You can try to take the girl out of the classroom...

As a mature student, teacher, tutor, educator, and mother, I seem to have developed an innate ability to communicate what I believe is important through the medium of life stories.

In the classroom, my pupils used to laugh and call it “story time with Mrs D.” As the years went on, I took enormous pleasure in telling those infamous tales of wisdom.

Now that become a student myself, I find myself on the receiving end of other people’s stories and lessons, and I’ll admit, it’s hard.

Yet today, in the middle of an amazing day of lectures and workshops, two encounters reminded me exactly why I am at university.

My first conversation was with G, my co-mooter, fellow French speaker, and beautifully intelligent young woman. She is the same age as my daughter, so I can’t help but feel motherly and protective of her. In truth, she is fierce and strong and needs no one’s wing, But the mother hen in me can’t help herself.

We talked about her family and mine. We spoke French, which was a delight. In a moment of soft vulnerability that shone through her bright eyes, I felt I had a rare opportunity to pass on some of the wisdom of women. The truths I wished someone had told me at her age. The strength still to come. What it means to be a woman in a man’s world. What it means to be a foreigner, a mother, a wife.

We walked to class together, deepening the connection, only parting after another half hour of quick-fire questions. And in my heart I felt that although I could not offer her the world she deserved, I could remind her that the world is hers to take. The future is not written. The fight continues and when women support women, no matter our ages, our community grows stronger.

I wanted to hug her, kiss her cheek as I do my daughters when life feels heavy. But I have learned that this generation sometimes needs their space. And with a wave of her hand she was gone.

Later in the afternoon, after another great workshop, this time with first-years, I once again found myself surrounded by much younger students. After a few jokes about my age and the cold, we walked to the café together. They included me in their debate about conspiracies, gaming, epic films and series they love, and I was happy to join in, gently reminding them of the power of their own thoughts, research, evidence, opinions and of course, what the world was like in 1985.

after most of them left to go vaping ( smoking in my olden days), one student in particular, had made a point in staying behind to speak with me. A young man of maybe nineteen or twenty, full of admiration for the words leaving my mouth about a world he never experienced.

A world where I had the freedom to climb trees, play outside until nightfall, impatiently wait for the next episode of Goosebumps, and answer a big clunky phone never knowing who was on the other end. A world of only three TV channels, week-long imaginative play, and no fear except for night fall and the street lights coming on.

I gave him a glimpse into a childhood he will have never known, and told him how I used to dream of everything they now take for granted: streaming whatever I wanted, FaceTiming friends, travelling easily around the world, holding infinite knowledge at my fingertips. I even imagined an assistant who would always have the answers and help me improve myself.

Those dreams have mostly come true. But with them, perhaps, went some of my childhood imagination.

What has never left me is the yearning to learn, something I hope stays with me for as long as I live and my desire to pass on to the next generation that good things can still come.

On our way to the last lecture of the day, the young student thanked me for the “ life lesson”

I felt pride.

You can take the girl out of the classroom, but you certainly can’t take the classroom out of the girl.