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Anna’s ambition: to be a Schoolteacher
by Mark Borland
Anna has always wanted to be a schoolteacher: “I’ve just always known that’s what I want to do. My friends don’t know what they want to do, but for me it’s always been clear.” To get an idea about what this would involve, Anna has been volunteering at a local school over the summer, working five days a week.
This commitment is even more inspiring given that Anna, who has cerebral palsy, needs a powered wheelchair to provide her with independent mobility. Her previous power chair, provided through local contacts would break down frequently, often leaving her stuck for several hours until her parents could arrange to pick her up. In March, Priority, working with Newlife funded a new powered wheelchair that will provide Anna with the independence she needs to get on with her life.
The new wheelchair is slimmer and better fitted to Anna. “It’s letting me do what I want to do and now I can chase the children at school!”
This September Anna is due to start her degree course in teacher training at Canterbury University and is very excited about going. However her local authority has still not confirmed that they will fund the carer that she obviously needs to be away from home and live independently. As her Mother says “the fraught experience of trying to establish how Anna can access support at university has served to show huge gaps between what the government promotes and how that is delivered at any local level.” Despite this Anna is confident that things will work out, but seems calmly resigned to the fact that there will always be a struggle when it comes to accessing the correct support that she needs.
This reaction comes from many frustrating experiences. At 4 years old, when applying for a wheelchair from the local authority, her mother was told “but she’s terribly young, does she really need one?”. Later, after an application for a wheelchair had been with the local authority for 18 months, they were told it had been ‘lost’.
More recently, when deciding which university to attend, Anna came away from one feeling that she just wasn’t welcome. They told me the course was “very stressful, obviously trying to put me off”. Canterbury however seems to be different, with good facilities to support Anna’s needs. But this simply highlights the different levels of service provision around the UK.
Anna’s mother expects this to continue: “Children’s services, despite all their own weaknesses, do at least have the impetus of statutory requirements (children have to go to school, must be cared for etc). Once you come under the ‘Transition’ team it seems you become a whole different ‘problem”.
The new wheelchair is allowing Anna to look to the future. Her Mother is delighted:
“Your donation, via Newlife, has made a real difference to us and the wheelchair makes it possible, in the vital, practical sense, for Anna to achieve her ambitions.”
It also meant that Anna could to go to this summer’s Glastonbury festival, where she saw many of her favourite bands, including Stevie Wonder. Fortunately the good weather meant there was little of the infamous Glastonbury mud to get stuck in!
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