HE Success stories

21/10/2011

Alan Gray collects the Leo James Award in 2010

The Faculty of Technology has recently expanded its HE provision, and extended to the top two floors of the Towerblock at the Crawley campus. With an increasing number of students choosing to pursue the HE route at Central Sussex College, two former students have written to express their thanks to the teaching staff who have helped them on their educational journey...

Alan Gray is 35 and lives in Crawley. He is employed as a Calibration Optimisation Manager by pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline, and was awarded the Leo James Award for Best Higher Education Performance in HNC in Electrical and Electronic Engineering at last year's Technology Certification evening. He says:

"I would like to express my deep personal gratitude to you all for enabling me to achieve the grades I did. As a mature student it was difficult task, not just from the fact I have a family and a full time job, but also because it was a considerable time since I left full time academic studies."

"Although the next step in my academic studies at the moment is still being determined, the grades I have achieved have allowed me the choice and flexibility I need for further academic and professional qualifications."

Matthew Denham is 23 and from Burgess Hill. He works as Production Engineer at HPC Precision Engineering, and studied at Central Sussex College from 2004 to 2009, at latterly completed his degree at Portsmouth University 2009 - 2011. He writes:

"During my final year Dr Masoud Ahary encouraged me to aim for a degree which I was initially apprehensive about. This saw me taking the 'Further Analytical Method for Engineers' mathematical subject to aid my application for the University. From looking back to the beginning of my apprenticeship I never envisaged that I would consider attending university, the opportunities that were opened up to me by both the college and HPC meant that what was once purely a distant vision became a reality."

"If someone asked me seven years ago if I knew what qualifications I was aiming for I'd of had no idea.... Seven years later I'm doing things I would never have thought, aim for the HNC, aim for the HND, aim for the degree, its all there for the taking and it will stand you in good stead for your future career."