Hello there

My name is Ryan and I am going to tell you about myself. I went to a special school in Coleraine from the age of 5. I enjoyed my time at school and all the teachers were good fun and cared about me. In 2003, Hessie came into our class which was the school leavers group. We were all around 17 or 18 and it wouldn’t be long before we were leaving school and moving onto something else, like work, tech or the day centre. Some of us wanted to go to the centre or even stay at school, but I wanted a job. I felt I was ready to show people that I could be as good as anyone else.

Over this time, Hessie set up a group of people from different schools who were all in school leavers groups in their schools. Daniel comes from Glengormley, Tommy comes from Belfast and Joanne comes from Portstewart.  We meet up in Belfast or Coleraine about every 2 months, have lunch and talk about what we want to see happen for us. Its gives us the chance to get to know someone from another school, another area and of a different religion and to see all our experiences are very different.

For example, although everyone was nice at tech in Ballymoney where I went I just knew that college was not what I wanted. Joanne, on the other hand goes to college every day and is studying child care and although she says it is hard sometimes with all the essays, she loves it.

We talk about the things we hope to do and some of the things that can help us get there.

I’m profoundly deaf, and hold an Upper Second Class Honours in Computer Science and Business Administration from Queens, and completed postgraduate study in Accountancy at Jordanstown.

Prior to starting at Queen’s I made contact with the JUDE centre (Joint University Deaf Education), which has since been incorporated into Disability Services.  The Disability Advisor met with me to discuss what support could be available through Disabled Students Allowance.

I started off with a radio aid system and copies of the lecturer’s overheads but realised I was missing a lot of verbal information in relation to the overheads, due to the fact that I am heavily dependent on lip-reading and cannot do this while taking notes simultaneously.  I decided that the best option would be to get a note-taker to accompany me to classes.  Finding a reliable note-taker wasn’t as straightforward as I’d hoped, and I ended up asking my friends to take on the task.  This worked out very well and I found myself looking forward to classes instead of dreading them.

The next year I had tutorials which required group discussion, so I applied for additional DSA to fund a SpeedText operator.  I thought this was amazing and was able to participate fully.  By the time it came to my final year I was very settled and things were going smoothly.

My postgraduate year at Jordanstown went without a hitch.  Lecturers were very supportive in providing overheads and/or text references and I had two excellent notetakers.  I wouldn’t have successfully completed my study without the support of the Disability teams and Queen’s and Jordanstown, who worked hard and were always there to help.

I now work for the Northern Ireland Commissioner for Children and Young People in the Corporate Services department and my role covers Finance and Human Resources.  I will be studying part-time later this year to complete my professional accountancy exams, so hopefully this will be comparatively stress-free!

Nikki is also a member of the Skill NI Trustee's Committee.

My name is Chris Meneilly and I attend Fleming Fulton School.  I am in my last year and am currently doing GCSE maths, religious studies and art, GNVQ Business (Intermediate), Digital Imaging occupational studies, food studies and Key Skills English.  I have completed science single award and history GCSE and got Grade C in both.  I have also got a B in music GCSE.

After I leave school I hope to go on and achieve a journalist and media course and also programming (as I am interested in computers).

I am interested in writing and journalism.  When the subject of work experience came up I told my careers teacher, Mr Jeffers, that I was interest in writing, he tried to find me a place were I could actually write a few articles.  A previous pupil of Fleming Fulton had been to Skill Northern Ireland in Jennymount Business Park; Mr Jeffers phoned to confirm that they publish an annual newsletter.  Skill NI is a charity which offers advice and assistance to disabled students in further and higher education.  Skill NI was to be my work placement for the following week.

I started on Monday at ten o’clock.  Cahir Hughes, the Policy and Research Officer informed me of what I was going to be doing and told me about the charity’s newsletter.  Shortly after I started researching for my first article which was about SENDO.

Each day I wrote an article for the newsletter; doing research in the mornings then writing the article toward the afternoon.  The office was quite small with only eight staff, who were all very pleasant and friendly.  Each day I started at 10 and finished at 3: 30.  I thoroughly enjoyed my time there and it has only encouraged me to pursue a career in journalism.  I would like to thank Skill for giving me a great work experience.