Sadly, due to the coronavirus outbreak this year and three months of lockdown measures, she and her classmates have not been able to celebrate their achievements together at a traditional ceremony. Instead, her immediate family threw a surprise ceremony at home complete with cap and gown, speeches and scroll.
“I couldn’t quite believe it,” says Riyanna, “my family had planned all of this and managed to keep it under wraps, surprising me with my very own home grad ceremony in the comfort of my living room.”
Riyanna Hewitt-Newell, 22 from Lewisham began her studies at London South East Colleges back in 2014 after leaving school. Although she had performed well at GCSEs, she wanted to improve her maths grades and had wrestled with whether or not to study health and social care or sports (something she had excelled in at school) at college. In the end, she decided on pursuing a career in health.
After her first year however, she realised that her heart lie with sports and exercise and changed courses joining at level 3. Throughout this course, despite reaching her desired maths grade, she was averaging merit grades rather than distinctions and so decided to ask her tutor Karen how she could improve on this. Back came the answer - “spend less time in the student common room and more time in the learning resource centre (LRC)”.
Riyanna said: “Well I did ask, and thankfully I was given a frank and very direct answer. It was time to get my head down, concentrate and take the course far more seriously if I wanted to fulfil the expectations I had for myself.
“To be honest, I have a feeling it may be the best advice I’ve ever received. It’s something I tell everybody else who wants to improve their own prospects in life and it’s so very true. If you want something so badly, you have to put in the work and earn it.
“Coming to College and studying a level 3 course is very difficult. You have to learn so much and to get the most out of it you have to go over and above your previous best - just like competing in a sport at the highest level.
“From that moment on, I would spend all of my time in the LRC and quite often would still be there when they began closing the building for the night. The more I learnt, the more I wanted to know, and I was suddenly full of conviction. I made it onto the second year (Extended Diploma) and at the end of the year I achieved two distinction grades and one merit. Then it was off to university for my next venture.
“Cutting a long story short, I kept with me all the great advice I learnt from my brilliant tutors Karen, Lee and Lincoln. They were absolutely amazing tutors and I feel that I owe them a lot. They more than prepared me for university. They enabled me to think on my own feet, how to prepare myself for exams and assessments, to see a much bigger picture of the sports science sector and most of all, how to motivate myself and believe in my own abilities. Thank you all so much.”
With her excellent grades, Riyanna would like to take her studies one step further and has applied for a master’s degree. She is now considering careers in either physiotherapy or sports rehabilitation.
Sports Science tutor, Karen Giannini says: “Only last week Riyanna wrote to tell me the good news and I couldn’t help but walk around all day with a big happy smile on my face. I’m so pleased for her and so glad to be part of a team that helped her achieve her goals. There’s a great career ahead and a world of opportunities awaits in this very exciting sector.”
If you think you have what it takes to build a successful career in the sports and exercise sector, we’d like to hear from you. We have a great range of courses to get you started. Apply now.
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PW