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Hew:
Hi, I’m Hew Evans. I’m an Avionics Technician in the RAF but I also study with the Open University.

This year I’m doing Exploring Mathematics, a Level 2 course, and Radio Frequency Engineering, which is a Level 3 course. I’ll have another four years’ worth of study before I get a Bachelor of Science, and if I want to study for a Masters it’s going to be another two years on top of that.

Father:
From when he was school he’s always been easily distracted and I think he feels he’s missed a big opportunity with his A-levels.

Mother:
The first parents evening he had gone to since he’d gone into Lower Sixth and his chemistry teacher greeted me with the words, oh it’s Houdini’s mother.

Father:
I’d had to say to him that we wouldn’t support him going to university because I didn’t think, I thought he was just going to waste his time there. He agreed that he didn’t think he would study. He decided that he’d join the RAF and he really changed overnight then.

Hew:
I thought I’ve got a chance to make myself shine. What I’ve got doesn’t really represent who I am, what I am, I’ve let myself down, and it’s always going to be with me. Stay positive. So I just applied myself to everything the RAF had to offer, threw myself into it and did as well as I could at it.

Male speaker:
He has shown right from the start that he wants to broaden his education in every possible way. His Open University studies, doesn’t appear to interfere with his work at all. If anything, I think he’s applying some of the things he’s learnt at work to his studies as well.

Hew:
I found I could do it when I tried. I can study at this level and succeed basically.

Father:
We’ve always brought him up that he would go to university and he would get a degree. So when he said he wanted to do an Open University course we were pleased yeah, very pleased.

Mother:
We felt he’d got the potential to study so it was nice to see that he was studying and was actually enjoying it.

Hew:
As I’m already doing training with the RAF so there was a lot of academic work. The first thing I had to consider was, even if I put all my heart into it, am I going to have enough time to do this sort of level of study. The answer to that was really it was something I really wanted to do so I knew that I would make the time and I could do it. I didn’t want to go in at Level 1, find it not challenging enough and just lose interest really. But then again I didn’t want to go in at Level 2 and find it to hard that I’d have to cut my losses and just say oh I can’t do this. So every time I thought this is hard I don’t understand I might fail, I just threw myself at it with double the effort.

The fear of failing helped motivate me to do as well I did. I try and set it out so I feel comfortable that I’ve learnt a big amount. If I don’t do three hours but I’ve done one and a half hours of really productive work and I’ve really learnt some new things, then I call it a night there and maybe have an early night and just kind of reflect on what I’ve done. I mean I know when my shifts are going to be each week and I know how much time before and after my shifts I’ve got, so it’s just a matter of having the motivation to study and the time to set out really and then everything else falls into place.

Treat yourself.

At the end of the day, I can’t see I’m ever going to get what I want or where I want unless I am motivated and hard working. So if I set myself this time in the week to study and I’ve got the time at the weekend I can go home and just kick back and relax and have some fun really. All the things I want to do all the time but I’ve got to discipline myself to do them just twice a week.

Mother:
When he comes home, at the weekend, he’s just a very normal young man who likes socialising.

Male Speaker:
Hew’s changed so much when I first knew him. Wild child to a lot more focused now. And I can remember thinking God bitten off more then you chew there but he’s definitely done okay.

Hew:
My weekend’s really the light at the end of the tunnel. Go out Friday and Saturday night and Saturday day is really just for relaxing and just getting over my hangover. If I don’t achieve what I want in the four days in the week I set myself an hour or two aside to study Sunday. As long as I make the time up then it’s okay to fall behind.

Use feedback.

Because I get everything posted to my house, my tutor marked assignments come there, the first thing I do is obviously open them up and I’m looking for the mark because I’m not really in the frame of mind to study it. It’s just scan over what my tutor said, maybe have a look at a few things I think I was conscious I might have got wrong and see whether I have or not. Once I’ve done that I’ll just, I’ll put it to one side, put it with the rest of my notes to take back to base. And I start studying again. I just do a debrief on myself; I just go through each question really analysing how I’ve answered it and if it’s the best way to answer it and what my tutor’s said. So when I comes to an exam or anything, all the time I’m using this material I know how not to get it wrong.

Know your goals.

Then when I come out of the RAF I’ve got a bachelors and masters, the type of work I’m going to be able to get and really what it says about myself, what I’ve achieved. I’m going to think more highly of myself because I’ve put myself through this. I’m fascinated by what I’m learning and I enjoy doing it so that helps me keep positive.

Female speaker:
Get the most out of your studies by visiting our website www.open2.net/openadvice.