Jo Pleass

Name:  Jo Pleass
Course Provider:  Dublin Business School
Course: BA (Hons) in Business Management (HRM)

So there I was. It was the summer of 2004; I was 38, married, with three-year-old twins and a pressure job. I wasn’t exactly bored. Yet, at the time, I kept finding myself thinking about going back to college.  Despite my best efforts the idea refused to go away and, eventually, I decided to enrol.

Primarily, I felt the need for a portable academic qualification, something that said I had recognised skills, in any language or location. A certificate or diploma was not going to suffice; it had to be an honours degree.  I had a number of reasons to explain why I wanted to do this but the real motive would not become apparent until much later. 

So in September 2004 I nervously began. The experience was somewhat strange at first, as it had been a long time since I had seen the inside of a classroom, but I wasn’t alone. One thing my classmates and I held in common was that this was not an exercise in making new friends, but found we made them nonetheless. First year passed quickly.

The following three years carried with them a wide range of experiences. Exams were tough and assignments were hard. Throughout my four years I kept remembering what we had been told from the outset: ‘Keep attending the lectures and you’ll be ok’. There were times when I felt I wasn’t going to make it: too much pressure; not enough time; stressing over exams. Making all that disappear would have been easy, all I had to do was stop going.

However, I noticed that something had started to happen at work. My colleagues and peers, even the highest level of management, started to treat me slightly differently. It was subtle at first but, when I spoke to my classmates, I found that they were experiencing the same thing.  I was being treated as somebody who knew things, important things. I was the guy ‘doing the degree’ – ask him, he might know.

November 27th 2008 was big day for me: Graduation Day. I had made it to the end. My kids were now seven and my wife and I were expecting our third child. One week later I was offered a role that constituted a significant advancement in my career.  It was the day after my 43rd birthday.