Why it's important to be brave enough to ask that cheeky question

A story about wanting to ask that question but not knowing if you should...

His name was Colin Peacock and he was a very organised, precise man in his late fifties with a clear, crisp way of speaking. Suit and tie. A lecturer in Education. We were all in jeans and still firmly in school mode, quiet and docile, even although we were sitting in a lecture theatre.

I’d gone along for a visit to Stirling University.

To explore the campus, meet some of the teaching staff, and find out what studying at university might look like as no-one in my family had ever done this.

It was an understatement to say that I felt like a fish out of water.

And I wanted to ask a question but didn’t know if I should.

It might come across as a bit cheeky.

But it was something I really wanted to know and options were important to me.

And so I asked it.

“Have I got it right that the grades you need to study the joint degree of English and Education are lower than the grades you need to study English?”

There was a pause that was a fraction of a second too long.

But then Colin smiled.

"Yes, you’re right. We want to attract people to our teaching programme and make it as accessible as possible.”

So far so good.

But that wasn’t the real question I wanted to ask.

This was.

"So, if I do the joint degree, will that be the programme I’ll have to take? If I decide the Education bit isn’t for me, can I just do English?”

A longer pause.

Me internally wriggling like a kid amped up on sugar and thinking “Shit, what have I done?”

“Well, yes that is possible” Colin said, talking a little slower and clearly thinking very carefully about what he was saying “But of course we hope that this is not the case and that you’d enjoy the joint programme and complete it to the end.”

And so I got the answer to a very important question that gave me choices, flexibility and a yellow brick road of adventure in front of me.

Long story short.

I applied to the joint programme, English and Education, and got in.

Did I love reading plays, novels, short stories, operas (I did 2 courses on opera – who knew you could do courses on opera?), the occasional poem (they all seemed as transparent to me as concrete) talking about all of that and then writing about them?

I absolutely did.

And the education bit?

I took to it like a duck to water.

Loved it.

It completely made sense to me.

As easy as breathing.

The philosophy of education, the psychology of it, how people learn, when they can learn best, then starting to teach, getting videoed doing that and getting feedback from my teaching tutor.

It was all totally and utterly fascinating.

And I was really good at it and was getting straight As.

This was compared to English where I was getting Bs – and whenever a poetry course had to be taken Cs.

And I very happily stuck around and completed two teaching practices and the 4 and half year joint degree and graduated as an English teacher.

So, maybe I didn’t need to ask Colin that question on that open day.

But asking that question made all the difference to me because it gave me options which meant I had more control over what was a brand new situation to me: university and this thing called getting a degree.

I’d found out what was possible because I was brave enough to ask.

And sometimes we need to be bold enough to ask that question to find out an answer that can me a game changer.

What about you? What question have you been brave enough to ask that changed everything?

And what was the impact it had on you?