Lauren: my first tip would be don't panic at all um because you just don't know where things could take you so for me i was really set on one certain university and i thought that that was going to be like the be all and end all of my career and if i didn't go there then like I wouldn't have a real degree and things like that and taking the chance that i did and was definitely the best thing i could have done it saved me a year of being at college and as the way the world works i've met people now that i know that if i'd have waited until next year i never would have got to meet them and so that's quite a big thing for me also try and be prepared as you can on the phone so write down things that you've done in your life that are good experience so i'm a qualified rainbow leader and then i volunteered with children so i had things like that and key points of skills and things i developed while i was doing that so that when i was asked on the phone okay tell me about a time where you've shown say confidence or organization that was already in front of me and I didn't have to panic and worry i could just like draw on it straight away um but mainly just be open-minded um you're like best course you may never have heard of the university marlon's quite small and i think it's definitely underrated people don't know we exist as much as we do and the main thing is it's your degree it's not your parents or your like boyfriend girlfriend friends it's going to be the rest of your life that this is going to impact so make sure it's the decision that's right for you it doesn't matter what anyone else thinks

Lauren: so we rand around a few you unis andthey just didn't want to know I didn't have the grades and that's what they were focused on and then I rang Marge on and the first thing they said is okay well why why do you want to come and study this course and I could speak about speech and I'm so P for ages I was really excited and had all this experience and that's all they really cared about they wanted to know that I was passionate and mainly that I was going to be committed the first ad I spoke to you was just super friendly and she was really excited it felt like she was excited almost like she was matchmaking me of my course and and a lot of the other unions I'd spoken to it was kind of more of a formality but she definitely put me at ease and just made me even more excited to be speaking to Marjonand then I was connected through to the administration for my course and she was just so friendly and really welcoming and just seemed so interested in me and a lot of the other places I've spoken to I just didn't get that at all but it kind of gave me the confidence to speak more about myself and because that can be really awkward sometimes you kind of got to like big yourself up and mention all these things that normally if you're quite like a modest person it's really difficult to do but she just made that so much easier and I could tell that she really wanted me to do well and like she wanted to let me on the course arms I'm really happy that I picked up the phone and I honestly can imagine now what would be like if I hadn't I've met so many incredible people made so many friends and my lecturers are incredible and absolutely loved my degree so is definitely one of the best decisions in my life.