British | Jamaican
In collaboration with Loughborough University
My maternal Grandmother and Mum are remarkable women, who have in my opinion had a massive impact in their careers. My Grandmother left Jamaica in 1949 when she was 19 to travel to the UK. She trained as a nurse and then a midwife and delivered a number of babies across London in the 1950s and 1960s, we still have one of her birthing record books today. She then moved to the USA and continued working as a nurse.
My Mum was a secondary school teacher in Milton Keynes for over 40 years and she was a respected teacher who had a positive impact on so many students' lives. In the late 80s and early 90s she was one of the only Black teachers in her school. Growing up we couldn't walk down to the local shopping centre without being stopped by a student she taught. Even today she gets recognised by families where she has taught three generations.
Over the last 20 years my career has been within two industries, publishing and higher education and I have experienced vast differences in terms of the representation of mixed-race people in these fields. For the first 12 years of my working life, I worked in London for several publishing houses. Looking back now I realise that mixed-race people were not represented in the publishing industry and I'm not sure if they still are. My first publishing job was in a sales and marketing department, and I was the only mixed-race person there for a few years. Don't get me wrong I enjoyed working at all the publishing houses and these positions and experiences have helped me progress to the position I am in now, but in terms of role models and seeing people like me progressing to senior positions that wasn't the case.
I do have to say that in all the organisations that I have worked within the senior staff have recognised that I am of mixed heritage. I have never felt that this has been overlooked or ignored. At Loughborough University, which is my current employer,I can see that this is actively being supported via a number of support groups and initiatives that the university has set up and created for its employees.
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