Kiteesha:
My name is Kiteesha and my uni is USQ.

I didn’t finish High School. It was a big, bad mistake and I knew that when I got out into the real world. I always sort of wanted to go back and finish school – a bit hard when you have a little one.

I did approach a few other universities, but I never really got the welcome that I got when I came to USQ.

We don’t come from a university background, that’s for sure – miners and barmaids, things like this. I think my dad’s words were “well, I couldn’t get you to go to school when you did go, so why do you want to go now?”. They couldn’t understand it at first, but now that I am in university, they are really accepting, and really understanding and proud of me – I think I’ve actually inspired a few of them to take the same step.

When I first came, I was freaking out... big buildings, education people everywhere, professors – but within the first week, everybody sort of just settled – everyone is on the same playing field. They are really laid back in this university. They keep it real. People know you by name. If ever I have any hassles, I could probably list 10 people that would be there like that to give me a hand. They really personalise their lecturers to make sure that, you know, you are understanding and that it’s not all just jargon and big words. The support is here and if you want it, they want to help you.

This is my SRO, Heather – she is my saviour. She helps me whenever I decide to change my degree.

Heather:
There are so many options within the degrees that sometimes it’s confusing. We try to figure out with what you’ve done, with what you’ve got left, how to get through the quickest way, the best way, the easiest way.

Kiteesha:
It’s for my son. I didn’t really want to leave that sort of a legacy that education wasn’t the way. It’s one thing to say it, but it’s another thing to put it into action. It keeps me on my toes – when I see some days, not everybody wants to study every day, but when I know Zeth’s coming and he’s got work to do, projects to do, and I’ve got work to do – we just do it. It’s important too because I’m big on reading and education – Zeth’s big on football and scooters.

Usually he does his homework, I do my homework and, yeah, we get it done. He gets in and he reads more than what a lot of his fellow students do. I think I’m really just showing him that you can do anything despite the odds, when you really set your mind to it.
It makes my head spin. I didn’t finish school – I think I didn’t even finish year 9. You know, single mum and all the rest of that sort of thing. People, often there is a sigma attached to that like, you can’t because you are a single mum blah blah blah... Nah, I belong here. And, just having so much more confidence and self belief meant I was actually going to do it – and I did, and I still am and I probably will come back when I’ve finished this degree. I was the only person that could hold me back now.

Coming to uni it’s really opened up a lot more doors for us. I want to help be part of the change (Zeth interrupts: a dog) when it comes to indigenous policy. More money for things that we didn’t have before, security, (Zeth interrupts: a dog) we really want to travel around Australia, (Zeth interrupts: a dog) Zeth wants a dog. Umm when I’m finished uni he can get a dog. But yeah, just more opportunities and security and (Zeth interrupts: a staffy) yeah – be able to support Zeth, you know, financially, yep (Zeth interrupts: and a bird).