Why Greenmount is all about life long learning

Standing in their workshop with their aprons on, scissors in hand, surrounded by vases of sweet-smelling blooms, Tracey Corr, Kathleen McClorey and Victoria Christie look completely at home.

These three ladies are all studying Floristry at Greenmount, travelling to the Antrim campus every week from various parts of the Province.

But something they all have in common – as well as their passion for floristry – is the fact that they have backgrounds and past careers in areas which couldn’t be more different from the creative avenue they’re exploring now.

“You get to express your creativity,” says Newry woman Kathleen.

“I love the freedom of it – even when you are working in the shop and under pressure, it’s not the same kind of pressure,” says the former paralegal, who also worked as a political researcher for a spell.

The 35-year-old studied Music and Irish Studies at university, so had a definite artistic streak, but it took a family member falling ill for her circumstances to change, and eventually lead her to finding that creative outlet.

“My uncle got sick with a rare condition, and I was caring a lot for him,” she says.

“Then after he died, I just couldn’t really face going back to an office environment. So I did a course in the local tech in floristry, and I just loved it.”

This led Kathleen to signing up for the Greenmount course, and where her passion has, quite literally, continued to bloom.

Belfast woman Tracey Corr also left behind a pressurised career to train to become a florist.

“I used to work in a crèche where I did payroll and accounts,” she tells me.

“I was always interested in floristry but I had a large family of five children, and obviously their needs come first, so I worked part-time when they were at school.

“Then last year my last two, who are twins, started secondary school, and I was off having surgery. It was then that I decided that I really wanted a career change, and if I didn’t do it now I never would.”

Tracey had no real idea about what courses were available in her chosen field in Northern Ireland, and when a Google search threw up Greenmount, she at first felt fearful that she was “too old”.

But after her interview, she felt completely reassured that this was not the case, and since starting the course, has “loved every minute of it”.

“I enjoy the creativity of it,” she says. “Floristry makes people happier, and even on sad occasions, flowers are about letting people know you care.”

For Victoria Christie, who lives in Randalstown, floristry is enabling her to express her artistic side as well.

“I was a support worker working with adults who had learning disabilities, so it was quite stressful but very enjoyable and rewarding. Before that I was with the elderly in the community. But it had always been in the back of my mind that I wanted to work with flowers, growing them or arranging them.

“Finances were a big thing, and I didn’t think that I would have been able to afford to leave a full-time job and go into full-time education, but then I found out that there were bursaries available, and realised it was doable and you could still have a part-time job as well.

“For me it’s the expression of creativity; I’ve never been able to do that in the any of the jobs I’ve been in, apart from showing my caring side.”

But as lecturer Anne Marie Grant explains, floristry involves a little science as well.

“It’s hard work, but it’s relaxing as well, and I enjoy seeing the students grow in confidence,” says Anne Marie, who has been teaching the course for 15 years. “And we’ve had some fantastic results from competitions; we’ve been to Chelsea every year for the last 10, and have come away with silver gilt, silver and bronze medals.”

My morning at Greenmount has only begun, yet I’m amazed already by the experiences of these women, and the fact that courses like this even exist here.

Before I know it, I’m being driven to the college’s golf course green, where students come to get trained in greenkeeping.

One such man is Robert Hamilton, who is employed by Lisburn and Castlereagh City Council, supervising the maintenance of the organisation’s golf courses, as well as its other sports pitches.

Since September, he’s been coming to Greenmount a day a week to study the greenkeeping course, in order to get a better grasp of the work done by his own staff.

“The course is two years, and it’s really helping give me a better outlook on what the boys do,” he says.

“I think the facilities here at Greenmount are great.”

Indeed, the campus boasts all the facilities its students need in order to qualify from the courses they’re studying.

I observe a group of young people in the dairy unit, assessing some of the cows, or, as lecturer Irene Downey tells me, condition scoring them, which is basically grading them from one to five depending on how much flesh is on their bodies, which determines if they’re the right condition for calving or mating.

“These students are on a three-year course, which includes one year on placement,” said Irene.

“It’s half classroom-based and half getting out and about and doing things in smallish groups, so they will be expected to do the milking, feeding, tagging calves – all the basic farm work.”

Someone who’s enjoying getting the hands on experience of Greenmount is David Henderson from Sion Mills, who’s studying to become a tractor mechanic.

“I’m from a farm and I grew up around tractors, I’ve always wanted to work with them,” he says.

“It’s a two-year course, and parts of it are hard, but if you’re struggling, you can get help.”

He adds: “I’m enjoying the Greenmount experience, it’s good craic.”

Veterinary nursing course that’s as hands on as you can get

As I’m chatting to Greenmount’s programme manager for Veterinary Nursing Siobhan Sheppard in one of the classrooms, I jolt a little after noticing what appears to be a live dog stretched out in all its glory on top of an examination table.

It’s not, of course; it’s a replica of the real canine thing, and even can be used to practise skills on.

Because as Siobhan explains, when it comes to studying here, it’s as hands-on as you can get.

“We offer two courses at CAFRE, firstly a Level 2 Certificate for Animal Nursing Assistants, which would be like your auxiliary nurse if you think of it in human terms,” she tells me.

“That course would cover a lot of your preparation work, some reception duties, booking a patient in, monitoring the animal, preparing the accommodation for the animal, and so on.

“We enrol 32 Level 2 students accepted every year. They are predominantly female, although we do have one to two gentlemen every year.

“The other course that we offer is the Level 3 Diploma in Veterinary Nursing, and we are the only college in Northern Ireland that offers this qualification.

“It’s three years, and very intense. Those students enrolling on this course are employees of veterinary practices that are approved for training nurses. These practices have been inspected and assessed to be a suitable training environment for student veterinary nurses.

“And that would mean that they have the right equipment, the right case load, right variety of cases, and that the students are going to see a wide range of species, procedures, and consultations.

“Some of the animal hospitals here as well would be deemed suitable training environments.

“So if you think of it in terms of human nursing, it would be like a nurse training on the ward and attending college one day a week.”

Siobhan says that the students learn all the “underpinning knowledge” and theory that they can put into practice as soon as they go back into their surgeries. They’re trained in small animal practice, including equine, rabbits, and exotics, and “as the years progress they can build on that”.

Just some of their modules of study include radiography, anaesthesia, emergency nursing, first aid, nutrition, medication dispensing, and pharmacology.

“Once they complete the Level 3 qualification, the students apply to formally be known as a Registered Veterinary Nurse (RVN), a prestigious title that is awarded to them by the regulator, the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons.”

I meet students and friends, Danielle Leatham, from Newtownabbey, and Caoimhe McNally, who works in her native Maghera.

Danielle works at a practice in Carryduff, and both girls are enrolled on the Level 3 course.

“It’s intense, but I do love it,” says Caoimhe, who would also see large animals in the course of her training at her vet as well.

Danielle concurs: “The course is very enjoyable and hands on, and what we learn here on a Tuesday we can go the next day and put it into practice which is good.”