Samreen, has been the longest participant on the GRoW Programme, joining us in 2018 when she was thinking about going back to work. Samreen, who used to work in the retail sector has now found work as a Teaching Assistant after a 12 year break to raise her children.
Samreen said “I am so happy to now be working again and doing a job that I have wanted to do for many years now. I am so thankful to the GRoW Team for all of their help in motivating me and helping me believe that I would finally get there. This is exactly what I have been aiming for and I can’t quite believe I’ve done it!
I used to work in retail but I have always wanted to work in education. When I was young I did a BTEC in software development and I used to teach students at Uxbridge College before my son was born and I gave up work. I have two children but not much family support around me so working in.a school with term-time hours is perfect for me and my family. Once I started thinking about going back to work I started to do some training courses and I was doing a Level 2 Teaching Assistant course when I enrolled onto the GRoW Programme. Through GRoW I continued to upskill, doing courses such as the ‘Preparing to work in Schools’, the Job Search Workshop and CV and Interview Skills Workshops with Sonia. I also did a First Aid course with GRoW, the Level 2 IEP Sector Induction for employability professionals and a course that focused on children’s mental health and behavioural issues. These courses were fantastic and really helped to boost my CV as well as giving me so many insights into how to get the sort of job I wanted. I also worked as a volunteer for a year at my daughter’s school in Hillingdon which was a great experience and helped me see in practice what a Teaching Assistant job actually entailed.
Starting the process of going back to work after 12 years was hard at first as so much has changed since I last worked, for example job applications used to be on paper whereas now everything is online – there is a lot to learn! Being part of GRoW has made an enormous amount of difference to my confidence. The team members have helped me to believe in myself and to also be resilient when I have gone for interviews but not got the job. It was hard sometimes applying for jobs and putting in a lot of effort to then not hear anything or be told I didn’t get the job. Before getting this job I must have applied for more than 100 jobs and trying so hard and seeing other people around me get jobs but not me was disheartening. I am thankful though for the support of the GRoW Team Members, as each of them played a special role in keeping me motivated and spurring me on.
The GRoW app was my favourite part of GRoW. Whoever made it and keeps it updated does an amazing job as it is so busy all of the time, with so much useful content. Having everything in one place on the app meant I always knew what was going on. I would get a schedule of the week’s events on a Monday, a jobs bulletin every Thursday with jobs for me to apply to and updates and advice in between. I used to organise my week around it, attending the different events and applying for jobs, it’s a fantastic resource.
I can’t put into words how overjoyed I felt when I was offered the Teaching Assistant job, I was literally in tears. I had two interviews for it and after the second one they called me straight away to give me the good news. The school has a number of young people with social emotional and mental health needs and the first interview was conducted by the students and the second interview by the management. It was a really different way of holding an interview and I so glad the kids liked me and thought I would be right for the job! I started in June and it is a full time position, 32 hours a week. I support all of the children in the class and provide one-to-one support for the children with additional needs. I am loving every minute of the job, it is so fulfilling.
I am really grateful to GRoW for their support over the years and for never giving up, they put so much effort into everyone to help them achieve their goals.”