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I have just submitted TMA 11 and to date all my marks have been above 90% which has given me a new lease of life and hope. This May not seem special to most but to me this course is truly my second chance.
When I was 15 my father passed away suddenly and my mother turned to drink, my family had fallen apart and with my exams around the corner the only person I had was my girlfriend at the time and wife of today. My mother soon after took her own life and left me in pieces. I swear if it was not for my wife I would have just curled up in a ball and just vanished.
I did take my exams and actually did quite well but unfortunately with all I went through I rushed out of school and into work leaving behind any hopes of my original dreams in the IT sector. I did well in my work and soon became a self employed carpenter supporting my wife and now 4 children until April of 2006. Now I have not gone into all the details of my life but due to the extreme grief that I had encountered and over working I suffered a near fatal heart attack. Obviously this scared me but more to the point at 35 years of age I feared more about leaving my family as my parents did me when I was 15. Anyway I obviously pulled through and decided it was time to let go of the past and get the qualifications I needed to get into the world of IT, to re gain my dream. So after a heart attack, a serious drop of income as I had to go bankrupt, 4 kids and nagging wife I have now completed Section 1 Part A.
If all else it was nice to get that off my chest and I thank you for reading a personal part of me.
-Jason
I have continued to complete my course with a 90% and 2 100% marks in TMAs 1,2 and 3 respectively after dealing with a loss of a friend to leukemia and the loss of my job.I have also managed to potentially find a job with a new company being setup in computer hardware and networking which will compliment my course perfectly once I complete it!
-Christopher
I have achieved 93% and above on my last 3 TMA`s which is worth celebrating for me. I was concerned that the course would be too difficult for me, but with the amount of study I have done, it seems that if you try hard enough you can achieve almost anything. TMA01 - 100%, TMA02 -93, TMA03 -93%.
-Alan
I have achieved 93% and above on my last 3 TMA`s which is worth celebrating for me. I was concerned that the course would be too difficult for me, but with the amount of study I have done, it seems that if you try hard enough you can achieve almost anything. TMA01 - 100%, TMA02 -93, TMA03 -93%.
-Alan
I have just started this course and I am really enjoying it, I have done well in my first TMA. I as off work due to ill health, I have still found the motovation to continue with my course and am getting my health back.
Thank you.
-Kevin
When I was about 15 years old, I had no idea about the road ahead of me. I didn't have a clue about what I was in for and the hardship that would test me. It started out like this. I was in High school at the time and was really intimidated by the other students, who were all much bigger than me. Some of them were racist, others just loved to push their weight around. I was in that situation for quite some time. After the hardship I suffered, I decided to break out of the nutshell I was in and take action against them. I got some of them expelled and others got away with it. I had to leave as they became more and more aggressive. Before I left, a few of my relatives in my homeland, Bangladesh, fell ill. Me, and the rest of my family went to visit them, and support them anyway we could. We were their for about 4 - 6 months, but it seemed like a holiday, for most of the time anyway. My parents decided to stay there for a while I came back with my brothers and sister.
When we got back, I was in even more of a mess when I found out I no longer had a place in school because of the amount of time I had been away. So I went along with my brother to The Learning Resource Centre to try and find somewhere else where I could learn and study.
When I heard all the places were full, I decided to go college and take up a course in IT. I thought I should get some qualifications in rather than waste my time starting a year behind. I started a GNVQ in IT, got the best marks in the class, with the best punctuality and attendance, only rivalled by the only girl in our class.
After I finished my first year at college, I decided to take up some serious work. So I got into a market research company in Central London. The pay was great and the experience was very fulfilling. After a while had passed, I thought of it as a dead end and realised I would be doing my future no favours by sitting there and just working deeper into a black hole, well, that's what it felt like.
A realised I had to take action, so I went onto the internet in search of something which would help me progress deeper into the IT industry.
That's when I saw it, it was like my questions had been answered. I clicked on to the link and left my contact details.
Later that week, I received a phone call from a really nice lady from skills train, I forget what her name is, she asked me what I wanted from life, what I wanted to do and what I wanted to achieve and whether I'm looking for new skills or a change of career. I told her I want to do something in IT as the whole concept of computers fascinates me. I want to make my future in computing. We had a little chat and then she booked in an appointment so the course advisor can come and speak to me.
A few days later, the course advisor came and knocked on my door. He was really friendly and polite as he asked me some questions. I agreed to do the course because I believe this qualification will get me VERY far in life and also help me achieve what I want to do, and the great thing is that I have total freedom to study whenever I wanted. But the thing I like about it most is that the tutors are really helpful and friendly.
I once called up one of the tutors and I felt a bit low on motivation, I explained my situation and I don't know what he said exactly, but it filled me with more motivation than when I had started the course. Now I'm studying extra hard and putting more time in, and because of the talk I had with the tutor, it really pushed me in the right direction, and my scores on my recently submitted TMA's prove it!
I'd just like to thank the tutor team for being so helpful and the course advisor for giving me this opportunity and the website which had Skills Train as a link, because at the end of the day, if they weren't there, I would not be on this road to success!
-Muhammed
I enrolled on a course with skillstrain in February with only basic pc knowledge. The first few months were a sruggle trying to find time to study while raising my son on my own and holding down a full time job, I was beginning to think I had taken too much on and would not be able to complete the course. After carefully considering my options I realised that getting in to the it industry was my ultimate goal and so I have now reduced my hours at work to part time which has given me alot more time to study. I have submitted 5 TMA's throughout May and am really enjoying the course now. Thanks for all your help skillstrain!
-Louanne
It has taken me about 1 year to get into the course due to the fact that I am a nurse, wife mother of three grown up children, have four granchildren of whom I look after to let their parents work, also have 2 dogs 1 cat 2 rabits guinea pigs as pets to keep the granchildren happy. But now its time to really get into the course of which I am very interested in, I like taking computers to bits to see how they work, and someday hopefully I will change my job direction to computers installation and repair, and show my 9 year old grandson a few tricks of the trade can only help his future as well.
-Ann
I DECIDED TO GO FOR A CHALLENGE, INSTEAD OF LIVING DAY TO DAY. THIS COURSE HAS REALLY OPENED UP A WHOLE NEW WORLD FOR ME, NEVER THINKING I COULD DO ANYTHING LIKE THIS.I HAVE STARTED WORKING ON MY OWN PC, WHICH IS NOW WORKING FASTER AND BETTER THAN WHEN I FIRST STARTED. I AM ENJOYING THE NEW KNOWLEDGE THAT I HAVE ALREADY PICKED UP, KNOWING THERE IS A VERY LONG WAY TO GO.
HELPING IMPROVE OTHERS WORK STATIONS OR PERSONAL PC'S/ LAPTOPS IS THE FULL AIM I HAVE, AND KNOWING THAT I CAN HELP OTHERS IS WHAT IS DRIVING ME FORWARD WITH MORE DETERMINATION.
-Martin
In this course so far I have learnt basic things that come into use in everyday life, I have fixed my friends PC's and I am still working hard to fix my own, even my teachers in school are impressed with what I can now do just from this course.
-Damean
Being a nurse and my fascination to technology seemed not a good mix, especially to my friends at work. After reading and finishing my first assignment, one of the trouble shooting model (Comp TIA's A+) really struck me by it's logical approach. Mind you, I applied this when I was oncall attending to a patient who was having a heart attack. Of course I asked the patient what he was feeling, and identified chest pain and shortness of breath as the immediate problem, we confirmed that the chances are he really having heart attack. Medicines and equipments for possible angiography were readied before the consultant arrived. The patient was confirmed having a heart attack after angiography and the blockage of his heart was removed. The procedure just lasted 20 minutes which could have normally lasted 45 minutes or more, because of early preparation with the aid of logical application of problem solving technique. It was really a very smooth procedure compared to an emergency scene I see everyday when you know what's happening, you know what's causing it to happen, and you know how to stop it from happening.
-Richard
I work very hard in achieving my marks which I am always pleased with. I am aiming to start up my own business by practising simple repairs on families and friends pcs with the knowledge I have achieved so far with Skill-train.
-Stuart
Being 39 and just starting to study for the last career move in my life and fitting study time around my very long hours of normal work which is totally different to I.T. Having taken and passed the first 2 assignments with quite surprising score (to me)of 85 and 100%,now studying the next assignment.
-Kenneth
COMING INTO THIS COURSE WITH VERY BASIC KNOWLEDGE OF A PC, I'M VERY PLEASED WITH THE RESULTS I HAVE RECIEVED,85,87,100,90%. AS I AM GOING ALONG, AND RE-READING AREAS I DIDNT UNDERSTAND FULLY THE FIRST TIME, IT IS GETTING MORE INTERESTING.ITS THE BEST DECISION I HAVE MADE IN YEARS.
-Martin
I only expected to complete one TMA a month, but in the month of May I have now competed seven TMA's all with high scores and I intend to have Section 1 Part A completed by the 1st of June.
-George
Even though I am only on my TMA 08 I have understood what I have been learning well enough to the extent that I went out to my local components shop and bought all the necessary components and hardware to build a PC. IT took me two days to build and just over £180 as I already had a copy of windows XP in the house. Then I advertised it in the free local paper,the next day a gentleman from Falkirk purchased the PC for £450 which was the asking price. A good profit but still a good buy for the gentleman as the PC contained 1536mb of ram a 17" TFT Monitor which I got NEW for £75, XP pro, 400w psu, dvd-r combo drive, 120gb hdd, pentium Celeron D, etc... not bad as I must be one of the youngest students here at just 17 with my own flat and paying for the course myself and the broadband connection. I feel it is essential to apply myself to something I am interested in and also get a great career out of it too.Also I have got 100% on TMA 04 which was a good improvement as my score was gradually going down since TMA01, I am managing to get a grips with proper studying time and am able to concentrate better as a result I have just submitted TMA05 but have done up to TMA08 already mainly due to the use of your study time table I downloaded which was very helpful.
-Michael
Passed my CompTIA A+ Certification exams. Changed jobs within the company, no longer a factory floor worker, but now I am doing a desk job.
-Mark
Over the last month using skills I have aquired through my training, I have managed to install a 120 GB Hard Drive, install a DVD +/- Re-Writable Drive, partition the new hard drive and transfer a large quantity of Software and Files across to the new drive. Whilst installing the new hard drive I was able to set the dip switch to master / slave correctly and using the knowledge gained through the course, found the appropriate driver for the device on the net. I feel I am really starting to get to grips with the course content and find myself searching the net for addition information to further my understanding of the lessons.
-Thomas
I am now working in a first line IT possition which I never thought would be possible until I started my coures. I feel I am gainig the experience that will help me on the completion of my course.
-Alexander
I AM CURRENTLY A CHEF WORKING 12 HRS A DAY AND STILL BE ABLE TO CARRY ON WITH MY COURSE, I KNEW NOTHING ABOUT HOW A PC ACTUALLY WORKED WITH ALL THE DIFFERENT ASCII AND BINARY DIGITS, NOW I HAVE A FAIRLY GOOD IDEA WHAT GOES INTO A PC.
-Neil
My Achievements are that my PC hardware and maintanance knowledge has grown and now I feel alot more confident when I come across a problems with my own PC or family members and even friends PC's, and if there is a new problem I just grab my PC Hardware and Maintenance manual which helps me to identify and troubleshoot the problem then hopefully fix it.
-Christopher
I retired from work a few years ago due to ill-health (physical ill health that is), resulting in me now having only my left hand functioning normally, in correctable double vision; the right side of my body severely disabled, an in receipt of a DLA award. I have had computing keyboard experience while at work, and privately studied with Computeach. The increasing demand from both areas leading up to a stressful state which brought about my early retirement.
Undeterred by all of this, I know I had (and still have), a flair for computing, and the ability to focus on it with interest; so, having more time than before, as I am not as able bodied as I would like to be, or as many others are, I am now using the only faculty left within me that functions normally, to pursue I now, an very worthwhile interest. The future of it...who knows!
-Nicholas
