by Latif Ullah

Education is the only way to success as my college founder used to say and to achieve it rightly so a well-planned and suitable place of education can help. These were the thoughts and motive whenever I intend of getting education in any standard/ level.

In the year 2021 my senior friend who are now studying in university of Sterling inspire me with the information of how and why they are getting admission in the UK. After seeing them as an aspirant of studying in UK, I well before my graduation in BS Journalism & Mass Communication from Abdul Wali Khan University Mardan (AWKUM) sets up my mind to follow the footsteps of my friends because I thought studying in UK or abroad can widen a horizon of knowledge and could produce opportunities in my career.

But as inhabitant of south Asian country Pakistan studying in a UK is a distant dream. You must have to prove and show enthusiasms of becoming an international student or it will be very difficult to get support from family to fulfil your dream.

Pakistan is a developing country where opportunities and resources are very limited. And in my case, I have a dream to achieve. My dream is not just limited to becoming a journalist, where you can be mouthpiece of a news outlet or organisation rather; I want to build a production house which can produce contents of masses demands.

After this brief let me tell you as an example of my own intent to how it happened successfully.

In November 2021 after getting basic information friends of how can I apply and pursue my post graduate degree in UK as an international student, firstly I focused on my BS graduation. I was in 7^th semester and our supervisor was assigned to us for BS research program. In research we were group of 4 students, one of them was Hammad Alam. During our thesis preparation in February 2022 Hammad was also completely aware and informed also wanted to join me as an international student. So initially he was inspire from me during our research in bachelor.

We share the idea of getting our master’s degree in UK to our family. Off course it was not an easy task for them to give us green signal as it was an astonishing ambition to follow. My family spent PKR 3.2 million in the process of my getting admission in UK. They took time and we discuss every angle and considering every step, our family agreed to apply for the study in UK after successfully completing our undergrad degree.

In March 2022 I started consulting with agents about my process. The first task was assigned to me by consultant was searching for universities in UK and for master’s programme which suit our background. For selecting university as our friend was already in Scotland at the time, they helped us for choosing university our priorities were University of sterling, Glasgow Caledonian University and UWS. These Universities have the courses which we wanted to study in. In May and June of 2022, we applied for all of them.

It was the time when we finished our thesis and defended our research successfully and I was unofficially graduated. I got offered letters from Sterling University and UWS and this University wanted to proceed with admission with the condition of degree. Our degree was not yet awarded to me by our university and it was late. After due date offer letters from both the universities expired and my mission of getting admission in September intake was vanished.

After this failure I learned one thing to keep yourself well prepared and manage every step quite accurate don’t just assume everything ready, make sure everything is ready to get you ahead.

In this attempt my family managed and calculate our finances. I had more than PKR 5 million in our bank account as a statement and PKR 2 million for my fees payment which was at the time equals to £8000.

In September my consultant hinted that UWS might open intake in January for broadcast Journalism. And we eagerly waited for the announcement which I received in October from Ma’am Elizabeth McLaughlin.

During this period my whole friends circle knew about my process of pursuing admission in UK. Two of our classmates from University Sohail Ahmad and Muhammad Amad approached to me and Hammad Alam and showed desired for a similar step. Our one incomplete attempt was very beneficial for them, and they prepared themselves in the next two month with us for this long journey of 3859.35 miles from Pakistan to UK for our postgraduate degree.

We got admission in UWS in November of 2022 and applied for the visa through Gerry’s visa application centre Pakistan. UKVI successfully approved our visa, and we were set to fly in the eve of Christmas to United Kingdom.

After reaching UK my friends initially arranged accommodation for four of us and we had some days before joining our university, so I started looking for part time job because I thought working and supporting to some extent here in Scotland might be a new adventure during studies. Got my part time job in couple of days and I started meeting new people from different nations now many are my friends.

Life in different part of the world is very challenging but finding ways out to tackle these challenges are sort of odyssey full learning experiences. 

Now I’m studying in my 2^nd semester I successfully passed my first semester and studying for the rest of coursework. Our study is challenging ourselves in broadcast journalism field, if I could add my success in learning, I proudly say working 15 days of placement in Awaz FM in Glasgow and I’m able to work on a news story for multi-platform.

Now looking ahead to complete my degree and searching for opportunities to have more experience in broadcast Journalism.