Student says Middlesbrough College teachers changed her life

Kira Coleman says being at college had helped her form bonds with other people and learn to trust again

A woman who was homeless and unemployed when she turned to a college course has praised her teachers for turning her life around.

Kira Coleman, 25, left home at 16 in Newcastle after a turbulent childhood and an experience left her with post-traumatic stress disorder at 18.

Ms Coleman, who was living in a homeless shelter and felt she had "no hope", enrolled on a music course at Middlesbrough College.

She is now studying for a degree.

Ms Coleman - who initially signed up for a access into higher education diploma - credited her teachers as being "the closest thing to family" she had ever had.

She said: "After leaving home, I moved around the North East a lot and fell in with the wrong crowds.

"I then went through an incredibly difficult experience which left me feeling like life wouldn't get any better.

"I had no contact with my family apart from my brother and I was a mess for a human being, so I went to college to sort my life out."

She said the college environment brought structure to her life and gave her a sense of responsibility.

She said it helped her form bonds with other people and learn to trust again

She said she hoped to continue her studies with a masters in music therapy

Ms Coleman is now in the final year of a sound and music technology degree and also works as a casual technician at the Globe Theatre in Stockton.

She hopes to go to on to do a masters in music therapy.

She admitted she had not always been the "easiest of students", clashing with staff on numerous occasions, but said her teachers had changed her attitude and turned her life around.

She said: "Regardless of everything I've said and all the disruptions I've caused in class my teachers have been such strong supporters and understanding that my anger and upset wasn't directed at them, they were just in the firing line.

"They have had more faith in me than anybody in my life, and not to be too sentimental here but that lack of family over the years, the teachers have been the closest I've had to family."

Her tutor Jamie Donnelly said: "We're all so proud of how far she has come - and I've personally seen a profound change in her since she first came to us at the college."