Love for wildlife catapults student to success

Student Layla Guildford from the Warwick School in Redhill, has been judged a finalist of the Allianz Insurance plc ‘Educational Achiever of the Year’ award by The Prince’s Trust, after inspiration from Surrey Wildlife Trust (SWT) sparked an interest in nature that helped her overcome her fears of interacting intellectually with other students and even public speaking. 

Layla was born premature and subsequently developed physical and mental disabilities that had her in and out of hospital throughout her childhood and she struggled academically and socially at school.  Since taking part in Warwick School’s XL programme, part of which involved working with Susan Edwards, SWT Outreach Education Co-ordinator and one of Layla’s ‘champions’, she was able to discover a love of wildlife so strong that it made her forget her inhibitions.  Layla worked well with the other XL members during their community project at Nutfield Marsh nature reserve and even lead the group in a session about wildlife; her new-found confidence has prompted her to go to college in the future. 

Susan Edwards, SWT Outreach Education Co-ordinator, comments:  “Surrey Wildlife Trust is working with the Warwick School as part of the HLF funded Surrey Greenspace Project, which has enabled us to regularly involve students with their local greenspaces. Working with others while learning outside the classroom has benefits for students of all abilities, as well as for wildlife through projects such as building invertebrate hotels, bird boxes and creating log piles.”

Christine Rickard of Warwick School, says: “Layla was nominated for the award and was in the top 3 young people selected from the South East; there was stiff competition to reach this stage.”