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Friday, July 25, 2025
Cumberland and Westmorland Herald
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Cumberland and Westmorland Herald
  • News
    Penrith businessman bitten by dog

    Penrith businessman bitten by dog

    End of road for Cumbria Classic Coaches after 28 years

    End of road for Cumbria Classic Coaches after 28 years

    Farm diversification project set to blossom

    Farm diversification project set to blossom

    71-year-old cyclist gets on his bike to Rome

    71-year-old cyclist gets on his bike to Rome

    Appleby car park and road to close for flood work

    Appleby car park and road to close for flood work

    Road closure plans for essential bridge repairs

    Road closure plans for essential bridge repairs

    Penrith drug dealer jailed

    Penrith drug dealer jailed

    Man who damaged Penrith’s Paddington Bear appears in court

    Man who damaged Penrith’s Paddington Bear appears in court

    Mandatory payrolling of Benefits in Kind delayed

    Mandatory payrolling of Benefits in Kind delayed

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    Teen golfer George Curry lines up with world’s best players

    Teen golfer George Curry lines up with world’s best players

    Ullswater Community College footballers make history

    Ullswater Community College footballers make history

    New management set to lead Appleby Football Club

    New management set to lead Appleby Football Club

    Success for fighting squad

    Success for fighting squad

    Penrith skipper Nicky Burns calls on team to keep winning

    Penrith skipper Nicky Burns calls on team to keep winning

    £100,000 target for new changing rooms extension

    £100,000 target for new changing rooms extension

    Medal success for Upper Eden tug-of-war team

    Medal success for Upper Eden tug-of-war team

    Eden man competes in Hyrox World Games

    Eden man competes in Hyrox World Games

    Double national triumph for Stuart Robinson

    Double national triumph for Stuart Robinson

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Home Farm and Countryside

It’s time to rewrite the definition of success

by CWH
16 January 2024
in Farm and Countryside, Latest
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Red Shepherdess, Hannah Jackson

I had the honour of speaking about women’s education to 150 headteachers of all-girls schools and naturally it had me returning to my school experiences.

I attended a girls’ grammar school and was a pretty “middle of the road” kind of student, but often felt invisible in a system set up to push the wrong behaviours.

There was very little focus on embracing individual students’ passions.

A career “working outside with animals” didn’t fit into the grammar school mould, unless the ambition was veterinary.

But this wasn’t for me ­— exams weren’t my thing and I wasn’t academically driven, so immediately this made me take my foot off the pedal.#

I failed all my AS exams in sixth form and fudged my way through GCSEs, but A-levels are a big step up.

This coincided with the traumatic loss of a really important family member who nurtured my passion for animals, which had me switching off even more.

However, I switched my mindset and got my grades for university.

Fast forward 10 years, I’m someone who still refuses to be defined by exams, failures or society norms.

I’ve now got a BSc in animal behaviour, a successful farming business, I’m a Sunday Times bestselling author and, most importantly, I love my life.

You’re probably wondering where all this is going.

Well, young people will spend 40-50 years in a career they will either love or come to resent.

Society has to redefine what we determine as a successful career.

We need to focus less on what makes you more money and pride in so called “professional careers”.

You can only chase money and ego for so long before you realise it will never be enough.

When your career is based on your interests and love then you are far more likely to make this a success.

We must stop preaching which careers are deemed “most impressive”.

Take farming, for example; teachers and my university tutor told me that a career in farming would be “doing myself an injustice”, I was “better’ than that” and it was a man’s job.

To this day it blows my mind that my passion for outdoors and animals was declared as being “not impressive enough” and how an entire industry was dismissed.

This is one of our biggest battles as an industry. How do we open the doors for young people to understand that farming can be for anyone?

How do we encourage our educational system to not only push farming as a viable career but shift to focus on nurturing passions and motivations?

I honestly believe we have lost and continue to lose many amazing individuals because of the influence of our educational system.

It needs rewriting, as does our definition of success.

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