From Coast to Cambridge

“I didn’t know anyone who had gone to Cambridge University from my town. I thought it was a prestigious thing and you had to be

very well off. If you had said I would get an offer to Cambridge, I would not have thought it was possible,” says Noah, who is from Hastings, a coastal town where the number of young people going on to higher education, or leaving the area, is low.

At his admissions interview Noah was asked about drug development, exactly what he learned on a medicinal chemistry course at

Villiers Park. “It was the perfect question!” Noah laughs, “I knew exactly what to say because I’d learnt it on the course!”

During his GCSE years, Noah lost both his mum and his aunt. “Villiers Park didn’t just help me with my studies, but also with how to clear my head. I had a mentor who was really helpful. He listened to me and advised me on ways to cope with stress and how not to overwork myself.”

After securing excellent A-level results, Noah received the news that he'd been accepted as an undergraduate at Homerton College to read biological natural sciences.