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Sally used her natural artistic talent to change people’s perceptions of her disability and inspire her future career!

When I first speak to Sally, I can hear so much enthusiasm in her voice for her art. Sally tells me that art has always been her motivation, her ‘spark’. From a very early age, she knew she had a talent.

When Sally started school, she quickly realised that she was going to be labelled as ‘the girl with Spina Bifida’ or ‘the girl with the disability’. She was adamant that was not how she wanted to go through life and saw that her talent for art could help change that. By focusing on her love of art, Sally helped her friends to see beyond her Spina Bifida and instead she was seen for her natural skills and talents.

Sally has a natural determination to show people what she was capable of and to not let her condition guide her experience of life. Sally tells me about the time she was completing her Duke of Edinburgh award in the mud and the rain. One of the teachers offered to allow her to skip that part of the course and have a lift back to base, but Sally refused and completed the course alongside everyone else.

There have been challenges – for example, moving from classroom to classroom carrying a load of books is never easy so Sally got herself a case with wheels to make her life easier!

I asked Sally what, other than her love of art and her need to pay the bills, inspired her to become a teacher…

1 Sally had a really positive school experience. Her teachers had ‘can-do’ attitudes, encouraged her art, and helped find workarounds to any challenges and barriers Sally came across.

2 She wasn’t particularly academic, and she worked really, really hard to pass her exams, and she knew she could use her experiences to encourage others to succeed too

3 She wanted to put her own insight and experience of living with a disability to good use, to support children and young people with disabilities in understanding the wealth of opportunities that exist, how learning to drive and earning money and/or applying for PIP can give so much independence, and allow them to make the choices that are right for them.

After her GCSEs, Sally went on to do ‘A’ level art and a degree in the subject too. That is all she wanted to do. However, as with so many things in life, Sally knew that being good at art, and having a degree in the subject, was not going to pay her bills.

Much to her parents’ concern, she decided her next move was to Liverpool and do a teacher training course. Like most young people, Sally had never been away from home, and never lived on her own. But she moved away, completed the oneyear course and secured a teaching job – in art, of course – in a secondary school.

If you’re feeling apprehensive about leaving education, unsure about what to choose, Sally offers this advice:

“Think about what you can do, what you are interested in and work backwards from there. What steps do you need to have in place to get to where you want to go.

Know your limits too.

Be honest and upfront with employers. They can’t make reasonable adjustments or support you in your new role if they are not aware of your disability’’.