Jane Braithwaite

Specialist Mentor (MH)

Jane qualified as an Occupational Therapist in her early twenties and began working for the NHS in the Mental Health field, before working for many years in Adult Social Care. This role included working as a practitioner in Mental Health and Physical Disability Services before moving into a Management role that also included Sensory Services.

In 2008, as a result of a management restructure Jane was made redundant. However, the outcome was a realisation that she wanted to move on from management and return to a practitioner role and she has never regretted this change of direction. So, in 2008 Jane began working in the Higher Education Sector as both a DSA Specialist Mentor and a DSA Learning Support Assistant (LSA). As well as appreciating the rare opportunity that Mentoring provided for long-term work throughout a student’s university career, working as an LSA gave a real insight into the academic world of students’ lives across many different disciplines.

The outcome of working with university students is that Jane has returned to university herself, no longer in Health Sciences, but completing first a Graduate Diploma and then an MA.