When did you leave Chesterton Community College? 

Gosh, it seems too long ago … must have been 1979, I guess! It was the first year of Chesterton being a comprehensive school which was 1974, I think.

What is your current job title or field?

I’m Veterinary Ophthalmologist (dealing with animal eyes) at Cambridge Vet School and Fellow and Director of Studies in Veterinary Medicine at St John’s College in Cambridge. I also run an ambulatory clinic visiting veterinary surgeries around East Anglia seeing animals with eye problems for them.

Did you know as a teenager which career you wanted to pursue or did you come to realise this later on? 

I knew aged 6 that I wanted to be a vet, when I took my guinea pig to Mr Jordan’s clinic in Clarendon Street (it’s still there!) and he cured him of mites, first showing me them down the microscope. He talked to me, not my mum who was in the background with the money to pay him – I was hooked!  Knowing that I wanted to make that my career spurred me on through exams to get to university – St John’s actually … I now teach in the same room I was taught in back in 1983.

How did you start on your career?

Well, I realised that eyes were the thing to focus on (if you’ll excuse the pun) through working with a vet near Birmingham in the 26 weeks of work experience you have to do as a vet student. I got my first job in a research hospital doing ophthalmology and never looked back!

What do you like about your job? High points? 

It’s amazing curing animals and making their owners happy. I had a dog this morning with in-turning eyelids and could fit him in to our surgery schedule, so he is now, 3 hours later, happy and comfortable, ready to go home when his owner turns up (which is why I’ve got a few minutes to write this)! His owner was delighted we could solve things so quickly when I rang him to say the op was done. What could be a better job than that, hey?

What is the first advice you would give a student wanting to follow in this direction?

Come and spend some time with me – let me show you round the vet school then come and spend a few days working with me. And more than that: study, study, study!