Starting a degree is never an easy choice and is always supported by our families and close friends. For the Sept 19 cohort, our families became part of our university life. Due to the pandemic, we had most of our university experience at home, having to deal with our personal lives and university workload together. We had to find the strength and courage to get out of our houses and attend placements, putting our loved ones at risk but still with their support. Families have been essential in the last 3 years, a lot of us have lost loved ones during this period and consequently struggled to carry on with university work, but we did it. Which is an achievement in itself. Now that this journey has come to an end and our graduation is coming up, it is meant to be an exciting moment to celebrate with our families and close ones.

Unfortunately, students were given only 2 tickets per person for the ceremony as graduation was described a “popular” this year. This is beyond disappointing and disrespectful when more than two people have supported us. Now we have to choose between our loved ones on who gets to celebrate our achievements with us. The theatre chosen for our graduation does not provide enough space to enable us to bring who we wish to bring. We are all aware of the number of students who are part of this cohort. A bigger venue or different fields graduations would to give us the opportunity to celebrate this moment. Previous cohorts had separate ceremonies and were able to bring 3+ loved ones. This is very disappointing.

Our families and loved ones have been the FOUNDATION to our success and they should all be there. Our parents, partners, siblings, children and grandchildren and this has not been acknowledged in the preparation for this special date. Instead, we have been put into this sad and distressing situation of having to choose who can attend, making us anxious and upset instead of happy.

We would appreciate that the university would reconsider the organisation of the graduation and make more tickets available with options or a different venue or different time slots to accommodate our wishes after working so hard along with the staff to achieve our goals and become the future of nursing. This is meant to be a day to celebrate together not to leave our loved ones aside. We have been together through this and we should be together at the end.