A 21-year-old Geography student from Cefnbrynbrain near Cwmllynfell who has excelled throughout her studies to achieve a First Class degree award graduated from Swansea University today (Friday, July 22).
Emma Worsfold, who studied her BSc Geography in the University’s College of Science, celebrated her achievement at a Degree and Award Congregation held in the city’s Brangwyn Hall, watched by her parents Jeff and Wendy, sister Katie, and grandparents Tony and Irene.
Welsh-speaker Emma has been described by her tutor Dr Keith Halfacree as caring deeply about and being passionately committed to her home community, on the edge of the Black Mountain – something which became particularly evident in her final year work.
Dr Halfacree said: “Although quiet and unassuming, Emma has been both a highly committed and conscientious student. She has excelled throughout her studies, leading to her rightly deserved First Class degree award.
“Her most notable academic achievement – a 10,000 word dissertation in her final year – was an engaged and in-depth study of rural service decline and school closures, which focused on the increasing reliance being placed by neighbouring communities on Cwmllynfell. It justly received her top mark throughout her three years of study.
“For me, it encapsulated perfectly how a student can be both deeply committed to her local community and background, and to her academic studies here at the University. We warmly congratulate Emma on her exceptional achievement and wish her all the best for the future. “
Emma, a former pupil of Cefnbrynbrain Primary School and Amman Valley School, said: “Community has always been important to me, and my dissertation gave me the opportunity to study changes taking place there; giving me a topic that I knew would be of great interest and importance to me.”
Emma’s dissertation was awarded the 2011 David Wild Prize by the College’s Geography Examinations Board, for what was judged to be the top Human Geography study.
Her study has also been submitted to the Rural Geography Research Group of the Royal Geographical Society with Institute of British Geographers as Swansea University’s entry for their annual undergraduate dissertation prize.
Emma is now looking forward to starting a PGCE Secondary Education course at Swansea Metropolitan University this September.
“I have thoroughly enjoyed the last three years at Swansea and will be leaving with fond memories, new friends and a great deal of new geographical knowledge, which I am looking forward to applying in my PGCE next year and my future teaching career,” she added.
For more information about Swansea University Graduation Week visit http://www.swansea.ac.uk/graduation/.
