What job/study are you doing right now and tell us a little about it?
Currently Lead Technical trainer for Osborne Engineering Ltd in Cramlington. The role involves preparing and delivering Mechanical engineering based technical training for companies within the oil and gas industry in the UK and overseas. I teach basic engineering science along with specific maintenance machinery based training.
Did you do any further/higher education?
Whilst I was in the Royal Navy I started a degree in Geoscience still haven't finished it though.
How did you decide on your career path and what is/was most interesting about your work?
I decided from a very early age that I was going to be an engineer in the Royal Navy, my grandfather had fought in the Battle of Jutland in WW1 so he greatly influenced me. I was lucky enough to have a thirty year career doing just that, I joined before I had even completed my GCSEs at school. The RN allowed me to travel the world, it's a job that requires you to work hard but allows you to play hard as well. You move from ship to ship job to job and no two days are the same, the variety of work makes it interesting the entire time. It allows you to grow. School had turned me into a young boy ready to work, the RN changed me into a well rounded young man.
Can you share a couple of fond memories of your time at St Cuthbert's?
Cross country was always "fun" particularly in the winter, we used to run outside the school grounds then and up Benwell bank one of the PE staff used to ride a bike up and down the hill to make sure nobody was skiving, once back inside the course went around the back of the Cricket pitch where most people stopped as you could get away with it there. The thirteen stairs to Father Walsh's study. I'll leave that there I think. Mr Lovel getting stuck in a snowdrift when walking between the upper and lower schools and threatening severe retribution on any boy who laughed at him, we were running cross country at the time. I still have my bible that I was given on my first day signed by father Walsh and my centenary tie from 1981
Did you have a favourite/influential teacher? What made them so important to you?
I had a maths teacher called Mr Pollard Eric I think, what an absolutely wonderful man, he had a great shock of grey hair like wire wool. We had to use fountain pens then and my work was always a mess as was many other people's. He used to come and look at your working out and say "looks like the income tax inspector has paid a visit". I hated maths was never very good at it he must have had the patience of a saint to put up with me, but I guess it worked out in the end as I became an engineer.
What advice would you give our current students?
Enjoy every second of being at school, it finishes all too soon. Listen to everything you are told however trivial, you never know someday you just might need it. Above all, try hard at everything even though it seems unimportant or as though you aren't doing too well, remember nobody ever succeeded by giving in.
Name: Patrick O'Connell