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Matt Agnew at his graduation from Sweden\u2019s Lund University.<\/span><\/p>\n When science communicator Matt Agnew became the Bachelor in 2019, he had just wrapped up his PhD in astrophysics. It was then the latest in a line of degrees, starting fresh out of high school with a double degree in science and engineering from the University of Western Australia.<\/p>\n At UWA, Agnew soaked up the social side of things. \u201cI spent a lot of time at the tav,\u201d he says with a laugh. That relatively carefree attitude was in contrast to how Agnew felt while studying for his final high school exams: \u201cI used to have the worst nausea. I felt sick with how much pressure there was.\u201d<\/p>\n After spending a couple of years working as an engineer in the resource sector, Agnew became disenchanted with his career. To reset, he went travelling and resolved to go back to university. Having been fascinated by space as a child, he chose astrophysics.<\/p>\n But he was rejected from all but one master\u2019s in the field because he didn\u2019t have enough undergraduate-level physics under his belt. That\u2019s how he ended up at Lund University in Sweden.<\/p>\n There he learned to be resilient. \u201cLiving abroad removes any kind of family and friend safety nets, and there was a bit of financial stress,\u201d he says. \u201cI was trying something new without knowing whether it was going to click.\u201d<\/p>\n Post-Bachelor<\/em>, Agnew did another masters, this time in artificial intelligence, to extend upon his day job as a data scientist. While it\u2019s clear that Agnew loves learning, higher education hasn\u2019t always been easy. He recalls working for a year on a project as part of his PhD, only for his research paper to be rejected \u2013 complete with scathing criticism. \u201cThat was a big slap in the face,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n \u201cYou can go a year slugging away at this hypothesis and none of the tests have yielded any results of interest. You\u2019re like, \u2018have I made a terrible mistake?\u2019 Then suddenly you have two brilliant results in a week. Occasionally, you have a wobble, and you can restabilise quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n Agnew wants to remind school-leavers that they can always go back to study again \u2013 like he did: \u201cIt\u2019s not your one shot to pick what you\u2019re going to do. You can change and go back to study more.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI thought I\u2019d be better off learning hands-on\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Flex Mami decided to intern instead of finishing tertiary study.<\/span><\/p>\n Radio host, author and influencer Lillian Ahenkan, aka Flex Mami, decided against going to university and instead went straight into the workforce. After about a year working two jobs \u2013 in hospitality and in retail \u2013 Ahenkan felt the urge to study again.<\/p>\n First, she tried doing a fashion business course, then she went to a private college to study public relations \u2013 a choice inspired by watching 2000s MTV reality series The Hills<\/em>.<\/p>\n She describes how watching publicist Lauren Conrad and her friends on screen inspired her to try working in that the field too: \u201cI was like, \u2018hold on a second, all these girls work in this environment, for a woman, doing things that I find interesting, why would I not go and seek out that kind of experience?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n The course required getting an internship in the second semester, but Ahenkan decided to do one straight away \u201cto get a better idea of whether I wanted to do that job or not\u201d, she explains.<\/p>\n She soon realised there was a disconnect between what she was studying and what she was learning on the job, so she left the private college too. \u201cI thought I\u2019d be better off learning hands-on as opposed to being at an institution,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n She juggled the internship with her two jobs. Then, when the internship became a full-time role, she picked up a side hustle DJing, and once she\u2019d built up a financial safety net quit the PR gig altogether.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile others looked to trying and failing as an indication that they would never get to where they wanted to go, I thought, \u2018it\u2019s just information\u2019,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n She credits her \u201cadolescent hubris\u201d for giving her the courage to leave tertiary study and then her PR job behind.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s something really beautiful about not having any experience and not having the burdens of the real world to force you to make decisions that are in opposition to what you really want,\u201d she says. \u201cYou can really do what you want when you\u2019re younger.\u201d<\/p>\n And the risk paid off. Now Flex Mami is the host of Love Island<\/em>\u2019s debrief show, which earned her a Logie nomination this year for Most Popular New Talent.<\/p>\n Her advice to school leavers? \u201cWhatever you decide on, you have to back yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI saw the world in a different way when I came back\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Jane Lu says doing a student exchange to Sweden changed her life.<\/span><\/p>\n Jane Lu, founder of online fashion retailer Showpo and one of the investors on Shark Tank<\/em>, always knew she wanted to go to university but didn\u2019t know what to study.<\/p>\n When she was accepted into a KPMG accounting cadetship while she was still in Year 12, the decision was made for her: she\u2019d study commerce part-time at the University of New South Wales, taking night classes around her job.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I got the job, I didn\u2019t realise it meant that you had to do an accounting degree,\u201d she says. \u201cI learnt that during the interview process.\u201d<\/p>\n Lu\u2019s workload didn\u2019t leave much time for socialising. Instead, it was a six-month exchange trip to Lund in Sweden that shaped her life. It\u2019s where she met her future husband, fellow Australian James Waldie, with whom she now has two children, and where she started to feel more like herself.<\/p>\n \u201cEvery point when you\u2019re taken out of your comfort zone and you\u2019re thrown into a new environment, you get to reinvent yourself,\u201d she says. \u201cI became more loud and more myself, more outspoken, more confident [on exchange].\u201d<\/p>\n The experience also changed her perspective on her career back home. \u201cI saw the world in a different way when I came back,\u201d she says. \u201cInstead of looking at my job as financial security, I saw it as a prison sentence.\u201d<\/p>\n One day, after she\u2019d spent the morning trying to fix a broken spreadsheet, Lu realised she needed to resign to focus on the pop-up store side hustle she shared with a friend. \u201cI was like, \u2018Oh my God. What\u2019s the point? I\u2019m three hours closer to death\u2019,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Despite stepping off the corporate ladder, Lu is now worth $73 million, according to AFR<\/em>\u2019s 2023 Young Rich List, having used what she learned from her failed pop-up venture to create Showpo.<\/p>\n Lu\u2019s advice to school leavers is to always try your hardest \u2013 because you never know what useful skills and contacts you\u2019re building: \u201cGive it your best and try to make the most out of every situation.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI always wanted to go to university\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Clare Wheeler was part of Sydney University\u2019s elite sports program.<\/span><\/p>\n The final years of high school were tough for Matildas midfielder Clare Wheeler. Her mother was battling a serious illness (she died just before Wheeler started uni) and Wheeler was juggling her education with playing in an under-20s A-League soccer team and the Young Matildas.<\/p>\n \u201cI always wanted to go to university,\u201d she says. \u201cWhen I was in Year 12, the A-League was only four months, so I knew I obviously had to have something else. But I didn\u2019t know \u2013 and I still don\u2019t know \u2013 the exact role that I want.\u201d<\/p>\n Wheeler completed Year 12 in Newcastle over two years, before she moved to Sydney to take up a scholarship to study commerce, majoring in human relations and accounting, at the University of Sydney.<\/p>\n She chose USyd as she wanted to have an American college-style experience, living on campus, and juggling elite sport, study, work and internships: \u201cYou had your education, your football, your gym, tuition help, all of that \u2026 I was really busy, but I also had a lot of support.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s not surprising that Wheeler was too busy for the annual Uni Games competition, or to have much of a social life, outside of her college. \u201cFootball comes first, study comes second, and then social comes last,\u201d she says with a shrug.<\/p>\n Wheeler finished her degree just in time for the pandemic to force a move to online learning and scarper her graduation ceremony. COVID also put on hold her plan to move overseas to play soccer full-time. It was the first time Wheeler had found herself without a plan. So she applied for a job at Macquarie Bank in the financial assistance team and loved it so much she left her Newcastle team to join Sydney FC, where she balanced 5am training with full-time work. \u201cIt was challenging, but it was also super rewarding,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Wheeler did finally get to move overseas to pursue sport full-time in mid-2021. Now living in Manchester, not far from her team Everton\u2019s home base in Liverpool, she plans to go back to university next year to study a graduate diploma in mental health.<\/p>\n Wheeler wants to encourage young people to stress less about the future. \u201cDon\u2019t put too much pressure on yourself,\u201d she says. \u201cIf you don\u2019t know what you want to do, take the time to figure that out. It\u2019s not a race.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t feel like this is for me\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Comedian Wil Anderson studied a journalism degree in Canberra.<\/span>Credit: <\/span>Daniel Boud<\/cite><\/p>\n Growing up in regional Victoria, Wil Anderson dreamed of being a stand-up comedian. But he didn\u2019t know it could be a viable career.<\/p>\n \u201cI was a 15-year-old kid from a dairy farm who, for some reason, thought he might want to be a stand-up comedian, but I wasn\u2019t really ready to announce that to the world,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n What he knew for sure was that he didn\u2019t want to be a dairy farmer. So he decided to study journalism in Canberra, taking advantage of his curiosity, creativity and English skills. In doing so, he became the first person from his family to go to university.<\/p>\n It was an opportunity to make a new start, away from his family and friends, many of whom were moving to Melbourne to study. \u201cI think going to Melbourne or Sydney might have been too much for this little farm boy,\u201d he says. \u201cI needed to ease myself in.\u201d<\/p>\n Anderson admits he wasn\u2019t the most involved university student. While he performed in school musicals and wrote plays in high school, he didn\u2019t participate in extracurricular activities at university. Instead, he spent most of his degree working in the office of the Australian Financial Review<\/em>.<\/p>\n His AFR<\/em> boss encouraged him to pursue what he really loved. \u201cI\u2019d graduated first in my course and I had all this work experience and I had a few job offers,\u201d Anderson explains. \u201cAnd I said to him, \u2018I don\u2019t feel like this is for me\u2019.<\/p>\n \u201cHe said, \u2018you\u2019ve done well at something that your heart\u2019s not in \u2013 imagine if you are this dedicated to something that you\u2019re really passionate about\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n So Anderson moved to Melbourne at 21 years old and started performing stand-up comedy. He hasn\u2019t stopped since (global pandemic aside).<\/p>\n But he uses his degree every day to analyse the news and the advertising industry on Gruen<\/em> and Question Everything<\/em>.<\/p>\n \u201cYou can see a pretty consistent line from what I studied to what I\u2019ve ended up doing. My university degree is a reminder that, at some stage, I set myself on a path to achieve something and then achieved it.\u201d<\/p>\n Anderson\u2019s advice to school-leavers is to ignore the pressure to decide about the future, and focus instead on nurturing a sense of curiosity: \u201cThe capacity to learn and a love of learning is the most incredible skill.\u201d<\/p>\n Give it a break: <\/b>Comedian Lizzy Hoo says a commerce degree can wait. In her gap year she mastered snowboarding, living off obscenely small amounts of cash and bailing friends out of jail. Valuable life skills, she argues.<\/p>\n Result driven: <\/b>From a hands-on paid gap year in the defence forces to scaling the tech world, get a pay packet sooner with these fast-track career qualifications – no university required.<\/p>\nInfluencer Flex Mami<\/h3>\n
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Showpo CEO Jane Lu<\/h3>\n
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Matildas midfielder Clare Wheeler<\/h3>\n
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Comedian Wil Anderson<\/h3>\n
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More from Campus, a new student hub<\/h3>\n