A student joining Keele’s School of Medicine in September has spoken of her joy after securing her place.

Rand Abadi will be joining the Medicine cohort after achieving two A*s in biology and Arabic, and two As in maths and chemistry.

The Whalley Range High School pupil left war-torn Syria with her family and settled in Manchester just two years ago, coming to the UK with limited English skills.

Rand had wanted to study medicine in her home country, but was unable to due to the violent conflict there.

But thanks to her hard work she can now pursue her ambition at Keele’s Medical School.

Speaking to the Manchester Evening News, Rand said: “I have always thought about doing medicine. In Syria lots of people were getting injured, I want to do my best to help.

“I am really excited to start studying medicine, it has been a long journey.

“I wouldn’t say my English was bad when I moved but studying in Arabic for my whole life didn’t really help.

“A-Levels alone are pretty hard so learning them in another language was difficult.”

(Image: Mark Waugh markwaugh.net)