Graduate Claire radiates success

Claire Cunningham enjoyed double celebrations when she graduated from the Middlesbrough-based University of Teesside. Not only did she achieve a 2.1 in her BSc (Hons) degree in Diagnostic Radiography, but also gained the Doctor Jack Kirby Memorial Prize of £150, awarded for the best overall student performance.

Claire, 21, is originally from Ballynahinch, County Down, Northern Ireland, and has worked as a Radiographer at Edinburgh royal Infirmary since summer 2000. She clinched the post in April, in her first job interview before graduating.

Claire said: “It was fantastic and a big relief to get the job and I love living and working in Edinburgh. I’ve always been interested in science and wanted an interesting course, something different with a job at the end of it. I decided on Radiography after completing a placement in a Belfast hospital when I was 17.

“The University’s placements were a good and necessary preparation for my current job. I’d never heard of Middlesbrough before I came to the University and living away from home was a bit of shock initially, but the people were friendly and the campus quite compact, with everything close by.”

In choosing a medical career Claire is following in the footsteps of her mother Deidre, who is a nurse at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast. Deidre and Claire’s father James both attended her graduation ceremony.

Former Assumption Grammar School pupil Claire added: “In future I’d like to travel, working as a radiographer around the world.”

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