Charlotte Hunt, a 16 year old who struggled at school after her mother passed away, has said that she owes her place at college to charity the Prince’s Trust.
The Derby teenager was predicted to fail her GCSEs but was over the moon when she opened her results and found that she had passed.
With her passing grades she could enroll at Ilkeston Sixth Form College where she is currently studying business and work skills.
She believes that it is a definite contrast to where she could have been without the help of the charity. She has decided to publicise the trust’s work after it was reported that one in three young people in the East Midlands suffer with depression.
The youth charity helped Charlotte get back on track when her performance slipped after she lost her mum when she was just 13. Charlotte then had to contend with her father falling ill and having to look after herself and her younger sisters.
Charlotte took part in the Prince’s Trust XL programme which aims to help improve motivation and boost confidence.
Charlotte struggled to spent time with other people after her mum died and said: “I found school difficult because I had other things to worry about. I was predicted to get Fs in my GCSEs and I didn’t have many friends at this time either, which made things very hard for me.
“My dad and teachers referred me to the XL club. I was a little bit worried about joining at first but I couldn’t have been more wrong. It was a huge achievement to get my GCSEs and it was a big deal for someone like me who had expected to leave school with nothing.”