About the founder

Because unlike most other privileged people, I recognise how lucky I am. I understood this fact from an early age, even sitting in my fee-paying private school in a safe and prosperous country at 12 years old, I knew this. So when I turned 19 I decided to join the police force. I wanted to step out of the safe bubble that I had grown up in and experience life. I worked for the police in my home city of Coventry as a volunteer on evenings and weekends with the same powers and responsibilities as a regular police officer. After graduating from university, I worked as a teacher during the day and as a police officer at night.

One day, I was standing in the police station looking at the pin board in the office. The pin board had photos of vulnerable people who were known to the police and who I worked with regularly. I got to know some of them by name. But I slowly noticed that photos started to go missing; they were there one day and not the next. These were often young women from the same city as me and the same age as me, who had gone missing - presumed dead. And I realised in that moment, that the only difference between myself and them was that I had opportunities in life and they did not.

In hind-sight, working as a teacher and police officer in my early twenties was perhaps too intense and I decided to leave my career to travel. There must be more out there somewhere, I thought. Whilst travelling I met an amazing array of kind and interesting people, spanning cultures, languages and backgrounds. It was a common theme that they all wanted to practice their English with me and I often obliged. Learning English gave these people opportunities and this was my ‘light bulb moment’. I know I must use the opportunities that I have been given in life to create opportunities for others.