Virginia Hughes

lives in Donegal with her husband and three children. A couple of years ago the illness of a relative resulted in her fostering her relative's three children and taking on a home-help role for the woman and a fourth adult child who suffers from schizophrenia.

"I suddenly found myself in a situation I couldn't turn my back on," she says. "When I saw the certificate course advertised I thought this was exactly what I needed. The kids are all in school so, when they're gone, I can settle down and have a few hours to myself to study. Initially, I found it hard going. The first assignment was a nightmare - I think I wrote it 10 times - but I got there in the end.

Now Hughes is enjoying the course thoroughly. "It has given me a great sense of personal achievement to have come this far. It has also helped me enormously with my caring work. I feel I would understand people's needs much better now.

"Every community needs people willing to take on caring roles. I hate to see older people ending up in hospital because there is nobody to keep an eye on them at home. The solution is more community care."

Triona Mhic Dhonnacha

is a mother of seven who completed both the certificate course through Irish and then did the diploma. She is now doing a specialist cert in health promotion and hopes to find work within her local community when she's finished.

"Health promotion is a subject dear to my heart," she says. "I'm particularly interested in promoting the benefits of breast feeding. My family are nearly reared now and I was interested in finding a way of playing a role within my community within the area of health promotion.

"I was attracted to the cert course initially because it was delivered through Irish. I feel it's very important to be able to provide a healthcare service to older people in the area in their first language. This is what they are comfortable with and it's both a courtesy to them and a way of preserving their dignity.

"Doing the courses I began to appreciate and the nurturing skills that one tends to take for granted as a mother. That's very good for one's self-esteem after 20 years of being at home rearing a family!"

She is also very pleased to have achieved qualifications at third level. "I found the idea of going back to study daunting at first but, because the subject matter was very interesting, you tend to get absorbed and this carries you through the academic side of things."

Mhic Dhonnacha is a very organised person - she says she had "terrific support" from her husband and family so was able to get the time to study,

"One of the reasons I enjoyed it so much was because it gave me a great excuse to mess around in bookshops which I love. The other advantage is that I'm now very much in tune with my older kids who are in college and doing exams."

Aideen Lovett

spent most of her career in the hotel industry before deciding to map out a completely new career for herself a couple of years ago. "I had enjoyed the hotel industry, but it involved very long hours for not very good money," she says. "I had reached a point where I needed a complete change of scene. The only problem was I didn't know what I wanted to do."

Lovett had some experience of voluntary work with homeless women in Britain and she began to consider the possibility of getting involved in a similar activity here but as a paid professional rather than as a volunteer. With this in mind, she started doing voluntary work in Galway to widen her experience but she also began studying counselling at NUI Galway.

She then moved on to take both the cert and diploma courses in social care. She is now working full-time in Waterford as the manager of a women's refuge there.

"The courses definitely helped me to get this job," says Lovett. "I'm really enjoying it. My only regret is that I didn't discover that this was my niche 20 years ago.

"It wasn't easy getting into the role of student when you've been away from studying for a long time. But I persisted and I soon settled into it. I had very good support from people around me."

She found it far more difficult when she was working in Waterford and commuting to Galway for the diploma. "I suppose I was giving 150 per cent to the job because it was new and commuting on top of that was really tough.

"Overall, I found the courses very useful and interesting. There are always bits that are not your bag, but the management and administrative material we covered has come in very useful to me now in my new job."