Queen’s graduate from Co Tyrone ‘turns struggle into strength’ as first in her family to attend university
A young Co Tyrone woman has graduated from Queen’s University Belfast having grappled with personal challenges, including mental health difficulties, to pursue a new-found passion.
Tanisha Wallace achieved a Master’s in Marketing but admitted that it is so much more than an academic achievement.
Her graduation day marked a personal goal she sometimes thought she would never reach. Since her teenage years, Tanisha struggled to manage emotional and psychological stress often invisible to others.
"I feel emotions very intensely, and that can make stressful or uncertain situations more challenging. Stress, sudden changes or feeling unsure of where I stand can make it difficult to stay grounded. It is simply part of who I am and how I process the world,” she said.
Tanisha also carries a lot of caring responsibilities. She helps care for her younger brother Corey, who is autistic and faces his own daily battles. Her mother, Sinead, is a breast cancer survivor who now lives with lymphoedema, which can cause painful swelling and leaves her vulnerable to flare-ups and infections.
Her mother was hospitalised for a period while Tanisha was studying for her Master’s. As well as visiting her daily, Tanisha was trying to look out for Corey, hold down a part-time job, complete assignments and all while driving long distances between university, home, hospital and her job.
As the first in her family to attend university, Tanisha has always been keenly aware of the responsibility of that and of how much her parents sacrificed in order to open up doors for her.
Therefore it wasn’t a casual decision to change from her first degree of English Literature to follow a Marketing pathway at post-grad level.
"I loved my undergraduate degree because storytelling has always been a big part of who I am. But it was in my first full-time job at agricultural and horticulture wholesalers JF McKenna, in Armagh, that everything changed. I stumbled across marketing tasks and I realised how much the work lit me up.
"Marketing brought together everything I cared about – culture, behaviour, psychology, ethics and strategy. That experience inspired me to apply for a Master’s at Queen’s Business School, and after being accepted, I continued at JF McKenna part-time.”
Tanisha loved studying Marketing and knew it was the direction she now wanted to go in.
"I soon realised I was not just completing assignments. I felt like I was contributing to conversations that mattered. It made me ambitious for a career that made me feel alive.”
On her graduation day, the achievement was all the sweeter because of all the challenges Tanisha had to overcome.
"There were days I could barely get out of bed. There were nights I cried from exhaustion and mornings where the thought of facing another day felt overwhelming,” she admitted.
What kept Tanisha going was being part of a loving, close-knit family. She said she also got a lot of support from Queen’s.
She said her graduation was “one of the proudest moments” of her life.
Ahead of the ceremony, she said: “Being a first-generation student means carrying more weight, but it also means breaking more barriers,” she said. "Walking across that stage will not feel like one person graduating – it will feel like my entire bloodline walking with me.”