When Lucy Longeri began university, she wasn’t sure what her future would look like. Studying at La Trobe’s Mildura campus, she found her confidence, community and calling, one step at a time.
In her blog, Lucy reflects on the people and opportunities that shaped her journey and why it’s okay not to know where you’re headed when you’re just starting out.
If you’ve ever done a paint-by-number, you know the feeling. Up close, it’s just messy little sections with numbers in them. You can’t see the picture. You just have to trust the process and keep going, one section at a time.
That’s what my university journey felt like. I started out never really sure what I was going to make of myself. Turns out I didn’t have to figure it out alone.
Year one: Finding my feet
I came straight out of Year 12, with the effects of COVID-19 still lingering, and starting uni meant stepping into a world that hadn’t quite settled back to normal. Everything was new: the content, the expectations, even the idea of calling myself a uni student.
But on the Mildura campus, I wasn’t one face in a lecture hall of hundreds. Within weeks, people knew my name, and lecturers asked how I was actually going. In a time when so much still felt unsettled, that mattered.
My classmates and I were in the same classrooms every week, swapping notes, sharing nerves, and turning from strangers into a team. I didn’t know yet what kind of teacher I wanted to be, but surrounded by people figuring it out alongside me, it didn’t feel so scary not to know.
Year two: Everything opens up
Year two was the year things opened up. I dived into my electives, followed my curiosity, and discovered how much more there is to uni than the core of a degree.
It was also the year I started putting myself out there, networking, introducing myself and asking questions. I wasn’t sure how I could make a difference yet, but I was determined to try, and that mattered more than having a plan. Opportunities rarely land in your lap. They appear when you show up and start asking.
Then came my first placements, the moment the degree stopped being theory and became real. Walking into a classroom as a pre-service teacher was nerve-racking and exhilarating all at once, and it reminded me exactly why I’d chosen this path.
Our cohort grew, too. Classmates from Albury-Wodonga joined us remotely, and it didn’t take long before there was no difference between them and the students beside me in Mildura. They quickly became my family. I learned that real connection isn’t about sitting in the same room. It’s about showing up for each other.
Year three: Finding my voice
If year two was about showing up, year three was about being heard.
I joined an advisory council, and for the first time I was in the room where decisions about students’ experiences were being made. It was intimidating at first. I sat alongside people who seemed to know exactly what they were doing, and I wondered if I had anything worth adding.
It turns out I did. I learned that being a rural student isn’t a disadvantage to apologise for. It’s a perspective, and one that’s easy to overlook unless someone speaks up. The more I shared, the more people listened, and being the voice for a campus like Mildura made me proud of where I study.
That year taught me skills I didn’t know I was building: sharing ideas clearly, listening to people who saw things differently, and asking the questions nobody else was asking. Those skills carried straight back into my classes and placements. I spoke up more in tutorials, asked for feedback instead of waiting for it, and walked into classrooms with a steadier confidence.
Year three is where I stopped being a student things happened to and became someone who helped shape what happened next.
Year four: Saying yes (and meeting my LTSA family)
Year four was the year I said yes to everything, and it started with joining LTSA.
I can’t talk about my degree without talking about my LTSA team. They are some of the most genuine, generous and hardworking people I’ve ever met. I arrived as someone who sat quietly at the edge of the room, and they patiently and kindly pulled me out of my shell. They backed my ideas, celebrated my wins, and picked me up when I doubted myself. Every time I thought, “I’m not sure I can do that,” someone on that team said, “Yes, you can,” and then stood beside me while I did it.
Because of them, I learned to lead, to collaborate, to advocate for other students, and to trust my own voice. To my LTSA team: thank you for believing in a quiet kid from Mildura. You changed my life.
That confidence carried into everything else. I joined the La Trobe Leaders Program, where I learned that leadership is built on listening as much as speaking up. I became a Move Squad ambassador, encouraging others to get active and look after themselves, which every future teacher needs to model. That role took me to Bundoora to represent my campus at a run club event, and I’ll never forget being trusted to carry Mildura’s name into the room.
By the end of the year, I wasn’t the student who was unsure what I’d make of myself. I was ready to walk into a classroom of my own.
What I love about studying rurally
Your lecturers know your story. Your classmates, whether beside you in Mildura or joining from Albury-Wodonga, become a second family and help you see what you’re capable of when you can’t see it yourself. You get to learn in the community you love and be backed by people who genuinely want you to succeed.
Thank you
To my lecturers: thank you for knowing our names and our stories, for pushing us when we needed it, and for believing we could become teachers before we believed it ourselves. You showed us what a good teacher looks like.
To my classmates: thank you for always having my back. Whether you were beside me in Mildura or on a screen from Albury-Wodonga, you made the hard weeks lighter and the good weeks better.
To the students I met on placement: you are the reason I wanted to do this in the first place, and you taught me more than any textbook could. Thank you for your patience with a trainee still finding their feet, for your questions, which pushed me to explain things better, and for your honesty when something wasn’t clicking. You showed me what this job is really about.
To my placement supervisors and mentor teachers: thank you for opening your classrooms to me. You let me try, stumble and try again, and helped me become someone ready for a classroom of my own.
To my friends: thank you for pushing me when things got tough and celebrating every small win like it was a big one.
To Mum and Dad: thank you for your love, your patience and your belief in me from the very beginning. Every step of this degree has been built on the foundation you gave me. I love you both, and I hope I’ve made you proud.
To anyone just starting, or in a rough patch
It’s okay not to know who you’re going to become. I didn’t. I started straight out of Year 12, with no idea what I was doing, and I still got here.
Be patient with yourself. Some years will feel like they’re changing everything, and some will feel quieter, but each one is adding something to the picture. Reach out to people, even when it feels hard. Say yes to things that scare you a little. Find your people, because they’re closer than you think.
You don’t have to see the whole mural today. Just paint the next number.