The new year for Year 12 students has begun with some thought-provoking talks from visiting speakers for the Forum Talks series.
For the first in the 2025 series, Colfe’s welcomed former Reading footballer Scott Davies, who spoke candidly about the depths of his struggle with gambling addiction. Scott shared his powerful story of how, as a suddenly wealthy teenager, what began as ‘a bit of fun’ spiralled into an addiction that cost him his footballing career and led to the loss of over £200,000, the destruction of relationships, self-harming and hitting what he described as ‘rock bottom’.
His messages were powerful ones to the Year 12 audience, and with the ease and prevalence of online gambling and a nationwide rise of gambling addiction among young people, highly pertinent. His honest account also served as an inspirational one, as he demonstrated the transformative power of overcoming the challenge. Having not placed a bet in over a decade, he now uses his experience of addiction to help other athletes who may be struggling with gambling-related issues.
Resilience was illustrated equally vividly by the second of the term’s Forum talks, as explorer Reza Pakravan gave a thrilling account of his breath-taking travels along central Africa’s Sahel desert. Reza spoke of his extraordinary experiences and near-scrapes as he travelled from Senegal to Somalia, seeing for himself the devastating impact that the changing climate and expanding desert is having not only on the environment but also on the indigenous societies and cultures of the people who live there.
The journey also took him through some of the most dangerous places on the planet; his route travelled through towns, villages and communities already struggling with shrinking resources and living in fear of the terrorist groups that have sprung up to exploit the conflicts. His tales of tense border frontiers, however, were punctuated by life-affirming stories of the people he met along the way, from the Wodaabe nomads to the communities coming together at a festival at the great mud mosque of Djenne in Mali.
The weekly Forum series for Year 12 students provides talks from external speakers on real-world issues, inspiring and encouraging discussion and mutual support. Topics are broad but revolve around a core theme of resilience or personal challenge, and include anything from war photography and wildlife conservation to social justice and battling addiction.
