Katy Mclean MBE was awarded an Honorary Fellowship
World Cup winning rugby captain Katy Mclean MBE, from South Shields, has received an Honorary Fellowship from the University of Sunderland.
Katy Mclean, England Rugby’s fly half and captain of five years, led her team to World Cup victory in Canada in 2014. She became the first woman to play rugby for England professionally and has 78 caps for the national team. Fiercely determined in what is a brutal game, she is fighting fit and has her sights firmly set on Rio for the 2016 Olympic Games.
A graduate of the University of Sunderland, Katy completed a Sports Studies BSc in 2007. She then gained a PG Cert in Education in 2011 and began teaching at Bexhill Academy in Sunderland, all while playing top-flight Women’s Rugby. Katy, who was born in South Shields, began playing rugby at her local club Westoe aged five; she admits, “rugby was a massive family passion and winning the World Cup was something that I dreamt about when I was little.”
Katy is a tremendous role model for women’s team sports and was among the first to play rugby professionally, something she never expected to see in her lifetime. Though the decision to leave teaching was really tough, Katy acknowledges: “the opportunity to be a professional rugby player was only going to come around once for me and I couldn’t turn it down.”
“To captain England to a World Cup, to finally achieve that last year was very special. That was easily my proudest moment, we worked so hard for it and so many things had happened, it was a massive relief if anything but also I felt very proud of everything we had achieved as a team as well.
“I’ve met some of my best friends playing rugby, that’s the beauty of that sport - it’s really inclusive, it takes any shape, size and ability – you don’t have to fit a mould to play rugby. So if you’ve never fitted in anywhere rugby is a really good place to start.
“It’s a massive honour for me to receive this award from the University of Sunderland. I had a brilliant time at Sunderland, I made a completely new set of friends and the support from the University academically was really helpful. I enjoyed my time there so much I came back to do my GTP (General Teaching Practice)!”
Katy's advice for other graduates is: "Dream big. And surround yourself with good people."
We honour her achievements and her services to rugby and women’s sport.
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