Marie has been a post primary teacher for 30 years in many types of school but originally trained as a personal manager. Marie ran her own tutoring business alongside her teaching as well as becoming a single parent of two very suddenly. At one stage, Marie held down five jobs just to pay the bills. She eventually met a wonderful man and remarried five years ago. Marie was always interested in mentoring teachers and was lucky enough to be sent to UCD on a mentoring course. They offered her a place on their Masters program but her own son was starting in University in the same year and Marie could only afford for one of them to go. Luckily, she continued as a mentor in her school and was given PGE students every year to Mentor. She then undertook a year long diploma in Business and Executive coaching and now she's just about to launch her own business in coaching, mentoring and mediation ( She's a trained conflict resolution restorative practitioner). She aims to take a mediation course within the year to complete her training. She continues to work as a teacher, a mentor to both NQTs, PGEs and children in difficulty.