On Wednesday, Upper V were given an inspiring talk by Jordan Wylie MBE. He began telling us about how he served in the British Army for nine years before representing them at football, for which he won his regimental colours for excellence to sport. During this time, he completed his academic studies before going to the University of Leicester to complete his degree in Security and Risk Management and then onto Coventry University where he achieved his Masters degree in Maritime Security. He showed us that despite having no previous qualifications, he was able to gain success. Jordan acknowledged that although this required hard work, his values and moral compass is what pushed him to accomplish his academic goals.
Jordan then spoke about his fundraising expeditions which we all found very fascinating, especially The Great British Paddle in 2020, where he aimed to stand-up paddleboard around Great Britain. One hundred and forty nine (149) days later on Christmas Eve when Scotland moved into lockdown and after suffering multiple jellyfish stings, he was forced to end his adventure after paddleboarding 2733 km. He went on to say that he felt he learnt more through having his journey cut short sooner than he anticipated. We were all inspired by his resilience and perseverance in achieving this incredible feat.
This expedition, like all of his many challenges, was to raise money for charity. This one in particular was fundraising to build a school in Djibouti in Africa which was successfully built over the course of three years. In recognition of this, he was awarded an MBE. Over the last nine years, he has completed many marathons in the world’s most dangerous countries, in the world’s coldest places, and has also canoed across some of the most dangerous stretches of water across the globe.
More recently, he has appeared as a hunter on Channel 4’s Hunted and Celebrity Hunted. To end his talk, we were entertained by a video of him catching an Abbey School teacher who recently appeared on the show.
We were all very much impressed and inspired by Jordan’s outstanding achievements and amazing contributions to charitable causes both in the UK and abroad. It was a wonderful talk that all of Upper V enjoyed immensely.
Sophie, Upper V
