Pasione proves you're never too old to study

Pasione 'Will' Ikilei's degree in international communications took five years to complete. Picture / Dean Purcell

Pasione 'Will' Ikilei is proof it's never too late to further your studies.

The 54-year-old trained electrician received his first degree yesterday, joining more than 1000 of his fellow Unitec students who graduated yesterday in three separate ceremonies at the Auckland Town Hall.

Mr Ikilei's degree in international communications took five years to complete, not helped by heart surgery in 2004. He had been scheduled to have a bypass in 2000, but kept delaying it.

"For four years, I used diet and exercise as a way of hiding from it. My doctor said you're not getting any better, but you're not getting any worse, so please get it over and done with."

The three-hour operation gave him a new lease on life.

"If I'm careful with the diet, careful with the stress - not too much communication work - I'll be alright. They said I'll live a long long time," he said with a smile.

Much of the struggle was also psychological. "There's a part there where I had to confront myself. I was on my third go at two subjects - and they were the last two subjects of the degree. If I wasn't going to pass those subjects, that was it, I was out of the programme for good."

The Glen Innes man got through with the aid of his tutors, but for a while, he said tertiary study took him out of his comfort zone.

"When you're brought up in a different context, you're always looking out for safety. And it's not the safest place to be."

But having done it now, Mr Ikilei has caught the learning bug and is pursuing a second degree, this time in business. "So I'll graduate again next year, at the end of the year."

He believes in the power of a good education. "I believe that you can live in Glen Innes, at the bottom of Pt England Rd, and you still can become very wealthy, if you try and harness the current system around you ... You don't have to shift anywhere. You don't have to travel overseas just to get a better paid job. You can do it right where you live."