Sue left school at 15, afraid of taking exams and due to take GCEs, so she began working in a shop. Sue worked in a variety of jobs until she was 24 when she learned to become a belly dancer. The work was fun and took her all over the country, the world and on TV.
Work began to die down a little in the 90s, so she started to dance and meet and greet with her snakes at various corporate events. Sue also attended the same types of functions as a Tarot Readers and Snake Oracles. Learning to diversify when self employed is a key skill.
Sue's first two snakes were corn snakes purchased in 1992 as pets. To learn how to best care for them, she joined a reptile club and then began rescuing more of them in 1996 when it became obvious that there were very few rescue facilities for these particular types of animals. Certain reptiles can live 20 years or more and people are not often able to keep them for all their lives.
When Sue was asked to attend a local children’s’ club with some of the snakes, it went extremely well. As there is no available funding for animal rescue of this kind, apart from private donations, she saw this as an opportunity not only to create an income to care for them but also as an educational, science project for all age groups. Sue has been featured on TV numerous occasions promoting education about these slippery customers.
So few people know anything about snakes that it has become a passion of Sue' to teach and relieve people of their fears and phobias: Sue usually has 60 to 70 snakes to care for at any one time and many volunteers come to the rescue facility to help for work experience. For a whole school day attending approx 6 classes Sue would bring 12 to 16 snakes; snakes become hot and tired with too much handling so we need to swap them around.
"Snakey Sue visited my school on Tuesday morning (5.2.2013) as part of our celebrations of the Chinese New Year of the Snake. She visited all our key stage 2 classes and encountered some children with a snake phobia! However, 100% of the children said they had completely changed their views on snakes during the time they handled Sue's gorgeous reptiles. Some even talked about contacting her to get a snake of their own. Sue is so knowledgeable, so calm and so passionate about snakes that this immediately puts everyone at ease. So when they finally get to meet the snakes and hold them, the children end up loving them and feeling just as comfortable as Sue does. It's an amazing experience to actually witness opinions and fears be challenged and changed. Sue is a unique woman with a rare gift of being able to quickly ease and enable children to change long-held fears and develop a love for these misunderstood creatures. We had a brilliant morning with Sue and the kids can't wait to have her back in school." John Harold, Headmaster
"Thank you for spending time with us. Your visit enriched our curiculum theme ten fold. We were inspired to make our own snakes out of clay and dough. We found pictures from home and brought them in to share with our friends and we were able to increase our vocabulary considerably by learning lots of new 'snakey' words. It was a real treat being able to raise the children's awareness of snakes by having such a hands on experience with these wonderful, gentle creatures. I cannot recommend you too highly. I felt you pitched your display perfectly for our age groups, and as such, it was a fantastic learning opportunity that we fully intend to repeat at a later date. I only hope other schools and nurseries are fortunate enought to share a visit from 'Snakey Sue'. Fantastic!" Lynda MacPherson, Manager of Stepping Stones Pre-School
"I would just just like to thank you for the wonderful presentations that you put on for the children. They are still buzzing about snakes days later. Several children want snakes as pets now so I don't know what we have started. However the experience was really valuable for the children (and some staff) as your visit has dispelled some of the myths about snakes. The children also remembered a lot of what you told them. We currently have a teaching student in the school who was really impressed and asked for your contact details so you may get some more business from this visit from his new school. I will certainly recommend you to teaching colleagues in other schools." Carol Miles, Science Coordinator
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