'I just fell in love with it': How a Syrian refugee is finally fulfilling her dentistry dream after swapping Damascus for Dundee

However, just as she neared the end of her final year of schooling, her ambitions were thrown into jeopardy when her family decided to escape the conflict that had ravaged her homeland for several years.

The student, by now 17, brought her school books with her to try to continue her studies when she swapped Damascus for Dundee in 2017, although she knew the Scottish education system would be dramatically different.

The destination had been determined by the Council for At-Risk Academics, who had found her father, a statistician, a research opportunity at Abertay University.

The stay was supposed to be temporary, but Mrs Abdullah quickly realised she would not be returning to Syria, which was in the grip of a brutal civil war involving the likes of Islamic State and al-Qaeda.

"My sister at that time was seven-years-old and she had never been in a place where there was no war. And when she came here, she said, ‘I can’t believe there is a place where there are no bombs and no explosions’,” Mrs Abdullah told The Scotsman.

"She was so surprised, and I just felt the same as well. I said, ‘actually I’ve lived in the war since I was 10’. The amount of stress that puts on us, the amount of danger on every singe person.

"I just came here and I thought, ‘I don’t think it’s safe to go back’. I was literally crying to my parents, saying ‘if you want to go back, you go back – I’m not going back’.

"I came here and I discovered it’s so much safer. There is so much potential to do things here, and I decided I really, really didn’t want to go back and live the situation that I had.”

Mrs Abdullah travelled alone to London to claim asylum, and faced a difficult transition to life in Scotland, not least because her brother was forced to remain in Syria, because he was over 18 at the time she left, with her parents and sister.

“I felt guilty for being happy here because of my brother. We were really close. It was a really difficult challenge,” she said.

Another challenge was finding a way to rekindle her hopes of becoming a dentist. She asked for help at St John's RC High School in Dundee, where she was able to sit five crash Highers and one A Level. She got four A grades and two at B.

"I always wanted to be a dentist when I was younger. Since I was 14 I would say. And then when I came to the UK I was like, ‘what if I can’t get into dentistry?’ Mrs Abdullah said.

"On the first day of school, the first thing I asked was, ‘who can help me get into dentistry?’

"There were people in the year above me who said there is a programme called Reach, so that is when I got into contact with Reach.”

Reach is a scheme backed by the Scottish Funding Council as part of efforts to “widen access” to higher education to more state school youngsters who face additional challenges, such as coming from low income families, being estranged from their family, being care experienced, or being an asylum seeker.

"They literally held my hand along the way. From August to October, I was going to events with Reach, with my guidance teacher from school, and I started to fill out my UCAS application,” said Mrs Abdullah.

"My personal statement, again I didn’t know anything about a personal statement, but there were volunteers from Reach that help you out, as well as with mock exams, interview skills, work experience, because I didn’t have any of that.”

Her determination to become a dentist only deepened after these work experience placements. "I just fell in love with it. It had everything I wanted,” she said.

Mrs Abdullah had five offers, but had her heart set on studying dentistry at Dundee University.

“I really wanted to get into dentistry at Dundee. I wanted to stay with my family. We didn’t want to be separated throughout the war, imagine coming to the UK and then getting separated because of university. It would just be a bit of a shame,” she said.

Now 24, she is about to complete her fourth year of the degree, with one more remaining, after which she hopes to stay in Dundee.

Mrs Abdullah is part of Universities Scotland’s new “40 Faces” campaign, which highlights the way widening access initiatives help students like her into higher education via non-traditional routes.

“I think widening access was one of the main reasons I actually managed to get into dentistry,” she said."It paves the way basically. If it wasn’t for widening access, and I’d applied through the normal route, I wouldn’t have gotten accepted – not because my lack of abilities, but because I do have a different background and a different situation.

"It’s nice that they actually took that into consideration. They took that into account. Because not everyone is the same. Not everyone has gone through the same situations, and everyone has got different experiences and abilities from their background.

"There are very intelligent people out there who have not gone through the usual Scottish education system, and they just want a chance.”