COMPLETING one's university degree is always a cause for celebration, but a Middlesex University student has a better excuse than most to crack open the champagne after passing his final exams a grand total of 26 years after enrolling.

Steven Coles was a fresh-faced 18-year-old when, in 1979, he began his first year of a BA Honours in Theatre with Performing Arts at Middlesex University's Trent Park campus, Cockfosters.

But he soon found the 180-mile commute from his Exeter home rather tiresome. He also objected to the number of essays he had to do and longed for the chance to do more dancing.

"I commuted from Exeter, so would leave at four in the morning for a 9am lecture," he said.

"It made me roll my eyes at students who lived in flats across the road but still managed to stumble in late. However, I wasn't perfect when I was 18. I moved into my girlfriend's room in halls of residence, which was completely against every regulation, but people kindly turned a blind eye.

"Performing arts was still an unusual thing to study back then and it wasn't so much like Fame the Musical as bohemian and alternative; very experimental and adventurous."

Sick of the essay-writing, he left Middlesex and enrolled at the London Contemporary Dance School, near Euston. A career in dance and acting followed. Later he took to visiting schools teaching drama, and, finding he rather enjoyed it, decided to go into teaching.

He said: "I decided my days of treading the boards were over. I enjoyed working with students when we were touring and I thought secondary school teaching would enable me to be based in Exeter where I have my family."

First, however, he needed to finish his degree, so he enrolled at a Middlesex University-accredited course at North Hertfordshire College, in Stevenage.

"Very nice symmetry," was how he described finishing his degree 26 years after starting it.

In September, he will take up a place on a teaching course in Plymouth. The course is supposed to last one year but, you never know.