Alison Brice left South Wilts in 1979 and is now a barrister in London, practising in family law. She says the useful part of school was not the debating society, which she avoided, but a fourth-form history teacher who would not accept an answer without a reason attached to it.

"I was told, more than once, that 'because it obviously is' was not an argument," she says. "Twenty-five years later I am paid to notice when the other side has done exactly that. It is the same skill. Nobody tells you at sixteen that the thing you find annoying is the thing you will make a living from."

She mentors leavers considering law and is candid about the parts of it that are not in the prospectus - the hours, the money at the start, and how much of the work is listening rather than speaking. Her profile is in the alumni directory, and she takes questions from current sixth formers as well as leavers.