'Issues are the same whether dealing with three-year-olds or 33-year-olds'

Caroline Gipps will bring an eclectic range of experience to the role of vice-chancellor of Wolverhampton

Caroline Gipps says she never aspired to a role in university management. "I thought professor would do for me. But I would always find myself in a particular situation, see an opportunity and go for it." The latest opportunity is to become vice-chancellor at Wolverhampton University in the autumn.

While training as a primary schoolteacher, she cherished hopes of moving into education psychology but was told, at the age of 22, that she did not have enough experience to do a masters degree.

A chance meeting with the director of the National Foundation for Educational Research led to a career in research. "He said the NFER needed people with social sciences degrees and experience in teaching. I thought, 'That's for me'."

Later, a spell as a graduate assistant at the University of British Columbia in Canada gave her the opportunity to complete a PhD in education psychology. She returned to the UK and got a research post at the Institute of Education in London. She stayed there for 19 years, becoming professor of education, then dean of research. She moved to Kingston University as deputy vice-chancellor in 1999.

All this experience, she says, has given her "a fairly unusual understanding of the education system across a broad range". It should stand her in good stead leading Wolverhampton, with its strong widening access agenda. "When you look closely at aspects of education such as learning, motivation to learn and testing, the issues are the same whether you are dealing with three-year-olds or 33-year-olds."