A MUM from West Dorset has beaten the odds to graduate with an Open University degree today - 16 years after she started.

Fiona Baker, 53, of Woodsford, near Dorchester, will be awarded a Bachelor of Sciences open degree at a ceremony at Portsmouth Guildhall.

Ms Baker's degree has survived divorce, a seven-year gap after her son Mike suffered severe head injuries after being hit by a car, and the death of her father during the final year of the course.

She said: "I honestly wanted to give up after dad died but my family, friends and tutor all encouraged me to continue and I passed my course with 75 per cent - a few marks short of a distinction."

Ms Baker started Open University (OU) with a social sciences foundation course in 1990.

Following her marriage break-up, she began an arts foundation course and one in educational issues in 1993, but found it too much while looking after her four children and working part-time as a teaching assistant.

She said: "I really enjoyed it, but I decided to have a year off and it was that year Mike was injured."

Mike, 28, was hit by a car 10 years ago when he was walking home from college.

Ms Baker said: "I had to care for him constantly at first, but now it's a case of letting him know where we are and encouraging him to do as much for himself as possible."

In 2003, she returned to OU while working as Mike's full-time voluntary carer, and gained a diploma in European humanities by studying in the early mornings and late evenings.

She continued studying health and social welfare, health and diseases but, in her final year of the degree, her father Brian Irving, of Dorchester, died at the age of 76.

Ms Baker said it was a really big decision to go back but after persuasion from friends and her tutor she thought Blow it, I'll do it'.

The overall degree is called Bachelor of Science Open because it combines history, technology, social sciences and social welfare. Ms Baker said her achievement would only sink in at the ceremony.

She said: "My eldest, Marie, has done a degree at university as well as at OU and she said OU was much harder because you're working at the same time. She keeps saying it is a real achievement, not just a piece of paper." Her children Lin, 18, Pete, 23, and Mike and Marie, 31, will try to attend the graduation ceremony but if Mike cannot make the long journey, someone will stay behind to be with him.She said the OU has been supportive throughout and provided disabled parking for them at the ceremony. Someone once described Ms Baker as an eternal student, and she is happy to admit it is true.She said: "The future depends on Mike and how well he becomes. If I continue as his carer fair enough, but if I'm able to enter the job market I will have the necessary skills. "I'm taking a break now, but I've seen a creative writing course that looks very interesting."