Once met, never forgotten - that's Tracey Burch-Moore. Blessed with a bubbling personality, and enough drive for two, this extroverted daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Reginald Burrows has never been one to let grass grow under her feet. In her forty-one years she has experienced and enjoyed more than some people do in a lifetime, and she's nowhere near done yet. In fact, she has recently gone back to college.

It takes a courageous woman to leave behind everything she holds dear - her homeland, her family and friends, and a regular income - to become a mature student in another country, and Ms Burch-Moore freely admits that initially she did so with trepidation. Nonetheless, like all goal-oriented people she has kept her eyes firmly on the future and her long-held goal to return to diagnostic medicine. Given some of the jobs she has held, this may seem an unusually serious choice, but Ms Burch-Moore has always had an affinity for medicine.

"As a child I was very sickly and was always in the hospital, and every single thing to do with it fascinated me. I always wanted to see and look. It was just something that was in me," she says.

Educated at Francis Patton School and Berkeley Institute, Ms Burch-Moore then went on to high school in the United States. Following her graduation at age 18, she embarked on a multi-cultural career internship programme in Washington, DC which combined academic studies with hands-on experience, and gave her a clear idea of what she wanted to do. Appropriately, she focussed on biology because it allowed her to "shadow" X-ray technicians in major hospitals in the afternoons. This led to Ms Burch-Moore entering the radiologic technology programme at Clara Maass Medical Centre in Belleville, New Jersey, from which she graduated two years later as a qualified X-ray technician. Atlanta was the next port of call, where she worked for one of six oncologists in a busy outpatient chemotherapy clinic. Twelve years of dealing with cancer patients eventually took an emotional toll, so Ms Burch-Moore decided to come home, and for eighteen months ran the Bermuda Healthcare Services.

"Then I thought, `That's enough of the medical profession for a while', but in the back of my mind I was always thinking, `I've got to get back to school'," she says. Her goal was to complete her Bachelor of Science degree, but first she had to earn the money to pay for her studies. What better place to start than Front Street? Hired by Mr. Thomas Dickinson of Astwood-Dickinson with only her love of jewellery as a "qualification", like the merchandise she sparkled so brightly that, after just one year, she was given a new branch to manage.

"I opened their store in H.A.& E. Smith Ltd., which meant doing everything including sitting on the floor assembling the showcases with Mr. Dickinson's daughter," she says. "Then they gave me a new challenge; to turn the Walker Arcade store into a little jewellery boutique. I had just two weeks to cosmetically change the store, stock it with approximately 5,000 pieces of jewellery, and staff it. I learned everything as I went along, but Mr. Dickinson saw that I was interested, and I loved the whole deal, including Mr. Dickinson, the staff, and the customers."

When Ms Burch-Moore left, it was with tears and Mr. Dickinson's blessing, because she and her sister Trina (now Government protocol officer) decided to try running a restaurant.

"I was still thinking `school' but since we wanted to run our own business, I figured the time was now so that I didn't have any regrets in future about what I really wanted to do," she says.

As the proprietors of the restaurant at Port Royal Golf Club, they "worked their butts off", as she puts it, for up to sixteen hours a day seven days a week, but no matter how hard the sisters tried, it was not profitable enough to continue, so they gave up the concession. Nonetheless, Ms Burch-Moore remains upbeat about the venture. "Owning my own business was one of the best experiences I could ever have had. I've never worked so hard in my life, but I learned, and knowledge is power," she says.

"After that I made up my mind I was definitely going back to school to finish my BSc, but again I needed to earn the money, so I was re-hired by Mr. Dickinson as a sales associate five days a week, and I bartended three nights at week at the Ocean View Golf Club restaurant, `Last Tee'. In fact, Freda Samuels and her daughter Andrea are wonderful people who have kept in touch with me while I am studying, and I still bartend if they need me to fill in."

Meanwhile, Tracey Burch-Moore is finally achieving her dream. In January she enrolled in Hillborough Community College in Tampa, Florida as a mature student, where she spends her days and nights studying, and has little time to relax. Being older and wiser than her young fellow students, she eschews the partying and carousing scene in favour of turning in her assignments in good time.

"I tell the kids I did what they're doing already. Now I want to do things right, to the best of my ability, and have plenty of time to do them, because I want to get the best grade possible," Ms Burch-Moore says.

By no means the only mature student in her class, with her outgoing personality she interacts happily with all ages, and is loving every minute of her decision. She admits, however, that while she always knew in her mind what she ultimately wanted to do, she had very mixed feelings when the time came to leave Bermuda.

"I was frightened because my heart wanted this but I wasn't sure if my mind would catch up, and the thought of leaving behind my wonderful parents and sister Trina, who is the love of my life, was hard. You are leaving the security of everything behind. It is a wild feeling, strange and intoxicating all at the same time."

Helping to smooth the transition, however, has been her childhood friend and Department of Tourism employee, Marshalle Smith, who works out of its Atlanta office and travels extensively. She also has a satellite office in her Tampa home, and invited Ms Burch-Moore to move in with her, which is proving to be a perfect arrangement.

"It gave me direction in the beginning, and it is wonderful because I take care of her home and her dog Toozie, who is `auntie's' little girl and just beautiful," the mature student says.

It helps too that there are a number of Bermudians in Tampa who give her inspiration. One couple, Nancy and Llewellyn Trott, and their child also left everything behind here to further their education abroad. Mrs.Trott has completed her Bachelor's degree, and her husband is now embarking on his master's degree. It is stories such as these which spur Ms Burch-Moore on. So far, she is doing well - she had a B grade at the end of her first semester - and is facing her new challenges with confidence.

"You can't control life's ups and downs, whereas school is pressure and you can control it. I tell myself, `I am here for a purpose, to do something positive. I busted my butt to go back to school so I am not going to mess it up'. As a mature student, this is a whole new life, and a whole new challenge, and it is opening up a whole new world to me."

After so many years out of the classroom, Ms Burch-Moore is excited about her B grade at the end of her first semester, and can't wait to crack the books again after the summer break. Meanwhile, she is revelling in her temporary position in Central Filing at the King Edward Hospital's radiology department.

"I think it is the most wonderful thing I could have done," she enthuses. "In layman's terms it is an X-ray film department, where all the X-rays are kept. Everything is in numerical order and every patient has his or her own bar code. It is a very efficient system, and I work with some really wonderful people there. It is the greatest job I could ever have. My colleagues work very hard and they never stop. We play music all day, and we really enjoy our work."

In two years' time, when her degree is completed, Ms Burch-Moore aims to return home to what she hopes will be a position in the hospital's forthcoming MRI department, or else working in diagnostic medicine. Only then will her dream be complete.

Central Filing is holding an open house at the hospital on Friday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. All are welcome. For further information ( 236-2345.