Former Scots All Saints College student Stella Gavey, who graduated from the Bathurst school at the end of 2020, moved to the United Kingdom in January to work as a gap assistant in a Scottish school.

The coronavirus statistics in Australia pales in comparison to those in Scotland, with over 194,000 cases confirmed since the start of the pandemic and 1,121 new cases confirmed on February 17, with over four million cases in all of the United Kingdom and 12,717 new cases confirmed on February 17.

But even with Scotland being in lockdown for over a month now, Ms Gavey said people aren't overly concerned about the pandemic.

READ MORE:

"It is a lot more chill for lack of a better word. People seem a lot less concerned," she said.

"Though it is still in a very strict lockdown, with supermarkets the only things really open."

Having lived on a small farm outside of Bathurst, the coronavirus was rarely a threat for Ms Gavey, so it made for a shock when she landed in a country that has been so heavily affected by the pandemic.

"The pandemic I have found I haven't been very affected," she said.

"I'm very fortunate to have lived on a lovely farm in Australia and I am very much a home body so it was the perfect excuse one might say to stay home.

"So being perfectly honest, I had almost forgotten about [the pandemic] when I was in Australia, so coming over to a country that had been so heavily affected was a bit of a shock."

Ms Gavey said it was always the plan to head overseas for a gap year.

"I was looking far a change of scenery and was unsure as to what direction I wanted to take in life," she said.

"A year abroad seemed the best option despite the circumstances as it had always been my intention to head over to the UK."

Ms Gavey is currently working at Cargilfield School, a boarding and day prep school located on the outskirts of the Scottish capital Edinburgh, where there's also a number of other Australians doing a similar job to her.

She plans to return home at the end of the year.

"I plan to head home in December. I am hoping by then it will be a bit more settled in regards to flights and such," she said.

Prior to the pandemic, there was an estimated one million Australians living and working overseas but Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) statistics indicate that 389,000 Australians have returned home since the borders closed in March last year.