In Egypt, during her early teens, El-Attar was two years ahead of her classmates and was set to start university at 16. But her arrival in Britain changed all that. Although as of 2018 El-Attar was studying for her Master's degree in engineering at Cardiff University, she herself was denied the chance to study at university during the years she was applying for asylum, according to nationwide university policy, which treated asylum seekers as international students, subject to vastly higher fees, while at the same time forbidding them to work.[1] This effectively barred her and other of the most vulnerable prospective students.