Avril Emslie was educated at the High School for Girls, from 1945 until1953, when she left to attend Bedford College, at the University of London. In 1956 she gained a special BSc in Mathematics.

However, it wasn't until ten years later that she joined the staff of the South Shields Grammar-Technical School for Boys, when the first school computer in the area was installed (and only the second to be installed in a school in the UK). She taught computer programming until her departure in 1970.