My final semester and module variety

This week marks the beginning of my final semester at the University of Southampton. In my third year I no longer have any compulsory modules and have been lucky enough to choose modules that best suit my interests. This new semester includes an applied plant biology module, a module with a focus on the relationship between ecology and evolution and a module on how current global issues such as climate change impact biological systems. In addition to these three modules, I’m also continuing work on my third year project in which I’ve been looking at both phenotypic and genetic aspects of stomatal patterning in Poplar, a forest tree seen as having a large potential as a more sustainable feedstock for biofuels.

Now that exams have officially ended, I’ve also had more time to catch up with my housemates (everyone has been pretty busy with exams ever since we came back after the Christmas break). I’ve known my housemates since my first year at the University and have mentioned them a few times in previous posts. So, I thought that it may be interesting for you to read a little bit about what some of them are doing in their final semesters and what life at Southampton is like for students on other courses!

One of my housemates who is studying Audiology at Southampton has recently begun her placement. She’s been gaining practical work experience such as testing patients’ hearing and fitting them with hearing aids and has been practising skills that she learnt over the past couple of years during her course.

Another one of my housemates who is in her third year of studying the University of Southampton’s Geology course has recently handed in a large mapping project which equates to two modules worth of credits (similar to the weight of my third year project). Over the summer, she and others from her course spent about six weeks in Petrich, Bulgaria where they needed to map the area for each of their projects. Other areas where students could chose to go to and map in included Oban in Scotland, Skye in Northern Scotland, Spain and Romania.

During her time in Bulgaria she and the other students who chose to map in that area also had the opportunity to visit two copper mines which she said was both really interesting and useful for their projects. They stayed in the village houses owned by the locals who knew very little English, so she said they quickly picked up simple Bulgarian phrases in order to communicate with their hosts. They also adapted to local ways of living during their stay, including their diets (which was mainly meat-based), and learnt a bit about their local traditions and habits. It sounds like an amazing experience abroad, and it must feel really good to now have finished and handed in such a large project! It's one of the many chances students get to study abroad at Southampton.

A photo of my housemate which was taken in their mapping area. 

I’m a little envious of her trip to Bulgaria but I was also lucky enough to travel over the summer when I went to Italy to collect part of the data for my third year project.

Anyway, on a separate note, with the new semester beginning, my course mate and I attended our first Chinese kickboxing class this week which we really enjoyed. It’s fun trying something new and with this being our last semester it’s great to take the opportunity. I’m not going to lie, we both have a lot of room for improvement (we are both total beginners!) but I’m excited to see how we’ll improve our strength and coordination over the term.

Lastly, to current students at the University of Southampton, I thought I’d also mention that the University is in the process of looking for another blogger to join the team! More details can be found on the University’s blog. It’s a great opportunity to earn a little bit of extra money, gain employed writing experience and enhance your CV! Why not give it a go?

Kristin

Starting a new semester

Log in to SUSSED > Online Timetable > View as Grid. This is a process that every student has been doing over the weekend, and will continue to do throughout the week, leading to even the most seasoned fourth year students asking with some degree of perplexity “Where is Building 34?” Yes, it is the start of Semester Two and I am pleased to say that all three of my exams went well! It is always such a great feeling when you walk out of the room after your final exam, because you come to realise that you don’t actually have any work to do, - perhaps to put it better, there is no urgent need to do any work!

Naturally I tried to make the most of my three-and-a-half days between my final exam and the start of Semester Two. In the evening after the exam I joined a couple of friends and went out to nightclub to celebrate our new found freedom. As you can expect the venue was packed, which helped make the dance floor very toasty; a stark contrast with the sub-zero temperatures outside. I don’t think I’ve ever danced wearing three layers and gloves before!

The next day I caught a train from the nearby Southampton Airport (Parkway) station to go and visit my girlfriend. I stayed at her house over the weekend and used the time to catch up and watch movies. We went to see the film documenting the life of Stephen Hawking, called The Theory of Everything. After completing my Cosmology module last semester, it was great to watch the history of one of the most important Physicists in the field, even though the film focused more on his personal life than his academic achievements.

The weekend flew by and now it’s time to turn my attention back to work. Fortunately, I do now know where Building 34 is (it is in fact the Education building, which is nestled to the side of the Hartley Library on Highfield Campus). This is where my first lecture of the new semester is, which will be for my Synoptic module. It’s going to be a tough challenge, as the course syllabus consists of every compulsory Physics module I have taken since first year! That’s thirteen modules worth of Physics squeezed into one!

In addition to the Synoptic Module I am also taking two optional modules, whilst trying to complete my Master’s Project that I started at the beginning of last semester. The next four months are going to be very busy indeed! One of the optional modules is entitled Space Plasma Physics, which focuses on the interaction of the Solar Wind and Earth, which was the topic that I wrote my dissertation on last year. The other option module focuses on Nanotechnology and is jointly run by both the Physics and Chemistry departments. I haven’t done Chemistry since A Level, but the course is designed for both Physicists and Chemists to attend, so I’m looking forward to starting it and trying something new!

It is amazing how just a few days off can refresh you; after spending a weekend relaxing I’m now ready and eager to get on with Semester Two – the final one of my University career! Here’s to another great semester.

James

Unlocking creativity

As the youngest of four children, I can remember growing up and watching my siblings go through the various stages of education, each time thinking that it’d never happen to me: GCSEs, A Levels, University and then employment all came and went, and at each stage, I watched them tackle all the resulting challenges, safe in the assumption that my turn would never come around. But a few days before my final semester at the University of Southampton begins, it’s a bizarre feeling to know that, for me, this really is the final stretch before it’s time to once again move on!

Yes, as I wrote recently, the past couple of weeks have been spent not only cramming in as much work on the Group Design Project (the Masters equivalent of a group dissertation in Software Engineering) as physically possible, but also career planning for the months - and potentially years - ahead.

Thanks to the excellent opportunities on offer through the University’s Career Destinations, ECS Careers Hub and a few other online directories, I’m glad to say that the search has been relatively fruitful so far. Indeed, thanks to the (probably excessive, according to my Mum!) number of extra-curricular activities I’ve undertaken, I’ve managed to identify several areas I’d like to work in, so now it’s just a case of applying and seeing what happens.

One such avenue which I’ve been looking into is that of the creative industries, for example forms of media, journalism and (surprise, surprise!) the arts, with an emphasis on drama. Something which I’ve identified over the course of my University career is that, for me, there’s simply no greater feeling in the world than that of having an idea, noting it down, and seeing it grow into something even bigger – it’s probably the most satisfying thing in the world, even if it doesn’t always come off!

It’s that sense of creativity which has driven my ambition and personal rationale since I encountered so many theatrical and media-based opportunities upon arriving at Southampton three years ago, as well as the many I’ve since come across during my course. My highest-scoring module to date was the brilliant ‘Human-Computer Interaction’ module in my second year, during which we studied various ways we could design computer applications and hardware to achieve certain objectives, making sure they would not only be fun and natural to use, but also powerful enough to make them stand out as products.

Our coursework assignment, to design a survey creation tool, started as a sketch on a notepad for me. A few days later, the mind maps were drawn all over any piece of paper I could find on my desk – the backs of envelopes, rough paper, and even in a notebook from time to time! A few months on from that and a report full of far too many different designs and ‘wireframes’ (sketches of application interfaces) for ‘QuestionBat’ was written, one of the most challenging and enjoyable coursework assignments I’ve had in my time here which really inspired my imagination.

An excerpt from my design document for the fictional survey website ‘QuestionBat’, one of the most enjoyable assignments of my time here!

Plus, it not only design modules which give you an opportunity to show off creative flair in Software Engineering, but even the more scientific, programming-based ones too. In first year, I was tasked with building a Crossword Generator application which might be used to produce them on a daily basis for newspapers, for example, which was in itself a great challenge and required great analysis of their mechanics, so there was many a crossword to be solved along the way (a guilty procrastinating pleasure of mine)!

Likewise, my Third Year Project granted me the opportunity to apply computer-based video analysis techniques to footage of theatrical shows which our Performing Arts societies put on here. This was not only a great way of applying my degree and personal research to the extra-curricular passions I’ve developed in Southampton, but was also a great excuse to watch loads of theatrical shows and not feel guilty about it – I could always claim it was research, after all!

The Creative Industries also introduced me to some of the best people I’m lucky enough to know – there’s nothing quite like it!

That’s not to mention specific events that the Students’ Union lays on, for example the Creative Industries Zone training at the beginning of the year, and the Careers Season at the beginning of last month, where experts from all branches of the field were invited to talk to us.

There’s loads of more ways that I’ve been able to try to harness this creative streak, from deriving ideas for theatrical shows and setting them on their way, to writing for publications like the Soton Tab (the Union’s entertainment magazine, The Edge, is next on the bucket list!), and even taking part in co-hosting student radio shows on Surge Radio (such as the ‘Performing Arts Show’ every Monday!) and filming with the Union’s television station, SUSUtv.

A small taste of the celebrity lifestyle, perhaps – but it’s a taste I’ve begun to aspire to making a regular occurrence, if my career one day allows it!

Robin

End of exams and exploring Southampton

I’m very happy to say that I have now finished all of my Semester One exams! As a mini break before Semester Two begins (and before I get back into lab work for my Third Year Project) my coursemate and I decided to spend a little time checking out a couple of the things the city of Southampton has to offer. As James mentioned in his last post, there are a lot of things I’d still like to see and do while living in Southampton. University life keeps you pretty busy, especially with so many societies and events on campus to get involved in (not to mention coursework, extra seminars and exams!).

In addition, my family have finalised their decision to move back to Australia, which has left me wondering if I would also like to move back Down Under (it’s been about eight years since I was last in Australia so this could be an exciting new adventure!). With this in mind, and with the realisation that my last semester at the University of Southampton is about to begin, I hope to take the opportunity to see more of what’s within the city while I’m still here.

One of the things my friend and I wanted to check out was the Civic Centre. We have both passed the building countless times but have never taken the time to see what was inside. We discovered it housed the Central Library in addition to the Southampton City Art Gallery, O2 Guildhall and Sea City Museum. Admission was free to the Art Gallery so we decided to take a look around…

Outside the Civic Centre building. 

Inside the Southampton City Art Gallery. 

It feels good knowing a little bit more about what’s in the city and its always fun to go exploring (especially after being glued to my desk for the past couple of weeks). We also wanted to eat out somewhere new to celebrate exams being over and opted for a vegetarian buffet restaurant which was recommended by the University’s Vegan and Vegetarian Society in one of their recent emails.

Our delicious vegetarian lunch! 

As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve managed to convert a couple of my housemates into eating a vegetarian diet. After studying for my exams, one of which had large focus on food security and the other on conservation, I’m even more aware about the importance of making more sustainable changes to our lifestyles.

One positive of finishing exams early in the second exam week is having some extra time to relax, recover from the intense revision period and start preparing for Semester Two. My friend is lucky enough to be heading home for a few days – however, I’ll be getting straight back into lab work for my Third Year Project. I’m happy to have had at least one day’s break in between and am looking forward to making some more progress with my project as well as learning some new lab skills. Our Third Year Projects aren’t due until the end of April, but I’m realising more and more how extremely fast time is flying by!

I hope time won’t pass all too quickly and that in addition to learning as much as I can in my last semester, I can find the time to see more of Southampton and the surrounding areas while I’m still in the UK.

Kristin

Making the most of 2015

It is now the end of the first week of exams and many people are finding that their workloads are diminishing and that the end is very much in sight! As I mentioned in my last blog post, my three exams this January are all in the second week of exams, so I’m still squeezing three module’s worth of revision in each day! Despite this, I’m pleased to say that revision is going well and I feel on top of all of my modules, even the Cosmology module that I’m taking.

On top of revision I have also started thinking about the year ahead. Not only have I started applying to the schemes that I’m interested in, but I have been thinking about the modules I’m taking next semester (which is only a week away!) and also what places and experiences that Southampton has to offer that I’m yet to say I’ve done. These thoughts were brought on by the sudden realisation that as 2014 transformed into 2015, this really is the final furlong of my University experience.

Throughout my four years in Southampton I have tried to immerse myself in as many different experiences as possible, so that when I do finally wave goodbye to the University in the summer, I can look back with no regrets. I came to the University with this motto in mind, allowing anyone at the Bunfight to persuade me to join their society.

I have found over my time here that I engaged the most with sports clubs, finding my way into the Southampton University Tchoukball team (a bizarre Swiss ball sport) in first year, before switching to Handball and finally joining the Physics Badminton team, in addition to trying out Ultimate Frisbee and Dodgeball along the way. Outside of sporting activities, I got involved with the Feminist Society, helped affiliate the Fancy Dress Society and this year joined the Art Society, so it’s fair to say that I have made the most out of the many different societies available at Southampton!

However, there are still several things that I would like to do and places I’d like to go; not in the form of societies, but in terms of places. At the end of the summer term last year I finally walked Southampton’s old town walls, which combine some great views with interesting history and architecture. However, I haven’t really seen too much of the old town within the walls, so I would like to take a proper look around and maybe visit some of the traditional pubs along the way!

View from the walls - it’s strange to think that this all used to be sea before the docks were built! 

There are also several music venues that I’m yet to visit, and with a constant stream of great bands gracing the city, I’m sure I will be able to find an excuse to step instead. The same can be said about the many unique restaurants that Southampton has to offer, from exciting Mexican spots to burger joints, there are still many I’m yet to try. One such eatery is the newly stylised Bar Three Diner in the Students’ Union, which was recently redecorated to resemble a 1950s American Diner with a menu to make anyone salivate! This is also the home to the Braveheart food challenge which has already reached levels of infamy across campus - part of me really wants to give it a go!

 SUSU's Bar Three Diner (Image courtesy of the University of Southampton)

Perhaps the single most important goal for me in 2015 is to simply enjoy my final few months in Southampton and to leave knowing that I’ve made the most of my time at University.

James

Heads down...

It’s been an eventful first week (as ever!) of term at the University of Southampton, with revision sessions aplenty, many a trip to the Hartley Library undertaken and, unfortunately, an overwhelming battle to fight procrastination (in all of its forms!) fought vigorously. When doing the entire house’s washing-up seems a lot more appealing than twenty minutes of note-taking, you know it can only be exam season!

It’s curious to know that this is probably the final time that I’ll be faced with the annual January exam spell, during which time spent watching way too much television over Christmas is regretted, coursework results are anxiously anticipated, and the number of slides to memorise seems insurmountable in the amount of time left. But, as James has written before me, everyone in and around campus understands that this is crunch time and is going through the same thing, be you a Fresher to a Fourth Year, so after lots of practice with January exams beforehand, you find that we all have our own way of knuckling down and making it happen!

This time around I’m quite lucky in that the modules I selected for semester one of the Masters year have been mostly assessed through coursework assignments carried out before the Christmas holidays, meaning I’ve only the one exam to take on (and in a topic I quite enjoy!). In fact, at the time of writing, I’ve somehow already finished for the semester, which is an odd feeling!

It’s a vast contrast to my previous years here in which the mathematical, scientific and practical nature of the Software Engineering degree subject matter has involved four or five exams about this time, although this naturally meant I had less by way of coursework beforehand! I guess it demonstrates the way that, across the duration of a University degree programme, you’re slowly but surely eased into the more professional practice of independent working and assessment, preparing yourself for the working world, with your marks gradually coming to rely more and more on your self-motivation and drive - a different sort of challenge altogether, particularly when there’s so much washing-up to be done…!

So although the past seven days have been spent making my way through numerous slideshows, textbooks, online resources and hastily scrawled lecture notes (complete with the occasional doodle here and there!), I’m very much looking forward to being able to relax slightly over the next fortnight or so while the semester winds down.

I will, of course, be chipping away at the remaining workload of the Group Design Project (the deadline for which, as I wrote about last time, continues to draw nearer and nearer!), but thankfully it’ll be without much by way of other distractions – as pretty much everyone else I know will be contending with exams themselves!

It’s therefore one of the best periods of the year for crossing things off ‘To-Do’ lists, a chance which I’m keen to take advantage of as my list has only seemed to grow for me since the start of the year!

As well as working on the project, I’m hoping to further the work I’ve done with regards to careers planning, taking advantage of the time off to get my C.V. in check and updated with the plentiful events of the past year. In doing so, I hope to draw some of the skills from the many theatrical productions and other commitments, both academic and extra-curricular, that I’ve had the fortune to be involved with, which should hopefully give me a competitive edge in future applications.

I’m also hoping to use this time to get a bit of reading done, in keeping with my personal target of reading five books for pleasure (rather than for coursework!) by the end of the year, as well as practising my design skills, planning for a potential future production or two, and, of course, catching up on all that missed television over the past seven days. This includes our appearance as ‘Gone Rogue Productions’, performing a quite unique version of The Importance of Being Earnest at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, which was shown as part of BBC Two’s Great British Railway Journeys last week and is still available on iPlayer)!

We took a ‘selfie’ of every audience member playing Miss Prism that we had throughout the run – and this day’s was particularly special!

Having Michael Portillo and the BBC crew come to the (slightly different!) show last August was a truly unforgettable experience!

So after having my head down in the books this week, I’m looking forward to what promises to be a fantastic, enjoyable and hopefully productive fortnight ahead. After all, after just making what I’d like to claim, quite optimistically, as a BBC TV acting debut (albeit a thirty-second venture!), 2015 has already got off to an incredible start in Southampton, and I can’t wait to see what comes next!

And to anyone reading this still with exams to go, good luck – they’ll be over soon... and sorry!

Robin

Exam week begins!

I hope everyone had a lovely start to the New Year! I can’t believe it’s already 2015, but I’m excited to see what new adventures and experiences the year will bring; especially because this is the year I will be graduating from the University of Southampton and will soon need to decide on what to do afterwards!

I spent New Year’s Eve in Sweden at home with my Mum and sister. Normally I welcome the New Year with friends, however this year I decided to watch the fireworks with my family. As they are preparing to move back to Australia next month, I may not see them for at least seven months (maybe more depending on what I chose to do when I graduate), so I thought I should spend as much time with them as possible before flying back to the UK.

My sister and our dog on our last walk in the forest before I left to fly back to the UK. 

I’m now back in Southampton and have jumped straight back into finishing coursework, meeting deadlines and revising for upcoming exams. In fact, my first exam is tomorrow morning, so wish me luck! Earlier this week I had some coursework due including a poster answering the question “Intensive versus Extensive farming – which is better for the environment?” as well as an essay related to the question. I was very impressed by a number of the posters created by other Biology students on the module and this was also a good revision opportunity, seeing as the poster topics covered questions related to the course.

In my first and second year most of my assessed coursework was in the form of write-ups from laboratory practicals. In third year, we no longer have labs unless you have chosen a lab project for your third year project. Some projects require you to be in labs everyday - it varies a lot depending on the project you take on. Most of my assessed coursework this year has been in the form of essays related to topics covered in the module, or poster presentations which are good practice for when we will be presenting our third year projects in May. They’re also good for building important transferable skills to use in our course and when we graduate.

Coursework and revision have basically taken over my life since returning to the UK. We’ve decided to postpone our next Green Action event until after exams to allow everyone more time to focus on revision over the next couple of weeks, but we do have a lot of exciting things planned for this year!

Green Action committee during our last social before Christmas. 

In addition to Green Action I plan on joining Chinese Kickboxing society this semester. At the start of semester one I wrote about going to lots of different martial arts and self-defence taster sessions including Muay Thai, MMA, Kung Fu, Judo and more! Out of all of them my housemate and I probably enjoyed kickboxing the most, so we thought we should grab the opportunity to try it again while we’re still at university. We’re looking forward to starting weekly sessions once exams are over; it should be a great stress reliever during our last term.

So, with my first exam being tomorrow morning…I had better get back to work!

Kristin

My revision techniques

And then it was 2015! The Christmas holidays flew by for me, full of festive cheer, celebrations, family gatherings and horses dressed as reindeer, but now I’m back in Southampton and it’s time to turn all of my efforts towards the exam period ahead of me.

Before the Christmas break I wrote about how I had started to write my progress report that marks the half-way stage of my Physics Master’s project. Yesterday was the official deadline for it and I’m pleased to say that I handed it in several days before it was due, as I had completed the majority of it in the final week of the holidays. Whilst writing the report it was rewarding to see the different aspects of my project come together and amalgamate nicely in front of my eyes. It’s a massive relief to have it written, so I can focus on other things!

One of the highlights of my Christmas was visiting the festive-themed grounds of an Edwardian House called Polesden Lacey. 

These ‘other things’ are those much-fabled exams that everyone seems to be talking about. This January I have three, which all fall in the second week of the exam period. I’ve been trying to decide if that’s a good thing or a bad thing, because on one hand it gives me an extra week to revise, but on the other it means I don’t get a little break before Semester two starts. I know deep down it’s a good thing, but when other people start to finish their exams before you, you can’t help but feel slightly jealous of their new-found freedom!

This will be my fourth, and final, set of January exams and by now I have my revision ‘plan of action’ down to a tee. I thought that with the remainder of this blog post I would share some of my revision strategies with you:

My revision starts effectively at the start of the semester, when I write up a neat set of revision notes after the completion of each chapter of work within a module. These tend to form my final set of revision notes, unless something needs to be updated or amended.

Then comes the slightly unusual part: with these notes I then pretend to teach them to an imaginary person. My logic with this, is that if I can explain a concept coherently, with the notes only used as an aid, then I will have a strong enough understanding of that topic to take with me into the exam. This method also helps expose any gaps in my knowledge, or parts that I’m not fully sure about, which then allows me to tailor my revision towards these lesser-understood areas.

Once I am confident I have a good enough background knowledge, I then attempt questions from past papers, problem sheets and textbooks and will once again use the feedback from this to strengthen my knowledge.

Obviously this strategy may not work for everyone, or indeed for every course, but this is how I revise and it’s been good to me so far in my university career! Closer to the exam I also like to produce a mind map to link all the concepts together, with often requires a large piece of paper and very small handwriting!

My colourful and rather hectic mind map for Quantum Physics 

It’s now time for me to get back to my revision, so I hope you have found this useful and, if you are in a similar situation to me, good luck for your upcoming deadlines and exams!

James

Back on course

So that was Christmas, that was New Year… and that was 2014!

Yes, I’m writing this in 2015, my first post of the new term and New Year - I hope you all had a great celebration-packed season! I always find it quite a curious feeling moving into the New Year as, just a few days in, I already find myself straight back into the swing of things in Southampton, anxiously preparing for exams and assignments, awaiting results from coursework … and somehow writing '2014' by accident on everything, a habit I’ll probably only be able to drop by March at the very earliest!

2015 promises to be a quite significant year for me, and a lot of the people I know down here! If all goes according to plan, following 17 years of formal education, this year many of us complete our degree programmes, graduate, and move out into the world of employment – an incredibly exciting, yet at the same time mildly intimidating, prospect!

Much of my Christmas holidays were spent looking up placements and researching graduate schemes, potential future employers, various industries and the opportunities galore out there. I spent time working my way through Career Destinations and the many other networking services the University of Southampton (for example, the brilliantly comprehensive listings at the ECS Careers Hub) makes available. As my Dad put to me on Christmas Day, “So, what will your job be by next Christmas, Robin?” - A question which well and truly struck home the significance of the upcoming year!

 Christmas was great fun in the Johnson household – and yes, I was given a selfie stick!

So, with a vague plan or two now up my sleeve, it’s time to kick on with my course, particularly the January exams (I’m fortunate to only have one this time around!) and my fourth-year Group Design Project, the deadline for which looms ever larger with the end of the month rapidly approaching. With just the three and a half weeks left of our allocated time, all systems are well and truly go as we scramble to make those last-minute additions and get everything written up.

Although at times it’s been tricky (particularly when things break!), my group and I are greatly enjoying the challenge, particularly in the knowledge that our work could well have a real-world application for an industrial client which could have a hugely positive effect on research and, hopefully, on people’s lives.

Moreover, we’ve found that (conveniently for our future aspirations!) we’ve all been equipped through the demands of the project with numerous skills, experiences and stories which hopefully will prove useful in the future, both on the CV and in the interview room. For example, not only has the project tasked us with working on a pre-existing codebase for the first time (in other words picking up, understanding and building on someone else’s programming code!), but it’s also challenged us to work as a team and to manage our time and resources as efficiently as possible across a whole semester - and around the myriads of other things we’ve had on!

Of course, being so close to the end, it’s important that my academic and career commitments are always at the forefront of my thinking, but it wouldn’t be a final six months representative of a quite hectic but incredibly enriching University experience without play to balance the work – or, in my case, plays! I’m fortunate enough to be involved with Performing Arts productions such as Romeo and Juliet in February, The Drowsy Chaperone in March and Into the Woods in April, so there’ll be plenty to get my teeth stuck into outside the lecture theatre!

2014 was an incredible twelve months of shows, rounded off with a great group shot at the Showstoppers Christmas Ball!

Equally as excitingly, a lot of us can’t wait for the end of this week, as we’ve recently been informed that a quite unique (gender-swapped!) production we were fortunate enough to be involved with last year at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, The Importance of Being Earnest, will be featured on television this Friday, so if you get the chance, keep an eye out for Great British Railway Journeys, BBC Two at 6.30pm – we’re hoping it counts as a BBC television acting debut!

2015 has quite the calendar year to live up to. From coursework to conferences, exams to elections, theatre to tours, and the Festival Fringe to filming, 2014 had a bit of pretty much everything. After a brilliant start to January, I can’t wait to see what lies ahead in store this year.
 
Well, after the Project deadline, of course…!

Robin