Student blogs

So the topic of this month’s blog post must obviously be the exams. Is there anything else? Actually, there is. My eldest son took his younger brothers to town on their bikes for the first time ever, just the three of them. My middle son started learning to barrel race (yes, there are cowboys in […]

Exams are usually memorable experiences for me. They are sometimes terrifying and unfamiliar, like my first year, and sometimes a bit funny, familiar and tinged with chagrin, like this year.   All of the experiences seem to center around time.  In my first exam year, time to study, time to revise, and time in the exam […]

So I made it through what I call ‘Assignment Month’..phew! By the end there I was just going on autopilot, and not necessarily giving my best work, but hey, que sera sera… After that I took a little break to travel for a few days and catch the inimitable singer/songwriter Mika on two stops of […]

Relationship of science and religion is one of my interests and I think it is a very promising area of study and research. This blog post by Dr Guy Consolmagno SJ, Vatican’s Astronomer, is an interesting meditation not only on this relationship but also on a lot more, including how an MIT graduate in astronomy […]

It’s time to dance as they say in America. I like that expression because it’s such an uplifting metaphor even though it means that, ready or not, we have reached the time for action.  For me, there are always the inevitable situations that seem to cluster around exam week. It has entered the realm of […]

One lesson I learnt from the last academic year is to plan better. I had this fool proof study schedule for this time; at least I thought I did. It had the number of hours, the areas to be covered and exactly what I hoped to achieve each day. I had planned the specific chapters […]

The ‘Rhetoric of Exams’ might sound odd to you, but I think there is a definite discourse of exams that merits some investigation, analysis and understanding. This year my goal is to embrace it. During my BA English study I have worked with tutors and coaches in a variety of ways that have all proved […]

Like most people, I was shocked at the bombing during the Boston Marathon. Television footage showed the devastating injuries caused when a bomb explodes, however primitive or home-made. I vividly remember as a young child overhearing my parents talk about the dismembered bodies on the streets of my home city, Dublin, after a bombing in […]

This week I am a road warrior, not in the Mad Max or professional wrestling tag team sense of the phrase, but as a business traveler.  I doff my hat to business travelers, their stamina and sheer determination.  As Edith Wharton wrote in ‘The Age of Innocence,’ ‘…all travel has its hardships,’ like those we […]

The first time I was a full-time university student, I was all of 17. The last time—other than now—I was 28. This time around, I am nearing the half-century mark. What’s different, and what would my advice be to someone my age contemplating a return to school? I don’t recall having a physical problem with […]

Here’s what I hope you will think is a humorous and helpful account of what revision 25 days before  my exams begin looks like at my house.  My study room and office look like something of a omnishambles right now. Books, bundles of legal size writing pads, pens and highlighters are everywhere.  They cover my [...]

So we all need a hideout corner in the midst of stressful times such as these. For me, the only ‘corner’ I resort to is the one where my piano lay. Playing a tune and penning down an ode alongside reminds me of the importance of rhythm: Not too slow, not too fast. I always [...]

Hi, everyone. I have decided to write a post on the applicability of the knowledge you get while studying at UOL LLB in real life. I have to repeat that I am lawyer already and work as such but I do not have a QLD in the English law and I am studying for this degree in [...]

I told myself that, when the first day of April arrived, a significant increase in what I call my ‘study application’ will need to occur. My focus is now entirely on 2 areas of concern. The first is in-depth research on specific topics. The second is disciplining myself to develop a complete argument before beginning [...]

“Daddy, are you doing your homework?” My five-year old daughter gets it. Not that there’s much to get. If Daddy is surrounded by a splattering of books, journal print-outs and scribbled notes, with a pencil in his mouth and a quizzical-to-stressed look on his face, chances are he’s studying. She started school in September and [...]

In February 2013 I attended a study day on Church Fathers at the Institute of Orthodox Christian Studies in Cambridge, dedicated to St Ephrem the Syrian by Dr Sebastian Brock, probably the world’s foremost expert on Syriac Christianity. In the morning Dr Brock introduced St Ephrem’s life and his times, and in the afternoon we had [...]

Urban literary legend has it that, over lunch one day, Ernest Hemingway boasted to colleagues he could write a short story in six words.  His colleagues doubted very much that even the great Hemingway could write a story in six words.  They each wagered $10, betting a $60 pot against him.  Hemingway scribbled these six [...]

When I asked my eldest if he saw a down side to my studying, he sweetly said that “it keeps you away from time with your kids, but … if you’re helping hundreds of thousands of people, I suppose it’s okay.” Wow! So…if I’m not helping hundreds of thousands of people (and I hasten to [...]

I’m not exactly panicking… With just eight weeks to my first exam, I’m on a pretty tight deadline with revision and scanning past exam papers. But a priority right now is outlining exam questions and being sure that I can stitch together a coherent argument on exam day. As I’ve said before on this blog, [...]

It’s one of those wonderful weeks when everything is going exactly as it should.  All the various threads of a year-long study plan for 4 modules have come together as planned, hoped, and worked for. For me, it is important to have a trusted study plan to produce specific results when I need them, like [...]