Hello again,

This week has been a pretty eventful one on campus! As some of you may have heard Lancaster received a good deal of rain over the last week or so and it all came to a head with some rather large puddles all around the university. The underpass even became flooded due to the near-monsoon conditions (which some students are calling Storm Desmond 2.0!). The good news however was that the water soon disappeared and has allowed the university to return to normality, the wet conditions will certainly be missed by Lancaster University’s resident ducks though!

In more serious news this week was also a big one for the PPR careers team as Lancaster hosted Chris Webber from the Cabinet Office in London who came to talk to students about opportunities in the Civil Service. Chris’s talk was fascinating and focused around the potential career paths open to those with an interest in working within government, the Civil Service Fast Stream, as well as providing some useful insights with respect to applications and successfully navigating the selection process. The session ended with a Q&A and which was a superb chance to gain an even better understanding of what a life in the Civil Service can provide.

Outside of work I also took part in the weekly ParkRun event in Williamson Park in Lancaster. The run happens every week at 9am on a Saturday morning, so you will only find hardy souls on the start line (especially as winter draws in!) This week the route was a little muddy due to all the heavy rain, but this fact did not dampen the spirits of runners and volunteers who dug deep and got round the 5km course – despite this a long shower was definitely a welcome treat come the end!

Until next time…

Hello again!

 

As we reach the middle of the term it is hard to believe that time is going quite as fast as it is! This week I have begun my research for the first major assignment of the year, a 1200-1500 word critical review piece, though the task is for history there are a great deal of transferrable skills that are equally valuable for politics. Essentially the assignment involves reading a text (I have chosen a highly political piece by Francis Fukuyama from his work The End of History?) and critically reviewing the work to assess how effective it is in presenting its argument, using evidence, and passing effective judgement about its subject matter. It is a pretty interesting exercise and one that makes you think a great deal about the way in which academic work should be written, which will (hopefully) make my essays better in the long run!

 

On Wednesday I attended a careers fair run by the university that hosted numerous employers including Unilever, Boots, BT, Toyota, BAE Systems, Civil Service Fast Stream and all branches of the armed forces (to name but a few!) It was a really fantastic to talk with employers about the opportunities that are available once you leave Lancaster and the event was also a great chance to network allowing students to talk informally with employers. Not to mention the vast array of freebies that we collected whilst we were there!

 

This week also marked the best result of the year so far for ‘Quiztopher Columbus’, the quiz team that I am a member of. Our team (rather limited in breadth of knowledge as we are all History and Politics students!) managed to come 10^th out of 17 teams competing this week. We performed pretty well in the general knowledge areas, but were definitely fish out of water in the music round, in which we scored a big fat 0! Still a great night nonetheless and a good way to unwind after a hectic week.

 

Until next week…

 

Hello all! First things first, let me introduce myself. My name is Michael and I study as a second-year History and Politics at Lancaster University. In these blogs, which will be published weekly, I will attempt to present to you the life of a ‘typical’ Lancaster student. This will involve updates on my activities, assignments and events for that week, and I hope that I may even be able to impart some pieces of advice (no matter how small they may be!) to you along the way.

 

Despite only being two and a half weeks into term things are already moving at a pace. As I am a member of my college football team (the Bowland C team) the week began with a practice session on Monday night. Lancaster has a huge number of activities and societies to join and so there is always something for everyone. The most important thing for me however is that they are all so open and accepting, no matter what your ability or your experience there is always something to get involved with. The practice was a good session and involved some team drills mixed with small practice matches. Having said this, I am still getting back into the swing of things as I didn’t play at all over the summer break – well over 3 months out!

 

This week I also met with my academic advisor. Every student is assigned an academic advisor who will provide additional support and guidance through the time that they spend at Lancaster. The purpose of this particular meeting was a beginning of the year check-in to see that all aspects of the year, both academic and non-academic have started well. These opportunities are great in getting a second opinion on pieces of work, receiving extra-pastoral care and tutors often write references for employers when you leave the university.

 

I also had the opportunity to attend a fantastic extra-curricular lecture this week as the film 300 was shown and was then followed by a lecture by Owen Rees (from Manchester Metropolitan University) on the Battle of Thermopylae. The lecture focused on the accuracy of the film in comparison to actual events on the battlefield and it was interesting to see how in some areas the film was surprisingly accurate such as the portrayal of Sparta as a warrior state. Whilst in other areas Hollywood has perhaps taken some artistic licence, such as the presence of rhinos and elephants being present at the battle – which they were certainly not…

 

Aside from that the bulk of the week has been taken up with studying. As I am a double major student of History and Politics my time is pretty evenly split between the two disciplines, though as you can imagine there is quite a degree of cross-over. For instance, this term I am studying the Vietnam War in History, whilst in Politics I am taking a module in International Relations and Security. This mixed nature of the subjects is really useful and can help provide some deeper understanding to concepts that appear in both subjects.

 

However, as exciting as the week has proved to be it has also been exceptionally busy and so I look forward to the weekend, which promises to be a great time as my flatmates and I are heading into Lancaster itself for a Halloween party. It will be a blast and I am really looking forward to rest at the end of a long week.

 

Until next week…