Thursday 15 October 2009

Where has the fun gone?

So an update, what have I been doing with myself in the month or so since I last posted?
Well the answer really is not a lot, apart from trying to get on with my masters and thinking why the hell I am staying at my current university and not going to Le Bridge and getting slightly a bit too merry at a small staff drinks party.

The reason why I have been pondering as to whether it would have been better to have gone to Le Bridge is because most of my mates have moved on to pastures green. Current friends are off doing law conversion courses and asking me questions about contract law that I still don't know the answer to. It has all become a bit difficult to realise that I may have become a bit stagnant, apart from the main reasons I chose to stay at my current university, there are other factors now which I feel I should have taken into consideration, such as a social life!

There also seems to be a small part of me that wants more guidance as to how to be a "professional", a trend that I am picking up from blogs about the BVC is that this is instilled in you when you start the course, that it is the start of your professional life and the end of your student days. Why do my student days have to end now?!?! Where is the rolling in at 5am in the morning and going to tutorials severely hungover?!

I seem to be trapped in between being a post-grad masters student whilst also having the responsibility (or is it burden?!) of teaching undergraduates, with little guidance as to how I should be "behaving" professionally. I still have friends that are current undergraduates, yet I am now making friends with staff.

I wonder sometimes where I am to draw the line and getting perhaps slightly too paranoid about very small minor things that I am doing, which in my mind could possibly attract significant academic glare.

Whilst also re-learning criminal law to a sufficiently high standard that I can teach it, I also have the daunting aspect of writing a 20,000 word dissertation for my course.

Where has the fun gone from being a student?

5 comments:

Unknown said...

In terms of behaving professionally - it's not really something that's taught per se. Just use common sense and act how you think you should be perceived to act.

For the BVC, we're not so much professionals as mature acting students. It certainly doesn't feel 'professional' in it's strictest sense, despite what they say and having had one month pass.

It's different from undergrad, but not entirely. I would imagine a master course should yield the same feelings. There's certainly no cause to completely abandon your student intuitions!

Odysseus said...

AP is right insomuch as it's not really taught, other than as a formal ethics capacity. Really it is as much about self-perception as anything. Given what people are aiming for, it's only natural that a certain level of maturity has crept in since undergrad, and there is more of an edge of seriousness.

That said, it didn't stop me slacking off horribly all day today. Nor has it prevent me from absconding to the pub at lunch time with my group on occasion. The fun will return! Postgrad was a bit of a trudge at times last year, but it did have it's moments.

Don't give up!

Barmaid said...

Is it too late for you to swap to plan B?

barboy said...

Lost, it's called growing up. They say that most men lead lives of quiet desperation.

So, suck it up, and get used to it.

Lost said...

Thanks BarBoy for the rather frank advice..

Barmaid - I don't really want to switch back to plan le bridge.. I think once I am settled where I am the moment things will get better :

Oddy - hmm pub