On research seminars, talking to people and learning stuff
Last Thursday saw the School of Law having another go at a little seminar series. We have tried this before and they fizzle out because attendance is usually low and people are busy… However we all do interesting research and we need to make time to talk to each other about it. So in spite of being full of cold and having a cotton wool brain I was really looking forward to it. The plan is to have regular seminars where one of us can present work in progress or even just an idea and we can chat about it. I like that. It’s what academic should be doing – having ideas and talking about them.
Well my wonderful colleague Dr Sanna Elfving has lots of ideas, good ideas and mostly they are about things that I don’t know all that much about. Sanna delivered the first research seminar on her work looking at the regulation of shale gas in the UK. Her slides from the session can be found here:
Elfving SK_UK shale gas regime_12 March 15.
I was struck by three things as we talked about shale gas extraction. First, the idea of pumping water and chemicals deep into the ground under high pressure seems like a bloody stupid idea – perhaps not the best thought to base a legal debate on but it was the first that srpung to mind. The other two points are rather more legal in nature: The regulation, though not specific to shale gas but designed to cover more conventional oil and gas extraction, seems ridiculously complex. There are so many different organisations involved in granting the many different licences which might be required, not to mention the role of planning permissions etc. Doesn’t the complexity mean that it is quite likely that something somewhere falls between the cracks and our health and environmnent are not adequately protected? If you are pro fracking then the complexity is absured, if you are against it, it is worrying.
The other question that arose for me is the obvious gap between politcal rhetoric and politcal will to actually see this happen. The Tories in particualr have pledged their support to fracking but nothing is done to actually facilitate making fracking a reality. Europe (or more accurately the EU but accuracy isn’t always a strong point in these debates) gets blamed for delays but actually there is no European legal framework on this and case law coming from Luxembourg is sending mixed messages (I must ask Sanna about the cases she mentioned, I have already forgotten).
It was a really lovely way to spend an hour and I was again struck by how varied legal scholarship is and how much really interesting stuff there is out there that I don’t really know anything about. More importantly though I also remembered how much fun it is to talk to people about their work, to hear their thoughts and to learn from people who really know their stuff. Research seminars are a good thing, go if you can!
Tweeting My Day
On 23rd September 2014 I tweeted my day. The idea came as a result of an email at work suggesting we could do some video diaries to help each other understand what we all do and the pressures we can be under better so as to ultimately lead to a better understanding of different roles. That in turn should lead to better working relationships. Well, a video diary was just never going to work for me! Twitter however would. So I offered to live tweet a day at work. I tried to do that as honestly and as informatively as possible. There are some details of discussions in meetings which I obviously couldn’t tweet but I hope I have captured what Tuesday this week was like for me, some of what I did, how I felt about it…
I have captured the tweets of the day using storify so you can see the whole thing here: https://storify.com/Jess_Guth/my-day-in-tweets
On reflection, I enjoyed the experience. It did slow me down a little in terms of work. My most efficient time – between 7.30 and 9am – was noticably less efficient but I did go through the day reflecting on what I was doing and why. I was acutely aware of how much coffee I was drinking and that I don’t spend enough time chatting to colleagues about work generally.I also felt connected though and like people were with me – not in a freaky being watched sort of way, more in a supportive kind of way.
I think I might do this again towards the end of term because I think it is really important to stress that there is no such thing as a typical day – had I chosen today or yesterday, the whole thing would have looked very different. That however is why I love my job. I hope it was interesting or entertaining or useful or perhaps a little of each!
Back in the classroom
So here we are again. It’s the end of September and in universities across the country staff are welcoming new students. I have just spent three days in London in various meetings and they all in some way required me to think about what we teach, how, why… my head is full of that strategic, high level, sometimes theoretical, sometimes just jumping through hoops stuff that I guess is now my job. It’s been interesting, it’s been intense and it’s been fun and as always after these sorts of meetings I am knackered. And yet, as I head back north there is an underlying excitement about the coming week. It took my a while to figure out what it was but now I have it: I’ll be teaching next week. I am excited about teaching! I can’t wait to get back in the classroom. This excitement started to build on Monday evening, just a little bit. I was giving the induction lecture to the new first years on Tuesday morning and on Monday I was getting exctied, on Tuesday I was buzzing. The hour in the lecture theatre on Tuesday was, it seemed at the time, everything I had been working for over the summer. They were here, the first years were here and I could fire the starting pistol for the journeys that can change their lives – that could change the world. Wow.
On Wednesday I took one of the tutorial groups for our sample/intro tutorial and personal tutor meet. Again I was excited and again the experience didn’t disappoint. It was a small group and we sat and chatted about so many of the things that matter to me – law, justice, morality, legal education, making a difference. I can whinge about students as much as the next academic but let’s not forget that we can learn so much from them, that if we encourage them to engage with us, we will be better for it. So, induction is over. I have my first EU Law lecture on Tuesday – I’ll be telling stories about EU citizenship (just in case anyone cares) and I can’t wait. Am I nervours? Hell yes, I will be walking into a lecture theatre with 100+ students and I’ll be putting my views, my research, my knowledge on the line. I’ll be performing and performances can go horribly wrong but I will have fun; and I will learn something and the more I think about it, the more I cannot imagine an academic career without teaching. That’s not an option for me, I need to be in the classroom, thats where I can see my vision, ambitions, hopes and dreams come true; it’s where I make a difference and it’s where I can re-charge my batteries and my sense of humour to help me deal with all the other rubbish being a manager in the HE sector can throw at you. So, I may be Head of School, but I have no intention of shifting all of my teaching – that’s just not me!
My Conversations 