So once again I've been a little MIA for a while. Keeping up with the blog along with my university work provides somewhat of a challenge and between the chaos of Hilary term (during which I've had multiple gymnastics and cheer competitions, my extended essay to write, and work for the Oxford Scientist magazine) and lack of motivation to write about my studies after a long day completing said studies I have failed somewhat in keeping the posts coming.
But now the vac has begun which give me a chance to update on whats been going on over the last term.
Some photos of Oxford in the sun as spring has started to sprung (if that even works as a sentence?). First one is the Teddy Hall garden, second one is Queens Lane looking at the church of St Peter in the East which is now home to the Teddy Hall library, and last one is a little further up Queens Lane looking at the Queen's college library.
Varsities/Competitions
So starting with the fun stuff, hilary term (the second term of an Oxford year) is varsity season for most sports. Varsity is just the name for when Oxford competes against Cambridge and for all the sports teams this is a big deal!
I competed in both cheerleading and gymnastics varsity, both of which we won, along with another national cheer competition, which we won as well:)
I've always been quite involved in the running of the cheer club (I love a good committee role) and this year I was secretary which meant a lot of organisation had to occur in order for these competitions to go ahead. This took a lot of time but is very rewarding and everything went smoothly in the end!
Cheeky varsity action shots...
Extended Essay
Turning to my actual degree, once the mapping project was handed in it was time to start thinking about my extended essay, which is another bit of course work we have to complete. My title is 'What is the most likely environment for extra-terrestrial life in the solar system' and I have to say I have really enjoyed researching and writing it. My current draft is 927 words over the 4000 word limit so I have some cutting down to do but overall I'm pleased with the progress I have made.
I also gave a presentation about this topic to the Youth Group at the Oxford University Museum of Natural History. It was a very rewarding experience to get to chat to them about potential habitats to life. they were all being very engaged and asked great questions! It also made me feel super cool to be able to talk about and answer questions on the topic, proving to myself that I do actually have a decent amount of knowledge on the subject and the hours spent reading papers was worth something. It was also great to see a bunch of girls part of this youth group and I will be very pleased if I managed to play any part in inspiring them towards study of the Earth Sciences or STEM in general. It sounds very cliche but seeing some of them reminded me of my younger self in a way and I would have loved the chance to explore and learn about the specimens and topics covered at OUMNH.
My Degree
On the topic of my degree I did also attend some lectures this term. The three courses I took were oceanography, volcanology, and quantitative paleobiology. All three I did actually enjoy. The physcial part iof the oceanography course (looking at the movement of currents and things like that) involved a bit of maths (which I try to avoid since getting a lowish 2:2 in the first year maths exam whoops) but the overall concepts were interesting enough it was heading towards being worth the confusion. The biological side of the oceanography course was a lot more enjoyable, looking at things like global phytoplankton distributions and the reasons behind the patterns. Volcanology was just cool because volcanoes are cool, nothing further needed there. I tend to think of myself as more of a climate/ocean/seds girl but the igneous rocks involved in this volcanology course were very interesting and I will hopefully be going on the volcanology based field trip to Santorini next summer! Quantitative paleobiology, as I have previously mentioned on here, started out seeming a lot more quantitative and a lot less paleobiology, This, however, thankfully, changed. Yes there was a bunch of stats going on but it was mostly focused around evolutionary trees and working out models for evolutionary history. Starting my first year of Earth Science I did not see myself enjoying paleo at all. My sister took A-level biology and the competitive sibling in me decided since then that I don't like biology and it's boring. I do still back the fact that I don't enjoy a lot of the aspects of biology, especially the bit that she does studying physiotherapy, but getting to grips with the actual mechanisms of evolution and how things have ended up looking how they do I have grown to love and I do think I'll be opting for the paleo option modules next year.
Having finished all my lecture courses for this year it's now time to revise for exams which take place in May. I've been 'on holiday' (aka staying in Oxford without the lectures going on) for about 3 weeks now and revision is slowly happening. There is a long way to go but you've got to start somewhere right?
It's always a little overwhelming starting revision, the feeling that there is no way you are ever going to fit all of this information into your brain and be able to answer questions on it. But I have learnt to just trust the process, if I go through the motions of note and flash card making, past paper question answering, and essay planning I'll be ready when the time comes (I hope).
On the topic of my degree, this term we also applied for masters projects. My course is a 4 year integrated master's course and in the last year we do a research project that we have to apply for this term. I've written a post all about the projects and application process that will be coming out at the end of April when I've hopefully heard back about which project I get. So fingers crossed its the one I want!
So that's all for now. Hopefully I'll be back on the blog a bit more regularly soon so watch this space...
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