Posts filed under 'Academic'
On Friday the 15th I attended my graduation ceremony of the Kingston University Class of ’09. Everything was planned to perfection, I must admit. It was a rare thing to see everything work so flawlessly and the proceeding to advance in such a fluid manner. Understand that I am not saying that Kingston university is usually unorganized, on the contrary, I’m saying that it simply felt perfect.
I’d like to thank the University for being an excellent educational institute. On the whole, the staff and faculty have always been helpful and present which was a very rewarding experience and in vast contrast to the Greek university.
I got all the merchandise that was on offer, simply because I could. I realize it is an expression of consumerism, but they are also memorabilia, like my T-shirt and sweater with all the names of the graduates, engraved frames with the logo of the University, mugs and engraved champagne glasses.
Also, in the free graduate grab bag there were two pins that were of a surprising wit. Don’t get me wrong, English humor is very nice and good, but it is of a certain flavor that does not match that of the pins.
They read: “Pro-gram-mer: an organism that turns caffeine to code”, and “127.0.0.1 no place like it”
They are both excellent and gave me a laugh.
Here are some pictures of the day.
January 20th, 2010
Some times life gets in the way of our lives. That is what hobbies are for, and one of mine is gaming. For some time now I had plenty of work and obligations to keep me busy so what little time off I could save went into gaming. With the launch of RFO (Rising Force Online) I found a new game that works backwards – meaning it is not “progressive”, “new”, “ground breaking” – but it works. Mainly it asks you to level up your character in the best way possible so that at the end game you can fight well against other people. After the disappointment of WOW’s lack of end game content, RFO brings back memories of DaoC that I cannot ignore.
University is now a bit more relaxing, with the papers submitted and the new ones being casually discussed. My job at the university keeps on at the same pace, frustrating at times, but always new and exciting, especially when I manage to get through to a student. I used to say that everybody can be taught; now I say that everybody that wants to learn can be taught. I hope I wont have to reconfigure that statement…
Playing around with some routers though has been the most fun I’ve had. Although it was fun, it was also “work” for the CISCO seminars I am taking, however it was new, exciting and thought provocative. CCNA part 2 is all about routers and how they work, and it is a far bigger topic than one might think at first. Buying two of them off eBay and getting them plugged in to my system was as pleasurable as the first time I used my own hands to upgrade my computer for the first time. A new horizon was open, and just like my friend ChrisV says, the only sad thing is life is never having to do something for the first time again.
That is why more and more I’m contemplating about following an academic career… who knows!
March 21st, 2006
Last night I took my final exams for CCNA Course 1. I graduated with a mark of 93.8%. On to course 2 now!
[For those that don’t know about it, it is a Cisco Certified Network Associate program, run by Cisco with their own instructors and facilities. A complete CCNA program runs four courses at the end of which the certification exams occur and, if you pass, you are classified as a CCNA.]
January 19th, 2006
I have just learned that my position as Teaching Assistant in the Kingston University will be extended this coming semester. I could not be happier. In a few days I will sign my contract and start again to try and teach some people, provided they too want to learn. I have already said how much I admire people that try to educate others, and this role is one I see myself taking on in a few years.
It is an amazing sight to behold, the smile of understanding looming over the face of a student. I plan to see as many of those as I can. Education is the only way to make the world a better place, be it by producing good professionals, or simply by opening the mind to different ideas, procedures, building critical judgment and thus creating an, even slightly, better citizen.
Educators make the world go round, the good one deserve our undying respect. The bad ones should find another way to make money…
January 17th, 2006
Teaching is said to be its own reward, and I believe that. I like it when I show someone something new, I enjoy seeing them smile at their new discovery and I believe that the world is based on a good education. So when I got a chance to be a teaching assistant in my university, I jumped at the chance. Every Monday, from 14:00 to 18:00 I try to the best of my ability to help first year students discover the world of computer programming with Java.
Does everyone like programming? Of course not. Should I expect them to be eager to learn and understand why things happen? Again, no. But for better or for worse, it is my job to help them pass the course at least with a C. And to that end I try to make them understand some basic notions because they will need those. So how to deal with people that just want the answer?
One student asked me how he should proceed with an exercise, I told him a basic plan, create the main class and then use a JOptionPanel to get the input from the user. Now this is a student that supposedly has used this JOptionPanel many times before in previous exercises. So when he asked me “What is a JOptionPanel?” I was stomped… After some time I realised that he never coded anything, he only got the code from friends, the net, a book or the lecture notes. He even asked me what that bit of code was for, even though he proclaimed that it was he that did it. He didn’t ever try to understand the code, he just produced a program that worked and was satisfied with himself.
When I asked him how he hoped to pass the exam that was to come next week, he remained silent. I still don’t know what the best course of action would have been, but I just told him to go back to the first exercise and try to do them all again by himself until he can do them without looking at previous examples, until he understands the code.
University is not about simply producing work. It is about learning. I like the fact that the British system will not pressure you to produce large amounts of work, that it lets you learn as much (or as little) as you want. In the end, the exams are designed to award those that really learned.
But the “teacher” in me wants everyone to learn, so cases like the one I just spoke of sadden me. He didn’t learn anything, he was just happy to make the programs work and now he faces a very real possibility of failing in the upcoming exams. And I do feel like I failed for not having noticed him before.
November 28th, 2005
