In the Dark

So Welcome Week has started in Maynooth, although I’m keeping a low profile ahead of my departure to foreign climes and haven’t seen any of the new students, who I’m assured definitely exist. I will be on campus tomorrow though as I have various things to do in my office before handing over the keys until next year. I think pint or two may well be drunk at some point this week to celebrate my departure too.

Although I’m not involved in Welcome Week activities, this week is nevertheless going to be extremely busy, and not just because of preparations for my trip to Barcelona. After a short hiatus in December, Euclid developments are well and truly back and I’ve got a stack of telecons to deal with. I had three today, and that’s just the start. I won’t get away from those while on sabbatical, of course, but at least I don’t have to organize them around teaching and other departmental activities.

I was chatting with my PhD student online this afternoon and it struck me that this will be the first time since 2020 that the Autumn Semester will start properly at Maynooth and students will get a full twelve weeks of in-person teaching with a study week. For the three previous years, teaching started late for new students because of a knock-on effect of the Leaving Certificate results being delayed by Covid-19 reasons. That meant that there was a truncated orientation process and term was a week shorter, i.e. 11 weeks instead of 12. I have been teaching first year physics students during that period, and it was quite a headache figuring out how to tweak things to make everything fit without rushing too much. Now all that is behind us, and a more relaxed start of term is possible, but it’s my successor in the role of first-year lecturer who will reap the benefit.

Teaching term starts later in Maynooth than in many other Irish universities. This year lectures commence on 25th September, a week today, by which time I’ll be in Barcelona. This has its advantages, but the disadvantage is that teaching is supposed to carry on until Friday December 22nd, just three days before Christmas…

This entry was posted on September 18, 2023 at 7:41 pm and is filed under Biographical, Education, Maynooth. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.