Pre-2024

Monday, 28 March 2011

The Seven Year Rule

The OU Credit Transfer Centre returned my certificates and other documentation today. There was also a letter enclosed explaining why I was not entitled to any credit transfer. Apparently, there is a 'Seven Year Rule' for the MSc course. I knew about this before, but I assumed this only referred to the time taken to complete the degree. Reading the small print, it seems that any course or qualification used for credit transfer must be less than 7 years old by the end of the OU MSc Qualification. Since I got my Postgraduate Diploma in 2000, it's of no use for credit transfer.

This means that the MSc is off because I can't afford to do 3 years of OU study at postgraduate level.

Sunday, 20 March 2011

The Imperial War Museum

For some reason the OU still think that I'm doing AA312 so I got an email invite to an event held at the Imperial War Museum. I was in two minds if I should go, but having been forced to go to a birthday party for somebody I don't really know by her indoors  the night before I really needed to get out of the house to clear my head. I got up quite late still suffering from the night before and Carolyn had by that time already knobbed off to sing to the Sky Fairy. After a shower and breakfast I made my way to Headcorn Road and got the 136 to Grove Park and then a train to Waterloo East. A young girl sat next to me on the train which I thought was a bit odd because experience tells me that most people would prefer to stand than sit next to me.

 I got to Waterloo East and made my way to the exit. It was down several flights of stairs and I came out in some side street in the middle of nowhere. After a while my GPS got a fix and I found myself walking down a very wide pavement in Waterloo Road. I passed the Old Vic and photographed it because I had plenty of time.

It was a bit of a maze of a journey but I managed to find the Imperial War Museum eventually. Typical OU stylee the signage was appalling and I had to venture in not knowing if I was in the right building. There was an OU representative in the lobby and she gave me a leaflet. I asked her where the lectures were and she directed me to the cinema at the back of the large room which had aeroplanes and tanks in it. I was a bit early so I thought I would go to the toilet. I went through a maze of rooms and found it but couldn’t find my way back. The place was dark and very claustrophobic which didn’t help. I followed the signs and eventually found my way back to the entrance so I just retraced my steps.

When I got to the outside bit of the cinema I had to register my name with the bloke on the desk and then wait around with the others for the previous lecture to finish. I found a seat but the place was more or less full. OU staff were there in abundance and the various people were their usual bossy selves, treating the punters like naughty children. A middle aged woman sat next to me but she was as unfriendly as the usual bunch of OU students that I’ve met in these places. We exchanged a few strained words and then ignored each other for the next hour, until she changed seats.

The first lecture was by Linda Corlett who was my tutor for DA204. She was quite petite and spoke with a bit of an accent, which I assumed was South African. She knew her stuff and tried to be a bit jokey with the audience but it didn’t quite come off. I think she was quite nervous. The lecture was about humans inflicting pain on each other which wasn’t a barrel of laughs but interesting nonetheless. She spoke well under the circumstances and I can understand why she is regarded as a good tutor.

The next lecture was on First World War poster propaganda which was an interesting subject but Dr Barry Dakcombe wasn’t very good. He was reading from his notes and kept stopping to drink some water. He didn't know his subject very well and at the end when people were asking questions the woman running the show had to get up on stage and help him out.

The last lecture was by Dr Anneka Mombauer who is an expert on the causes of the First World War. I think she used to be the course tutor for AA312 a few years ago. I heard a similar lecture by her about the same time last year in Camden so I gave it a miss.

I  walked back to Waterloo East but got a bit lost because my GPS was playing up. I found it manually, and was quite knackered after I climbed the stairs to the upper platforms. I got the Hayes train to Catford Bridge then the 336 home. Carolyn was out when I got in so I ate some biscuits, drank some squash and just dossed about a bit. After stroking the cat I did a bit more on the broken computer. I managed to do a partial restore which was better than nothing but not perfect. I tried again and after the second wang it appeared to work again. I had to tidy a few things up but it appeared to be back in full working order. I put the case back together and called it a day.

When Carolyn got home she seemed alright and wasn’t grumpy at all so the rest of the evening went well. Looking back on the whole thing I don't know if it was all worth it. In fact, at the moment, I don't know if my whole life is worth it, but it's probably best to keep on going anyway.

Saturday, 19 March 2011

SXR207 Popularity

SXR207 is proving to be very popular in its last year of presentation. The OU have put on another two weeks to cope with demand. Part of me still wants to go, but I'm now committed to having a holiday in Guernsey instead and I can't really afford both.

Saturday, 5 March 2011

The documents arrive

Carolyn and I went to the post office on Wednesday afternoon to post the documents obtained from the University of Ulster to the Credit Transfer Centre of the OU. We sent it recorded delivery so it's possible to track it to a certain extent. The post office website said that it had been delivered yesterday and when I looked on my student homepage today I saw that they have amended the 'Qualifications you are working towards' section to include the two qualifications that I asked them to consider credit transfer for. It takes up to 8 weeks to find out exactly how many points I'm awarded though.

Sunday, 27 February 2011

Degree Certificate

I got my degree certificate sent through the post a couple of days ago. It was a modern looking effort just like the Certificate in Humanities one that I got a few years ago. I must say that I was a bit underwhelmed but I don't know why.

Thursday, 24 February 2011

Ulster responds

The University of Ulster sent me the information that I needed to send to the OU to get Credit Transfer. I thought it was quite quick, because I was expecting a long wait.

I packaged up the bits, filled the forms in, and put the entire bundle in an envelope. I will give it to Carolyn and she can send it off Recorded Delivery when she has time. The OU says it can take up to 8 weeks to receive the verdict but they acknowledge the receipt of the stuff straightaway.

Tuesday, 22 February 2011

Day Trip to Ely

I did a trial run to Ely just to see if there were any problems associated with my intended route, because I will be taking Carolyn with me on June 4th. It involved getting to King's Cross and taking the King's Lynn train to Ely. It was fast to Cambridge, which saved a bit of time. It's also possible to get a train to Cambridge (either slow or fast) and then changing, but the way I did it was the simplest. The cathedral is only about half a mile from Ely station but it's on quite a steep hill.

I got there OK and had a look around but the weather was so bad that I wasn't seeing the place in all its glory. There were very few tourists and the high street was deserted. I had a bit of lunch in the grounds and after about half an hour or so made my way back home again.

The journey home was a bit slower because I had just missed a train but I quite enjoyed just sitting on the station platform and letting the world go by.

I came home via Victoria which was a bit of a mistake because the tube station is being refurbished and a lot of the normal exits were closed. This added an extra 10 minutes and a lot of aggro to an otherwise straightforward operation.

Looking back on it there was nothing awkward about the trip, except for the Victoria bit, so I'm fairly confident that Carolyn and I can do it without any problems.

Friday, 18 February 2011

Credit Transfer

I've just had an email from the OU. Apparently I can claim for both MSc Science and MSc Science and Society on the same form, which should cut down on the admin. Interestingly, they were not keen on my Biochemistry degree or OU Humanities degree as entry to the MSc programme but were quite impressed with the Biomedical Science PgD. They said it should get me entry into 'any of our MSc programmes', which is good news.

I think I will still plump for the generic MSc Science one though, as it attracts the most credit points and is the most flexible. I quite fancy taking Science Communication one year and Forensic Engineering the next.

Wednesday, 16 February 2011

Cancellation

Today I cancelled my early reservations for SXR207 and S207. I really need a year off from the OU to recharge my batteries and so it just isn't possible to do these courses yet. Since this summer will be the last presentation of SXR207 it means that I will never be able to do it, but I'm afraid that's just how things are.

But I'm hoping that I can manage something in 2012, and I'm eyeing up some postgraduate courses in Science communication and forensic engineering. But any progress in this direction will depend on how much credit transfer I can get.

Monday, 14 February 2011

MSc Science

I told somebody at work that I have a Postgraduate Diploma and they said that I should think about converting it to a Masters Degree. I hadn't thought about it before but I made a few enquiries with the OU to see what I could do with it. Turns out that they offer up to 90 points credit transfer towards an MSc, so this is definitely worth exploring.

Credit Transfer is a long laborious business but I got the ball rolling today by filling in a form and sending it to the University of Ulster asking for details of the syllabus that I followed when I did the diploma. This, with a few other bits of paper, is what I need to send to the OU to get the credit required. It costs 60 quid in "administration charges" but I think it's worth it.

Monday, 11 October 2010

The Day of the AA312 exam

I've just come back from Queen Mary College in the East End of London after sitting the exam for AA312 Europe 1914-1955. It went OK, without going that well. I think I've done enough to scrape a pass but not much more. This will be my last exam for my BA Humanities degree. It was only due to the revision for this that I realised how exhausted I am. I'm not sure that I want to do any more courses for a while. I need to recharge my batteries. I have provisionally signed up for S207 next October but I might give it a miss.

Sunday, 1 August 2010

New Netbook

 

I've just bought a new netbook to replace my old laptop. The Samsung NC10 is one of the better models, but now obsolete, so I had to buy it 'as new' from a bloke on eBay. It's very good but I felt it necessary to upgrade the memory from 1Gb to 2Gb and I replaced the battery. The 3 cell effort supplied is good for about 2 to 3 hours, but the replacement is a 6 cell 7800mAH jobbie which will give me between 6 to 8 hours. It's added a bit of bulk and weight but I think it's worth it. It will be useful at Durham of course and I had this in mind when I bought it.

Thursday, 22 July 2010

More Information about the week

I'm getting more information about the activities of the week from those students who are currently there. Apparently the evening lectures are optional. I'm not sure if this is good or bad, but it does give a bit of flexibility I suppose.

I checked the Three website and the coverage for my broadband dongle should be OK, but I'll probably take my Bluetooth dongle and use my 2½G mobile phone as a backup modem just in case.

Tuesday, 20 July 2010

Timetable for the week

 I must thank David for posting a copy of his timetable for SXR207 on his blog this year. I thought I could do better than the OU one so I knocked this up in my lunch hour. It seems like quite a full week!

Monday, 19 July 2010

Dry Run to Durham on 17th July 2010

I couldn't resist this opportunity to go to Durham. I had taken advantage of an offer from East Coast offering tickets from King's Cross for just £9. It's less than a London Travelcard so very good value. I had done a lot of planning, as usual, for this trip and I had a GPS, several maps and a timetable with me. I left the house having kissed goodbye to Carolyn at just gone 8.35am and got the 336 bus, which conveniently stops outside my house, at 8.45am. Got to Bromley South at just after 9.00am and jumped on the fast train to London Victoria which was standing at the platform. I could have waited for the next train, which was my timetabled one, but this meant I had a few minutes in hand further along the journey.

I had to stand up all the way, which I fully expected, but I felt sorry for a young girl who was struggling to hold a double bass or possibly a cello as the train was rocking about. In the end she strapped it to a hand rail and stood in the first class section of the carriage, which I thought was a bit cheeky. It was only 17 minutes to London Victoria, according to my watch, which is very good going.

Got off at Victoria and headed for the underground. It’s usually packed but today it was quite reasonable. The tube from Victoria to King’s Cross is only about 10 minutes. As I had got the earlier train I had some time in hand so I explored St. Pancras Station which is joined to King’s Cross by a walkway. I was quite impressed with the station itself, which was very spacious and light, but the signage was appalling. The destination boards were faded and looked like the old 1980s style efforts.

 

For a new station I thought this was a bit of a let down. The choice of restaurants and other eating places was very good though and I thought to myself that I might eat here one day. St. Pancras is really two stations in one because the Eurostar now leaves from here as well as the normal domestic services to the midlands. I explored as much as I could without making myself late for my train.

 

I walked back the way I came in and found my way to King’s Cross which is a lot smaller than St Pancras. It was also quite crowded but I managed to explore a bit without bumping into too many people. I found out where the toilets were and also found that King’s Cross now has a platform 0. This is very strange, because I don’t remember it from the last time I was here, about three years ago. It seemed a long wait for my train but eventually the destination board for the 10.40 to Newcastle changed to from ‘Being Prepared’ to ‘Now Boarding’. As I made my way along the platform a row of East Coast staff blocked off the flow of passengers and inspected our tickets manually. They weren’t the politest bunch of people in the world and the bloke who dealt with me looked like a nightclub bouncer. He let me through but not without looking at me as if I had just been scraped off his boot. Ticket barriers are much more friendly.

 

I easily found Coach F, seat 50A, and put my rucksack in the overhead thingy. There is never enough luggage space on these trains and the carriage luggage compartment only contained enough space for 3 or 4 big cases. Some people were using the space by the disabled toilet to put their cases, even though there was a notice telling them not to do this. Just as I was about to settle down, a family of three people arrived at my table. A man, woman and a small child about 4 or 5 years of age. The woman was struggling with her case so I offered to help but she declined, quite dismissively. Then I asked the bloke if he wanted me to let him in to the window seat and he grunted, so I let him in. This really set the tone for the 3 hour journey to Durham.

It was my own fault for not taking enough to occupy me on the train. I only had a mobile phone and a GPS to amuse me. The entire journey consisted of having to listen to the woman telling the child that he couldn’t have his popcorn unless he ate his sandwich first, and the child crying because he didn’t want to. The bloke made it worse by eating the popcorn in front of the child and teasing him. It was quite amusing for the first few minutes but after 3 hours I was getting very irritated. After Darlington I moved seats to an ‘airline’ one and had the rucksack on my lap. There were quite a few distressed passengers on the train because there was no trolley service and I was convinced that people were eyeing up my sandwiches and biscuits. Perhaps paranoia had set in.

 

I was glad to get off at Durham. The coach had seemed really cramped and claustrophobic. East Coast really do pack ‘em in. Having said that, it only cost me 9 quid so I can’t really complain. When I got off the train at 1.35pm I looked for the ‘Open University’ signs on the platform like the OU residential schools website said there would be. There was sod all, so I went through the barriers to the bog, and after walking up and down the platform for a bit, ventured outside. There were a few people standing outside the ticket office and I heard a woman say to a bloke ‘are you an OU student’ and the bloke replied ‘yes’. The woman then sarcastically said ‘I thought so, the sweatshirt gave it away – good move’, and then turned her back on him. I hope she was a social studies student, I wouldn’t like to spend a week with that.

 

I got a bit confused leaving the station and my GPS couldn’t get a lock so I walked in the wrong direction for a bit before realising my mistake. When I walked back past the station the people had gone. I think some had got into a red taxi and the others walked towards a bus stop, but I wasn’t entirely certain. I walked out of the station approach and followed the route given to me by the GPS, which was now working. I stopped to admire the view of Durham for a bit, it really is a beautiful city.

 

I had to cross a main road by a roundabout and then walk down some cobbled streets heavily laden with shoppers. I couldn’t walk as fast as I would have liked and found it difficult to stop and take photographs without being bumped into, but I did my best. Once I got out of the shopping area things improved and I could get up a good speed. I headed south towards the University of Durham Science Park but the road I wanted to go down had some security barriers and I didn’t fancy negotiating with the bloke on duty. Strictly speaking, I had no business to be there on this occasion, so I didn’t want to push my luck.

 

I decided to approach Grey College from the front. I managed to walk up what seemed like a very sleep hill and eventually made it, although I was feeling pretty tired and hot at this point. There were some temporary AA signs telling drivers where the Residential Schools were, which was good. I walked slightly further up the hill and reached what I assumed was the residential block where I took some more photos. I wanted to walk along some of the internal footpaths but looking at my watch I realised that I was running short of time so I started to make my way back. I took a different route because I wanted to see more of Durham, but having panicked a bit because of the time shortage, didn’t take as many photos as I would have liked.

 I got back to Durham station in plenty of time, and having done a bit more exploring of the station, found out that in order to get from one platform to the other it is necessary to go out of the station and then go back in again using a different road. Very odd. It confused me for quite a while until I realised what was going on. I changed my shirt on the station platform, as I needed to freshen up a bit, and had some more lunch while waiting for the train home. According to the destination board it was running about six minutes late.

 

While I was waiting I saw two student types, one male and one female, loitering by the ticket barriers. The girl was holding up an A4 sheet of white paper. I walked towards her and could see that it had the words ‘Open University Residential School’ on it. The type was about 16 point (probably Arial) with an OU logo, in black and white, at the top right hand corner, about 2cm by 3cm. Too small too late, I thought. It was gone 3.30pm and registration had closed. How anybody was expected to see that from the platform is anybody’s guess. The girl quickly scurried off and the bloke just stood there waiting for non existent students. I went back to the platform and within a few minutes my train had arrived, which was the 15.42 to King’s Cross. It arrived at exactly 15.48.

I quickly found my seat, by coincidence also Coach F 50A, and sat down. There were already 3 other people at my table. A very friendly Indian girl on my right, and a young couple facing me. She sounded French and he sounded American or Canadian. All were in their early twenties. They seemed more friendly than the Addams Family I had on the way up, but kept themselves to themselves nonetheless. The journey home always seems quicker than the journey going and this was no exception. Despite the train leaving Durham a bit later than scheduled it arrived at King’s Cross on time, at exactly 19.09.

The tube was practically empty at that time in the evening and it was a reasonably pleasant ride to London Victoria where I got the fast train to Bromley South without much of a wait. There was a couple of old drunks on the train who were a bit loud going to Maidstone East, but they were inoffensive. By the time I got to Bromley I was very tired so I wanted to get home as soon as possible. Instead of waiting for the 336 bus I decided to get the first bus that came along and walk a bit. After about 10 minutes a 261 came so I got on it. I got off at Southover and walked to my house. When I got in at 8.20pm my wife Carolyn was there to greet me and after a sit down and a slash, I had my dinner. I was glad to get home but I really enjoyed the day. Durham is the furthest I have ever been on my own and I managed it without incident. It has definitely given me the confidence to do SXR207 next year because I now know that the travel arrangements are by no means insurmountable, even for a geezer like me.

Sunday, 20 June 2010

eBay is wonderful

The physics textbooks arrived yesterday. 8 Books from the S207 course and 1 each from SXR207 and SXR103. The S207 books seem to be from a course divided in two. The first three are typical OU books and I would guess are about A level in standard. The remaining five have been written in association with the Institute of Physics, and look a bit harder. I think this is because level 2 physics at the OU started as two separate 30 point courses. I've uncovered evidence of S271 and S272 existing in the past.

The SXR207 Physics by Experiment book is very thin, and is mostly concerned with error and uncertainties. There's very little information on the practical experiments themselves. SXR103 is a much better book. It's slightly thicker and contains more detail on the sort of activities likely to be performed at the residential course.

When my current course finishes, I'll take a much closer look.

Wednesday, 16 June 2010

Revolution

Of course, before I start dabbling in physics I need to stop dabbling in history. At the moment I'm doing AA312 Total War and Social Change. It's going OK, but much harder than anything else I have done. I have just had TMA04 returned and I got a much better mark than I thought I could manage. I am really glad to get that TMA out of the way, and at least I now know a bit about war and revolution and the relationship between them.

Tuesday, 15 June 2010

Book Bashing

I saw an offer on eBay that I couldn't refuse at the weekend. All of the S207 The Physical World textbooks and the SXR207 Physics by Experiment textbook for just over £20. I put in a bid and got them. Very pleased.

Early Days

I've purchased the tickets already. Only £9 single with reserved seat. For that price I can't go wrong. East Coast do some very good deals if you book on-line in advance. I'm seriously thinking about doing SXR207 at Durham next year, and I've already made a few preparations. I'm doing a trial run from London to Durham on 17 July, which will be the day that several OU students will be doing it for real. I'll spend a bit of time wandering around the town while I'm there because there won't be time next year, if I go. 

I've also expressed an interest on my OU Student Homepage. It's appeared on my profile, but no money has been deducted from my account and I can't choose my week yet. Proper registration doesn't open until October.