Presentations.

Now, don't get me wrong, I understand that we need to assess people in different ways because we all learn in different ways and we all have different strengths.. but public speaking?  For an exam?  Really???
I would absolutely love it if I was just set 4 essays for the year and I worked my ass off for them... but I suppose we aren't meant to like examinations, and I can see why talking to a group of people will be beneficial, especially as I want to teach.
My real little rant here is about having to work in a team with people who just won't co-operate with you.  How are you supposed to do well in your assessment is the other people in your group won't even communicate with you?  I guess I wouldn't mind too much if I just did all of the work and they took some of the credit, but how is that ever going to work if they just don't show up to the slot we are given to present in?  Our presentation is over a month late and I really hope we are not penalised for this.  The easy way out is to just blame other people, but for once I will not take the blame here.. thank God it's only in philosophy.. if we manage to get over 40% I will be one happy girly.
I'm going to need so much luck for tomorrow.. I don't even have a script yet.  Stupid 9am lectures.. why can't you just disappear.

Sorority Girls.

Ohhh crappy television you are serving me so well right now.  I was recently sat in my university room is a depressed state and needed something light and so overly American that I didn't need to think anymore and so I brought up the Channel 4 website and found this delightful little show: Sorority Girls.

Now, it is terrible television.  Really, really bad.. but I can't help but LOVE it.  It's funny and easy to follow and slightly bitchy at the same time.  I am going to cry when I've watched them all.. but then I guess I can just watch the same episodes over again.. yay for the internet and being able to catch up on American drivvel!

Laziness.

I really, really, really do not want to go back to university tomorrow.  Urgh.

Hate it. Hate it. HATE IT.

Anybody want to give me some advice.. help.. take my place? No? Okay (insert sadface).

Thought Vomit.

This is basically a useless little blog entry but I think I've decided what I actually want to do with this thing.  For years I have tried and failed to keep a diary.. I'm not really sure why, maybe because it was a cry for attention that was never answered because it was never read by anybody else (obviously).  That's what blogs are basically for, let's face it.. attention seeking little entries.  So, I think I am going to use this little baby like a journal.  It will contain random thoughts, thinks I like, thinks I really don't like (see earlier post on University Drop-Outs), maybe some cats and a whole lot of honesty.

I had fish for dinner. Yum.

University Drop-Outs.

Okay, so, following on from yesterdays blog about university, I think I may as well just rant on about the thing that probably annoys me most about the whole system apart from the finance and that is the UNIVERSITY DROP-OUTS.  I know some.  I have first hand experience of what they're like and they aren't all lazy, let me tell you that.  I think most drop-outs have been screwed over by what they expected from university not actually being the case, for example, it isn't a 24 hour party 7 days a week, which is kind of their own fault for going into it all naive and shit.  But anyway.. the point of this little ranty blog is to tell you all why drop-outs annoy the hell out of me. Here we go..

What I don't understand about drop-outs is that they act as though it takes some guts to just stop going to university and this, of course, is reinforced by their friends who probably didn't have the nerve to leave their parental home and try something new for once in their lives like everybody else and so it makes them feel better.  It does not take 'guts' to just stop doing something you didn't like.  In my opinion, that is the cowards way out.  Fair enough if you couldn't cope financially and were too far away from home to make the trip back every weekend for food and money, that isn't the kind of dropping out I'm talking about, it's the people who think the workload is too much, or they just miss home or their friends or their boyfriend/girlfriend or their cat.  WHAT THE HELL.  I hate university, straight up hate it, and I'm not there thinking about dropping out because I understand that in this shit economical state we've managed to get ourselves in to, you need a degree to get anywhere.. Sure, some jobs don't require that you need a degree, but if you want to actually make a decent living and maybe, I don't know, get a promotion and reach the top of your game, well.. GOOD LUCK WITH THAT. 
I also hate how they sort of group together to make their silly little drop-out cohort and they're all like 'YAY! UNI DROP-OUTS FTW! OMG! WOW!'.. just.. what?

University.

I am currently in my first year of university studying for a BSc in Sociology and I am sick and tired of people thinking it is all fun and games and unprotected sex and a constant hangover, probably like every other bloody student in Britain.  This student culture is not one which I personally have subscribed to, and although many of my friends have told me stories of how 'wrecked' they were during fresher's week, I would be surprised if, in reality, they hadn't spent their first week crying into their Cup'a'Soup and Tesco's own chicken tikka because they missed their mummy.  I know my first week away from home was pretty crap and if I'm being honest, I still hate it.  University definitiely does not live up to my expectations. 


I do, however, live up to one of the key labels we all pin to a students' backpack and that is that I am as poor as hell.  My student loan goes in.. and my university take it straight from me because they let me live on their campus.  They may as well not give it to me at all.  I think the best part is that if I am unable to pay for my accommodation because, oh, I don't know, I actually wanted to eat something that term, then I am forced to pay a 'dishonesty' fee.  If I don't have the bloody money to pay for my accommodation, I sure as hell don't have money to be paying the ridiculous fees they add on either.  The system is still as fucked up as it was in the past.. only the rich seem to be able to make it through this education system unscathed.  The tutition fee rise that we saw recently is also another knife in the back of equality.  I'd say I come from a working class background, if I were asked to define it (which I was in one of my lectures last term) and I kind of don't know whether the long, torturous road to higher education was really worth it.. at least not yet.  Maybe you should ask me after I graduate if I'd do it again.. if you asked me now, I would probably laugh in your face. 


I suppose, really, I shouldn't complain.  I'm one of the 'lucky' ones that managed to get to university BEFORE the tutition fee rise.. I just feel sorry for those who, like me, will struggle to make the journey to higher education and then be slapped in the face with debt.  This whole rant probably doesn't make sense.. ah well.