Reflections on the first term of third year

The last week of term drew to a close with the traditional feat of endurance to meet every deadline, sparing a few moments to decorate our corner of the Physics and Astronomy department and for a quick Christmas lunch before everyone leaves for the holidays. Looking back, this term has been the most work intensive of the degree so far, not least because of the project work you know you could always be doing lingering in the background.

Deliverable week is made all the better with Santa hats and tinsel.

For natural sciences students, dedicated project time doesn’t start until the second half of second term, however the periodic project seminars and open-endedness of many of the topics means a lot of work has to get done beforehand, resulting in there always being something to do when you think you’re done for the day…

Saying that, for me this has also been the most interesting part! Tracing the literature for the thread that leads up to your particular topic and thinking through the different ways you could contribute really does make you realise you’re reaching the point in your degree where you can use everything you’ve learnt for something undiscovered. And while this may take the form of seemingly endless refinements (I just counted 83 simulations that I ran only in only the last two days..) and copious amounts of unusable data, the process never loses its excitement. Speaking of excitement, after almost three months of wading through endless log files and syntax errors, last night I finally achieved the correct model I need to use for my project! Now let’s hope I can get some viable results…

Aside from work, this term also felt unique in the realisation that for a lot of people in my year graduation is fast approaching. Forever focusing on the next deadline makes it difficult to see how far you’ve progressed, and personally this always seems to give rise to this recurring feeling of paradoxically wanting to move onto to something bigger while not feeling you’ve learnt enough. But now with the deadlines temporarily put to rest, I think it’s time to head down to Brighton for the Christmas break.