The Final Push
The teaching has finished for my first semester back at uni, next week is what they call the “swot vac” . This is revision time for the exam period that starts the following week and it’s also when final assignments are due for subjects that don’t have a final exam. I’m 50-50 with some assignments due and a number of exams. I’ve got a list of due dates and assignments stuck on the wall of my study so I can prioritise my time.
There’s still a lot left to do but I have a good understanding of what I need to do and I’m comfortable preparing at home. My home study is a better place to be than the campus anyway, at least as far as study is concerned. There are quite limited places to set up work on campus, particularly in the winter when everyone is trying to get inside. I will miss the interaction with lecturers are tutors though. I just need this last push to cement some solid results which will hopefully carry me across the line for a mid-year entry into a CSP Bachelor of Arts course.
The contingency plan was to use CAP for the second semester, at which point I’d have a very strong application through VTAC. Unfortunately my side work with my former employer didn’t materialise and we’ve incurred unexpected expenses. There simply isn’t the money to full-fee the second semester. So I really need to a CSP offer… No pressure then…
It’s actually going to be a pretty relaxing finish to the semester, I don’t feel anything like as time constrained as I was at the end of the teaching period. Home study works quite nicely for me and with all four subjects if I get tired of something I can switch to something else. At home I’ve got the gas fire at my back, my desktop computer, a working stable Internet connection and of course as much coffee I can stomach. Chinese, continuing the theme of the semester, is more work than the other three combined. There are four tests in total including a couple of exams. I will also need to develop a relatively poor skill of mine for a one-on-one 10 minute oral exam in 10 days time.
Other than Chinese the next major cause for concern is a written exam for “Philosophy, Politics and Economics”. Not because of the subject, that wont be difficult at all, but because the exam consists of basically hand-writing two 1,000 odd word essays. I can’t recall the last time I wrote so much by hand, my mechanism of writing is all about electronic editing so this is something I need to do practice.
Ramming that point home, I felt I did poorly in a Chinese written composition exam last week because I was simply unprepared for the exam conditions. I was extraordinarily well prepared in terms of background study but I had never practiced writing a short essay in Chinese without any aids. Add on some exam pressure and it was borderline disastrous. It’s quite difficult not to be angry with myself for not seeing that one coming but fortunately it wasn’t a lot of marks in the scheme of things. I’ll do mock exams before the more substantial one later on. I wont make that mistake again.
