Half way

Today I completed TMA 03 and sent it to my local support resource for proofreading and comment. Hopefully, sometime next week, it will be submitted for assessment and by then I  will really be halfway through.

Thus far it has been enjoyable and reasonably easygoing, but no doubt it will become tougher. Nevertheless, I have learnt a lot of new stuff as well as remembering a lot that I had forgotten.

The next four months will show me if I still have the ability, and the desire, to follow this path for five more years. I hope the answer is affirmative because it gives my life further structure and increased purpose.

The Open University

Yesterday I applied to Student Loans, hopefully they will provide funds so I can begin studying with the OU again. This time the course is a BSc Honours in Psychology and Counselling.

The first module is: Exploring psychological worlds: thinking, feeling, doing (D110). It begins on February 3rd 2024, the day before my birthday. Please wish me luck.

The Liberal Arts

It was Steve Jobs who first introduced me to the phrase The Liberal Arts. If I remember correctly he thought this would be the future for the computer, that is applying technology to the liberal arts.

Photo by Alexander Shatov on Unsplash

I did buy a luggable mac, as pictured above, in the late 1980s. I stayed up deep into the night to produce marketing work on it for an exhibition at the NEC in Birmingham. It was a night when I also learnt, big time, about the importance of backing up your work!

Photo by AB on Unsplash

Thirty-five years later I use the iPhone for photographs, for taking calls, for texting, for writing and for browsing the web. In January 2019, at the Sainsbury Centre for the Visual Arts, I once again got the inclination to study. And what better place than there I thought.

Sadly that wasn't to be. My age disqualified me from qualifying for a grant, which meant I could not follow the UEA master's programme. Undeterred I determined to produce and follow my own Home-Made PhD.

The study programme consisted of producing video poetry. I used the Agenda application for keeping track of progress. The videos can be seen on Youtube by searching for Coastmoor. This also gives you access to my non-PhD videos.

The homemade study helped me, but ultimately I needed support to encourage my diversification. Winchester University provided such a portal with their Liberal Arts BA. While unable to join them on the course I could use their curriculum and study guides to set up my own Home-Made BA.

And that's where you will find me from the 13th November onwards. All that I have to do now is to find the books in the packing boxes.