I’ve finally hit week 1 of studying at the University of Bath! This week has been all about getting into the swing of semi-distant learning. We’re scheduled to study 4 days a week remote, with one 4-hr in-person session a week. There are at least 10 online platforms to juggle all in all, which really could be worse, and everything fills a purpose. At least we’re CS students, if anyone could be expected to cope with distance learning it’s probably us.

I’m getting squared and sorted with my notetaking and work situations, getting into all of the habits that should make this year as effective as possible. Health is a key part of that too. The weather’s suddenly turned, and I’m a lot less incentivised to get out running. I’m also struggling with some feelings in my right wrist that might be the beginning of RSI, this could be because I stupidly decided to try out a keyboard with a really high key height just because it has some shiny bells and whistles like LEDs. I’m back to typing on the straight laptop keyboard now, and I’ll see if that improves anything.

In person

On Wednesday we had our first in person session. There wasn’t much work to do, it was mainly an introductory thing, and we also had to do the weird approach of all being in the same room, then signing in to a Microsoft Teams meeting to include those who couldn’t make it, but after we settled in I found it incredibly nice to spend some time chatting to other students. There’s a very different mindset between people who are working and people in an academic setting. I’ve really missed the kind of wandering conversations you get to have in that space. Meeting the other students and chatting to them about where they’re coming from was definitely the best part of the week. We’re all headed into the same strange year. Plus I got some tips on my Vim setup (need to work on including plugins, Goyo is apparently quite nice for writing blogs).

It was much less fun actually getting to campus. It was my first time getting to the university and I wasn’t that familiar with Bath’s public transit. I narrowly missed the bus going there, and had to get two on the way back. Might take the bike next time. The SU was an experience in post lockdown contact tracing measures, scans on the NHS app, and tapped in with our library cards, but a £4.20 pint of Guinness, a lot better than London.

I also did the very first project sheet of coding on the course! A little homework on C, I’ve previously taken early parts of Harvard’s CS50 course, so none of it was really new. I think things will slowly ramp up through the term. Bath seems to have a really good focus on equipping us with the tools for discovery and the principles underlying coding rather than focusing on teaching us the languages, which is exactly the approach I was looking for. It was also great to compare the different levels people are at with their coding experience, seems like a good mix between us all.

Focus for the next few weeks is staying targeted for upcoming coursework, and chewing through the material as and when it comes. I’m finally all finished with my job, it’s good to be able to draw a line under that, even if it’s a bit bitter sweet.

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