course convener

having been concerned that the other postgrads i've met have been having induction sessions this week, i did end up breaking my stance on not emailing my course convener, alex prior to a face-to-face meeting here on campus. however, i am glad that i did.

of course my email was not met with an answer, but proposed that i pop in to see him today. so i pulled emily, a fellow AMP post grad from jamaica, along with me and we met alex this afternoon. i did find out that he's from what was yugoslavia, which could explain our difficulty through email...

a much better situation in person than through email, alex told us not to be concerned about anything and that it would all work out. apparently, alex is also unaware that i like planned information and have come to somewhat expect that from a university.

i did not know, also, that the masters AMP program only began last year. while this makes me a bit more hesitant, he did field a phone call from David Hargreaves while emily and i were in his office. and then promptly tried to reach Adam someone after emily mentioned how excited she was to meet him. He also mentioned a host of people who we will be working with - including Adrian North and John Sloboda. This will be amazing. To have these people to work with is exactly why i came to England to study. And the masters AMP program will be general in order to cover so many topics so then i'll just have to really narrow my research focus and make the most out of all these amazing people in the field.

He had us meet some people and showed us our classrooms (one being the play therapy room which brought back memories of MT) and then sat for tea with us at the Whitelands dining room--my favorite view on this campus so far.

it all seems broad and nebulous (it's even unclear how many students will be in the program), but in re-emphasizing that it will all sort itself out, we begin our course next week.

i do suppose that gives me more time to sort things out this week. and i need to order some of these books as soon as i can.