Thursday 6 October 2011

They're here...

Of course I don't mean the alien invasion, just that the students are back, oh hang on.. :-)

Actually aside from campus looking like a trash can at the moment, it's nice to see the place restored to (one of) it's primary functions. There was a danger for a week or so that I was about to actually acheive one of my summer research goals but now there's no chance. However, there is definitely a different buzz around the place.

Our new PhD students start today, and as admission tutor I feel excited that I have been involved in giving 15 students opportunities to follow our graduate programme.. but slightly nervous in case any of them turn out not to live up to expectations. For the coming year I wanted to try to get a better comparative measure than their paper applications, but I would have at most 10 mins with each student in which to do it. I wonder about
a) asking some very standard questions to each student (should these be technical or more open-ended e.g. what excites you about the subject X)
b) sending out something to be prepared in advance (e.g. get them to summarise a short paper in subject X)

Either of these would be more objective than a look at their paper application, a general chat, and a "gut instinct". But would they be more reliable?

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