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Week 11

I worked on my review of last weeks event. I sent John my first draft, which he was rather pleased with, and am now working on my second draft before uploading via WordPress. In a similar vain to the Govinden review, he had little feedback. I think I’ve officially hit my groove these last couple reviews! Not having a dissertation (as I submitted it at the end of Easter) has aided my mental health massively and given me more time to work on my reviews, something I’m very grateful for. 

Link to the article is here: http://archive.nclacommunity.org/content/?p=3562

I could not attend Thursday’s event live, due to it being my 21st birthday, so am watching it next Monday and working on my review of the event. I’ll be assuming the time spent on this review on my timesheet, as this is being published on the 25th of May. 

On the morning of the 24th, I sent a timesheet to John, and worked on my review of Gharvi and Newland’s event. I sent my first draft of the review to John Monday afternoon/evening, in the hope to receive some feedback tomorrow and have it published a couple hours before my timesheet is due. 

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Week 10

John said that my latest review was my best one yet! This certainly made me feel very proud - that over the last 10 weeks I’ve come very far. He’s sent me some feedback to work on it and I should have the review shared today (Wednesday 12th). This feedback was very minimal, again highlighting how pleased he was with my review. 

On another note, I’ve started applying for graduate jobs and John outlined that he would happily provide a reference for any of my future interviews/applications. I think his willingness to help is hopefully testament to the dedication I’ve shown the NCLA over these few months.

Link to the article is here: http://archive.nclacommunity.org/content/?p=3557

On Thursday, I live-tweeted the event with Jon McGregor: ‘Lean. Fall. Stand’. As I had done live-tweeting before, now on an academic level, I felt more confident with my abilities. I think I did a good job, this time incorporating more direct quotes from the event. They can be viewed here: https://twitter.com/NCLA_tweets/status/1392918403371909125

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Week 9

On Monday I worked further on my review of the Natasha Pulley event, sharing it with John and Theresa that evening in the hopes of having feedback/uploading the review later this week. 

After working with John, I had my final draft published to the Archives on Thursday Morning. I also spent a bit of time on FB and Twitter advertising tonight’s event, a talk with Niven Govinden on ‘Diary of a Film’. As discussed, I wasn’t able to attend this event live. 

Link to the article is here: http://archive.nclacommunity.org/content/?p=3552

On Saturday, I watched the event from last week and spent time working on my first draft. I was a HUGE fan of this event, and found it very interesting. I think it’ll be to a similar calibre as my Roger Clarke review. I’ve scheduled this to be sent to John on Tuesday, his next NCLA working day. Theresa is currently out of office, so I think John will be my main port of call. 

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Easter Break

Throughout Easter, I worked to promote the previous events that the NCLA has hosted on our Instagram, as we had previously worked with Twitter but not so much on the Instagram. I used graphics from the previous events as their main image and created brief descriptions of each event, as well as instructions on how to access this content.

I also worked with Theresa Munoz in promoting and sharing events happening involving the NCLA, such as the James Berry prize and the Dead (Women) Poet's Society. I shared this with the Course Reps at SELLL, and also directly onto the SELLL Blog's Instagram page, where it would've intrigued writers and readers alike.

As no events were on, this was a great opportunity to work on my dissertation.

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Week 8

As there’s no event this week, I’m taking my time writing the review of last week’s event, Natasha Pulley discussing her latest novel ‘The Lost Future of Pepperharrow’. Whilst I had attended the event previously, I couldn’t really take notes as I was focusing on listening to Pulley and finding interesting things to tweet. However, I developed a useful tool which was to use my previous tweets as a framework for my review. This worked effectively, and John had less feedback than normal for this review!

However, on Tuesday I had a discussion with John and Theresa regarding my placement. They loved the reviews I was doing, and provided some feedback in terms of sharing these events more often on our Twitter and Instagram. I decided that during April I would post about these events, with links to my reviews, for more people to interact with. These posts can be seen in my next blog post, during Easter. I released one every day through one week, to keep them relevant. I plan on doing this again at the end of Semester 3, keeping it as some sort of ‘Semester in review’ event.

John also encouraged me to continue live-tweeting events in the future, and Theresa outlined further work I can be doing within my role. I’m aware that I won’t be able to attend two of our last three events live, but have promised to work on my live-tweeting on May 13th. 

I also emailed Melanie Birch to explore the demographic of our NCLA events, so I can learn more about who my content is aimed towards. This may be of use during my project, depending on what I decide to write it on. 

Tuesday evening I created event pages on Facebook for the remainder of the NCLA events. These were the four events occurring through April-May.

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Week 7

On Tuesday, I started working on my review of last Thursday’s event, the PBS poetry discussion with Rowan and Jen. I sent my first draft to John and Theresa on Tuesday evening, expecting a list of feedback on their next working day (Thursday). 

On Thursday, alongside the feedback for the PBS event, I was asked by John to live-tweet that night’s event. I accepted, and my live-tweeting can be viewed here: https://twitter.com/NCLA_tweets/status/1372638804448788480

Live-tweeting is something I’ve done before in my student-media journey, but never on an academic level, so it took some getting used to. John suggested that, unlike previous students, I limit the content of my writing and only report on the areas that I think will be engaging. I didn’t want to be bombarding the audience. I think I did a good job, and John gave me similar feedback.

The PBS event was posted on Friday. Writing, receiving feedback then writing again is starting to become the norm now, and I’m getting more comfortable with my writing skills. A link to the article is here: http://archive.nclacommunity.org/content/?p=3537

We also arranged to meet next week via Zoom to discuss my plans for the next semester, as this was the last event before the Easter Break.

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Week 6

On Tuesday, I sent my most recent review of Roger Clarke’s event for the NCLA. After receiving feedback from both John and Theresa, I posted the review on the website. This was a very very fun article to write, and I think John noticed that in my writing. This has been one of the more interesting things I’ve noticed, and I wonder if it’ll continue: when I learn about a novel/text I like the sound of, I tend to write more engaging and lengthier reviews of these events. I’m still proud of the reviews I’ve done for the previous two novels, even though I wasn’t as keen on them through the event, and all my reviews will be done to a high quality. It’s made me wonder about what I’ll write about in the future - I’d love an occupation where I don’t have to write about things I find disinteresting, and perhaps have the freedom to explore topics I genuinely love? Food for thought. 

The NCLA were even able to send me a copy of the book!

Link to the article is here: http://archive.nclacommunity.org/content/?p=3526

This Thursday was our first event in 2 weeks, a poetry event hosted by the NCLA’s own John Challis and two PBS supported poets. I wasn’t able to attend the event live, again relying on YouTube to re-watch the event on another evening. 

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Week 5

This week was a reading week, so I took some time to reflect on my experience with the NCLA. I’m very pleased with my progress, and have enjoyed writing these academic reviews, but would like to expand my skill-set and help in other ways through the next few weeks. I’ll see what I can do, and if I don’t believe I’m being tested enough will ask John and Theresa what I can help with. 

I also spent a LOT of time working on my dissertation throughout this week. As the NCLA works alongside Newcastle Uni John and Theresa were very accommodating of my degree, so having flexible hours has certainly aided my experience.

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Week 4

On Monday and Tuesday, I received the feedback for my latest review on Cal Flyn’s Islands of Abandonment: Life in the Post-Human Landscape. I think after two articles I’m getting much more comfortable with my ability to write academic-minded reviews, and I’m very pleased with how quick it took me to adapt to this environment. I email John and Theresa almost every two days, to maintain communications and show that I’m still engaged with my role at the NCLA.

I’ve scheduled the Cal Flyn review to be released on Wednesday morning, and will be running a Twitter post to advertise it. 

The article is available here: http://archive.nclacommunity.org/content/?p=3502

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Week 3

On Monday, I received confirmation that my article was ready to be published. This was a very happy feeling, knowing that my writing was up to the calibre expected by the NCLA. I used WordPress to lay-up the article with all the relevant attributes, such as a link to our Twitter, YouTube and Events page. I’ve used WordPress before, so this wasn’t necessarily challenging, although their version of WP was a bit different to the version I use at The Courier, which made for a few confusing minutes! 

After publishing, I advertised the article on the NCLA’s Twitter, hoping to drive more students/academics to the review.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, I started work watching and writing a review of an event that was on last Thursday, in relation to a book called: “Islands of Abandonment: Life in the post-human landscape”. I couldn’t attend this event live, but luckily all of the NCLA’s event these last two semesters, due to COVID-19, have all been uploaded live on YouTube. 

On Thursday, I sent my first draft of this review to John and Theresa, in the hopes that I can receive feedback by Monday for it to be released early next week. I also attended the NCLA event that night, a talk with Roger Clarke on the history of ghosts, which I’ll be writing up next week to keep with my current schedule. 

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Week 1+2

After communications with John and Theresa over at the NCLA, I was instructed on a few areas in which I should be working on during my placement. They got me set up on their social channels, including Twitter and Instagram, and introduced me to their WordPress. We also decided that, given my experience writing news reports and articles for The Courier, that working on reviews/write-ups of NCLA events may be a significant area for me to work on. 

In my first week, on the Thursday, I attended an event with Kerri Andrews, who’s recently published a book on the history of women walkers. 

After attending, I spent the following week writing and working on my first write-up for the NCLA, including a link to the YouTube video for any readers to watch the talk, and a QnA section in which I highlighted some of the more prominent questions asked by the live YouTube audience. It was a very different experience to the typical writing that I do for The Courier, which is more music/sport/news themed. This was more academic writing, which will certainly help me develop a different writing skill over the next weeks. I look forward to reading John and Theresa’s feedback to gain more information on how to better my writing. 

I finished writing this on the Friday of the second week (19/2), after regular drafts were sent to John and Theresa with feedback received. I’m planning on having this up on the Monday of Week 3 (22/2). 

A link to the review: http://archive.nclacommunity.org/content/?p=3493

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Introductions...

Hello! Welcome to my blog in which I’ll be exploring my placement with the NCLA