Thoughts..

A president once said in his famous speech, “Ask not what your country will do for you but what you can do for your country”. In the spirit of the celebration of democracy of my beloved country, Nigeria and in witnessing the recent Presidential handover, I ponder on these words.

I remember applying for the Commonwealth Distance Learning Scholarship and an essay question was presented asking applicants how undertaking their proposed graduate study would be of benefit to my home country (Apparently, I wrote quite the compelling essay… If not, why am I even blogging here?). It goes to show that nothing is really all about you and nothing is really for free. With someone gives you an opportunity or gift, a lot more are waiting to receive and benefit from that gift. You have an immediate responsibility to utilize that opportunity to improve not only yourself immediate environment, community and/or country. 

This is my message to students especially scholarship holders. Yes, education is a right, but it is also a gift and an opportunity. And where I come from, quality education is even more precious. So, when you work on that research, project, invention or paper, courtesy of your grant or scholarship, think about how it is much more than your career/educational advancement or churning out excellent scientific papers. Think of the bigger picture; to improve health, technology and socio-economic sectors of your immediate or global community. To be a blessing to mankind. By making other lives better, your life is more fulfilling and by making other people shine, you shine even brighter.

So before I turn this to a boring motivational write-up, let me get down to my actual studies.

As usual, it has been assignments and discussions and more assignments and deadlines with my studies. I am undertaking a very interesting course, the final for this session called “Applied Epidemiology in Public Health”. To be sincere, I was very skeptical about enrolling for this course. I knew I really needed the course as a Public Health professional but the amount of data analysis expertise that accompanied it was a bit of a scare. I wouldn’t say I fancied data analysis so much till now, but welcome to public/global health, where you must be able to analyze data. I also asked my course supervisor for advice in one of our Skype sessions and she guided me alright. Now that I’m into it, it’s really not as bad as I thought and I believe (and I am working hard) to do much better than I initially expected I would in this course.

Interestingly, in the last two weeks, we have had a guest come in and interact with us on ‘Outbreak Investigation’ - the topic at the time. She works in a governmental public health institution in Scotland. She was with us over a period of two weeks and she was great at answering the questions that we (students) had. I find bringing her to the platform for those two weeks as a very good move on the part of the course lecturers. It is a good way of simulating a real classroom environment where guest lecturers and professionals are invited to interact and share some of their experiences including real-life application of students’ coursework. I look forward to seeing more of that in my journey as an ODL student in University of Edinburgh.

Discussions and more! (1)

 Hello Readers!

As usual, it’s been a flurry of activities since my last post. I’m talking essays and heated academic class discussions to presidential elections in my country and certain career landmarks … and just trying to juggle so many aspects of living together.

I would first of all, love to congratulate my country Nigeria for a relatively successful and peaceful political elections. The Presidential elections was undertaken two weeks ago while the Governorship took place yesterday, 11^th April, 2015. In case you don’t know, I’m an ardent follower of politics and it was quite the excitement and tension following up on the daily political dramas that occurred in my country up to the election days. The drama isn't totally over yet but I am quite satisfied with the presentation of the new President-elect and new crop of State Governors. I am looking forward to a better and more progressive Nigeria. I am also grateful to the international community for their on-line and off-line support. Its been a remarkable 2015 for Nigeria so far and a big shout-out to everyone! As it is commonly said here, “Nothing dey happen” (Translation, It is going to be alright), I strongly believe that we shall all overcome and Nigeria will get more alright.

Now unto my academics…

So in my just-concluded course ‘Understanding Infectious Diseases”, we were entrusted with this scientific journal and were given the ultimate power to make our own versions of a compelling summary out of some major parts of the journal. Personally, I considered the journal quite akin to cryptography and I was beginning to get a little worried about that upon the first few reads.  Believe me, I always assumed that I was pretty good with summarizing especially when it comes to taking into perspectives, the analytical part of journals, but this took some sweat out of me. I was relieved to find out that I was not the only person in this boat when we had our class discussion on the journal as some of my colleagues also shared their experiences with difficulties encountered in breaking down the technical languages and complexities of the journal.

Anyway, as expected, the contents of the journal stimulated one of the most interesting, controversial and engaging discussions that I have experienced so far in my ODL course of study. I mean how do you really explain and/or confirm that infection with helminths (worms!) could be a preventive cure for your asthma and other allergies??? – Yes! That was the topic discussion/debate. 

Unfortunately for me, during most of the period when these heated discussions were on, I had been diagnosed with a lethal combination of malaria/typhoid infection. I was unable to attend to much of the discussion except  to read through, monitor, learn and also do some more research on the topic of discussion as I could. But of course, at some point, I did get off my feet to contribute (not unless I wanted to forfeit the associated marks). 

As usual, when you have a controversial discussion as this and you have very bright students as colleagues, you cannot but learn more than a thing or two from such discussions. My colleagues all contributed to the learning experience by sharing personal experiences from all parts of the world, notes from other scientific journals, news reports, giving accounts of on-site professional experiences and providing generally intelligent deductions from cases presented for discussion from the journal. This was highly expository for me and I look forward to having more of this in my next course after the spring break.

To be continued….

N.B: It is now 362 days today that the Chibok girls were abducted from their schools by Boko Haram Terrorists in Nigeria. This happened last year 14^th, April 2014. Kindly join us in our prayers and solidarity as we continue to ardently hope for their return and for justice.

Please use the hashtags #BringBackOurGirls #ChibokGirls #NeverToBeForgotten to join the solidarity on Twitter. Thank you. 

More than studying …. (II)

If there was ever a time I wish I was a full-time student at The University of Edinburgh; that would be now. Judging by the rapid inflow of messages I get in my school mail talking about either an invitation to one road trip here, some sporting event there and some volunteering opportunity somewhere and another election coming up elsewhere – it all seems so exciting and I feel just a little wistful that I’m not in the midst of the flurry of activities in the campus. (And what is it about “The trip to Loch Ness”, I’m really curious as there have been repeated invitations to the trip since last semester). Anyway, they say you can’t eat your cake and have it, so I better just probably wait till I get the opportunity to visit Edinburgh, right?

So, in my last post, I was discussing about the variety of assignments that I’ve been having in this semester and I’m going to talk about my just-concluded Poster assignment.
Let me mention first that I had no prior experience in scientific poster-making, therefore, I was quite apprehensive about how to even go about it in the first instance. Fortunately (thanks to our ingenious course supervisors), in addition to providing how-to materials on making posters, we had the opportunity to critique a sample poster and I considered this a great idea. Everyone contributed accordingly and I’m pretty sure it was a highly beneficial exercise and learning experience for us, not just as students but as researchers, scientists and workers in our different fields of work.

Also, I reached out to a fellow ODL student and Nigerian who I “met” on the Facebook ODLEdSoc platform. He is a second year student running a course that I consider similar to mine (MSc International Animal Health) and he was really helpful in giving a few pointers on his own experience with his previous poster assignments. All in all, I tried my possible best in making what I consider very appropriate for some cool high scores.

So, wish me luck with that!

It’s just a few hours away from the next month and I’m sure we all had great times in January and February.

Just to leave this little nugget by Napoleon Hill – “There is one quality which one must possess to win, and that is definiteness of purpose, the knowledge of what one wants, and a burning desire to possess it”.
I hope this motivates someone for the month of March and beyond.

Ciao!

More than studying ....

4:07 am. Lagos, Nigeria.

As my “internal alarm system” wakes me up in my room, I feel the simultaneous blend of heat and caress of cool air both coming from my ceiling fan above and my open side windows on the sides. Thank goodness the rains are finally here to cool the searing characteristic dry heat of this season. I’m grateful for the present electricity - and then I feel dreadful at the thought of having no electricity to power the fans at this moment (Yeah, this happens here). The heat would have been plainly discomforting and the few mosquitoes that I noticed were very much around just before I slept would definitely have thanked their maker for such an opportunity! But of course, if that happened, I still would have survived anyway and probably slept fitfully through it all.

So, I look through my windows, observe the starless night, feel the peace of the quiet night and it comes rushing ... Edin-BLOG!!! (that’s what I call it).

Yeepa!!! (That’s Nigerian pidgin English for “Gosh!!!), I grab my nearest phone, reconfirm today’s date and grab my laptop immediately. I feel grateful once again for this electricity because my laptop battery has run really low.

So Yes ... I’m here again.

I hope we all had a great January and a LOVEly February. I can say I have been having a good semester so far. This semester course schedule and organization was quite different from last semester’s course. However, the good news is, I’m more prepared. We have had series of very interesting assignments which were given in new ways, some of which I have just recently been introduced to.

The last 2 assignments were given as writing an abstract, giving a diagrammatic representation of that abstract and then making a poster!

I’m not new to writing abstracts, thanks to my undergraduate research project and one year of work experience in a research institute; but I was definitely new to the recent trend of presenting cool diagrammatic expressions of your abstract (and project). This I learned, is necessary to present a summary of your project in an engaging way that can be communicated easily, especially to the layman. It was quite the interesting and learning experience undertaking this assignment as I consider my drawing/artistry quite horrible. (I imagine myself as a kid, when my teacher tells me to draw a picture of the sun and I end up with something that looks a lot like a very active amoeba). Keeping my poor artistry in mind, I immediately set to work and read so much more to further familiarize myself with the dynamics of the assignment given and the use of Microsoft Power point. Also, the support and tips given by the course team (as usual) and fellow classmates was incredibly helpful. So, I was thrilled to know that my hard work paid off when I got a reasonably satisfactory grade in the assignment

And you know the most interesting part, undertaking this assignment has taken me to a whole new level of expertise (please allow me to brag!) on putting together creative presentations especially for my workplace. I have learned so much from just undertaking this assignment that has and will improve my capacity beyond just getting an education.

Okay, I have to go now. Wish you all a great week ahead!

To be continued… Promise…

2015!

A new year is an opportunity for a fresh start, new hopes and new goals at least for most people and that definitely includes me. Now, I am not going to go all cliché and go on and on about setting goals but …. YOU JUST HAVE TO SET GOALS!

I was one of 3 invited guests at a radio station in Lagos, Nigeria last December and the topic of discussion was on Goal setting and making Resolutions. The discussion got really interesting and one thing that struck me during the conversation was that – Really, after determining your goals, how do you turn them into reality? Or how do you make your plan work? What specific steps do you take to make the plan work? What options are available to you and which is most resourceful for you to choose? WHAT IS YOUR STRATEGY? This struck me because a lot of us are good at fantasizing and even speaking about our beautiful goals and dreams but its either we fall short or nothing even comes out of it

Like I mentioned in my previous posts, it’s been quite the experience for me as an ODL student studying from far away Lagos, Nigeria. This is especially significant as I now have a basic idea of the studying terrain in the University and I can now adapt better to the work-study schedule in my first semester and modify to subsequent semesters.

As the first semester results were released, I had a few concerns about my results and I needed a few guidelines on how I can improve my studying and writing skills and generally grow as a student. Of course, I contacted my ever approachable course director who was indeed very helpful as she immediately set up an appointment for me to discuss on my concerns and improve my performance for subsequent semesters. If you feel this would also help your studies or grades, do not hesitate to contact your course supervisor(s) as I am sure they would really help in giving advice and constructive criticism where necessary.

I also engaged a few of my ODL colleagues in the second and third year, on the ODL Facebook group and it was enlightening to hear about their experiences on how they encountered similar adjustability issues (especially combining studies with work) upon inception of study, adjusted their academic goals and strategy and implemented lessons learned. I intend to do better, I intend to reach my academic goals and that is why I am taking one of many strategic steps towards reaching that goal and I enjoin everyone to take that step. Plan your year, plan your months and plan your day. The quote “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail” is very relevant in our everyday life.

Oh and lest I forget, a new goal for me this year is to post more often - at least 3 articles every 2 months. Yaay! So help me God.

Wish everyone a wonderful and successful academic year!

More...

Hello everyone,

First of all, it was my birthday yesterday 29/11/2014 and I’m so excited and grateful to be purposefully alive in good health and celebrating with family and friends. It’s been quite the work keeping up with calls, text messages and Facebook messages from well-wishers all around the world but who am I to complain? I’m enjoying the birthday attention either way.

Second of all, let me apologize for the loooooong silence. November has been a hectic month at work and compiling that with school and other extras has been quite overwhelming! (And maybe just a little bit of the infamous "thief of time" won't just let me write something!). To be frank, the past month that I’ve been off grid, I got to fully realize how involving the ODL program is. I try to imagine how much work I would actually have if I was undertaking the full-time study. At some point, I scheduled a Skype appointment with an IAD representative to aid my understanding of the ODL and we had a very fruitful discussion. In addition, we discussed extensively on tools and resources for time management among other things. Taking all of these into context, I view this “challenges” from a positive perspective of continuous personal development and capacity building as an individual and as a professional. It is also a privilege and opportunity to increase my ability to multi-task effectively.

So yaaay! Vicky Ware, a current ODLstudent, came up with this grand idea of setting up an online forum on Facebook called ODLEdSoc. She set the page up for all past, current and aspiring ODL students from University of Edinburgh to “meet”, interact, socialize and share experiences and ideas. I truly commend her for this and the overall response has been great. I join the social forum and got to meet new people, meet my course-mates (again!) on a more relaxed social level and even got to interact fully with a third year student of my course of study from my country! He even gave me some orientation and tips on using the discussion forum to increase my chances of getting more marks, literature search and how to interpret the Turnitin results on assignments submitted. I do hope soon that the social forum becomes a standardized officially recognized society in the University, if possible. For all ODL students who have not joined the Facebook page, you can send an email to odledsoc@hotmail.com, or just send a request to join the page ODLEdSoc on Facebook while including some form of recognizable school ID. It could just be your school ID number. All prospective ODL students can do the same - send an email requesting to join the Facebook page.

Finally, end of term is very near and as much as I can’t wait for to have some kind of breather and enjoy the upcoming holidays, I’ll miss the “company” of my course-mates and our weekly discussions. And apart from making sure I submit my assignments before the deadline, this is also an opportunity for me to refresh my memory by going through my course materials and discussion forum again. You never can tell what useful information you have missed therein. I wish you all the best as we approach end of term and end of year. And I wish you great success in your upcoming examinations and assignments. 

Ciao!

Where are my study resources??

Whew!

So it’s been a very long and busy 3 weeks and 3 days since the last time I posted. I have just enough time in between reading my lecture notes for the week, writing assignments and reports, and posting my thoughts on the discussion forum (while still being delighted with the depth of knowledge, creativity and diversity exhibited by my classmates) to make this post. All these studying I have to keep up with on a constant basis in conjunction with maintaining optimal performance in my workplace in Nigeria had gotten me quite stressed out in the first 2 weeks of study.

It was just less than a week ago that I remembered a message in my school mail (which I saw a while back) on Institute for Academic Development (IAD) study resources. I went to make a quick perusal of the messages in my inbox and …. There it was!

I found the link to the IAD school webpage and blog which contained various learning and career resources. Therein, I found documents ranging from time management to effective reading, literature search, managing reading workloads, drafting and planning assignments and even procrastination. Awesome right? (Lesson learned – check EVERY web-link sent to your inbox).

So, in case anyone like me just didn't take note of this on time;

http://iad4masters.wordpress.com/resources/

http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/institute-academic-development/postgraduate/taught/learning-resources

You are welcome! 

Fresh and new too..

Hello all!

I would start by giving a warm welcome to all fellow new students - ODL, full time or part time. I remember being so thrilled at getting my notification of admission/scholarship that I displayed about six different dances together (while listening to Pharell’s “Happy” and Kirk Franklin’s “Could’ve been me”); which probably made me look like a really awkward dancing mosquito. Yeah, it did feel that great!

Now, as a Nigerian resident, talking of mosquitoes naturally reminds me of malaria and a host of infectious diseases, the currently notable sub-saharan epidemic being the Ebola virus. When the virus sadly made its way into my country, all I could think of (among other things) was that I couldn’t wait to get started on my Masters program in Global Health and Infectious diseases (GHID), to learn as much as I could and develop advanced skills to successfully combat similar situations that may arise. Though it’s going to be quite the journey now that I have gotten started, I strongly believe it will be worthwhile and highly beneficial to my personal and professional development.

Navigating through the online classroom platform was quite challenging and bewildering at first, most probably because of the sudden influx of information and registration processes you have to absorb and undertake all at once. But after consistent usage and special thanks to my wonderful Programme Director, it's pretty much getting better per time. To aid a smoother start for the online learning platform, I think it’s just really important for an ODL student to go through the learning and information platforms (MyEd, Learn, Blackboard, Collaborate) as often as possible, and I mean even when you don’t have any serious thing per say to do. It’s much more like going sight-seeing as a full-time fresher so as to get acquainted with your new school. With time, we all get used to a consistently navigated environment. Also, I asked as much questions as I could from technical administrators and my course director(s) which have been very helpful. Discussion boards is another awesome way to get acquainted with the online platforms. In fact, it was through this that I realized that I wasn't alone in the "ODL newbie" movement (which shouldn't be that surprising, right?).

So, I finally got to “meet” a good number of my classmates and I’m especially pleased with the diversity in culture and professional experiences present. Now that lectures have officially started, I’m truly looking forward to a mutually beneficial learning experience, making new friends, establishing lasting relationships and generally having an awesome academic year. I wish you reader a great year too.

Welcome to my world!