Time for holidays #HappyChristmas

Cheers!
Image source: jules / stone soup, CC BY 2.0, Link

Today is the last day at work for most people, though many will have taken today off - especially those travelling. It is a quiet day in the College, and the roads were also very quiet coming into Dublin too. Despite this, it is one of my favourite days of the year. We have a tradition in the College to wind up the calendar year with Irish Coffees in the staff canteen - a great get-together with some festive cheer. 

The past semester seemed to have passed me by very quickly. I had the same modules as in the previous year and only minor updates were required to deliver them again - so not so much preparation for classes. I also managed to stay on top of continuous assessment grading - it's great to reach the end of the semester and not have this hanging over me. It was with a little tinge of sadness when I finished each module - I may not be teaching three of the four modules again. I will especially miss the Business Data Analysis module - I have come to love teaching statistics since I started doing so in September 2012.

January will be busy as I will have about 150 exams scripts and projects to grade. Once again I will not have any new modules, and will have just two Statistics classes and one programming class. The biggest thing that I will be participating in next year is the Programmatic Review of the Higher Diploma in Data Analytics. The documentation required for programmatic review is horrendous - I am not looking forward to this one bit. The length of time it takes is also huge. Even though this is just a one year programme, it takes a year to develop. The review will start in January 2020, and will be presented to a panel sometime in late 2020. Once confirmed (early 2021), we will then be able to deliver it for the first time in September 2021, with the first graduates receiving their Diplomas in November 2022. It seems such a long time away before the first students will graduate.

Merry Christmas Everyone!