P-cubed Newsletters

Contents HeadsUp The semester is well and truly underway, with weather-related interruptions hopefully behind us.  I for one have been enjoying brushing up my lectures and engaging with a  refreshingly enthusiastic class of students. It’s been an enjoyable...

Contents HeadsUp Well, it’s been a bumpy start with rain, wind and power outages, but we’re underway. Semester 1 is upon us. Expect the unexpected should, perhaps, be our motto. This last week brought three moments in which I caught myself feeling unexpectedly buoyed...

Contents HeadsUp I jotted the last Heads-up in the wake of the floods. Two weeks later, I’m doing so on a laptop with a fading battery as the house shakes in Gabrielle’s grip. I am grateful for a cup of tea brewed on my tramping stove, the power and wifi having been...

Contents HeadsUp This was going to be the “welcome back, hope you had a great summer break” commentary. Well, there were some days that were glorious and quintessentially summer. And in due course I look forward to hearing how you spent them. But for now, here we are,...

Contents HeadsUp As I write the last Heads-up for this year, I have just cancelled two routine meetings whose participants are already on annual leave. Last week seemed a sequence of saying “if I don’t see you before Christmas, have a good one”.  With business all but...

Contents HeadsUp ‘When it rains, it pours’ is a saying with metaphorical as much as meteorological resonance around the School over the last couple of weeks. Unlike the gloomy weather, the metaphorical downpour of staff and student accolades and achievements is...

Contents HeadsUp The time of heads-down marking exams is coming to an end. As your heads come up and you look ahead to the summer, please take the time to go into PeopleSoft HR, break into your nest-egg of annual leave and book some weeks off over summer. As I said at...

Contents HeadsUp It was great to attend the School Research awards on Thursday. As usual, it was amazing to see the diversity of research activities across the School (from analogues for life on other plants to meditation and back again). T is important to recognise...

Contents HeadsUp By the time you read this, I hope you’ve all had a good and refreshing long weekend. I hope, too, that you’ve spared a thought for the struggle Labour Day commemorates.  The eight hour day may seem like an illusion to many of us academics (yes, I was...

Contents HeadsUp I’m standing in for Robin while he’s away on a few days leave, and I must admit to writing this at the last minute (thanks for the reminder, Iliane).  While grasping for inspiration, I thought about what I’d done over the previous...