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May 2010

Starting university—what the

universities don't tell you by Kristianne

Colvin

For many second years, this entire year has

been geared up for beginning university in

autumn.

Everyone has been stressed at some level, first

deciding what subject you want to do, which is not as

simple as it seems (who knew you could have so many

variations and combinations within one subject?). Even

after that you still have what seems like hundreds of

prospectuses to look at or read as they attempt to

convince you they are the best university ever to grace

the earth – whether you believe them or not depends

on where you actually want to go.

After you manage to make these two decisions and

Continues on Page 3

Also inside...

apply, you then sit waiting for weeks and weeks until they tell you if you actually have a

place. Finally, you (hopefully) receive a place at a university you like; you’ve picked

the course you’re sure you want to do. Now comes the fun bit – actually going.

Gap Years by Nielsen Cerbolles

Preparing oneself for the gap year journey is as easy as pie. Well, if

you're employed...with

pay....

Anish Kapoor at the Royal Academy of Arts By Amy

Page

An insight into the artist, Anish

Kapoor, Turner Prize winner and

contemporary artist

Featured

Photography

By Jonno

Morley

We take a look at

one student’s artwork, showing the talents from

within the college.

College life

Articles from the students about

events in college

• Key Skills • The “ten

minute” rule

Page 2 Page 5 Pages 4 and 8 Page 9

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Filling the gaps. By Nielsen Cerbolles

Preparing oneself for the gap year journey is as easy as pie. Well, if you're employed...with

pay.... I can clearly remember the days when my mother would constantly shout at me to try and get a job. I was sitting down on my moderately comfortable leather sofa unconsciously nodding away and rolling my eyes because I knew that the chances of getting a paid job was the same as receiving a fully functional ACME product with an inclusive 100% money-back

guarantee. Forward to the present and still students across the country are in a predicament where jobs are scarce and has reached a point where even degrees are irrelevant. Where to go

from here? Well for those taking a gap year, such as myself, the search for a job is an even more tedious task than ever before. In some cases, it is the year where you get to 'travel the world' or 'discover yourself'. But in planet reality, it is a year where you struggle to find a job to sustain your social activities; otherwise you'll be lounging around on the sofa watching day-time drivel such as the Jeremy Kyle Show. Arguably with the prospect of more and more students heading to university to avoid the dole, the competition for full time jobs between students will likely be low. Still, I can't

help feel that contractors are still reluctant to provide jobs to inexperienced young adults. The most sensible thing to do (prepare to cringe) is to volunteer for free jobs. Sure your social life will probably suffer (a lot) because of it but experience should be a priority instead of money. Let me enlighten you with a little tidbit: I’ve heard numerous stories about aspiring journalists assuming they will become editors in a blink the second they strut out of university and parade their degrees to potential employers like it was some sort of

primary school certificate for being 100% punctual. As an aspiring journalist myself, I can’t help but chuckle and 'roffle' for a good ten minutes

at this strategy. Whether you want to do journalism or another profession, experience is seemingly becoming more important than a piece of paper saying 'First Class Honours'. Employers look to see if you can work in a professional environment and if you don’t have that ability (as well as other things), the probability of getting a long, prosperous and sustainable

occupation is as likely as someone saying “I love that Go-Compare advert”. Interestingly, some of the students' techniques when trying to look for jobs are somewhat unoriginal and lazy. Take for instance, the use of gumtree.com or searching for jobs in big chain stores are arguably laughable in my eyes because there are too many people competing for a few jobs. In my experience, thinking outside of the box proved much

better and managed to get lucky.

Gap years—sun, sea and sand. If you’re lucky

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(continued from previous) How? Well, I used Twitter (seriously) to widen my connections and publicise myself. The result? I got into contact with an upcoming journalism publishing/internet company and

now I blog, take photographs for them and contribute any way I can. The key thing is to remain persistent but remain level headed like Simon Cowell botoxed face. I anticipate that the gap year will be the equivalent to being within college because of the amount of calls, haggling, paper/Word work, rejections we have to endure...sort of

Starting university—what the universities don't tell you by

Kristianne Colvin (continued from page 1)

Of course there’s the adjustment period. How many people in that age range are likely to

do all their washing, cooking, ironing, cleaning, themselves? I know I don’t do it all

myself, and I doubt many do. I see myself only buying food that goes straight in the oven,

buying clothes that will never wrinkle, and trying not to create any mess to save on the

vacuuming. A crash course in ‘how to do the clothes washing without turning everything

that was white pink’ may be in order for some people…

It’s not so bad if you will be living at home, though there is the fact you’ll be with you

parents for the whole three years (it depends on your perspective if this is a blessing or a

curse), but if you’re going off half way across the country, you’ll have to move. Into a

dorm. Full of people you’ve never seen in your life.

Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a terrible life threatening event. But, say for example, like

many universities, you’ll be moving into a flat based around a communal space like a

kitchen or main room, with six to eight rooms attached. That right there is the potential

for seven possible nutters living with you for the next year. Not a negative necessarily I’m

sure, but, there’s still that tiny possibility…the likelihood of everyone being entirely

normal, with no ‘wild side’ to drive you mad or weird habits that you’ll never understand,

are slim.

There’s no real way to get rid of annoying flatmates apart from literally shoving them out

of the door and hoping they forget how to get back in. You can try all you like to label

food to stop it being stolen, ban them from using your things so they don’t get stolen, and

hiding your alcohol so it doesn’t get stolen, but then again maybe that makes you the

neurotic one.

All you can really do is hope for the best, learn to get the hang of things you’ve got to do,

sleep lots, and maybe fit in some work there too. If worst comes to worst and you’re the

only sane housemate there then…get used to it. Not much else to suggest there. At least

it’s most likely only for the year. And perhaps feel a little better about it considering

what could have happened. I found a book about house sharing with crazy flatmates

entitled I Lick My Cheese, and more likely than not you won’t have to deal with that sort

of thing. And if you do then… hide your cheese.

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Key Skills?

by Hanin Khaddour and Andy Tran

I don't know about you, but when I chose my subjects I put down four, it was four right? Yes,

I'm pretty sure it was FOUR, so I'm sure you understand the confusion that went through me

when I saw I had that one extra subject. Key skills. What is it? I don't remember signing up

for it. When I tried to point out what I thought was a clear mistake on my timetable, I got

told I had to do it. But why? “So you’re computer literate” they say. Eh?

Here’s what really gets the frown lines out, everywhere we hear how our generation is

spending too much time on computers, and how they’re even trying to get little kids

interactive by putting those interactive white boards in their classes. Oh, and what with all

these new touch screen phones coming out, we can't help but surround ourselves with what

are essentially teeny tiny computers. So all I'm saying is find me a teenager who is computer

illiterate.

You wouldn’t be in a Maths class if you knew more than your maths teacher, and you

wouldn’t be assigned to a biology class if you already graduated from Harvard, so why on

earth would you be in an IT class when you, and the rest of your class can teach your

teachers one or two things about computers?

That’s precisely why I didn’t do IT at GCSE level, I’m sorry to say it, but the stuff they teach

you in IT is almost completely redundant. I don’t particularly need to spend 15 minutes

being shown how to save a word file to a specific location on my student drive, and I don’t

really need to be shown how to open Microsoft Excel, I’ll use a shortcut of my choice, thank

you very much.

A simple everyday task like searching for information on Google is suddenly amplified totally

over proportion. If I wanted to search for specific information about a location, I’d just type

in something like “Hotels in New York”, but all of a sudden, I’m bombarded with totally

redundant phrases like “Multiple Search Criteria” and “Search Relevance”. I’m sorry guys,

but to be honest, the phrase “Common Sense” pretty much sums it all up with a cherry on

top.

To be honest though, I’m not totally narrow minded about this, and there are people out

there who need extra support in IT, but in the same way, I need extra support in Maths, but

that’s not compulsory (even though the use of maths is everywhere, just like IT)

So, if it can’t make us any better at IT, then it can’t make us any worse right? Wrong,

before the days of me doing IT, I would save files, create folder structures without a

seconds thought, and to be honest, that sort of thing doesn’t need a seconds thought, it’s

almost instinctive. But now, I go through this extra step of thought “should I click this?”,

“what happens if I save it there?", which just distracts me from what I really went on the

computer for. Now, what would our government come up with next, master-classes on the

skill of walking?

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Anish Kapoor at the Royal Academy of Arts

By Amy Page

“I have often said that I have nothing to say as an artist. Having something to say implies

that one is struggling with meaning. The role of the artist is in fact that we don’t know what

to say, and it is that not knowing that leads to the work.” – Anish Kapoor

Anish Kapoor is a significant artist who has exerted tremendous influence over fellow artists

of his generation, yet is someone relatively unknown. I personally hadn’t heard of him until I

saw posters all over London of his unusual, colourful and textural creations. Kapoor was

awarded the Turner prize in 1991, the year I and many of you were born, so in our memories

he is sometimes lost in the abyss of artists who are not yet dead and remembered, but aren’t

a la mode and claiming inches of newspaper columns with their latest stunts (naming no

names, Damien Hirst).

What sets Anish Kapoor apart from other contemporary artists is his thorough exploration of

colour and form with each series of sculptures being different to any that he has done before.

The exhibition hosts rooms of mirrors, fantastical objects covered in colour pigment, sculp-

tures created out of wax, cement, iron, fibreglass and marble, works coming out and going

into the wall, a massive slow-moving carriage of wax that travels the length of five galleries

and a canon. This one man show is a menagerie of mediums, leaving the spectator dizzied

with visual stimulation.

Another aspect of the exhibition that distinguishes it from others is the interactivity of it; one

can walk around, through and under the sculptures, making it a more enjoyable exhibition to

see, breaking the mould of the sometimes monotonous experience one has when looking at

painting after painting in a gallery.

One of the most memorable rooms is the home of Kapoor’s ‘Non-objects', deceiving mirrors

which are enjoyable and akin to a house of mirrors at a fun fair. They are exquisitely smooth

and polished with all traces of human manufacture removed, to help induce the experience

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of the “contemporary sublime”. One mirror turns everything upside down, but once you are

dizzyingly close, it is reverted back to normal but magnified. There are two huge bowl

shapes hanging on the wall which you can completely submerge your head in, a long curved

mirror ‘wall’ and a few free-standing 3D shapes which are, for lack of other words,

‘trippy’. The only downside of this part was its environment; the effect would have been

enhanced if it had been in a plain white room, rather than an old classical floor-boarded

room at the Royal Academy with those metal grates in the floor, removing from the

potentially transcendental effect.

For me, the supposed highlight of the exhibition ‘Shooting into the Corner’ (2008-09) was

an overrated anticlimax. ‘Shooting into the Corner’ is a canon which, every twenty

minutes, fires a shell of wax (weighing about 20lbs) into another room at 50mph. It sounds

impressive but the reality was disappointing. I am probably in a minority thinking this, as a

young adult and a girl but the waiting around in a cramped space with a limited view wasn’t

worth the final heavily anticipated ‘pop’ of wax hitting a wall, to cumulate with the

hundreds of other obliterated shells of wax. It cheered up the young kids who had been

dragged along immensely, but I left disgruntled with sore feet.

All in all I enjoyed it greatly and it will stay in my memory as one of the most fun

exhibitions that I have been to. It was also thought-provoking and challenged my ideas of

the role of colour and my perceptions of modern art, which may need to be seriously

rethought!

What on earth to think of the BNP

By Kristianne Colvin

Since last July, when the British National Party, or the BNP, managed to get two party

members into the European Parliament, the profile of the party has risen significantly to

the point that after Nick Griffin’s appearance on Question Time it is said that one in five

people in the UK would consider voting for them. Although we do live in a democratic

country, the rise of an extremist party such as this hasn’t come as a surprise to anyone

considering the current economic and political climate within the UK. Now we’re coming up

to an election with every chance that people will consider the BNP as a perfectly sensible

party to vote for.

With people becoming more and more disillusioned by mainstream parties, particularly

Labour, people are taking two main options – they are either turning to parties which are

offering something else, such as the BNP, or they are simply not bothering to consider

voting in the election. The first is the reason why the BNP has more support, but the second

doesn’t help anyone. For those who oppose the BNP but don’t want to bother voting for

another party they no longer believe in, their lack of voting only increases the chances of

power for the BNP.

Of course, the BNP has featured regularly in the news in the last year. Griffin’s appearance

on Question Time in October became a huge feature of debate, not only because of what

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(continued from previous)

he said but of the idea itself. Instead of a travelling show as normal, the show was filmed

in BBC’s London studios with increased security, as the threat of protesters and people

trying to interfere was very high – those who did protest were generally peaceful, but the

melodramatic nature in which it was announced, with threats against Griffin and the idea

of him featuring on the show in general, were far from helpful in reducing problems.

People argued that he shouldn’t feature purely because of his political views, but the

idea of free speech and democracy made it so that he had just as much right to be on it

as anyone else.

What he actually said was obviously important too. Although it is said that Nick Griffin

was somewhat ganged up upon by both the audience and the other panellists, it is

unclear as to whether he was trying to give input as to what the policies of the BNP are,

or whether it was merely defending himself against quotes supposedly said by him.

Throughout he was only claiming that he has been severely misquoted, such as the fact

he supposedly said “I want to see Britain become 99% genetically white just as she was 11

years before I was born”, even though the BNP claims to be nationalistic rather than

racist.

However, he was caught out on more than one occasion, particularly in that he was

quoted saying “perhaps one day once, by being rather more subtle, we’ve got ourselves

in the position where we control the British broadcasting media then perhaps one day the

British people might change their minds and say yes every last one must go, every single

member of an ethnic minority” on film, and so had no way of getting out of it.

Regularly when he seemed to have no proper response he seemed only amused, or

clutched at straws as it were to try to make a point which was far from the one being

made. When Jack Straw, justice minister, confronted him on the fact that not only white

British people fought in World War Two, but people of many other races, Griffin’s ending

quote was “My father was in the RAF during the second world war while Mr Straw’s father

was in prison for refusing to fight Adolf Hitler.”

Certainly, this is one view of the BNP and the way in which they are portrayed as racist,

but I personally feel that if people are to argue the other side it would need a huge

amount of justification before I could accept the BNP from any other perspective. I am in

no way imposing my views on anyone else and obviously anyone is free to support anyone

they want within the democratic system in which we live. However, I must point out the

irony of a recent court case in which Nick Griffin accused a young Asian man of calling

him a “white b*****d” and in doing so being racist towards him. The man was cleared, but

for Griffin to have political policies in which anyone who is not ethnically and racially

British should return to their countries of origin, ultimately something which can be seen

as a very racist view (though the BNP calls it a nationalist view), it seems a bit

hypocritical to be offended by being called “white”, something he is proud to be.

Considering the latest opinion polls, its likely to end in a hung parliament for us all in

May. However, I’m not entirely sure that voting for the BNP just for them to throw a

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spanner in the works is all that helpful? Sure, it’s not as many of them as it is of the other

parties, but they’re still there to make their points, ridiculous seeming or not, and it is sure

to cause an argument. As soon as the election is over, newspapers will remind us all of the

“racist BNP” or “supposed nationalist BNP” and how well they managed to do depending on

the outcome. I for one wouldn’t consider going near them at all.

I am one of those who thinks, if you don’t bother voting, you don’t get to complain, and if

the BNP has any stronghold over anything to do with our government, I certainly want to

have the opportunity to make my point about it. It’s all a matter of opinion – racist, fas-

cist, nationalist? And of course, the main question, what did they, and what will they,

achieve from the elections this month?

The “ten minute” rule

By Tharshni Umakanthan

The fundamental rule of college is you can’t be late for your lesson by more than ten min-

utes. Interestingly this ten-minute rule seems to vary teacher to teacher and ends up be-

ing the five minute rule, twelve minute rule, or I’m-in-a-crummy-mood-so-I’m-not-letting-

you-in rule.

If you’re late, come in quietly, apologise and have a relevant excuse. It’s best to blame

something else for your lateness but keep it simple and realistic, for example: ‘the train

was hijacked by a group of escaped monkeys’ or ‘Godzilla ate everyone on the bus but I

managed to survive’ are not great excuses.

This ten minute rule applies for teachers too, but be warned that it doesn’t work the other

way round - if your teacher arrives late while you’re waiting in the classroom, you can’t

refuse to let them in. I’ve found that teachers have less imaginative excuses ranging from

‘I got lost (though I’ve worked here for the last five years)’ to the best being: ‘I was

asleep’. Fair enough.

If the teacher doesn’t arrive after ten minutes then the

lesson is cancelled. Don’t get too excited when after about

eight minutes everyone gets ready to leg it, as teachers

almost certainly arrive (regrettably). So there are my

rules for being a good student. And if they don’t work for

you then…well I guess they don’t work.

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Blue Skies

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Old Stone Path

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With thanks to…

Editor

Kristianne Colvin

Co-editor

Nielsen Cerbolles

Layout

Kristianne Colvin

Writers

Hanin Khaddour

Andy Tran

Amy Page

Tharshni Umakanthan

Nielsen Cerbolles

Kristianne Colvin

Photographer

Jonno Morley

? Do you want to write for

There is both the printed magazine, and our website. To submit

contact:

Raz Ahmed

(in the English office)

Kristianne Colvin

Printed editor

Nielsen Cerbolles

Online editor