Happy new year!

I am now almost half way through my PhD; time has really flown. After a year of reading and writing, I finally finished my literacy review yesterday. It now includes sections on film and education, literacy, motivation and emotion and I am really proud that  it is done. Overall, it spans 40,000 words. I am very excited about passing it on to my (potential) new supervisor Ros McLellan from the University of Cambridge. Hopefully we will finally be able to start working together in a fortnight's time.

In the first week of January, I visited the MeCCSA in Bournemouth and spoke about the student population of the Bradford Film School. This was a very interesting experience as it was the first time I visited a conference and held a presentation on something that was not PhD related! You can actually find a short video here. I am writing quite a lot for the Steiner Academy Leeds free school bid at the moment, so I might try to put a different paper together for that, too.

Unfortunately my PhD research has hit a bit of a wall- the schools are not very good at getting back to me and after gathering data from the first 10 classes, it is very quiet now. I am a little bit worried that it is too late to re-approach some of the class teachers and I am hoping that Ros can help me to figure out a new strategy to gather as much data as possible in the last months of the school year. Fingers crossed!

Starting the research

It's been quite some time since I have blogged- the summer flew by and now I am already half way through the first phase of my research. I started to contact schools in August and also met the teachers at the first teacher training event. Unfortunately it turned out that the classes were actually Year 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 (instead of only Year 5), but on the other hand there are almost 30 schools who are part of the scheme this year. It has been challenging to get in touch with them and organise a day at school with the teachers but whenever I have met students it has been very interesting and rewarding. So far, 200 students have taken questionnaires on writing and film.

On a none-PhD note, I have joined a group of people who are trying to apply for a Steiner Free School in Leeds. Have a look at the website if you are interested :-)

I passed my transfer a few weeks ago, too, so there is one thing I can tick off! Hurray! Chapter-wise, I am now done with film, literacy and motivation and also hope to submit the section on emotion at the end of the week. Unfortunately I still haven't got a second supervisors but I have got my fingers crossed that the paperwork is finally going to come through before Christmas.

Last Saturday I attended the Media Education Association conference in London and spoke about the ways in which the scheme uses film to teach literacy. I only spoke to a small group of people, but I think that most of them found it interesting and helpful. One of the attendees turned out to be Paul Reeve, the new head of Film Nation UK. I had another quick chat with him at the end of the day and he told me to 'get on with my PhD quickly' as it was needed by the film education community and that it would be 'dynamite' once it was published. That was pretty great feedback from someone so important!

In three weeks time I am off to my first international conference the Media and Learning Conference in Brussels. You can find the programme here. It looks like a very interesting event and I look forward to sharing my research with the international film and media education community. I have also been accepted to speak at the Meccsa conference in Bournemouth in January and will be presenting a paper on how Bradford introduces film to people on the margins of society. 

First international conference acceptance

Many exciting things have been happening in the last two weeks, starting with the official launch of the Bradford Film School on the 2nd July. Representatives from India and beyond  came to celebrate the launch with us and it was great to see such a warm reception. It has been amazing to be part of the team which made the new school possible and I am especially proud of my involvement in the BA (Hons) Film and a BFI Film Academy bid which I submitted last week.

One of the guests at the reception was David Wilson, who spoke about the importance of learning in the world's first UNESCO City of Film. 

Two days ago we also had the last day of the City of Film literacy scheme, where seven of the participating teachers write up their case studies and commented on their experience of the year. All of them were overwhelmingly positive and most of them the teachers will continue on the scheme as mentors for next year's teachers.

In other great news, I have been accepted to two further conferences, the Media + Learning Conference in Brussels which takes place in September and the Media Education Summit in Sheffield in September. On both occasions I will be speaking about the differences between media literacy and using media for literacy. Whilst the Media Education summit it going to be my first 'professional' conference, Brussels is going to be my first international one. I am very excited!

My last two days have been completely taken up by the completion of my methodology chapter. After checking with the university about ethical approval last week, I was told that I had to submit my whole chapter (or rather most of its content) together with my application, so I am trying to get everything done before I start travelling for two weeks tomorrow. Yesterday I wrote 6,000 words in one hit, so have my fingers crossed that everything will be done tonight! I will post some ideas once everything is submitted.

University of Bradford Postgrad Group

This week, my City of Film journey has led me to a sign on a door:

A few months ago, I meet Michelle Sutton, the principal of Bradford College at a City of Film board meeting and, as a result, have been working for the college since February. We are currently in the throws of founding a new Film School and I am helping to coordinate marketing campaigns and to write the BA (Hons) Film degree course. At the same time I am also preparing the first chapter for me PhD and the structure of the methodology, so things are busy!

I have been feeling a bit isolated at the university and founded a postgrad club a few weeks ago. At the first meeting we had 26 people and people were really enthusiastic about meeting other PhD students. Two weeks ago at our second session, we were discussion lots of postgrad issues from vivas to publishing and I really enjoyed meeting other people from the uni!

On Saturday I visited the RATMA Student Film Festival at the Keighley campus of Leeds City College. I was really impressed by the effort that the students had put in. Films were screened almost every hour so people could catch what they liked almost all the time. Plus there was lots of fundraising for charities, free refreshments and a band. Pretty good for the first year! Unfortunately I wasn't able to make it to the award ceremony on Sunday but it the festival runs again next year, I would love to go.

On a related festival note: Last year around this time I was preparing for the FilmFest Munich with the other people of the team. I just found a picture of my desk:

At the festival centre we needed lots and lots of phone numbers really quickly and that was the one way to do it! Although I am kind of glad not to be involved in the stressful time this year, I also miss the excitement that festivals offer! I guess my PhD will have to take that role this year! :-)