I took a bus to NTU's Clifton Campus today for 5 hours of intensive training for a new job I am taking on. In the new year I will begin tutoring primary students in literacy and numeracy. Clifton is about 20 minutes outside the city centre by bus. It is quite a small campus and remote and houses the Department of Education, Sciences, Medicine, and Technology. It is generally the university's science base, whereas the city centre site hosts the arts and humanities.
It made me feel a world away from where I began, academically. With a background in sciences I feel somehow more at home around this centre - although a departure from my norm has served me better. I think the matter that I am focused now on a discipline that requires that I get out into the community, make contacts daily, and engage in my social environment is a needed break from the path toward the sometimes isolated and independent work-style of academic research.
