“Think of your degree like it’s the TV show Game of Thrones“

Wait, so you’re telling me some of us are going to die before this is over? And one sorry soul by having their morning coffee spiked with poison? 

At the beginning of today’s lectorial, we were asked to write a list of ten things we wish to achieve at the conclusion of our degree in Media. While I didn’t reach the list of ten, I managed to put down a list of seven (somewhat) achievable goals for this degree.

  1. Create a portfolio of radio/television content I have presented/produced for prospective employers. I guess this goal pertains to the “employable” label we’re all going for. Even on day one of the degree, I acknowledge that it’s going to be very tricky to crack into the media industry. But I think at least developing some sort of content through the SYN FM / RMITV programs and the coursework of the degree should allow me to have something to show prospective employers at the end of the road to show that “Hey, this is how bad I was three years ago, look at how I’ve grown into mediocrity! Growth potential!”.
  2. Student exchange to Canada. This is kind of more of just a self-fulfillment one. I’ve travelled Canada before and would love the opportunity to stay there for an extended period. In my previous degree there were circumstances that arose that put a spanner in the works with achieving this goal, so I’d like to make it right this time around and get abroad and see the world.
  3. Maintain at least a ‘distinction’ average (70%) for marks. Again, a little egotistical self-fulfillment. 70% is achievable – and necessary to fulfill (2), so it just kind of seems like a no-brainer in that sense. That being said, I’d like to be able to also…
  4. Enjoy myself. My last degree wasn’t fun. It just was too much of nose-to-paper, not enough creating; so I decided to leave it after 2 years. I want to have more fun this time around.
  5. Create lifelong connections with other members of the media industry. Hey, it seems the industry is a bit about being in the right place at the right time, and a bit about who you know. Not that I’m just being friendly so you guys help me get a job *cough cough*.  Really though, media is about collaboration. And I’d love to use these three years as an opportunity to create networks that could be used for future collaboration. On the topic of collaboration…
  6. Develop stronger collaboration skills and the ability to sit back and not ‘take the reigns’ too often. In a lot of prior uni group assignments I’ve kinda done the “It’s okay if you don’t do your half of the work, I’ll just do it myself” approach. I’d like to be able to – for my own sake – step back let the organised chaos roll on a little more; and only step in if things are looking super dire.
  7. Be able to keep up with the readings. Hey, I said ‘somewhat’ achievable.

 

Next, we were to read an academic paper on two types of psychological methods of attention – hyper-attention – the concept of wanting to concentrate on multiple elements at once; and deep-attention – the idea of being able to focus on intricate things for extensive periods. It was kind of comforting to read this and realise that it was actually considered the norm for my generation to struggle to focus on one thing for an extended period of time. I would definitely consider myself a person with hyper-attention focus.

I think there’s an element of “instant gratification” that one receives from hyper-concentration – it allows for shorter bursts of attention exertion; so one aims to make each burst of attention valuable and take something important from it. I think even ten minutes of quick study could be incredibly fulfilling for hyper learners, should they take something useful from it.

What’s interesting is that this piece was published in 2007 – before smartphone technology emerged. I can only imagine the emerging technology, paired with the decreasing age at which children are introduced to these information machines, is causing us as a society to become more and more hyper-attentive. Our brains are processing ridiculous amounts of information in ridiculous amounts of time. So much for the radiation waves from mobile phones rotting our brains.

All in all, today’s lectorial served as a good re-introduction for myself into the university lifestyle, and a neat little intro to the course. I look forward to the future topics we cover in this unit and throughout the core of this degree