It’s been a busy few months for the Graduate School of the Environment (GSE) here at CAT. We’ve had the Science Symposium, Graduation, the Distance Learning Open Day, as well as hosting the ERASMUS programme for a fortnight, and at the time of writing, the students have attended their first 3 modules for their courses.

Science Symposium

CAT was delighted to host the 6th Science Symposium during the second weekend of October. The event was attended by over 100 people, and had a range of speakers, including Erik Lombaut from Belgium, who discussed his work on Lobe Cities. The Professional Diploma students also had the chance to exhibit their work during this time.

Graduation

This year’s graduation ceremony took place in the evening after the Science Symposium, and was held in the brand new Sheppard Theatre in the WISE building. It was a fantastic event, enjoyed by all who attended. The guest speaker, and presenter of awards was Pat Borer, who designed the WISE building at CAT.

Distance learning had their first 3 Graduates, Dwayne [Ireland], Chris [China] and, Richard [UK and South Africa].

Distance Learning Open Day

On a glorious day in October the MSc Architecture AEES Distance Learning team held a workshop day for their students, our 3rd ‘Open day’.Various workshops were offered to enable students brush up on their skills including ‘finding and using online resources’, ‘essay writing’ and ‘using UEL’. There was an excellent tour from Tobi Kellner (Info) that took in some of the less well known areas at CAT, which included an ascent to the reservoir that provides CAT’s water supply and powers the cliff railway. It was great to meet the students in person and to show off the new WISE building, which hosted several talks including an inspiring presentation from Martin Kemp of Zero Carbon Britain.

Erasmus

CAT recently hosted 40 students and 6 accompanying staff, from 4 European Universities, for a two week intensive course on renewable technologies. The 2 week course consisted of a series of lectures at CAT and a number of field trips to visit renewable energy installations. This is part of an Erasmus students exchange programme, which enables students to study for short periods at other EU universities. Students on the GSE Masters courses are eligible to apply to attend these courses. The programme is coordinated by Gerry Jones, a lecturer on the AEES MSc and David Hood, who lectures on the REBE MSc.

In 2009 Gerry and David accompanied 17 students to Joensuu in Eastern Finland on a two week intensive course in Biomass energy studies. October 2010 saw students from Finland, Slovakia, Greece and Germany study at CAT. The current Erasmus programme is scheduled for 3 years, next years course will be in Eberswalde in Germany.

The cost of the Erasmus course is part funded by the EU and students currently have to contribute 25% of their travel costs.


That’s all for now, look out for the next GSE newsletter in February!

The Student Support Officers - Kirsty, Rachael, Alice, Will and Sarah