June 2024 round-up

June was hard. We need to move houses (yes, again!), and spent a lot of time trying to find and, then, secure, a new place to move into. But, unfortunately, that fell through at the end of the month. So we are back to square one… except with a lot more stress. I also picked up a very painful knee injury, and dealt with various disappointments on the professional front, as reported below.

At least, the weather was lovely (well, for a while), I had some truly wonderful times with each of the “kids”, and I made progress on some personal projects.

Research

On June 9^th-10^th I headed to Birmingham for the workshop related to our project about the role of consumers in driving innovation in manufacturing through digital technology.

I submitted that small grant that I said that I was working on, in the last round-up post. But sadly, I also learned that two grants that I had applied for earlier in the year were unsuccessful.

Moreover, I prepared the materials for data collection for a project, and need to submit it, urgently, for ethics’ clearance. However, I got sidetracked with the house moving situation mentioned at the start, and have not done that, yet.

Writing

The revisions for the SAMPJ paper that I mentioned last month were completed; the paper was resubmitted, and it has now been published. I will write a summary as soon as possible. I also got revisions on two other journal articles, both due in early September. 

But, on the other hand, a journal paper that had been submitted, earlier, based on the washing machine project, was rejected and will need to find a new home. And my co-authors and I decided to park the metaverse paper, due to the house moving situation at my end and some other issues at theirs. Life…

Teaching

Marking, marking and more marking. Exam boards to confirm marks. PhD supervision meetings.

Luckily, no dissertations to supervise this summer. 

Service

I joined two meetings in London, as part of my deputy director role of the SeNSS Doctoral Training Partnership, to review progress in the last year, and to develop plans to support the circa 160 students in the network through their studies. I also spent time analysing the students’ reports about their progress in the previous year, and their training needs.

I also reviewed two journal articles.

So, that’s it. I hope your June was less stressful than mine. Wish me luck for July.