Well, it’s official. Tim Thompson has left the building. And entered another one. 100 metres away. On the same campus. This seemed more dramatic when I started…
As some of you may know, the School of Science, Engineering and Design is no more. We’ve had a bit of a restructure here at Teesside, and the School that was once my home has been split into its three component parts and spread across the rest of the Institution. Engineering heads over to the new School of Computing, Engineering and Digital Technologies, Design mooches across to join the new MIMA School of Art and Design, and Science pootles across to the new School of Health & Life Sciences. For most staff and students, this won’t make any difference at all, but for our Exec team, we’re being split up. Like the Avengers at the end of Age of Ultron. If the Avengers had KPIs to address and used words like ‘granularity’ and ‘efficiencies’. Anyway, as a scientist I’ll be heading over with them. And into a new role as well. I’m saying goodbye to the the world of Learning and Teaching and saying hello to the world of Learning & Teaching (Portfolio Development). It’s not as dramatic a change as the introduction of Chapter 2 in Fortnite this week, I grant you, but it does mean that I move away from directly supporting the student experience and move onto more strategic projects. But I like change and I like a challenge, so it’s all very exciting.
But saying that, I’ve actually been in SSED for about 12 years, so I’m a little sad to be saying farewell. The School has given me lots of wonderful opportunities, despite the fact that no-one in it has really known what I do. Which has actually worked in my favour, since I’ve been largely left alone to develop my research and teaching. Under the radar. An anthropological ninja, if you will. Oh – you won’t. Hmmm. I’ve also learned a huge amount about the engineering and design disciplines, and over the past 3 years as AD I have really enjoyed working with them on a range of School projects. Like turning a chuck of the Engineering building bright pink, yellow and green. My legacy is nothing if not colourful… I’ll certainly miss working with a lot of people and seeing them on a day-to-day basis. But not the ones who think I’m a bastard obviously, they’re probably glad I’m going elsewhere.
So on Monday I emptied out my office and handed in my key. It was like that final scene in Friends, when they all left Monica’s flat. Except I didn’t go for a coffee with my mates. I went to an Information Governance meeting with bespoke Data Breach Training.
And I’m now in a new office. I hate packing and unpacking, so I fully expect to be surrounded by boxes for several months to come. In fact, when I was packing up my old office I found a box which I hadn’t touched since I moved in there 30 months ago. Crucially the new office is much closer to the cafe that sells delicious tiny cheesecakes. In fact, it’s probably dangerously close…
So, onto new adventures! Albeit with basically the same aims and with basically the same people. But you get the idea.