Today i got registration details for my final year at college. I’ve spoken about if before, but it’s getting closer and becoming ‘official’ now… I’ll be registering for my ‘IT Management’ level 8 course on September 7th and i start the following week on September 13th…
To be honest had i been in the same building with the same equipment, i wouldn’t have been looking forward to this year, in fact i may very well have considered going elsewhere to complete a 1 year course. But things will be very different this year… we’re in a brand new building with brand new equipment and that will have a massive impact on pretty much everything for not just me but everyone in the place.
It’s like an energy boost for everyone. If things are new and different they just seem ‘better’. I suppose it depends how open to change people are, some people hate change but if you hate change you really shouldn’t be in IT or anything related to it which is pretty much what this new building will house.
So i am looking forward to this year. It will be much more manager-y and much less code monkey stuff. That probably suits me better. I’m better equipped to write in english than i am in any programming language. It will also be much more business orientated than my previous 3 years. That’s good too. I like business. I feel my interest & best skills lie somewhere between IT and business so IT Management should suit me down to the ground.
The big thing this year is the thesis. Thesis; A statement or theory that is put forward as a premise to be maintained or proved… and there’s a hell of a lot of proving to be done which involves lots of research and analysis.
photo credit: Alexander Mooij
As far as i’m aware the thesis isn’t restricted to a particular area so obviously it makes sense to do something that interests me. SEO? Blogging? Social Media? Leaving Cert? Obviously i can’t just pick a topic and write about it, it needs to be something interesting & creative and in a nutshell ‘add value’ to the world.
With regards ‘leaving cert’, i have a huge incentive to go down that road. I’ve got all the contacts i need to get whatever info i need and it could well prove to be a very smart decision to take on something related to leaving cert & IT. I’d have the passion & enthusiasm, it would ultimately benefit my leaving cert sites and i’m pretty sure i could come up with something creative and unique that would ‘add value’ to the world as i put it.
The problem with virtually any other area is that it’s too large for me to research in such a short space of time. I can’t become an expert at something my heart isn’t in so anything related to hardware, networking or management in a general is out the window.
Anyway, 9 months of hard work await for me. After that, it’s job hunting or job creation time. Which is why focusing on a leaving cert related project might be a smart move – out of all of my websites, theleavingcert.com is the one with the most potential to become a working business as things stand. Having said that, 9 months is a long time for me and this is a year which will be tricky to predict…