Hello again from Caitlin and Nancy!

Since we last wrote on the blog we’ve been in meetings galore! We started off the week by meeting with Yolanda, one of the Routes into Languages interns who also works with LLAS. As a Graphic Design graduate, she will be helping us to create a logo as well as helping to improve our website. Following that, we attended an ‘Open Home’ event, hosted by Friends International Southampton. Having heard about their work with international students, we really felt like we wanted to experience their project first hand, and we were so glad we did. Despite it being the summer holidays, their event was extremely well attended and we chatted the evening away over tea and cake with some new international friends. We really appreciated how welcoming FIS were and hope to stay involved with them.

Mid-week marked a meeting with Jill Doubleday, the CPD developer for ICS. We pitched Jill our final ideas for the festival and we’re really looking forward to working more closely with her as the project goes on. Finally, we met with Claire from the Ethnographic Encounters team to discuss ideas for any potential collaboration between our two projects.

Check back next week for more updates!

Hello everyone from the ICS interns, Nancy and Caitlin!

This week has been one of celebrations, as not only is the University Staff Party happening this afternoon, but we also both officially became graduates of the University of Southampton. Along with other students from the Faculty of Humanities, Caitlin graduated in Spanish and Portuguese on Monday. And on Wednesday, Nancy and her colleagues from the Faculty of Social, Human and Mathematical Sciences also took to the stage of the Nuffield Theatre, with Nancy gaining a degree in Economics.

Although we haven’t spent too much time in the office together this week, we’ve still managed to have quite a few breakthroughs in our organisation of the ICS festival. Firstly, we have a date and official name in mind, which we will reveal at a later date! Given that we now have a better idea of when our event will take place, as well as all the activities we hope to put on, we’ve spent the final part of our week scouting out potential venues. Everything’s really coming together!

Stay tuned for another update next Friday!

Hi again from the ICS interns, Caitlin and Nancy!

This Monday marked the tangible beginnings of the ICS festival, when we delivered our primary ideas to the LLAS group, as well as to the interns from the Humanities department and the International Office. In addition to our ‘Ideas Boards’, interns from the Routes into Languages scheme, the Southampton Feedback Champions programme and the Ethnographic Encounters project also gave short presentations on their progress thus far. We also got to meet the Director and Deputy Director of LLAS and received lots of insightful feedback on our initial proposals for the project.

Bearing the team’s comments in mind, our main objective this week has been refining our ideas and structuring our week-to-week plan. For this task, we chose to get creative; we got out of the office, pulled out some A3 paper and scribbled down all our ideas in an array of colours. Those sessions culminated in a detailed calendar of tasks for the next two months, and although the festival may seem far away, we only have one full week left together, so there’s a lot to be working on!

Wish us luck!