All four done!

The last two years have been by far the most busy of my life so far, so you can forgive me for neglecting to post here during the third and final years of my degree course, right?

In September it will be two years since I moved to Exeter to complete an Alzheimer's Research UK funded research placement, measuring the effects on the brain of drugs which affect epigenetics using a technique called electrophysiology. My placement year was more useful than I ever could have imagined, and really did affirm that I want to continue in biomedical research, specifically using electrophysiology to further our understanding of brain function and how communication between brain cells is altered in disease. In January 2017 I achieved a solid 72% for my literature review and project plan, and after that I really threw myself in to both lab and student life; on some occasions I would work until 9pm and then meet up with friends and stay out until the early hours!

My project was originally due to finish at the end of July, but I was a bit slow getting started on the non-electrophysiology aspect, which consisted of running samples on gels to determine whether the drugs affected the epigenetics (unfortunately, we didn't show that they did). I finally left in September, which meant the writing of my report coincided with the beginning of final year. After returning to Exeter to give some presentations and producing a poster on my project, I achieved 73% for the unit, my first at Master's level.

The final year of the course was very well planned and consisted of five units, with the first four delivered primarily via lectures from September to February, and the fifth comprising the MSci project, poster presentation, and an extra exam in May on top of those for Units 2 to 4. Unit 1 teaching built on the statistics lectures from second year, which was easier for me thanks to performing several one-way and two-way ANOVAs during my project. We were also introduced to whole-animal experimental design, which was wonderfully complemented by an optional in vivo skills course I undertook just before Christmas. After receiving results of the January statistics exam and the February figure interpretation exam, I calculated that I had achieved 84% in Unit 1, the best start I could've hoped for!

The Unit 2, 3 and 4 lectures were delivered sequentially from mid-October onwards, and each unit included a piece of coursework (essay or data interpretation) accounting for 10% of the marks as well as a 3-hour exam in May. I was pleased to achieve 78 in the Unit 2 and Unit 3 essays, and 85 in the Unit 4 data interpretation, but the fact that 90% of each unit would be decided in the exam hall was rather daunting. I then had my Unit 5 coursework to contend with, which involved writing a grant proposal with little guidance, but I powered through and just like in third year received 72, plus 83 for my grant proposal defence.

Irritatingly, our exam timetable for May was published a week late (plus the timings of my exams prevented me from going to the French Open), but the schedule was helpful as it gave us an extra week of revision time before exams began. Unit 3 was first up, which I found quite tricky, in particular the section 1 experimental design question. Two days later it was Unit 4 time, and annoyingly I remembered a crucial piece of information for one of the essays just after the exam. I then had five days of focused revision for the Unit 2 exam, and I was relieved to find essay questions based on both of my favourite topics. The following afternoon was the MSci exam, for which we had to answer one of four questions covering broad themes across the other units. I was delighted that a question on allosteric modulators came up, as I had researched them extensively for a PhD opportunity I was interested in.

Other than Unit 1 and the Unit 5 project, we had to wait until 28 June to find out our final year grades and the degree classification we would be graduating with. On that day I was travelling in Macedonia, so I had to get through a three-and-a-half hour train ride plus a taxi ride to our hotel in Skopje before I could find out. My final results were:

Unit 1: 84
Unit 2: 78
Unit 3: 67
Unit 4: 69
Unit 5: 75

… which means I got a First! And, I discovered at Graduation on Monday, achieved the highest mark on the MSci Pharmacology course, although we all got Firsts!

So this is where I am now, graduated and looking forward to the next chapter, which will hopefully be confirmed soon!

Gearing up for second year

It's been almost three months since I finished my summer exams, which on the whole went better than those in January! My main goal for the summer series was to improve on my Biochemistry result from January (66%), which I managed to do, ending up with 73% for the whole year! For this exam I adopted a new revision method, which involved rewriting my notes for each topic in a word document. Although I didn't receive a breakdown of the marks, I think getting used to summarising and explaining key concepts was particularly helpful for the essays, which were worth 40% of the exam marks. My enjoyment of the cell biology topics led to me choosing a Biochemistry unit for second year.

The Pharmacology exam was worth 70% of my Pharmacology 1B unit mark, so it was important to do well so that I could maintain my first class performance from January. However, struggling to revise the content in time and neglecting to do either of the past papers didn't put me in the best stead. The exam was fairly good, aside from the data handling section, which was largely based on practicals we completed during the first half of the year. This was completely unexpected, especially as some students had taken Pharmacology 1B without having done Pharmacology 1A, but attempting the past papers might have made me aware that other topics would be worth revising. Overall, revision of practicals is something I ought to do more of next year, for data handling questions and to integrate knowledge from lectures. Anyway, I ended up getting 70% on the exam, which contributed to a solid unit total of 74%.

Physiology was my last exam, and I had almost two weeks after the other exams had finished to revise for it. I left three of the four topics until this period, and completed past paper questions to support my revision. Computer issues meant I had to handwrite my revision for the final topic, but I found it just as effective as creating word documents. I think a combination of the two methods would be ideal: using word processing to create a detailed revision guide and condensing the information using handwritten notes. My unit grade was 86%, with a score of exactly 90% in the exam!

Now I have just under four weeks until the start of my second year! I want to be better organised this year, so as well as writing up notes as I go along, I'll make sure to get a good planner and use it consistently. Hopefully I can maintain a high academic standard!

First year exams

With only three teaching weeks remaining, my first year of university is rapidly drawing to a close! It's now the last week of the Easter holidays, and with just over a month till my first Summer exam, revision is paramount. I already had three exams in January, including the Pharmacology 1A end of unit exam. I was delighted with all three marks; I got the highest overall unit score in Pharmacology 1A, over 80% in Physiology, and a 2:1 in the Biochemistry exam, which I thought had gone terribly. The summer exams are as follows:

Monday 18th May ¦ Biochemistry Paper 2 ¦ 35% of unit mark
Friday 22nd May ¦ Pharmacology 1B ¦ 70% of unit 1B mark
Thursday 4th June ¦ Physiology Paper 2 ¦ 40% of unit mark

Well, I'd better get back to revising!

My A-level results

I found out my A-level results almost three weeks ago, and they were:

Biology: A

Psychology: B

German: B

Chemistry: A*

I was satisfied with the Biology and German results; I got a B in BIO4, so an A* was out of reach, and although I got an A in the German paper, my speaking was slightly weaker this year, so I'm still pleased with the result.

At first I was disappointed about the B in Psychology, but in hindsight I think there was a trade-off between Psychology and Chemistry, and ultimately, rather than revising to an A standard for both subjects, Psychology lost out while Chemistry gained. Before the start of the exam period I was hoping for an A* in Chemistry, but the horror of the F334 exam really dented my confidence, so this achievement was a brilliant surprise.

Thankfully, my UCAS Track status had been updated by the time I logged on at 8:03 am, so I knew that I'd been accepted by the University of Bristol before I found out my results. This was an immense weight off my mind, and now that I will definitely be studying pharmacology, it makes sense for this blog to undergo the same transformation, from bio-chem-psych-deutsch-student to something like pharmacology-student!