Edinburgh Uni Explorer

My journey exploring Edinburgh Uni, one teaching room at a time

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This short film documents the project of two environmental science students from Edinburgh who are working to bring solar energy phone chargers to refugees in Greece, where overcrowding makes electricity is hard to come by. These chargers enable refugees to charge mobile phones which provide a valuable source to contact their families overseas. They have received various grants and funds through the university and crowdfunding, and so far have stilled several units in camps.

Great example of the possible application of technical skills and innovative thinking to help by Edinburgh students.

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Towering Above

While surveying some rooms in David Hume Tower, I was yet again enthralled by the stunning views from the upper floors. I used to have class on the 13th floor in first year, and I remember not being able to pay attention most of the time because I couldn’t stop looking out the windows. 

An unexpected view of 50 George Square and the shiny, new backside of Appleton Tower.

Arthur’s Seat in all its glory.

And can we just appreciate the changing colors of the leaves?

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Begin Semester 1

After a break for the end of summer, I have returned to my place here at LST, where I will continue to explore the campus of Edinburgh University. 

Looking good, Appleton! Appleton’s scaffolding has finally come down after being under refurbishment for the last year. There are still some works being done to the ground floor and street level, but its always nice to see construction being finished. 

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Towering Over the Fest

Although David Hume Tower (DHT) is an eyesore visible from almost every vantage point in the city, it does offer some spectacular views. This past year the interior teaching rooms have been refurbished, and the law library has been moved in from Old College. The tower will be up and running again by the time the academic year starts. Below is an aerial shot from DHT of George Square, featuring the iconic festival fixture of the Underbelly and Edinburgh Castle off in the distance. 

From the other side of the tower is a panoramic view of Newington, Arthur’s Seat, and the Crags. Cue instant flashback to first year economics when I had class in the room where this was taken. 

Lastly, here’s an upward shot of good ol’ David Hume.

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The End is Nigh

Entering the penultimate week of my internship here at Learning Spaces Technology, and it feels as though the summer has flown by! My first day at the office was on the 4th of June, and I received the guidelines for my project. 

Now, two months later, this project has taken me on a journey stretching across the city of Edinburgh to 3 different campuses of the university, 39 buildings, and over 200 teaching rooms. During the visits to these locations, I have taken over 5,000 photographs. The project has allowed me to explore the university, going to places I never would have normally seen in my usual university studies.

I wasn’t assigned the project to simply wander throughout the university, but along the way, I was compiling a database of information about the technology within each teaching room. This database will be used by LST as a tool allowing room surveys at-a-glance. It provides a consistent, centralised, and comprehensive resource the department didn’t have access to before. Additionally, the database can be used as a source of future data analytics by the university. 

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A Different Take on Tartan

I found this texture a few weeks back at KB, and close up it reminded me of tartan, although in reality, it is far from it. 

In reality, it is a section of the solar panels on the outside of the William Rankine Building, where Civil and Electrical Engineering are taught.

How appropriate that an engineering building is fitted with such innovative materials. 

[misterft]

The Graduate (Probably)

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Calm before the storm

(George Square before the festival)

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Mad Men or Real Life?

A few weeks back, I spent a few days at the KB campus exploring and surveying rooms. One of my favourite discoveries was the lecture theatre in the Hudson Beare Building. It managed to be 100% retro and 100% modern at the same time. The theatre was almost perfectly maintained in its original 1960s aesthetic while being updated with the latest technology. I felt like I had just walked onto the set of Mad Men. 

The building was named after British engineer Thomas Hudson Beare, who taught engineering at Edinburgh University from 1901-1940. In his extensive tenure as professor at the university, he oversaw the transfer of the engineering department from the central campus area to the Sanderson Labs at the King’s Buildings after the influx of new students from around the world.

The theatre was designed in 1961 by Robert Gardner-Medwin and is an excellent example of Brutalist architecture in Scotland as is the George Square Lecture Theatre in Edinburgh’s central campus. Below is the outside of the HB theatre, which bears (no pun intended!) a striking resemblance to its counterpart in George Square.

The interior of the theatre is beautifully preserved in its near-original condition, with concrete structural ribbing and wood paneling.  

The theatre is connected to the main part of the Hudson Beare Building via enclosed walkway added to the structure at a later date.

Just before you enter the walkway there is a cafe with a view of the theatre from the outside.

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Pokémon Go wants to be the exercise app that actually works

No, Pokémania won't solve obesity.

Pokemon Goers are not the average target market for a fitness app.

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The Bookshelves of Edinburgh University 

Here’s another photo collection of the university. Can you name the locations?

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“I like that desk, that is a nice desk” 

This newly refurbished room is showing some university spirit! 

Out of over 300 teaching spaces we manage, there are only three other desks in the uni with this type of branding. 

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Room Surveys for Dummies

So, you ask, what exactly does a room survey look like?

My main responsibility as an intern in Learning Spaces Technology is carrying out room surveys of over 300 teaching spaces across the whole of the university. 

I usually start a survey by taking a few wide angle shots to capture the general layout and feel of the room, usually one from each corner.

Then I move on to document the specific AV equipment like the projection screen, projector, webcam, etc.

Finally, I arrive at the desk, where all the magic happens. This is one of the most, if not the most, important part of the room surveys as I use the information to compile a comprehensive database of information about all the teaching spaces LST manages.   

The desk usually contains a PC, DVD player, a control panel, outlets, mics, and various other pieces of AV equipment which hide behind the cabinet door.

I can usually complete a room survey in 10 minutes, but bigger rooms such as lecture theatres often take much longer to survey due to the larger area space and more complex technology.  

And there you have it! This is my general routine when looking at the teachings rooms. Thanks to the recently refurbished Thomson’s Land Room 1.15 for being my model room!

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In order to welcome the month of August to Edinburgh, I present to you, a photo collection! The pictures are a miscellaneous jumble I have compiled as I’ve been looking through some of my work from earlier in the summer. Included in the collection are snapshots from the various locations I have visited over the last month and a half: Paterson’s Land, Outreach Centre, George Square (before all the festival madness), Alison House, the Medical School, and an aerial shot of the quad at the Holyrood Campus taken from an upper floor of Charteris Land.

I took the majority of the last two weeks off as I paid a visit to our Irish neighbour and afterwards, as a I recovered from I bug I had caught from said neighbour. However, there are no hard feelings, and I am back up and running like normal from now on!

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The brand new Outreach Centre is not only home to teaching rooms and office, but also a cafe/lounge called Levels, serving a variety of food and drinks as well as providing a chill space to work or simply hang out. I hope the sun comes back out soon, so I can sit outside and enjoy a coffee there one of these days!

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A powerful camera this small, packing pro specs. Carry it everyday, wireless, save video after fact.

This would be perfect for my project this summer, which involves taking a camera and some other gadgets with me from place to place.

I could just clip it onto my jeans and be on my merry way!

Check it out on indiegogo!

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Story time

My project as a part of being a summer intern at LST is still in full swing as I have now completed 200 rooms out of 314 total rooms. It is currently week 7, which means I only have 5 more weeks to go.  The project has been interesting, involving exploring areas and buildings of the university I normally would never get to see. Many random and unexpected adventures have happened along the way, such as walking into a lecture theatre where class was going on only to be met by the confused stares of a 100 summer school students. I have had to go back to the office after forgetting my keys (as well as countless other items I need) a record number of times.

Once when I was checking out some rooms under refurbishment in the Medical School which were right next to a lecture theatre from which a huge gaggle of students had just come out, and as I had my university lanyard on with my keys and staff card, I must have looked somewhat official and like I knew what I was doing. Before I knew it some had approached me and asked about what they should do if they lost something in the lecture theatre and another asked me where the nearest toilet was. As I had only been in this building twice before, I had no idea how to answer either of these questions, but I managed to lead the first student to the reception office and find a sign leading to the toilets for the second student. After this, I legged it out of there before someone asked me a question I genuinely didn't know.  

Last week, as I mentioned in a previous post, I spent two days working at the King's Buildings, which is the science campus of the university, in other words, a place I rarely have to go to as a business student. I had a list of rooms and buildings to complete by the end of the day. However, I soon realised I had no idea where half the buildings were. What's worse was when I asked people for directions, many of them couldn't help me as they didn't know where the rooms or buildings were themselves. The most confusing bit of KB is the interconnected maze of buildings including (but not limited to) the Fleeming Jenkin, Hudson Beare, Sanderson, Faraday, Alexander Graham Bell buildings. Luckily, after much patience, reliance on Google maps, and helpful direction-givers, I was able to check off all the rooms off my list.

Now, as there are less and less rooms to survey and as more rooms are unavailable due to refurbishments and Festival bookings, I will start focusing on finding new and interesting ways to organise all the data I have collected. It's not that I am not happy about working with Excel. It's more that I know there are countless other resources available for use to organise this quantity of data (albeit not always free of charge), and I would find them out. MS Access is another option I will continue to explore.

Well, that's a decent summary of some of the daily shenanigans I have to deal with as an intern, and I am sure there will be many more to come before the summer is over. As the project continues to develop, I will always be looking for new ways to organise myself and share my progress. Daily (or almost daily) updates will continue to be posted to this blog and Twitter (@nottheorphannie), for those interested in what I get up to.

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Another shot from Paterson’s Land, a building I posted about a few weeks ago. 

This staircase ascends from the main entrance to the ground floor and up towards the first floor, with marble columns guiding the way and a pattern of gilded details like this one.