For a certain young person – I was viva’d, too
This post is written for a certain young person who, from what I know, went through something similar recently, and to tell her she’s infinitely smarter than I am and has a great future ahead of her.
It is a good thing that my alma mater, the former School of English & American Studies (renamed Faculty of Humanities since 1 August 2004) at the University of East Anglia, runs a degree award system in which 50% is determined by course work throughout the three years and the other 50% from exams held only at the end of the third year. Otherwise, I might not have graduated with a degree at the end of my three years there (having been away from school for seven years before returning in 1986).
As it was, I almost didn’t.
On the morning of the day when the exam results were to be released, I went along to look at the viva list for borderline students. And I was on the list. (Can’t remember if I reacted with surprise or dismay). After which, I had to hang around for the viva which would be conducted sometime during the day before results were posted in the evening. But the amazing thing was I received a lot of support from people who told me I would be alright.
The viva was going to be about one of the papers we had sat for. At the time the list was posted, none of us on the list knew which paper that would be. I told myself there were only two papers I could be viva’d for – the Joint Film and American Studies paper, or the Women and Writing paper.
I told myself if it was for the former, then I was on the borderline for a 2:1 result, and if it was for the latter, then it was borderline for a 1st class result.
It was for the Joint Film and American Studies paper. So, okay, I was going to graduate with either a 2:1 or 2:2 degree.
At the appointed time, I went in for the viva which would be conducted by one of my Film Studies lecturers and an external examiner for the paper. It wasn’t so much a Q&A session but more a casual and friendly chat about Film Studies in general – perhaps gauge my overall knowledge of Film history and such.
Come the evening, and I went along to look at the list of results, and found my name in the section for students awarded a Bachelor of Arts (Second Class Honours, division one) in Literature.
BTW, the reason I did so badly for the Joint Film & American Studies papers was because at the time of the paper, my brain shortcircuited and instead of talking about the character Abra from John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, I was happily calling her Jabra, the nickname of a girl I knew in UEA, whose real name was Jo Abra but affectionately called Jabra by her friends.
