This week, we began our extra-curricular outreach in a second school. Instead of the whole team of four attending one school, we split into pairs to deliver the Young Detectives club. While this certainly brought challenges – the sessions had been planned for teams of four – the second school had a more manageable number of students, so it only took a small amount of creativity to resolve any problems. This is not to say, however, that the session was without other obstacles.

As we were starting late in the second school, it was decided that we would run three 90-minute sessions rather than four hour-long sessions. As such, there was a slower pace to the sessions that, occasionally, allowed the students to get bored and lose attention. In future weeks, we hope to add some short activities throughout the session, such as small games. The second issue was that the original classroom we had hoped to use had flooded following the storm in Oxford. Although the school had moved us into another space, several students ended up in the wrong room, which led to Young Detectives time being lost. Still, the students were involved and seemed to enjoy the session, which overall ended as a success.

We have also continued with our research project, sending out interview invitations and polishing off our questions. I’m looking forward to meeting our interviewees and learning about their opinions and experiences surrounding the policy on extra-curriculars.

We also spent some time in and around Blackbird Leys. Last Friday, we visited the area for a tour and a delicious meal at a local Caribbean restaurant. It was interesting to hear suggestions about how the community infrastructure could be improved – and the role that the university could play in supporting it. This week, we visited the bowling alley in the Kassam Stadium complex, which was a great opportunity to get to know my fellow scholars better!