My name is Peter Davies, I am 46 years old and currently studying BSc (Hons) in Sound Technology at Wrexham Glyndwr University.

Why am I doing this?

• This blog is going to give you an insight into a mature student studying a Creative Media degree.
• I am going to try and post on a daily basis the things that I have found interesting or not from lectures, seminars, live sound.

My aim is to publish all about what will become my own personal Creative Future in Media and hopefully have some fun along the way…

The Story so far….

Back in June 2019 I enrolled onto the BSc Sound Technology at Wrexham Glyndwr University, I was really excited about finally starting a degree, its been over 30 years since I was last in any formal education.

Since leaving school I have been in various jobs, always trying to better myself. I started out on a YTS Apprenticeship as an Electrician which has proved to be useful for many years, I completed a City & Guilds course at NEWI which is what Glyndwr was known as before it became a university.

Following that I completed another City & Guilds course in Electronic Servicing and landed a career building Optical Shaft Encoders at Hohner Automation. I left there for a company called Zeta Communications where I built varying electronic products from start to finish. I ended up in the SMD area where I learnt to program a robotic pick and place machine something I really enjoyed before being made redundant and the company closing down.

Since then I spent 18 years working in administration and the last 15 years in Scottish Power working my way up to the Large Business Billing Team.

I subsequently took voluntary redundancy to look after my severely disabled son Llew, a role which is very challenging but rewarding too, after 5 years my wife who also worked at Scottish Power also took voluntary redundancy as the pressure of home life with Llew was starting to take its toll on our mental health.

It was then we decided to swap roles where she would become the main carer for Llew and I could embark on a lifelong ambition to obtain a degree, if only it was this simple 30 years ago…!!!!

So, finally, the start date of my new journey came near, excited at the prospect of another life goal…or mid-life crisis as I have now relabelled it. The 26th October finally came around and myself and my cohort got to meet our lecturers and gave us a taster of what was to come. Oh yes not forgetting Freshers week too..!!!

The first semester involved blog entries, a few quizzes and some pratical tests all around what we had learnt during the previous weeks.

I am also the Course Representative for Sound Technology for this year too.

We covered the following three subjects in first semester’s modules.

Recording Technology was a studio based theory and practical session in the Off The Wall Studio . Every Monday morning week we learnt a new topic and had to produce a written assignment as a blog entry to include audio clips relating to the practical studio sessions.

Audio and Visual Science was more involved with the scientific theory of audio and visual, each week we learned about subjects such as colour, sound, decibels, power and watage. The module was assessed in the form of onlie quizzes based upon the session content.

Live Sound, ultimately my favourite module covered all aspects of the Live Sound environment, from calculating decibel sound pressure level to designing a pa system for a given specification. Each week we had a theoretical session followed by a practical session using a live PA system, each week we would gradually build the PA bigger and more elaborate as we where going to be tested at the end of the module and build the system as a group on our own.

With all the blogs and quizzes submitted and the practical tests complete its onto Semester two which is the reason why I have started to write this blog as its forms part of my own personal Creative Future.