I’ve spent the last week at the University of Toronto attending the summer doctoral program hosted by the Oxford Internet Institute. Conveniently abbreviated as OIISDP. Every summer the institute hosts a group of ~30 graduate students who are working on research related to the internet. I was lucky enough to be one of the students accepted for this year. The program is two weeks long and consists of presentations by faculty from Oxford, other schools, and the students themselves. One of the main reasons I wanted to go, aside from getting out of Knoxville for a few weeks in the summer, was to meet fellow doctoral students who may be working on topics close-to my own interests and the program has met my expectations and more.
Today was Saturday, the first day we’ve had off since arriving on Monday. I used the free time to walk around the city with fellow students and enjoy some plays that were part of the Fringe Festival of Toronto. I saw two productions today Almost, Maine and How to Be a Spinster. The former was enjoyable but some of the metaphors were a bit too on the nose. The latter was a fun comedy about being a spinster/single person with the conceit of presenting the play as a inspirational workshop you might find at a conference. There was one dig about being a PhD student that struck close to home.
I hope to write more about the content of the program soon.
