Do you feel like a student yet?

How do you become a student?

Sign up to a course? Well that's the first step but fundamentally that means you've completed some basic admin. I don't think that makes you a student.

How about attend some lectures? Well you can be in a room and learn next to nothing if you're not engaged. Attending lectures could mean you've managed to read your timetable-it doesn't make you a student.

Write assignments? I suppose that's part of it, but you can probably pass things with the minimum effort. I've passed things without learning much of note. It didn't make me a student.

Here's what I think - students are created from a desire to learn new things, to test the parameters of our own understanding and to take pleasure in the slow revealing of new knowledge. That isn't always straightforward, in fact it's often the exact opposite. We don't like uncertainty or feeling out of our depth. Well guess what? That's part of becoming a student too. It shouldn't be easy.

We have all at some point read academic material that we haven't understood but persevered nevertheless. That's how you become a student.

We have all juggled the academic and the personal and somehow managed both areas. That's how you become a student.

We have all regretted starting something but refused to give in. That's how you become a student.

But eventually, slowly, through progress that sometimes feels like root canal treatment, you increase your understanding.

And one day you wake up with a working knowledge of your topic and enough confidence to tell other people about what you know. Guess what? At that point you're a student.

Don't be afraid of the 'A' word

I've been thinking recently about the perceptions that come with the word 'academic' and how it can be used in both a positive or intimidatory way. I know a bit about this; for a start I have the word academic in my job title, which frankly is a bit of a give away.

But does that make me an academic?

Honestly, I'm not sure. Some days I feel absolutely confident in what I'm doing, saying and sharing. On those days I'd probably say 'yeah' I'm an academic. But equally there are times when I go to meetings with 'proper' academics when I feel about twelve years-old.

When I first started working in academic libraries a typical mistake made by librarians was to try and turn students into proto-librarians. This was clearly a terrible idea and luckily for you this approach is now illegal in most civilized countries. Now the trend is to try to turn students into proto-academics. Although you may not personally be comfortable with this notion, I think it's a much more healthy option.

Because I think you are all proto-academics; you research, you evaluate, you debate and you may well eventually publish. You may not ultimately describe yourself as academic within your chosen full-time career, but along the way you contribute to the total sum of academic human knowledge and what could be smarter and more honourable than that?

Just remember this; everyone starts somewhere. Academics are not born, they get to be academics by reading stuff and writing about it, exactly the same way you do when you write assignments.

Finally, to those of you who are about to hand in dissertations, I trust you luxuriate in the feeling of having wings on your feet. I hope you learned something new about yourself and your topic along the way and I congratulate you on your efforts.