Last weekend, my sister and her younger daughter were visiting, staying with my parents. It’s hard to find activities which everyone from 13 to 85 can join in with, but we scored an unexpected hit with…… universities! This wasn’t as dull as it sounded. I work for Strathclyde University Library at its Jordanhill Campus, which is a lovely parkland site in the West End of Glasgow. My Mum and Dad have never been there and, as the campus is closing in the summer, I wanted them to see where I worked before it disappeared. Jordanhill was originally a teacher education college (read about its origins in Wikipedia), starting in this building, the David Stow, in 1921:

Subsequent building has not been as attractive! The Library is housed in the Henry Wood Building:

Inside, the Library is more visually pleasing though:

And the campus is lovely, here’s the sunken garden for example, outside the Crawfurd Building:

This was such a success that we repeated the exercise the next day at Glasgow University where John is Head of the School of Engineering. It is very historic, dating from 1451, though has only been on its current site since the nineteenth century:

We visited, amongst other things, the recently-refurbished Hunterian Museum…….

…….and an engineering lab, also recently refurbished:

Again, the campus as a whole is lovely with the historic cloisters…..

……and views across the park to Kelvingrove Museum and Art Gallery:

My niece seemed to enjoy herself (well she didn’t complain), especially standing at the microphone in a lecture theatre and giving us all a talk. She went away with bags of freebies: badges and bookmarks etc, including some for her big sister who had been left at home studying for her GCSEs. So there you are: how to entertain your teenage niece in one easy lesson. Take her to university!