Reflections of a part-time PhD student
This term marked the beginning of my third year as a PhD student, and for me it also marks the beginning of the real work!
To this point I’ve covered in full-time terms, about 18 months, and in those terms I am definitely on track to be done on time, having completed my upgrade before the summer.
Completing my upgrade means that data collection and analysis can begin! Okay yes I have loads more reading and writing to do but over the summer up to now I have thrown myself into collecting my data (questionnaires and interviews) and am spending every spare minute checking transcriptions, which is as tedious as it sounds, but it has allowed me to start making initial notes on common themes, so it’s worth it!
Research Consultancy training workshop
Being a part-time PhD student, as well as someone that has spent a long time in my career teaching research skills and study skills, I don’t go to many PhD workshops. I talk about this in my ‘reflections’ post, but in general, to me, it feels disingenuous to get points from classes I could teach, so I usually get my points from alternate routes like delivering training, or going to conferences, but I do tend to keep my eye out for interesting things that I can join in with so that I can meet some fellow PhD students and learn something new.
I have been interested in consultancy for a while, as a broader concept, but also as something that might be interesting to get into…