Hi SavvyRookie

I am in the process of starting a part time PhD in Biomedical Engineering and I talked to a research officer yesterday. I asked him the same questions you have asked. He said it would take approximately 4 to 6 years to complete as my PhD is quite specific. This was based on roughly 20 to 30 hours per week (I would expect to do more!!).

I also have a wife, full time job and three young children.

I hope this helps
(up)

Thanks for that athos78 and BilboBaggins, I have just been trying to gauge how much effort I will need to put in!!

I have read that the maximum number of words for a thesis is 100,000. How does this breakdown in terms of the number of words per section and is there a minimum number of words?


Cheers in advance Stephen

Thanks Satchi I appreciate your support :-)

Thanks MH I appreciated your advice.

The interview was very informal and I liked the Director from the start, he was very laidback and welcoming. The questions revolved around my past and present qualifications and what my present position in my company involved. I did a bit of a presentation showing a couple of products I have designed, this worked quite well as they were able to talk about some of their projects. At the end we talked about how I would finance the PhD and whether my company would be willing to support me (hopefully they will!) this was followed by a tour of the facilities, which were very impressive. The interview went so well I can’t really believe it. I think that they will change their minds so until I receive a formal offer through the post I won’t be counting my chickens.

I emailed them yesterday accepting their (verbal) offer to start this year and asked what I needed to do next, so I am holding my breath waiting for a reply.

It couldn’t have gone better :-)

The director verbally agreed that there was a position for me but he was keen for me to start straight away, unfortunately this poses a small problem as I wanted to finish my MEng first and I still have a year to go. He suggested that I could work on some projects in the meantime which I thought was a good idea. All I have to do now is get my company to agree and sponsor me!!

Today!!

I have been preparing as much as possible but I feel totally lost.

I am not too worried about that as the topic is related to the work I have been doing for the lat 9 years, so hopefully I will be able to blag my way through that.

Thanks for the advice I really appreciate it. I will defiantly make sure I can answer all of those questions before my interview on Thursday. :-)

I would just like to ask the question ‘is this normal procedure’?


I have managed to get an interview to study part-time for a PhD and when I phoned to confirm the date and time with the PA I asked her some questions, it turns out that I will be interviewed by four people, the Professor his RO a supervisor and an current PhD student. After the conversation I was very concerned as I thought the interview was only going to be a general chat about PhD application but it would appear that I will be in for an interrogation! Is this normal? And has anybody else been through this kind of application? Any advice would be very welcome.