This weekend:

1 Complete revisions in Chapter 7-plus alignment in Chapter 8 conclusion.
1.1Read reformatted sections for logical flow and meaning.
1.2 Eliminate redundancy or any repeated material
1.3 Add 4 paragraphs of around 300 words a paragraph in Section 7.2.1-7.2.5

2 Ignore anything else as hard as this is...other than necessities.
3. Take a deep breath and gather energy for major push with getting all little items complete during Term break (begins next week)
4 Stop wasting time on trying to change PG forum avatar or on similar time wasters (lol).
.

Good luck and best wishes to any others starting to plan the final miles (or hopefully the final miles).

Hello Everyone,

I submitted my MSc by Research thesis (25,000 words) 23.01.2017 and still haven't received my results. Just wondered what the average time to receive the results/award is? My experience at this university was not a good one and I'm concerned that they might fail me. Any advice while I sit, wait and worry?

Thanks in advance,

Steven.

Hi there Steven, a few years ago I completed my MEd by Research of Thesis (same length). I submitted it in September 2010 and received the examiner's marks in mid March 2011 to graduate officially in April 2011. I can't remember the actual dates now. It was longer than it should have been and I am not sure why but I think it might have had something to do finding examiners and then once they had them, the examiners had two quite different scores and needed to agree on what the final outcome would be. The outcome was good and the thesis was accepted with no need for revision or change.

The length of time does not mean that you will have failed-universities are large beasts and often move slowly. It can take a long time to go through all of the various checkpoints. If you are worried contact the university's research admin officer or your supervisor and ask how it is going. They should be able to reassure you or move things along if necessary. Well done on your submission and good luck!

Hi PjLu and thanks for the response. I didn't realise it could take that long for the results so I'll stop worrying! I've just read other people's experience of waiting for results and it reassured me lots. Cheers.

Today I emailed off a copy of my full draft to both supervisors, who plan to read it over the next month and then let me know:

a. whether I can file my intention to submit in 8 weeks form with my faculty
b. what else really has to be done or altered

I still have to chase up on some references, write the acknowledgement, place in appendices, and my list of tables and figures and redraft and format 3 or 4 tables on pdfs that need to inserted on Word rather than as pdfs (bit hard to fit them in).

So I plan to do this over the next few weekends after work, and then will fly over for what I hope is the final big meeting.

It is a surreal feeling-still things to do but so close now. Fingers crossed any changes the supervisors suggest will be minor ones.

Hi everyone, how are you all doing? I wanted some very small piece of advice on something stats related that I am stuck on. Anyone able to help please? Thanks :)

Just wanted to swing by and say that I submitted my corrections this week and while it took every bit of energy I have to do, that's that done. Graduation in July. Next post will be in the 'hall of fame' threat. Can't believe it!!

Good luck to everyone else finishing up xx

Wonderful work litphdgirl! Well done and best wishes for the graduation-not long now...

Hi everyone. I just wanted to drop in and say that my examiners reports came back this week and I have passed subject to minor revisions. I say this not to "rub it in" to you poor folk who are still pre-submission, but to say that IF I CAN DO IT, YOU CAN TOO! When I submitted, as you can see from my posts, I was pretty convinced that my thesis was rubbish and that it would come back with major revisions... I really only submitted because I had a job offer and thought I'd just submit and deal with the awful examination results later. But my comments were overall very positive and the changes they want quite minor.

I know other people have said this, and it is probably easy to dismiss it thinking you are clearly so much more of a failure than anyone else here. But I thought that and it's just not true. Please remember that you are the worst person to judge how good your thesis is now, so trust that your supervisors won't let you submit if it's truly going to fail, and have faith it'll all work out okay!

Congratulations, litphdgirl and teegs, brilliant news! It is so good to hear from people making it through to the end!

My thesis has been ready for a while now, but submission is being stalled at every turn by internal university 'stuff' that I can do nothing about. I know it will get sorted out, but it is very frustrating, having everything sitting on hold for one reason after another!

@ Congratulations to Teegs90-great result and best wishes for your future success and publications.

@ Chickpea, I hope that your submission issues are resolved very quickly now so you can move on. Well done though for all your hard work and talent in getting to this point. And on your resilience-must be very hard to be at this point and have to be held up by administrative issues.

My current status is I have a complete polished draft, with all bits and pieces finalised. I'm waiting for feedback from both supervisors as to whether I can give my formal intention to submit notice (8 weeks notice) and then formally submit the thesis mid to late July. I have a big meeting lined up with supervisor in 2 weeks (owing to move and new job I don't live near the university any more so have to travel around 1000 k's) and this meeting will be the last I think. I just have to 'rest' now until this meeting on 25/5 and then make their suggested adjustments in the final 8 weeks before submitting. They've been very quiet now for almost a month, so I am a bit nervous that I might find they want structural changes rather than surface-which might hold things up. Anyway, I can't do anything about it now until I meet face to face and find out whether they approve my notice (or not).

Thanks, Pjlu!

Good luck with your meeting with your supervisors. Hopefully they will approve your plan and won't suggest any big changes at this stage. Hope you can enjoy a bit of down time until the meeting - sounds like you've earned it!

Hi all, just thought I'd drop to moan about my thesis writing. Have written first drafts of lit review and methods, both panned pretty heavily by my supervisor. Now writing quant findings, hopefully will finish that today if I can stop procrastinating...

Terrified of starting my quant discussion. What am I going to say?

Hi,
I'm new to this forum, and have just come across you! I'd love to join in the support thread. I'm submitting in September (hard, hard, hard deadline after 7 years on and off, including a year of maternity leave ...) and have a LOT of work to do before then. Also feeling really unsupported by my supervisors. I'm a social science phd in the UK, doing a qualitative study, and freaking out that I still haven't got all my analysis nailed down, and need to go back and re-jig literature, methods, theory, etc in the light of how my study evolved along the way, which my supervisors seem to think are just minor issues.

Congratulations to those who have recently submitted and those who are very very close! Sorry I can't help with the quant discussions.

Hi there and welcome! Re-your statement above- I still feel like this and I am going to submit my thesis in 8 weeks time anyway. I think it might be down to just wanting it to be perfect and always seeing room for improvement. When you get the final product, even with a bit of editing to go, there are all these thoughts that swim around.." my analysis is limited, I've got to reshape the first chapters, etc, etc". When you come to do this work, it isn't as complex as you think-although owing to fatigue, it can be hard to be motivated to do it. So then the thoughts come back "wow, my thesis is 'meh', it can't possibly be good enough. Surely I need to do more. What was all this pain for anyway?".

I think these thoughts are common and, of course, you can always do more but at some point you have to stop and graduate. There may also be some truth to these thoughts but not in a negative way.

Essentially, the PhD is just a large study-your final piece as an apprentice. And the first step to a research career, or a symbol of reaching a level of understanding or intellectual scholarship, if you don't use it for academia but in the professional world.

And what it looks like at the other end, isn't quite how you envision it at the start or even in the middle of the journey. So your supervisors may be less worried because their expectations are for a 'good enough product that qualifies you for a PhD' whereas the candidate may be hoping for and seeing in their mind a perfect product, that may even be transformative or transform your life somehow.

In my opinion, it is still very worthwhile doing, absolutely essential if you do want to be an academic or researcher and still worthwhile as a form of terminal degree which conveys a level of professional expertise in an area-even if you don't. (Provided though that you understand and are hoping for one of these two outcomes. It can be disappointing if these outcomes are not what you were aiming for).