They should pay. Email someone (preferably an admin person) to check. Likely that you will need to by the ticket then submit an expense claim so it might take a little while to get your money back, but it should happen.

Regarding the word count reduction, I would suggest maybe getting a couple of people to help you with this. Hard to see the wood for the trees sometimes when you've been looking at something for a long time. When you've finished the corrections on a chapter, perhaps show it to someone else and see if they can suggest ways to prune it. Perhaps someone who knows nothing about your topic and thus won't get bogged down in the detail but will focus on sentence structure etc.

I don't know if this kind of assistance would be permitted by university regulations, but if it is then it might help you a bit.

Also, I don't know what your topic is but if you have data tables, check the formatting. If you have a number range presented as 'X - Y' it will count that as 2 words whereas 'X-Y' is one. Seems a shame to waste your word count on hyphens!

Completely outside my realms of knowledge so I can't tell you for sure one way or the other. But I wonder whether you could use 'zero inflated' models here?
http://www.kent.ac.uk/ims/personal/msr/webfiles/zip/zip.html
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/routledg/cjas/2000/00000027/00000003/art00009
http://www.kent.ac.uk/IMS/personal/msr/webfiles/zip/ibc_fin.pdf

Might be barking up the wrong tree though!

"An important issue to consider in this context is that T is P, as addressed by xyz theory"?

"Of particular interest in this case is that T is P, an issue highlighted by xyz theory"?

Before you alter the values, check whether any of them could be coding/typing errors.

Make sure you document all the changes you make and record this when you write up.

Sounds like you're doing the right kind of things. With an interdisciplinary programme it's good to be open to a lot of different perspectives and it sounds like you're getting a wide introduction.

All I would say is don't overdo it! The PhD is a marathon not a sprint, and you need to make sure you don't overdo it before you've even begun. The first year will give you a good opportunity to immerse yourself and get your head around the new areas.

Good luck :)

Here is what I said earlier to someone who posed a similar question
___________________________________________
I would think VERY carefully about this.

If you're doing it as a career move - consider whether this is really going to help you. Many academic fields are over saturated with PhD graduates and jobs are very hard to come by. Recent PhD completers who have looked outside academia for work have reported that the PhD can be as much of a hindrance as a help. Do some research into what the prospects are like in your field. If you think a PhD will be genuinely likely to help then could you wait until a funded opportunity arises?

If you're doing this because it's an interest/passion - consider whether you could carry on your interest as a hobby, or find a job that allows you to dabble a bit. There's nothing stopping you pursuing this as a PhD in 5, 10, 20 years time when the funding situation may be more amenable and the job market better.

Essentially consider whether 3 years of full time effort with no financial recompense and no guarantee of a job or enhanced career prospects at the end of it is worth the sacrifices. Sorry if this sounds harsh but reality is that this is probably the worst time ever to choose a full time self-funded PhD.
_____________________

In your case I would add that I don't think institution matters *that* much - it's one of many factors along with publications, networking and grants that build up your academic reputation. I'm also not entirely sure what your motivation for doing this is if you're already giving serious thought to working in consultancy afterwards, rather than academia. I don't know much about consultancy work but my instinct is that an employer would probably rather choose someone with 3 years relevant work experience than an anthropology PhD when employing a consultant.

======= Date Modified 15 Aug 2011 13:46:31 =======
I can't comment on writing a thesis chapter on it, but in general you might find the MIAME guidelines of relevance if your expression data comes from microarrays:
http://www.mged.org/Workgroups/MIAME/miame.html
http://www.nature.com/ng/journal/v29/n4/pdf/ng1201-365.pdf

Otherwise I'd suggest trying to get hold of a couple of recently published theses and seeing what the authors did.

Thanks Delta. I realise it's probably not a welcome perspective. But I've always been a pragmatist, and my romantic notions of academia have long since vanished.

I'm doing a PhD cos my career has reached a bottleneck where having one will be advantageous. But in my field the outlook is comparatively good, and there are opportunities outside academia where a PhD will be if not desirable then at least not be a hindrance. And I'm trying to orientate my project so that I gain not only generic but specific transferable skills. And I'm funded.

If these things weren't the case then I would be very hesitant about starting a PhD at the moment. Other people may be more willing to take a larger gamble than I am, but there are limits beyond which it is no longer sensible. You have to figure out where your situation lies on the spectrum.

======= Date Modified 15 Aug 2011 12:21:45 =======
I would think VERY carefully about this.

If you're doing it as a career move - consider whether this is really going to help you. Many academic fields are over saturated with PhD graduates and jobs are very hard to come by. Recent PhD completers who have looked outside academia for work have reported that the PhD can be as much of a hindrance as a help. Do some research into what the prospects are like in your field. If you think a PhD will be genuinely likely to help then could you wait until a funded opportunity arises?

If you're doing this because it's an interest/passion - consider whether you could carry on your interest as a hobby, or find a job that allows you to dabble a bit. There's nothing stopping you pursuing this as a PhD in 5, 10, 20 years time when the funding situation may be more amenable and the job market better.

Essentially consider whether 3 years of full time effort with no financial recompense and no guarantee of a job or enhanced career prospects at the end of it is worth the sacrifices. Sorry if this sounds harsh but reality is that this is probably the worst time ever to choose a full time self-funded PhD.

I did the MSc in Epi at LSHTM. I loved it. It's a great place to study with a very interesting mixture of people from different countries and academic disciplines. The course is very well designed and delivered and the core epidemiology/statistics teaching is excellent. I would highly recommend it.

I don't know the programme at Imperial in detail, nor do I know anyone who has done it. My impression of the MSc there at the time I was applying was that it had a heavy emphasis on infectious disease modelling, which wasn't my cup of tea. I notice now that they have pathways within the masters so if I were to have gone there I would have opted for the biostats or chronic disease pathway, but I don't think those were explicitly available at the time I was looking. I think Imperial are increasing the size/scope of their public health department at the moment.

I do have one gripe with the LSHTM course which is that my interests are non-communicable/chronic diseases, and the way the optional modules were organised worked far better if you were into infectious diseases. That said, If I had my time again, I would go to LSHTM, just because it's such a great place to be, and I learnt a lot from my fellow students and all the extra seminars and events that go on there. I think also the course was going to be restructured a bit in terms of modules so maybe a clearer chronic disease pathway will feature in that.

If you want to contact current students I know that LSHTM are amenable to those kind of requests and I'm sure Imperial would be too. You might also like to read this:
http://careers.bmj.com/careers/advice/view-article.html?id=20002805

Good luck with your decision.

What are your research/topic interests? Non-communicable or communicable disease? Do you want to go into theoretical research or maybe something more applied like field work/ applying public health interventions?

Both programmes have their strengths but which is best may depend on what you're looking to do next (and what your background is).

Mind you there are pockets of light relief. I found this very heartening:
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2011/8/9/1312907555533/Locals-in-Clapham-turn-up-050.jpg

And the efforts of @Riotcleanup on twitter and Operation Cup of Tea on Facebook can raise the spirits.

And this is good for a giggle:
http://photoshoplooter.tumblr.com/

I've found it massively distracting too.

Actually there have been a whole load of news stories in recent weeks that have really got under my skin and bothered me. I do find it hard to focus on my work when I'm feeling agitated.

I'm kinda glad it's not just me. Was feeling really guilty that my to do list had been derailed.