well done, congratulations!!

yo yo tigger. met my supervisor last friday, finalising my presentation today. i don't use powerpoint, i use this software called prezi where you essentially draw a big map and then when you click, it zooms about to a specific part so it's just one big slide. sorry, i realise that doesnt help at all!!!

yeah, i wonder what i'm to be asked. i was meant to be the first of the bunch but now greg can't make it so i don't even know when it is. :( grim.

still, from what i gather, we should all be grand!

i'm a fat bloke but my sense of humour really has taken me far. i can't complain

i don't post a lot mate but i hope you work it out

thanks for the info!!!!!

what's latex?

(weird bodysuit references aside)

sounds pretty normal from what i can gather...most arts students i know live in the fog you speak of and i walked through it for a few weeks before biting the bullet and writing one of my later chapters- a case study. 15,000 words done, submitted and corrected after three months. feels good. gives you confidence. i think you'll feel better once u have a chunk done

i did laugh at this. reminded me of a nightmare i had frequently at exam time- i'm so horribly shit at even the most basic of maths problems that i would dream of walking into an exam hall, sitting down, looking at the paper which had the correct title page- something to do with ancient history or journalism no doubt- then i would open the paper and it would have some bullshit picture of a circle with a triangle in it and i had angles to work out- worst of all i couldnt tell anyone because speaking was forbidden. horrible. the key to understanding this fear is understanding how brain-crushing mathematics is to me.

still, i think u'll be grand!

hahaha yes, i think we know each other!

emmmmmm, i'm getting on alright. nearly done to be honest. maybe another days work left!

i know, i think i can only go into detail on the stuff i've already done...the other stuff is in the future and is therefore all speculative! fifteen minutes really will fly by like!! i did a forty minute paper at the symposium and it flies in!

we will rule. my viva is the first of the bunch. grim!

i would be going above their heads if i were in your position!

hey geekgirl!

happy christmas. Also, I don't think you should fret unnecessarily over this problem you have. I think that, because the PhD project is not of your own design, you can afford yourself a little comfort in the fact that thos who designed it obviously think you're good enough to do it and do it well while they drop about £60k on you! Be happy.

Myself and a few of my friends (although we are arts students) designed our projects and most of our pressure comes from keeping the design and flow of it all together and moving in the same direction- whereas a few of my other friends at uni picked up pre-determined projects and most of their pressure comes from the direction you are coming from- the 'do i know enough about this?' direction. so i think your situation is more normal than you think.

i hope this helps! congratulations on the funding. to be onest, i love my phd lifestyle. hope you enjoy yours!! :)

hey, im faculty of arts, whereabouts are you? they ran a little presentation for us in arts to give us an idea of what the viva is and how to do it and also what the confimration viva will be like.

from what i gather, its an overview of where you see the project going and what you have done to date! best to check with supervisor though!

u in the uni often?

Ciarán

hey tigger!
im in university of ulster, where you at?

from what i can see, it shouldn't be too much bother, fairly informal like apart from the presentation, certainly nothing to lose a christmas over :P. That is to say the report seems fairly informal and concerns how you feel it's all goin so far!

thoughts?

yeah guys, don't get me wrong, i'm happy enough to have done the harder work now and stay ahead of the game for the time being! still, was a pain in the ass writing so much so early esp when it wasn't really required!!

yes, the 100 day viva is a thing at my university and onle a few others it would seem- basically so you don't get to your confirmation viva and completely lose it...sort of a way of tracking your progress a few months in. with so many people at the uni being government funded, i suppose it lets them keep tabs on their money, you know.

anyone else have any assessments pending?

hey guys,

anyone else prepping for one of these in january?

i was told i had to produce at least 10000 words for it and i produced 15000 and a prezi presentation to go with!

then after i submitted (and my supervisor was loving my work), we were informed that wrong info had been circulated and these were the requirements for the confirmation viva in june LOL (and by LOL i mean :-s)

i was greatly pissed off until i realised i have essentially already worked up my phd to expectations not usually met until june! still, all i have to produce is a four page report. ludicrous.

anyone in this boat?

happy christmas/holidays!