Ooops I just noticed the rather extensive 'tips' thread that is already going!

Congratulations to you all! It must be such an amazing feeling.

I feel really inspired when I hear of people finishing. I was just thinking it would be really cool to have a 'words of wisdom' type thread where people who have finished give their tips for getting through it. If anyone can be bothered doing this i'd really value it. Having a bit of a tough time with it just now so could use some inspiration!

I think i'll have to hold back from doing a Gwynnie to be honest. It really has changed my life but I don't want to sound 'gushing' so I might go hard and write a full on emotional version for my own use and write a modified more stable sounding version for the actual thesis.

The first thank you from me will go to the research participants. I read a thesis the other day that involved numerous in-depth interviews and I noticed that the participants weren't even thanked in the acknowledgements! I thought that was pretty shocking.

I am in New Zealand doing my PhD and my funding runs out (aggh!) at the end of October. I am currently trying to work out how I will support myself as I finish off the write up. I've one option that is NZ based but am also trying to look into the option of UK funding sources. Does anyone know of any funding available for students from the UK doing PhD study at an overseas institution? been doing lots of googling but all that comes up is funding for UK students studying at UK institutions wanting to go overseas to study short term, or students from overseas wanting to study in the UK. I found this http://www.ukcisa.org.uk/student/ukstudent/funding.php but still not having any luck finding anything. Maybe it just doesn't exist.

If anyone here knows of anything that might be an option for me I'd really appreciate a heads up. I'm looking to apply for about 5k, and I'm in Social Sciences.

Thanks :-)

PS - maybe you should mark them IN the pub!

You have my sympathy but i'll pass on that. I marked 84 recently and the thought of looking at another essay makes me feel ill!

Keep going and you'll be at the gym and pub before you know it. It is rubbish though, I know.

Hey,

I can totally relate to you on that.

Before I started my PhD I was pretty much super confident. About 6 months in my confidence had fallen away and I felt continuous self doubt. I think it is pretty normal to feel 'different' as a PhD student. You are working on something so individual and working alone most of the time. People who don't do PhD generally don't understand the emotional or practical side of it. So it's no wonder it feels lonely sometimes.

For me, looking at it positively doing the PhD has forced me to think critically about myself and how I do things. At times this has been really painful, but I think it is valuable self development I would not have had in a 'normal' job. Although I still have low days, I can feel my confidence coming back now.

One thing I have found helpful dealing with the lonliness aspect is to socialise with people at least once a week outside of the PhD/uni life. I am in a running club and just going along there and talking about things that are not PhD related and having a good hard work out at the same time really helps.

Posting here is also very helpful to gain perspective and some relief that these feelings are normal!

Best wishes

Oh they do get paid for it. PhD students tend to get used for tutoring 3rd year courses and the UG's and Masters tutor 1st year and 2nd year. I agree, I would have been very uncomfortable with another UG marking my work too. When I was doing my degree we had PhDs for tutes until 3rd year and then we had the lecturers for tutorials in the final year. It's so strange.

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I am from the UK currently studying overseas. Since coming here i've noticed many differences compared to my experiences of university in the UK. One of the differences in that they employ undergraduate students here as tutors. A second year student can be employed as a tutor of a first year paper for instance. I found it strange when I first arrived, because in my second year I really don't think I would have been equipped to do this work. Anyway I just got used to seeing this going on and accepted it. Today I started thinking about it again on hearing about a friend's flatmate who is in her third year and has apparently been given 125 2000 word essays to mark in a week! Now part of me wonders whether this is the flatmate grossly exaggerating. I could NEVER mark 125 essays in a week, it just wouldn't be possible.

It did get me thinking about it more generally though. I wonder if they are being unfair to students and just trying to cut costs through some cheap labour. Is it just me, or does it sound a little exploitative?

I'd be interested to hear other people's perceptions of this...

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Thanks for reading and taking the time to reply!

Even after putting all of the grades up by about 5 apparently I was still too harsh! The average mark was about 66 apparently. I feel quite mean but I didn't intend to be!

I got a response on the abstact and she just said that's excellent thanks so at least that went ok.

======= Date Modified 25 30 2010 11:30:14 =======
I need to have a rant.



I have just finished marking eighty three 3000 word essays. I was up until 3am last night and have been working on them for the past week (i'm slow). Today I had a meeting with my supervisor to moderate them and she said I was WAY too harsh. I literally had to add 5 marks to some of them. I don't know if it's because I went to a uni with stricter marking but some of the essays were appalling, I couldn't believe the marks there were getting. I'm talking third years that cannot write introductions or write in paragraphs and reference wikipedia. I am no genius but some of them were just awful and were passing!



Then I realised today (after just a few hours sleep) that I was supposed to submit a draft title and abstract for a conference. I have been invited to present at it and I can't believe I managed to forget to write it given that I got the email two weeks ago. So I wrote one and sent it through but it is seriously terrible. I'm mortified and now afraid to check my email!

All I want to do is go to sleep for about 3 days but I have a chapter deadline looming...

Thanks so much for all the replies. Sue, your reply really helped me put things a bit more in perspecitve. Thanks so much.

Her work isn't exactly the same as mine. She did a mixed methods study with a particular population group and I did an in depth qualitative study with a subgroup of that population. It is just the title of her paper basically sounds like the title of my thesis, but when I read what she has done it is actually quite a bit different and she has little data from the specific group I worked with.

I wish it wasn't so stressful. I know these times always pass and there are ups and downs. Wouldn't it be great if we could just push a fast forward button and it would all be done? I'm so glad this forum is here to get these rants out there!

First - really sorry for the depressing thread.

Today I really, really hate my thesis. I wish i'd never bothered with it. When I started it I was all naive and thinking I was going to change the world etc. I know this was really unrealistic but I was well meaning. I really care a lot about what I am researching. Now I just feel like it's all pointless because no one gives a s*it anyway. I feel as though people just think i'm doing it all for my own benefit and I am the only one who is going to benefit from it. If that's true, then what on earth am I doing here living on the bare minimum and dragging myself through the mill mentally. I probably won't even get a job.

This academic in my field (one of the only specialists in the country) just published a paper that is basically the title of my thesis. She tried to discourage me from doing the research from the start, basically saying she had it all covered and I should just run off and research something else. But I found supervisors who said this wasn't the case and I should do it, then helped me get the funding. I feel like i'm not going to get my PhD no because she has published this chapter which basically means my own research is pretty unoriginal. She knew exactly what i've been doing and i've been doing it for 2.5 years now, it's not like I just started. I know she can do what she wants but I just want a fair chance!

I wish I hadn't been so naive when I first started. The whole thing just seems so pointless right now.