Hi,

I have a relatively good job (earning ~£40k), a mortgage and various other ties that prevent me from quitting work and studying full time. I would still however love to do a PhD. Can someone point me towards information with respect to studying for a PhD part-time?

Robin

Hi Robin,

Opportunities for studying part-time for a PhD will depend on your subject and where you live: it seems to me that your already busy life may not allow for much travelling, although you may know better about that.

The best thing to, in my opinion, is to look for potential supervisors (I'm presuming you have some idea of the topic you wish to pursue) for your research. Contact the ones you think will be good for you, tell them a bit about yourself: work experience, qualifications, your proposed area of research, and why you want to do a PhD; and see how they respond.

It usually takes a minimun of 4.5 years and a maximum of about 7 to complete a part time PhD, so it's a long term commitment.

I've just started the second year of a part time PhD, but have been able to devote most of my time to studying (I teach part time and am very, very poor) so continuity and concentration haven't been too much of a problem for me. I'm not sure how that would pan with a heavy job commitment.

It's a satisfying thing to do, I've had ups and downs with it, but I am very glad I'm doing it. There is not much I would part with it for!

It is possible to do a PhD part-time, although it's really hard. In Australia a part-time PhD takes a minimum of 6 years - don't know what the UK minimum is. I did my PhD part-time that for a while, and was studying before work in the morning and at night. It's difficult to get a block of time to really concentrate - I found that I'd just start getting into it, then would have to go to work or to bed. One of the hardest things is doing field work while you're working full-time. Depending on your methodology, it can be difficult, if for example, you need to interview people.

That said, I don't want to put you off. My employer gave me a bit of study leave, and I purchased an additional day's leave a fortnight, which meant that I had a day during the week to study and was still getting paid OK. I got a lot done in three days a week.

Oh - and you will need to plan for a chunk of time where you don't undertake paid work but just write your thesis - a few months will be needed.

Mostly it's worth it - although I can't say that at the moment as am going through a rough patch writing up!

Good luck.

As you have a job, mortgage and commitments, I assume you will be remaining in your home town.
Therefore I would suggest visiting your local university and taking advice from them.
Or, there is always the OU.

Hello Robin,

It is achievable and plenty of people do combine full-time work and doctoral research, but my own experience suggests to me it depends on various factors including the form your research will take.

My husband and I are both about 18 months into part-time PhDs, and we've had very different experiences in relation to work. Although we both had 'proper jobs' as the start, I have found it impossible to combine my study with a full-time job and now teach part-time (with a fair drop in income), whilst he is just about able to keep the plates spinning! The difference is that whilst my husband is doing a maths study, which mostly involves desk work that can fit around his full-time (non-academic) job, I am doing a social science project with a lot of interviewing out in the field. The need to schedule interviews well in advance and travel across the country to do them just didn't fit in with my job.

Now, if it sounds as if I am suggesting my husband has it easy, I'm not! It has wiped out his evenings and weekends, and a lot of his annual leave. This works if you really, really want to do it, but he is having to very disciplined to keep going. I noticed you used the phrase 'love to do a PhD', which is fantastic, because you'll need that motivation. You don't say what your personal situation is, but it needs to be considered - I think the fact that we are both studying together helps (we both value what the other is doing, we're busy at the same time, mutual understanding of the highs and lows, a reasonable amount of sympathy if the other is up against a deadline, and a little bit of healthy competition)

One very big plus for someone who has an established career is that you will bring a set of transferable skills that will come in very handy. Any of the following will help: time- and self-management, negotiation skills, networking, planning and goal-setting, problem-solving, report writing, juggling competing demands, and I think treating your research like a job helps.

Finally, earlier someone mentioned local universities or the OU. This doesn't have to be the case, I am at a university 200 miles away, my husband's is about 100 miles away from our home. We each go there about every 12 weeks (was 4 weekly for me in the early stages), keep in contact with supervisors by email, phone and webcam and have Sconul cards to use in our local university libraries. It isn't a problem.

It can be done, but you have to plan carefully, and you have to make sure that everyone else realises that you will not just be able to drop everything and fit in with their plans at a moment's notice, you have to be prepared for the fact that you will not be able to go out as much as you did, and that people do not always understand why either of these things may not be your only concern. I'm part time, but apart from my studies, I'm also chair of the local community centre, a school governor, and am a steward for the union at my place of work, and I keep up the usual jobs around the house and garden. It is hard work, but then that is the same for any PhD - it is just spread over a longer period. however you need to consider the demands of your particular area, for example I can do a lot of work from home - don't need labs or anything, and have supervisors who answer e-mails etc. promptly, both of which are important features for me.

Hi,

I've been looking for info about doing a PhD this way and wasn't sure if it was possible. So I'm glad I found this thread. I'm wondering if when you are working full-time, do you get many opportunities to see and converse with your supervisor? I'm thinking of doing bioinformatics/computational biology type studies and I started of my MSc doing a distance part time course this way so I would think it's a possibility. I'm not sure what supervisor attitudes would be like to this minimal level of contact on a PhD.
Being employed full-time already I'm also wondering if the fact that with self-funding it would help my application chances, as I also got a poor BSc class (my excuse is that I had issues when I was young and foolish and doing my BSc but that doesn't really help me push on with my future unless I put it behind me) but I have worked in industry for 8 years and done an MSc since then.

S

Hi

I have just sent my application to the University of Queensland to undertake a PhD part time. I am really lucky that I have worked at CSIRO for 20 years and have worked myself into a position where at least half the work Iwill be doing is also what constitutes myPhD project. I have 3 good advisors, 1 from work, 1 from UQ and 1 external who is an expert in the field. It is still proving a little difficult to find the time to do the literature review which is not in the work project. Also luckily my kids are 10 and 14 so a bit more independent than some younger ones. I made it quite clear to my supervisors that I wasn't having fortnightly meetings. I'll email regular brief updates and we can call meetings as we need. We have all known each other for a number of years so again that is a plus in the communication stakes. I'm hoping to have the bench work done in 5 years with publications along the way which are required for work anyway and then somehow finalise the thesis in the last year. That should have me submitting when I'm 50 but before I'm 51. I'm quite excited by it all but it does seem like a very long road to travel.

Duffy