======= Date Modified 28 24 2010 11:24:32 =======
Hi,

I'm at the end of my third year, and tether. All the research is done and dusted, papers are in prep and now it's just a case of writing up. A potential cock up in regards to my studentship (they think I started and was paid from June 07, I'm pretty sure I wasn't even interviewed for the post till mid-july!) means that money might suddenly become very tight and being able to stay on at Uni might not be workable.

My time table for writing up has me at the 2nd or 3rd complete draft thesis stage at July 30th, and my bank account unless I hear good news has me out on my ear about a week later. I've got a few options, a friend and former housemate who lives here says he'll put me up for a bit rent free, I could try and get a job and finishing the writing at half speed, or I could go home to my family and finish writing up there. Another possible option is that one of many academic job applications come good and finish up before I start teaching/researching for them, but it's a long shot.

I'm looking at the first or third option there but I was wondering what people's experiences were with the final stages of writing up. Do you think I even need to be in and around Uni any more? Have people managed to move home and finish writing up promptly or would I be better off finding a way to stick it out here?

Thanks, and sorry for the wall of text!

Hi, I am in the same position as you. In fact I am currently writing up now, and am doing so at home. I think whether it works depends on a number of things; do you have a good space to work at home? do you have the motivation to do it without being in an office? Do you still need the library (probably you will need this until the end), and if so, can you live without being able to go to the library at the drop of a hat? The biggest obstacle for me would have been with printing. Though I am writing I am still reading and try to stick to journal articles because I can get them more or less immediately by printing them off. Same with my drafts. But I can ONLY do this because I work in a University in my home town (not the one I study at), so I can use their subscription to journals to print them, and their ink and paper. I cant access any journals from home because I am not signed up, and the level of printing I do is so massive, I would hate to be printing on a slow home printer.

There is nothing wrong with working from home however. I have always lived 250 or so miles from my uni and travelled there weekly, so I am used to it. If you have a uni in your home town, you can usually join its library for a small fee and then use its facilities. being able to get started on work as soon as you wake up, without having to make your way into uni and having access to all the free tea you can manage should not be underestimated!

it depends on the environment you have to work in now, the one you would at home, and whether the stress of struggling to stay where you are now outweighs the inconvenience of not living where you study.

good luck with the write up!

Q

I did all of my part-time PhD from home, including the writing-up stage. I'd email in drafts near the end to my supervisor, and he'd post them back to me. We had very very few face-to-face meetings. As usual it was very isolating, but I was isolated throughout my PhD. This forum was a huge help for support. And I got through. I graduated last week :)

Thanks Q and Bilbo :) Congrats Bilbo on graduating! It's those kind of things that I need to hear!

Brilliant! Thank you thank you thank you! I hadn't even considered the library at home. It's a fair bit smaller than the library at Uni but it should do the job. I'm past the stage of needing much in the way of books etc from the library, it's more a case of needing it for printing and access like you say. Definately something I need to check up on.

I don't really need anything in my office/lab, or much in the way of books. I've got most of the pdf's I need backed up as chapters 1 and 2 have been done, and WoK and my supervisor should be able to help with any I'm missing even from home. The work environment is the key thing, I've not really got anywhere at either parents that I can really work at. I mean I'd just need a room, a desk and a plug socket but there's nothing like that at home as it stands. But, if I can get access to the local uni library I could basically camp out there during the day to get things done.

Staying here at Uni, as much as I like the place, will I think become rapidly stressful. I have packing/moving to deal with as well as the writing. Part time work outside of Uni on top of that would not help the writing, especially not the amount I need to cover rent and bills.




I'd wondered about this. I enjoy my face to face meetings with my supervisor (even the one today that he'd forgotten about!) as we get on and they're normally very productive. I'm thinking though once he's seen my first drafts of everything, and any major problems have been dealt with, via email/post might work fine. I know this might vary alot between supervisors but when it came to posting things back were they a) okay with it? And b) reliable? I'm guessing post adds and extra day or two on to geting things done. Was it a case of planning for the gaps and working on something else in between or, dare I say it :D, did you make use of the delay for a bit of a break?

Thank you both again. You've been really helpful and honestly just knowing others are doing it, and have done it, takes a bit of the stress off. I'm just vary weary of getting into a situation where I've not got the time or facillities to get it finished and it ends up dragging on for a long long time.

Congrats again on graduation Bilbo, and good luck with your write up Q! I feel your pain!

My supervisor was very reliable, both at just processing the material quickly, and posting it back. Sending it in the post added very little delay onto the bigger time needed by a sup to read and write proper feedback on your work.

In the early stages of my writing I was working on a pair of chapters at a time, and once I'd sent those off to my sup and he worked through those I'd move onto the next 2 chapters. So there wasn't really a gap. But after my first full draft I was shattered, and took full advantage of the opportunity for a break!

You should still meet with your sup, but you don't need to meet so regularly when you're writing up. More when you have produced a big chunk of work, so a full chapter or two. Then you have something substantial to discuss. In the writing up stage I found the sup meetings - even if I had relatively few - boosted my morale no end.

I'm currently writting up my thesis, and I can tell you from personal experience, you don't even need a desk to do write up!

of course I didn't choose to do without my desk, but my elderly cat who is going senile gets very VERY upset if I work at a desk... any desk. After trying to work in lots of places around the house, it turns out that she is ok with me sitting on the bed to work, so that's what I've been doing! It took me a couple od days to get used to it, but I enjoy it now.

======= Date Modified 28 Jun 2010 15:16:44 =======

I'd second this! I did much of my writing up sitting up in bed with a laptop on my lap. It worked very well!

I'm not at the writing up stage yet, but I work exclusively from home - I don't use our postgrad office - its noisy, quite a distance away, and I figure the extra couple of hours here working are better than being stuck in traffic :-) With my sup I tend to send in work (I do see him regularly too) and he will use the word comments facility, scrawl all over it and email it back with an email with extra comments so we don't even use the post! its the way I've always worked with him since he was my sup for my BA dissertation.

You don't need a desk but do be careful - when I was moving last year my desk was packed up and moved ahead and I wrote a paper on my laptop on my lap - I somehow strained the muscle in my shoulder which in turn trapped a nerve running up my neck and into my head and I spent the whole summer in agony - make sure if you work without a desk that you move v regularly and that you ensure that you sit correctly - the nature of my chair meant that my shoulder was slightly raised continually and that's what did it apparently - I suffered big time for months - its no fun.

Thanks :) Meetings should still be doable I think. 'Home' is only 70 miles away from Uni so I should be able to handle the occasional train journey. Im hoping I don't need too many meetings though.



Oddly a cat recently paid me a visit whilst I was writing. A random cat jumped in through my bedroom window, took one look at me and my work and clambered back out!

I think I'm stuck to the desk for the most part. Ive got very pads for writing notes on (and a special one for research ideas!) but my laptop has issues. If I try and move my keyboard onto my bed I first get stiff and uncomfortable and then I fall asleep! I wish I had voice notation software though. That would be fantastic! I'd definately work from my bed then.

Thanks :) I hope my supervisor is savvy enough for using word comments. In the past he's sometimes highlighted and then sent back a document with general notes on but I'm not sure that'll work for something the size of a thesis, certainly not with the amount of mistakes I'm bound to make! Word comments could work then, I might mention it to him when it's time to leave.

Normally my meetings over the past 3 years have been to discuss results and brain storm for research. Occasionally it's been to go over some theory that I might have been lacking in (I began as a staunch cognitive psychologist and these theory meetings have converted me into an associative learning theorist instead!). But I'm hoping now most of those reasons for meeting will have passed, I don't even have end of semester reports to deal with anymore. So I'm thinking all electronic could work, and it'd certainly make it easier for me.

bumping this a little but then I'll leave it alone. After heroic work by my supervisor the funding cock up has been dealt with and I have another 2 months grace :) So fingers crossed I'll be done before I even need to move out!