What is appropriate
behavior for a dissertation student toward his or her chair and committee
member? In a traditional brick and mortar program you would see the behavior
modeled by students further along in your program, but it is difficult at an
online school to know what is normal.
The
reality is it varies tremendously, so the first bit of advice I have for you is
to ask what your chair and committee member prefer. If your chair does not
suggest it, ask for a phone call to get you started, and discuss how your chair
likes to structure their class and what their expectations are of students.
What are they expecting from you in the first quarter? How will they decide if
you should get a “U” or an “S” in the dissertation course? How would they
prefer for you to address them?
In
advance, think about how you like to work… are you independent and good at
personal goal setting? Then perhaps ask if you could send them your draft once
a month (or whatever the 2 of you agree is appropriate). Are you a person who
has a hard time structuring your time and goal setting? Then ask for help as to
what is realistic. You might want to set up regular meetings or times when you
will need to submit drafts. Talk to your chair about your needs, and how they
can be accommodated.
Also
ask your committee member when they would like to see a draft. Many will prefer
that you wait until the proposal has been approved by your chair, unless you
have specific methodological or content issues on which you want their advice.
A
few general bits of advice, be polite, ask questions when you need help, no one
expects you to know everything. A “thank you” for good advice, prompt response,
etc. means a lot to faculty (think of it as positive reinforcement, they will
tend to repeat the good behavior J).
This
is important: No one will know you are
having problems, unless you say something! Typically, if they don’t hear
from you, the faculty’s assumption is that you simply don’t care or aren’t
working on the paper. There are many people who can help if you run into
problems. If you have writing issues, contact the writing center. They have
editors that will work with you. If one of your committee members advises you
go to the writing center then listen and try not to be defensive. They are
trying to save you time and tuition money! If you have committee issues,
contact your program coordinator or program director. Be assertive, it is your
money and time being spent, however, always be professional in interactions
with faculty and administrators. Emotional responses are never a viable
solution.
Faculty
are people too, with busy schedules and family obligations, it is not realistic
to expect immediate feedback. However, if you have not heard from a faculty
member at all within a couple of days of sending an email, write and double
check that they received it. Ask if they can give you an estimate of when you
might get a response. Again, be polite and professional.
Remember,
every faculty member who reads your paper is allowed 10 business days. I know
it is hard to wait, but go on to the next stage. If you are waiting to get
feedback on your prospectus, then go ahead and start on Chapter 2. If you are
waiting on your proposal approval, work on your IRB application and power point
for your defense. There is always something to work on. If you can’t
find anything else, do an update in the literature and see if anything new has
come out that could be helpful.
What
do you do if you are having problems with your chair? First, write out an email
outlining the issues, say how you would like it to be resolved- be very
professional- no emotional response. Often it helps to take on some of the
responsibility. It is a good idea to let it set for a day to make sure that you
are not being impulsive. As the health psych program coordinator, I am always
happy to read such email drafts and give suggestions. Here is an example of a
an appropriate email:
Dr. X,
I am concerned that it is often
taking 3 weeks for you to review my proposal drafts; the delay is really
slowing my progress on the paper. Is there anything I can do to make this
process go a little faster? If it would help, I could just send you a couple of
pages at a time. Ideally, I would like to be able to get a response on my
writing within a few days to a week. Do you have any further ideas?
If
you feel that you don’t get a satisfactory response, the next step would be to
contact your program coordinator or program director and ask for help.
One
final bit of advice, keep a record of when you submit papers to faculty, when
you get a response, and their comments. It is a record that may come in handy
in the future (this is where a research journal comes in handy!).
Next time I will consider what you can learn about yourself
while writing your dissertation. Do you
have an issue or a question that you would like me to discuss in a future post?
Would you like to be a guest writer? Send me your ideas!
leann.stadtlander@waldenu.edu
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