Concern about time

From a concerned student:

I have a concern about the process that is shared among many of my fellow students, but none of us want to bring it up with our chairs or administration, in fear that they will make the remainder of the process more difficult for us. I wanted to get your insight on this, even though you are a Walden “insider.” :) There is a sense that Walden has an unwritten rule about making this process unnecessarily long, either as a way to get more money from the students, or even just as a way to make the degrees more meaningful. This is evident in the ongoing back-and-forths between student and chairperson. I understand that each person in the committee has up to 2 weeks to review, but I have found that my chair regular takes that 2 weeks even for minor revisions that take no more than a few minutes. As you are aware, two weeks = about $600 in tuition. This is painful to the student on many levels. Two weeks is a reasonable about of time for reviewing a proposal for the first time, but not for the seemingly endless communications that occur in the process. It is frustrating, to say the least. 

Thanks, this is a great question! This is a concern that every dissertation student expresses, even those in traditional brick and mortar programs. The difficulty with the dissertation is that it is a very technical paper, written by students without a great deal of previous experience in this area. Let me give you an example, I went to a traditional program at Ohio State for my doctoral degree, it took me two years to complete my dissertation. This was during the time when faculty did not edit online, so I kept all of my rejected drafts in a box. By the time I was done, I had filled two printer paper boxes. So hopefully, you can see that revisions are simply part of the dissertation process. Also, I do want to mention that it was not at all unusual for faculty to take 2 to 3 weeks to return drafts when I was in graduate school. 

Now let's consider, why it takes so long to complete a dissertation. First, students are not used to writing at the level that is needed for this type of paper. It is very formal, in a specific format, and requires an in depth analysis of a great deal of literature and new data. Second, supervising the dissertation student requires considerably more work than teaching a class does. Each draft must be read several times, once for content then for grammar and APA formatting. Third, the committee members are held to a very high standard in supervision of doctoral students. If the students' papers are unable to be approved at the next level, the responsibility for that comes back to the committee. If this happens repeatedly, the chair may be required to be closely supervised or may have their students removed. Needless to say, faculty should be considerate of the time element for students, whenever possible. 

I hope this provides some insight into the process; completing a dissertation is difficult. It is supposed to be. It is your first professional paper and when you have completed it you be entered into an exclusive profession in which you have proven yourself to be qualified to enter. 

Next time I will answer a student question about writing.  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