Check List for Your 1St 100 Days As a Phd Student

Check list for your 1st 100 Days as a PhD Student

Robert MacIntosh and Kevin O’Gorman

Starting a PhD is very exciting and the process might feel like a journey into uncharted territory. As you set off to haul your thesis across the polar cap, a clear sense of direction in the first 100 days is vital.

Know what you are aiming for

Read a PhD - Have read a finished PhD cover to cover and made notes, ask your supervisor for a recommendation. This example thesis should use similar methods to those you intend to adopt and be in a similar discipline to your own; the British Library has an excellent and growing catalogueof electronic PhD thesis.

Get the basics sorted - Have a working abstract, research question(s), aim(s) and set of objectives in written form even though these likely evolve over time.

Deal with the housekeeping - Have a formatted (to your institution's style) full working document of your thesis, with placeholder headings and subheadings, a table of contents, list of references, etc. Whilst these vary from institution to institution there are some broad rules of thumb on length and content available. [Hyperlink RG Download]

Establish a Work Ethic

Write 10,000 Words - Get used to the idea that PhD writing involves a great deal of over-production and subsequent subediting. Aim to write 10,000 words on a key area of your literature (it sounds a lot but it is only 100 words per day on average). Just accept that you probably won’t use all of it in the final draft of your thesis.

Understand when you write best - is it morning, afternoon or evening and make sure that you create diary entries for writing time that align with this.

Be realistic - Calibrate what you mean by being a ‘full time’ PhD student. Being clear about how much, if any, of the time spent on related academic thingslike tutorials or marking is accounted for and how much is actually ‘overtime’. Full time should really mean most working days for most of your time even when you’ve allowed for an appropriate amount of annual leave, lunch breaks and the like. Track how much time you are actually working on your thesis.

Get Yourself Supervised

Establish a feedback routine - Have received written and verbal feedback from your supervisor on those 10,000 words and specifically on your research question, aim and objectives.

Get out there - Have discussed with your supervisor and have thought out a strategy for a conference that you will eventually present your research in say the second year of your studies.

Sort diaries 6 months out - Have scheduled meetings agreed with your supervisor at appropriate intervals for the first 6 months and make sure that you keep that updating that forward meeting schedule.

Familiarise yourself with your territory

Seek out your leader(s) - Find who the key people are in your subject area, both living and dead.For those both living and local (i.e. at least the same country), figure out where you might meet them or at least hear them talk; this could be at conference, research seminar or a similar event. Be sure to have read at least enough of their material to sound knowledgeable before meeting them.

Make some friends – PhD study is sometimesdescribed as a lonely process so make sure you establish a Peer Support Network early. This will likely include some other new PhD students although they might not be studying exactly the same thing as you, some more advanced PhD students perhaps working with the same supervisory team or research group, who could offer wisdom and (dubious) moral support, and some recent graduates who can remind you that there is life on the other side of the viva.

Get to know everyone - Figure out who is who in the School / Institute / Department / Faculty / College in which you are studying. Alongside all the other academic advice it is important to realise you are joining an organisation with a plethora of established routines and process. Get to know howyou claim expenses, where you can book meeting rooms, who deals with ethical approvals, who administers the PhD programme, who runs admissions, where the stationary cupboard is location, and who services the IT. These people are also your colleagues and can help you feel that you belong.