Marshmallo Posted May 10, 2011 Share Posted May 10, 2011 I've had 2 so far and have 2 to go. Finish a week tomorrow and can't wait. -1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave_binos Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 I enjoyed my time at University but i'll be pleased to see the back of it. I have exams on the 17th and 18th. After that I am done. I feel like this and I'm still in 3rd year. Getting rather bored of education. My grades for 2 of my subjects have been fantastic but always struggle with exams. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FFC_GJS Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 I've had one exam still 5 to go between now and next Thursday. 11am on the 19th cannot come quick enough. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SaltyTON Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 Accreditation is back. Got my last written (well, typed) exam a week today, then a trip to the Vet School for an hour long practical Meat Hygiene exam. Then all done... and pray that a council will give me a graduate job! -1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
banterman86 Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 What's the script with a phd anyway? Excuse my utter ignorance on the matter, but how does it work, why would you do it etc etc? At undergrad it seemed like an excuse to be an enternal student, but now when I see phd studentships advertised they seem to effectively be "ins" to lecturing.. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NotThePars Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 Thought I'd messed up my Political Theory exam by only answering on two thinkers social contracts when it asked for three, however, the marker emailed me to say that I had answered another question on Rousseau's freedom vs Hobbes security sufficiently to gain a strong pass for that question instead. So I'm sorted for first year. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xbl Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 What's the script with a phd anyway? Excuse my utter ignorance on the matter, but how does it work, why would you do it etc etc? At undergrad it seemed like an excuse to be an enternal student, but now when I see phd studentships advertised they seem to effectively be "ins" to lecturing.. A PhD is how you become a Doctor, its hell, don't do one. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
renton Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 (edited) What's the script with a phd anyway? Excuse my utter ignorance on the matter, but how does it work, why would you do it etc etc? At undergrad it seemed like an excuse to be an enternal student, but now when I see phd studentships advertised they seem to effectively be "ins" to lecturing.. A Phd is essentially a 3-4 year project. You are given a title and told to research it, so far so simple. You basically have a wide latitude in how you go about it, although that degree of freedom will be set largely by the field of research and the personality of your supervisor. At it's most simple, in terms of science and engineering at least, it's an underpaid research and development post. Why do it? Effectively because you end up on the crest of where current thinking is tending towards. Industrial research tends to be quite narrow in it's focus to near future applications of the current state of the art. University Phds are more radical, allowing the researcher to follow fields of research with no immediate applications. Companies tend to provide some funding to some Phds because it allows them to hedge their bets on future developments with little of the overheads if they took on the project themselves. So basically, you can find yourself right out on the cutting edge of the state of the art and allowed a lot of freedom to develop your chosen field of study. You wont get anything like that in idustry and it can be very intellectually satisfying. There is also the issue of publishing your work, effectively adding your name to the growing scientific discourse. Against that there is the pressure to publish, and to jealously guard your work. Collaboration is not encouraged as that could lead to someone else being first and ruining your chances of publishing work, which for academia is the be all and end all. There is nothing like the vicious blood shed that can develop from feuding academics. As for it being an 'in' to academia, yeah that's fairly common, if becuase it's the best way to be able to continue your research while haivng a life. Since you are always fighting for more project grants, more money - you are effectively at the mercy of grant councils, your next meal is dependent on their funding decisions, and these projects may only be 6-18 months postdoc. Thus you can't really plan long term for your future, and thus if you want to stay in non industrial research, being a lecturer provides the stability and safety net to do so. On the other hand, you could be like me, I've finished the practical body of work required of me, have two journal papers in review, two conference papers and about four papers which I'm second author on so I'm not overly concerned about getting the PHd at the moment. But I can't really be bothered with publishing and I don't want to be a lecturer. However, I was able to get an industrial job on the back of my PHd, so it can be an 'IN' to industry as well. It depends on what you want long term, and what you pick as your subject matter. Edited May 11, 2011 by renton 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
banterman86 Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 A PhD is how you become a Doctor, its hell, don't do one. I'm not that ignorant! Short and to the point though, good times A Phd... Cheers, not quite the happy days existence I had hoped for. I;ve ben out of academia a few years, and did a different masters to my undergrad, I perhaps wouldn't fit. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Supras Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 Cheers, not quite the happy days existence I had hoped for. I;ve ben out of academia a few years, and did a different masters to my undergrad, I perhaps wouldn't fit. Yep, I thought it would all be strutting around university campuses, firing into undergrads and spending the rest of your day in absent thought/posting on pie and bovril. It's actually quite comforting to know it's shit. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xbl Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 I'm not that ignorant! Short and to the point though, good times Cheers, not quite the happy days existence I had hoped for. I;ve ben out of academia a few years, and did a different masters to my undergrad, I perhaps wouldn't fit. Believe me, its not that great, especially in the sciences. Its very dependent on your supervisor, but often that supervisor does absolutely nothing for you and knows bugger all about your field. You go to bed every night worrying about the future, because your system isn't working as well as you hoped and you didn't accomplish nearly as much as you wanted. There is very little structure and its essentially just 3+ years of grinding away at the same thing with very little feedback and often nothing more than a hope that its going to be good enough. And if you're not publishing, then your supervisor just doesn't want to know. In some ways its fun, in that you can pick your own hours, you can earn a little extra cash on side projects, and if you're lucky, you can exploit the expenses system to the max, but (certainly in Stirling) its quite a lonely existence. You don't meet that many new people, and those you do meet tend to be students you teach, you're not part of the staff...but you're not a student either, and you can become so specialised that your more general (employable) skills fall by the wayside. So there are good and bad points. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vikingTON Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 Out of interest, how do you 'know' whether it is good enough or not, what is the feedback like in those terms? (Say compared to Honours where everyone knows if you've done shit if you come out with a Third) 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ad Lib Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 Yep, I thought it would all be strutting around university campuses, firing into undergrads and spending the rest of your day in absent thought/posting on pie and bovril. Like, say, an LSE Ecomonics lecturer? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xbl Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 Out of interest, how do you 'know' whether it is good enough or not, what is the feedback like in those terms? Well, you go to conferences were people ask you questions...you publish journals and at conferences, but...you know, its really all a game, and I don't think I'm allowed to go into it here. Its one of those things where the first rule is that you don't talk about it, especially to outsiders. Regarding supervisor feedback though, it really depends on how good your supervisor is. I get none, and neither do most of my friends. You get a yearly viva in which people who don't know all that much about your field grill you. But err, thats it really. You have to be pretty damn independent! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ad Lib Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 Well, you go to conferences were people ask you questions...you publish journals and at conferences, but...you know, its really all a game, and I don't think I'm allowed to go into it here. Its one of those things where the first rule is that you don't talk about it, especially to outsiders. Regarding supervisor feedback though, it really depends on how good your supervisor is. I get none, and neither do most of my friends. You get a yearly viva in which people who don't know all that much about your field grill you. But err, thats it really. You have to be pretty damn independent! It's academic research, not fucking fight club. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xbl Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 It's academic research, not fucking fight club. ...you'd be surprised. Incidentally, very few people "fail" a PhD, but so, so many people just vanish one day and never come back, or get a job and never finish up. Its a strange thing. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
renton Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 (edited) Out of interest, how do you 'know' whether it is good enough or not, what is the feedback like in those terms? (Say compared to Honours where everyone knows if you've done shit if you come out with a Third) Well, for a start it does what you expect/want it to do. That helps. In a broader sense, it's all about peer review. Getting papers published in journals and conferences, and then being cited by others is a good indicator then of the value and quality of your work (different journals have different impact factors that define how well they are rated by the scientific community). Once you have at least one journal paper, it's pretty much impossible to fail a PHd, and it's then simply a case of having the discipline to get the thesis written -and event hat goes to a review board of internal and external referees who will sit down for a few hours and grill your methodology and conclusions. Edited May 11, 2011 by renton 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hank Scorpio Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 Got my graded unit exam tomorrow. I need to a B to get into Criminology at Napier. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yoda Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 First year Politics exam a week today. First year HRM exam a week tomorrow. First year History exam two weeks tomorrow. Having two in two days is quite annoying as I'm finding it difficult to split my time between them. Out of interest, for those of you who did your first year exams in these subjects at Strathclyde, how was the exam? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bullywee Posted May 11, 2011 Share Posted May 11, 2011 (edited) First year Politics exam a week today. First year HRM exam a week tomorrow. First year History exam two weeks tomorrow. Having two in two days is quite annoying as I'm finding it difficult to split my time between them. Out of interest, for those of you who did your first year exams in these subjects at Strathclyde, how was the exam? i did all three subjects last year, but got an exemption from the HRM exam. my politics exam was one day and the history one the next and i spent all my revision time (apart from about an hour) prior to the politics one on politics. that hour i spent going over history was spent on the source i was going to choose in the exam (if i was you i'd pick a picture/ poster over any written sources, so much easier in my opinion) and then only studied for history in the 24 hours before the exam. i got extremely lucky in the sense that for the entire exam period i studied four topics and they all came up and i came a few % from getting a first for both exams, so if you do a reasonable amount of work you'll pass easily. Edited May 11, 2011 by bullywee 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.