To be considering a doctorate?

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It's not as if I need one (does anyone?) but I am thinking about it. I already hold an MEd and I'm just finishing an MA in Special and Inclusive Education. With the OU an EdD would take 3.5 years from next May with a 50,000 word thesis (which will make the 20,000 word dissertation I'm ploughing through now seem like a short story). We are planning to emigrate in two years' time and I work full time as a primary teacher. Am I deluded?!

I am shocked at some of the attitudes in this thread. I taught on a professional PhD, a DMedEth (Doctorate in Medical Ethics) and many of our students were distinguished professors in their fields, e.g. Gerontology, who wanted to expand their education. They all had an MA in ethics and then did two years of taught courses with 5,000 word assessed essays, totalling 30,000 words and then six years of a 60,000 word thesis (all part time), which ended up being more than my 70,000 word thesis.

OP my experience is that students cope very well with the structured part of the course as there is a lot of guidance, emanate able chunks of work and shorter deadlines, but life can take over when faced with the motivation to complete the long term thesis. Ideally you need to identify two days a week when you concentrate on the thesis, get into the habit of writing even if you don't produce perfect work and keep in touch with others in your profession through, for example, conferences.

Of course people fail PhDs. It's devastating for everyone involved but it happens.

I haven't done a PHd, but when I was an undergraduate my tutor failed (or recommended that they fail) one of his PHd students - so people definitely do fail PHds.

Kate Atkinson failed her PhD on the American short story at viva and that's pretty much why she started writing.

Am at people implying that one PhD is as good as another. Of course there are minimum standards for university qualifications but that doesn't mean they are all created equal and I don't think it's snobbish to say that.

My issue with the professional doctorate described above with 'manageable chunks' of 5000 word essays is what stops it being a doctorate. A doctorate about producing an original and independent large-scale piece of research rage breaks new ground within the discipline. It's not a case that you can add up 5000 words here and there up to a total 80000 words and therefore it's a doctorate.

The whole point of a PhD is that it is supervised, not taught.

sorry about the typos and in a taxi with a crazy driver. Although 'research rage' seems quite appropriate.

Absolutely meme. And interesting that tbe PP notes that her/his students struggle with the dissertation - which is the actual point of a PhD.

And as another poster asks, how is it snobbish to be aware of these differences. I know that a professional doctorate offers a depth and breadth of research to practitioners, but we shouldn't pretend it's the same as a standard PhD.

meme if you are referring to my post I never said the entire doctorate was made up of manageable chunks, just the first two years, the students then wrote a 60,000 word thesis. The degree was examined in the usual fashion, I.e. internal and external examiner plus viva so no reason to think standards were lower than for any other doctorate.

There are, of course, doctorates by publication as well, but god help these students given the derision with which professional doctorates have been met with in this thread!

Foggy the reason my students struggled with the thesis was not ability but the part time nature of the degree. I have had similar problems with all my p/t PhD students not just the professional doctorate ones, it's just that the professional doctorate was only offered on a p/t basis. So imagine you are a professor of gerontology, you teach medical students, you supervise junior colleagues, you have to see patients and may even have a private practice, you carry out research in your primary field, publish in your primary field and pursue research grands, and you are at a point in your life where you have children and elderly parents to look after...it's not difficult to see why the thesis may be put on the back burner. The most challenging aspect of a p/t PhD is to keep at it without a break, taking a break means a substantial set back in progress with the thesis as you have to catch up again with your earlier work before moving on.

I was basically told to go away for 4 years and come back with 100,000 words written and an argument of sufficient depth and originality that it would be able to satisfy the lengthy interrogations of two eminent experts in the field.

My supervisor then pointed me in the direction of the relevant archives, and told me to get on with it. In return I got three one hour supervisions a year.

This was back in the mid-90's and things of changed but,as far as I'm concerned, that total self-reliance is a key aspect of a humanities PhD. Even reducing the word count to 75-80,000 is a retrograde step IMO.

That's all very well, Radical, but it's obviously going to be different according to discipline. For the sciences and even social sciences, a PhD student will often be recruited to do a very specific piece of research as part of a wider team effort, so it's not self-led at all, but to imply that it's somehow less rigorous is ridiculous.

I'm doing a PhD that spans law and the social sciences, and the difference is really marked between the discipline-specific expectations about the technicalities of research design.

To think that the humanities-style approach you describe should be applied to other disciplines betrays a real lack of understanding.

radicalrooster, same thing with my PhD. In fact, for the last two years, I had a supervisor in medieval France for my work on 1970s South Africa. The only supervision I had was with an academic at another uni who had taken me under his wing. This was in the late 90s.

(I'm not saying for a minute that it's acceptable to treat research students on that way, and it's certainly not how I behave.)

booboos. I didn't mean the entire thesis was done that way-apologies, I can see that my post suggested that. But the idea that a doctorate is done in the way you describe--essentially hand-holding goes against basic expectations of doctoral work.

I had a training event for doctoral supervision at my univeristy recently. Everyone else in my group were from STEM subjects (I'm Humanities). They told me how they have to start teaching PhD students how to write a research paper. I told them that I expect my students to already be able to write academically. Many students have already produced work that is of or close to publishable quality in their undergraduate thesis. They expressed great surprise. They also couldn't get their head around PhD students publishing work as sole author and asked why would I allow that and shouldn't I be down as a co-author. I explained that I would have no claim on that at all because all research and writing would have been done by the student. It's not my research.

Bugger. My supervisor worked on medieval France . He hadn't found a way to teleport into another era. My fault for typing on my phone in the back of a taxi again

I'm late to the thread but I have a phd so I thought if give my view. If there's no professional advantage to do a phd, you'd be mad to pay for one. It is cheaper to pay for access to a university library and study independently. The value which a phd supervisor and access to seminars adds to your work is not worth whatever insane amount university fees are this year. If you can't see yourself studying independently.... Is a phd for you anyway?

My PhD supervisor (only half) jokingly said to me , "you've got three years - go and cure cancer. Ill see you then..."

should you do it? Well, 15k is a lot of money - what kind of contact/supervision are you getting for that? Do you have open access to your supervisor? Regular check ins?
My lovely supervisor (sadly now deceased) was very hands off but available if you see what I mean. He was also a world leader in his field and that opened up a world of conferences, interesting people to talk to and experiences. The lab head had a Nobel prize (he did my viva which was utterly fucking terrifying!)
Don't underestimate how valuable that contact is - a vast part of the PhD is independent research but bouncing ideas off fellow minds is so valuable.

My PhD was a full time job so the idea of doing one with a job and kids is anathema to me - your mileage may vary of course, but dont underestimate the time needed. I pretty much locked myself in a room for a week every time I had to write a paper or a grant. I would struggle to go that now with a job and baby taking up mental bandwidth.

Anyway, I'm rambling but I'd say that if:

The contact time is sufficient
You can afford it
The professional payoff is worth it

Then go for it.

As someone who is about to submit i may be a bit biased but I say run the fuck away enjoy your life and never look back. Ask me again in a year.

Sticks fingers in ears about people failing PhD but takes solace in the fact that Kate Aitkinson is fucking awesome.

Good luck, Donatello

I tell my students that doing a PhD will ruin

their lives.

Weirdly I have next to no memory of my viva. I remember the first question was "what is your thesis?" and being slightly confused as it was clearly the enormous book thing they had in front of them

Mine has blanked itself a bit too. I had one utter loon who was pissed off I'd shown something that contradicted his pet theory ( I was later proved right) and a Nobel laureate. Joy.

Passed though. Probably the amount of wine consumed after killed a few neurons...

This must be fate. I am doing my primary teaching postgrad and currently under pressure to get a 5000 word essay on becoming an inclusive practitioner in for Friday. Your 50000 word thesis gives me the fear. I think if you really want to do it and you really are a life long learner you should go for it. You are putting me to shame. I'm currently struggling to relate growth mindset to the inclusive learning environment so any tips 1000 words to go arghhhh

strawberryblonde don't think about it as 5,000 words. Think about it in paragraphs - or pages (a word-processed page in 12 point font is around 250 words. Write 2 pages a day (500 words) and you've got your essay in 2 weeks. Or set your clock and write non-stop for 30 minutes twice (so an hour in all). Don't edit, don't second guess, just type.

I need 7,000 words to finish my thesis by next week! Aaargh - everyone seems to be cutting down at this stage and I need to magic some extra words. (I have cut out a whole section which would have meant that I had already finished by it did need to be cut out!)

To think that the humanities-style approach you describe should be applied to other disciplines betrays a real lack of understanding.

I didn't suggest that it should be applied to other disciplines. And I'm well aware that science researchers often work on a discrete project as part of a wider team effort. I was simply pointing out what I was expected to do, and by extension identifying the most challenging aspect of the process in my case.

They also couldn't get their head around PhD students publishing work as sole author and asked why would I allow that and shouldn't I be down as a co-author. I explained that I would have no claim on that at all because all research and writing would have been done by the student. It's not my research.

I piss myself laughing when I see science Professors with 600 odd 'publications'. 600? Do me a favour.

I have next to no memory of my viva.

I recall mine very clearly. It lasted five hours . That's pretty normal here in Europe though.