PHD considerations with children

[Silibi]

Hi everyone

I have recently completed a masters and achieved distinction. I have learnt a lot while doing my masters and have really enjoyed conducting my research and writing my dissertation. It was a part-time degree, and for the dissertation part I worked entirely remotely.

My partner and I have 3 young children, and while my partner is supportive of everything I do, he has a demanding career himself. He is the main bread winner and a large part of his remuneration is performance based. When he is home, he does a lot of the child care. But when the children are sick and nursery won't have them, or if they get sent home early, I need to be there.

I am considering the next step in my career. I am considering whether it is feasible for our family that I go for a PHD. I understand that it will be demanding. I am hearing mixed reviews about how often I need to be at university. Some say remote is fine, others say it's 9 to 5 everyday.

Does anyone have any experience or advice please?

Depends what it is but unless it's lab-based I can't sere it being anything like 9-5 everyday. I did it with just one child and mostly from home.

Congratulations on your distinction, that must have been really hard to do with all your commitments. Being honest, it's really hard, but if you are absolutely committed, you will make it. If your supervisor understands and you have flexibility built in, and you are really organised, it's doable. Are you going for funding and do you have additional support networks in place for the kids? The hard thing is the lack of time in the school day, and summer holidays etc and the way courses and conferences etc are set up.

..If you have an idea of which university and course you can see if there is a distance option. I don't know how that impacts funding though. I went full time so I could apply for funding, but my supervisor understands I can't be in very much. If you apply to Oxford or Cambridge, even part time, you are expected to be there and attend a minimum amount of time at the college - which for me was totally impossible with kids. So depends on the institution and your supervisory team. It's all manageable! Just needs a lot of luck and a supportive family!

You don't have to spend any actual time in your Cambridge college as a PhD student - but you are supposed to live within 10 miles of St Mary's. If further out and a parent/carer - it can be negotiable. It used to be practically impossible to get part-time funding but that is has changed a lot and is worth looking into (I went full time but intermitted 2 years to make it effectively part-time).

Totally dependent upon discipline and maybe institution e.g. my part time phd student lives about 50 miles away and we meet once a month, some correspondence in between (social sciences). She was on campus a fair bit at beginning of academic year for induction, training etc, but it’s mostly all research from home for her until she moves onto fieldwork