Phd and work?

[Yes2014]

Hi I think I know the answer to this! Am full time at work, single mum and no savings. Did an am and got a distinction, and am being encouraged to continue the research into a phd BUT the funding, if I got it, would be too little to live on- don't think I could get any extra money. Also, am old.
Am really excited about the possible research, would LOVE to do it- but 3 years on nothing and no career afterwards makes it just a pipe dream. It's impossible isn't it.. Couldn't do it and work f/t.
Has anyone done it?
Or are there ways of making more money?
Would be throwing away a solid career for what?

Sorry about your loss Chimney.

I have a question: I have an MSc student (graduated couple years ago) and she's sent me a proposal for a phd.

Tbh it's not great. And any person who takes her on will have to work hard to get her out iykwim.

How do I convey that to her and the committee (she's asked me to be her referee!!)??

Sorry, I also should have said, I am sorry for your loss, Chimney.

Also, as two fingers has said, supervisors are looking for timely completion. If a student takes longer than 4 years to complete, the supervisor is penalised. Further, departments do not like students dropping out - it looks bad for the statistics. Therefore, as a supervisor, when you take someone on, you want to be reasonably sure that you will be able to get this person to completion within 4 years. This plays a large role in ensuring students are committed.

The Doc Ed you are describing is exactly what I am looking at. It is described as a PhD here (not UK) but it is exactly described by the Doc Ed you describe. I am much more comforted by the later posts. Has anyone done one how have you found it.

whoops!! chimney I didn't mean that icon! gawd, I need to change my glasses.... it was meant to be

Thanks everyone it was 20 years ago so is a memory rather than raw grief. And I have my big boy. My friend who lost a potential partner and is now without children, probably had a rougher time because there was no public 'position' for her as there was for me: I got instant sympathy as a widow (which honestly I didn't need, the grief was raw but very private then & I didn't talk of it much), but no such thing for her. Just a "get on with it & find another man" -- which, like me, she didn't really want to do. But as a "widow" I've rarely had that pressure.

Anyway sorry for derailing the thread!

I was thinking about this yesterday while giving a research methods lecture why does anyone do a PhD? I think because there's no other alternative not that there's nothing else to do, but because it's the only thing you want to do. But I worry because I'm not sure the current generation of UG and even Masters students actually has the resilience & determination.

I know I sleepwalked into mine to some extent. I did my master's largely to get out of a rather nasty relationship and surprised myself by being quite good at it, then essentially my PhD supervisor swooped down and got me funding. It seemed a very normal thing to do because my brother was coming to the end of his at the time, and the money didn't feel too bad. I had a pretty low opinion of my ability to earn money elsewhere, TBH.

I absolutely love it and I work damn hard, but I certainly didn't start out with the certainty some people have, I felt like a total fraud. I think that's quite common too. I kept expecting someone would turn up and say 'but you won't make it through, look at you!'

I would hate to be doing anything else.

I think that is a very common feeling, LRD! Look up "imposter syndrome." I realised that I needed to stop being scared and in awe of "doing a PhD" and then I'd be ready to finish & submit.

But given the mollycoddling that a lot of my Masters students seem to demand, I don't think they're capable of the big set up to PhD.

And no, I couldn't imagine doing anything else. Indeed, I doubt I'm good for anything else now. But I am only 15 years off retirement, so an old lag ...

Oh, yes. I am familiar with it.

I think it's very interesting seeing how differently it affects people. I love getting to be independent. I think that is slightly why I get impatient with the argument that to do a PhD well, you must be in proximity to your supervisor and other students. Sure, it helps, but you must also push yourself to get in touch with people who aren't right there and don't have a vested interest in telling you it's all going to be fine.

Do you feel it's changed a lot in the last few years, then? In terms of students' expectations, I mean.

Sorry, 'it' being imposter syndrome, in case my first line's not clear.

I'm getting my stuff together to start an EdD I will be working full time as I do it and work is paying some, though not all, of my fees. Like you I work in education so there is a synchronicity between the work I already do and my research interests. The traditional route is not the only one. I seriously considered going down the online route because it fit in with both my general area and my wrok schedule.

LRD, it is not so much about the physical proximity of your supervisor, but that in the sciences, you have a physical requirement to be in a laboratory in order to carry out your research. Even if you are not physically in a laboratory, you will probably be using specialist computer software to analyse the results of your experiments, so will need to be located in a specialist computer lab. Your potential locations to carry out your research are therefore limited and there is an expectation that you will be busy in the lab every day. Further, the supervisor must ensure that adequate training and safety procedures are in place that whilst you are in the lab, you are not injured. Therefore, no student is ever allowed to work in the lab alone, they must always, as a minimum, have a "buddy" with them who can raise an alarm if something should go wrong.

Further, in the sciences, unlike the humanities, as a PhD student you will usually be working in a small corner of your supervisors field, which he/she will be established in. As a student, you are basically an apprentice and the degree of your independence will increase as you go through the process, with a supervisor and/or peers training you closely in the first year, through to you being able to defend your thesis at the end. I always said students were ready to submit when they were prepared to argue with me about their research and could convince me that they were right!

All-in-all though, regardless of the physical location of your research, the original comment made by the OP was that by doing a PhD, she was going to have the time to really be there for her children, which was something that she missed whilst working full time. She was expecting to be able to drop her children off at school and collect them in the afternoon. I still believe, if you expect that taking on a PhD allows a SAHM lifestyle with a bit of reading between 9am-3pm whilst the kids are at school, it is unrealistic. Anyone starting out with an unrealistic expectation of what a PhD is like, or how much work it entails is going to get a rude awakening and will either (possibly resentfully) step up to it, or drop out. IME, most will drop out which is a waste of student time, supervisor time and university and government resources (particularly if research council funded). Further, if research council funded, a student who does not finish on time, or who drops out will negatively affect the supervisors ability to gain research council funding in the future, therefore ultimately affecting promotion prospects for supervisors. Independence can therefore be something of an illusion and very much dependent on the individual student and their ability. If a student is progressing as expected, he/she is likely to be allowed to get on with it, with just monthly progress meetings, if a student is not making sufficient progress, that is a different matter.

P.S. Apologies if that doesn't make much sense - very tired this morning from working till late last night and writing this whilst procrastinating over an (over-due) book chapter - you see, it doesn't stop!

I know in sciences you have to be in the lab - sorry, I did originally make the point that I was talking about arts subjects, but I think it got lost. I don't know which the OP is thinking of?

Tthe point I was trying, rather clumsily maybe, to make was, the OP did not say she expected to be working 9-3. She mentioned wanting to be able to do the school run. There are ways to make an arts PhD pretty flexible. It doesn't mean you get to work less time, and I have acknowledged that I agree with everyone who wants to remind the OP that she might be extremely pushed for time.

I know people who've done PhDs with small children work their socks off and I couldn't do it. But obviously, they do.

And btw, yes, I do see it doesn't stop. I had noticed that myself.

I definitely didn't think of the phd as in any way an easy option or SAHM alternative! I was just imagining more flexibility in life, rather than having to be out 7am-6pm each day. That's also why I am loathe to do an edD even though it's more sensible in many ways- because already my working hours are too long and doing the MA dissertation in the summer holidays was just atrocious misery- not because of the writing and study, which I loved and found straightforward, but because it took me away from the dcs for so much of the holiday. Teaching is very child friendly, except during term time when it is all consuming, especially as a HoD.

It's all food for thought on this thread for sure. I was thinking no further than simply that I would absolutely love to pursue my interest in my field of study. My potential supervisor suggested phd rather than edD route and it got me thinking, that's all. I wasn't anticipating being a lecturer the next minute, my worry would be that I would be taking a leap into nowhere and all I'd have would be a studentship for the next three years to live on- after that who knows? Starting from nowhere but with three years of immersing myself in something that fascinates me.
I can't see how anyone does it- I mean gets to do the phd- I'm really discouraged now.

not because of the writing and study, which I loved and found straightforward, but because it took me away from the dcs for so much of the holiday

I think what we're saying is that a PhD will take you away for those times and much much more. Which is why I think you should look at a part-time professional doctorate. They're a bit easier because they have course work, and don't require the one single 100,000 thesis. I gather that they're considered quite useful vocationally in fields outside of academia, and the EdD might be what you want, if you want a sane work/life balance.

Thanks upthechimney but the edD looks so structured, and sort of dull, my potential supervisor was against it. Are they received in the same way? I thought phd carried more weight? The amount of words required for a dissertation doesn't phase me, the writing and research for the MA were effortless, what was horrendous was finding the hours on top of work hours and the edD doesn't get rid of that problem. I mean, being up till midnight is one thing but being up till midnight then up at 6 for a full day with teenagers is not good.

One thing to consider - PhD students (and academics) do not work to terms, unlike undergrads and masters students. You would therefore need to arrange childcare in the holidays. Some universities have on-site holiday clubs, which students are charged significantly less for than staff, but childcare costs will still need to be factored in.

Writing up the thesis is also hard. I love my research field and remain in the same field as my thesis 18 years on. It is different from writing a masters dissertation, I think because you invest so much in it emotionally and it will be pulled apart and questioned first by your supervisors, then by the examiners, not because the work is bad, but because that is their job.

In my world these coursework Doctorates - called "professional doctorates" - would not be seen as equivalent. But I imagine in the school teaching system they'd be seen as a very good qualification.

It sounds as ough you're very able, talented, and motivated. But if your first thoughts are about being home for the children ... Wll, I just think you need to have by careful second, third, and fourth thoughts.

Look, you may well decide to go for it. (Although it's probably too late to apply for a studentship this year. The deadline for my university's DTP studentships closes next week). People generally find what they need to do, but Pharos not in the way they expect. But I think what we're all trying to warn you about is that your imaginings about lifestyle are a bit of a fantasy.

In your position, I'd be looking at part-time candidature, and keeping my full time job. That's where a professional doctorate is manageable. But depending on your field it wouldn't necessarily get you an academic job. But i should think it might in a Faculty of Education, for example, or Law or Business -- those fields where research and teaching is often quite vocational. A lot of advice needs to be discipline-specific.

Whoops, strikeout fail there!

It's all such helpful food for thought. Supervisor still urging against edD but what would a part time phd entail ( part from whopping fees?)

Hello OP, I'm considering something similar - working full time while doing part-time PhD (no DC though). I don't see how the money is going to stack up otherwise, absent funding which I'm not counting on. I'm instinctively not keen on going full-time because at 35 I don't really want to live like a student again (am in London, miserable place to be poor).

My institution officially reckons you need 15 hrs a week to devote to a part-time PhD, which if taken literally basically means a 7-day working week . I do know people who work a 60-hour week, my best mate does. But she's a well-paid, high-flying teacher. Working a 60-hour week as a needs-must short-term commitment to rocket boost your career is obviously a bit different to actually planning to work one for 6+ years to pursue a private dream.

Saying that, the current full-time PhD students I talk to say they only do 20 hours a week in terms of pure reading/writing (this is a HASS subject, and I know they do a lot of extra-curricular stuff, conferences, fieldwork etc which isn't core to their PhD, though may well be core to their chances of future academic employment).

I have huge admiration for anyone who contemplates doing this with children - but that probably says more about me and my control freakery than anything else

Hi OP, I'm doing a pt self-funded PhD (social sciences) while working ft, and I'm a lone parent to a dd(6). I'm roughly half-way through, and seem to be perpetually discouraged about my chances of making it all the way through.

I second the point about the difference between MA and PhD - the MA felt pretty effortless compared to this level, although I made it harder on myself by tackling my subject from an interdisciplinary perspective, which has ended up with me trying to get on top of an entirely unfamiliar disciplinary approach. I feel like I know less and less rather than more and more.

I'm not expecting a great career boost from it. I work in in uni admin (different university) so it gives me a bit of credibility and I have dreams of one day returning to my pre-child area of work, when the PhD (if attained) while be relevant. I am still unsure whether it will be worth all the weekends when I could have been doing something more fun, and the unrelenting guilt that I should be working harder and doing more. No way do I hit an average of 15 hrs per week!

On better days, I do feel a tingle of pride and I still feel like my project is worthwhile.

I can't give it a wholehearted thumbs up, if I'm being honest. Ask me in five years...

How do you manage to fit regular supervisions with ft work bibliomania?