Transcript Doing Your Dissertation: One Step at a Time Office of Graduate Studies and Academic Affairs March, 2006

Doing Your Dissertation:
One Step at a Time
Office of Graduate Studies and
Academic Affairs
March, 2006
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The Challenge
Make an independent contribution to your
field and communicate it, demonstrating
that you have the knowledge, research
skills, and motivation to do so
 Plan, conduct, and complete the biggest
project of your life
 Please a committee of readers
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Sources of Guidance
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Your dissertation director/mentor
Other faculty in the department
Other doctoral students
Completed dissertations in your field
Your school’s office of graduate studies and
school-specific guidelines for dissertations
Books on the subject
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Think Dissertation All the Way
From your first course on:
 Identify gaps in the literature, and therefore
possible dissertation topics, as you take courses
 Read more and write papers in areas of special
interest
 Gain needed experience and ideas from
involvement in faculty research
 Complete the requirements for advancement to
Candidacy (course work, comprehensive exam)
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1. Pose the Research Question
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The hardest part for many
Not the same as choosing a topic—that’s easier
Need to be familiar with previous work on the
topic; research questions come from thoughtful
reading of the literature, previous research
Generate questions about the topic that are (a)
interesting, (b) important, and (c) answerable
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Interesting???
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Interesting to you (you’ll be at it a long time!)
Interesting in your field
Maybe even interesting to your grandmother
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Important???
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Tests a leading theory?
Will help resolve a debated issue in the field?
Brings together concepts that have not been
brought together before, looks at things from a
new perspective?
Helps explain discrepant findings?
Improves measurement of a key construct?
Asks a question that needed to be asked?
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Important???
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It’s not enough to argue that no one has studied
it before (maybe nobody cared!)
It’s usually not enough to replicate prior work
using one more demographic group, one new
little methodological wrinkle
Yet it doesn’t need to be the Great American
Research Idea, either!
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Answerable???
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A question can be very interesting and
important but not answerable, or not answerable
within the scope of a dissertation project
Can the research question be framed in terms of
specific, measurable constructs, can the
hypotheses be tested?
Are the library resources or data you need
available or gettable? Can the project be done in
a year or so? Can you cover the costs?
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2. Develop proposal with mentor’s
input
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One school/department may require only a
brief prospectus, another may require the first
three chapters of the dissertation:
Introduction (with clear statement of the research
question and its significance)
Literature Review (should lead right into the
research question and hypotheses)
Methods (tells how you will answer research
question)
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3. Form Dissertation Research
Committee (or Research Advisory Committee, etc.)
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In addition to dissertation director (mentor,
advocate), or director and co-director, usually
need two other members at this stage
Use outline of proposal to acquaint potential
committee members with your project
Seek committee members with relevant
expertise, including methodological
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4. Defend Proposal/Obtain Approval
to Do Dissertation
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Varies by school, but proposal must be approved
by dissertation research committee
Committee meeting usually involves systematic
questioning on theory and methods, pass/fail
outcome, and suggestions for improving the
proposal that grow out of the discussion
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5. Obtain Required Research
Approvals
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Student is responsible for research compliance if
project involves human subjects, animals,
hazardous materials, RNA/DNA, etc.
See www.gwumc.edu/research for forms and
procedures
Leave plenty of time to get approval
Do not begin data collection until approval is in
hand or you will not be able to use the data
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6. Obtain Funding if Needed
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Estimate costs and discuss with dissertation
director
Faculty grant funding and other GW funding
sources may exist
At www.gwu.edu/~fellows, see Dissertation
Funding at a Glance, a guide to competitive
fellowships and grants to support dissertation
research
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7. Conduct Research
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Develop a timeline for collecting data and
analyzing it, or for reading relevant texts and
writing chapters of literary analysis
Break large tasks into smaller ones and go at
them one by one
Keep dissertation director posted if the
unexpected happens or if your thinking takes a
new direction
Write as you go…
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8. Write (Rest of) Dissertation
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A Word template with a dissertation format acceptable
to all GW schools is available at:
www.gwu.edu/~etds
Determine what style manual is followed in your
department (e.g., Turabian, Manual for writers of term
papers, theses, and dissertations; American Psychological
Association, Publication manual
Follow your school’s guidelines on margins, type size,
paper weight, order of parts, etc.
Write and rewrite in response to feedback from primary
mentor and committee members
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9. Select Final Examination
Committee
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Dissertation Research Committee of at least
three, plus:
Two additional examiners
Varies by school, but usually at least one of the
added examiners must come from outside
student’s department or school or even from
outside GW
Sometimes neutral dean’s representative sits in
on the defense or chairs it
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10. Schedule Dissertation Defense
(alias Final Oral Examination)
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When draft of entire dissertation is ready,
circulate it to the entire examination committee
plenty ahead of desired defense date, asking
whether it is ready to defend
If committee signs off, schedule date/time for
defense with plenty of time for all to read
version that will be defended
Complete Application for Graduation Form by
deadline.
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11. Defend Dissertation
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Final Examination session open to the public
Normally begins with chance to highlight purposes,
findings, and significance of work
Mainly questions and answers
Committee decision:
>Pass with no revisions (rare)
>Conditional pass (Pass subject to making specified
changes to satisfy dissertation director or all/part of
committee—can range from minor to more significant)
>Fail (must redefend)
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Helpful Reminders
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The committee approved your project.
Assuming you did what you said you would, the
committee is very unlikely to decide that it was a
dumb project to do!
They may question how you executed or
interpreted things, though, so be prepared to
explain yourself.
Remember that all dissertations are flawed!
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12. Finish Your Dissertation!
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It’s typical to have to make changes after the
dissertation defense.
Double check important things like the title, abstract,
and your name!
Turn in the signed approval form indicating that the
final examination committee accepts the dissertation
and turn in the required number of copies of the final
dissertation.
Turn in Proquest/University Microfilm Form and
Survey of Earned Doctorates
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13. Publish Dissertation
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Proquest/UMI—All dissertations must be
submitted there for archiving
GW Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETD)
Initiative—see www.gwu.edu/~etds, part of a
national movement to make theses and
dissertations more accessible for free
However, you can withhold access to all or part
of the dissertation for a specified period (e.g., 1
or 2 years) in order to pursue a patent or
publication opportunity if you wish
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Publishing with Proquest/UMI or on the
Web Does Not Prevent Other Publishing
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The Doctoral Dissertation Agreement Form from
Proquest says you are granting them a nonexclusive
right to reproduce and distribute the dissertation, not
an exclusive right—that means you can publish parts
elsewhere (e.g., in articles or books)
You have the copyright by virtue of being the author;
registering a copyright is mainly useful if you have
something commercially valuable and want to be able
to sue others for copyright infringement.
You’re responsible for ensuring you have permission to
use material that is not your own.
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14. Really Publish Dissertation
Making your dissertation accessible via the
Web does not prevent you from publishing
parts of it as articles or reworking it as a
book.
 Yes, you’re tired, but get it published soon!
 And don’t stick it in a drawer just because
you’re rejected the first time—Keep at it!
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15. Applaud Your Achievement and
Graduate!!!!!!
If all goes well, in a year or two’s time, you
really have shown that you are capable of
generating knowledge in your field.
 No, it’s not as great as you might have
hoped, but it’s yours and it’s done!!!!
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The End—And the Beginning
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