Your Passion and Possible Paths to a Dissertation Question Dr. Howard Schechter Dr. Joe Nolan
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Transcript of Your Passion and Possible Paths to a Dissertation Question Dr. Howard Schechter Dr. Joe Nolan
Your Passion and Possible Paths to a
Dissertation Question
Dr. Howard Schechter
Dr. Joe Nolan
Lansdowne Residency
April 17-20, 2008
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Welcome to the Bunker!!!!
• No skateboarding allowed!
• Tunnels make great doo-wop harmony rehearsal halls.
• The food is very “cruiselike”. You will gain weight here if you don’t watch out.
• If you’re bored, ask the desk clerk for the treasure map.
• You will find yourself going outside, just to find out where you are.
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Unreasonable persons rule the world!!
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In order to achieve social change you must be an unreasonable person!!
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How to become a Fud (PhD)
• Have an interest area.• Come up with a research question.• Start exploring it during the KAMs, preliminary
coursework, professional papers• Let your annotated bibliographies or preliminary
research references serve as a foundation for your dissertation literature review.
• Pick the right committee• Have a thick skin.
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How to influence social change
• Find a problem in the world that moves you to action (What makes you upset????)
• It must be a problem that wakes you up at night.• Your search for a solution must keep you going
through the day.
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The Fiendish Master Plan
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Exercise 1- If you don´t know where you´re going, any road will take you there!
• What is your fiendish master plan ? (25 words or less)
• Why do you want to be a ¨FUD¨?
• How do these two answers match?
• Your school or College (Program)
• Your current area of concentration for study
• Your current occupation.
• Do these 3 answers relate? If not, what are you intending to do to change this?
• Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
• …in 10 years?
• How does this match up to your fiendish master plan?
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The road map
• The fiendish master plan• Preliminary research (KAMs, courses, papers, etc)• The proposal• Dissertation• The job search (Academia, Entrepreneurship, Other)• After you get there…
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Preliminary Research
• Identifies the problem• Explores all angles of the problem• Starts to brainstorm solutions
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The proposal & dissertation
• The proposal starts to offer solutions to the problem.• The dissertation tests them out.
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The job search
• Starts you on the road to providing that solution.
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Where are you at now? Research Exercise
• Does your research up until now match your fiendish master plan?
• If not, are you prepared to scrap what you have done so far? You really should be.
• If not, you still have options.• The rest of the day is devoted to exploring those
options
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Confused yet?
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Had enough for the day?