Things I’ve learned in my first year of PhD / EdD studies

I started my part-time EdD (professional doctorate in Education) at Edge Hill University last September, looking at the topic of student belonging. I had known that I wanted to learn more about belonging since the beginning of that year, as it had come up more and more through my day job (working in student engagement at Middlesex University) as something crucial to building a supportive student experience. Since then, I found a supervisor who I wanted to approach (Professor Liz Thomas), went through the admissions and enrolment process at Edge Hill University, had an overall, very positive first year of my doctoral journey even though I changed university. Here are the main things that I’ve learned along the way.

1.??????Find a supervisor who cares about your area of work

I reached out to my hopeful supervisor, Professor Liz Thomas, because she was someone who came up again and again when I started looking into the literature around student belonging. My original rationale for this was that it just made most sense to have my supervisor as someone who was an expert in the subject area that I was pursuing. They would be best able to evaluate whether my ideas made any sense… best able to direct me to relevant articles or authors that I had missed… best able to introduce me to key figures within the sector who could help me with my research project. All these things were true, but there was something else as well.

A week or two before the deadline for applications to the Edge Hill EdD programme, Liz popped me an email. She just wanted to check that I had all the information that I needed to submit my application. I remember feeling so positive about that email from my potential future supervisor because it made me feel that she genuinely cared about me and my research project. In some sense of amusing irony, I would later find out how much the concept of 'mattering' is related to belonging in research. Maybe Liz would have done this for any candidate – just because it’s who she is. But maybe it’s because the research project that I was proposing was something relevant and interesting to her, so she was more invested.

Either way, that care has meant that I’ve never felt alone or isolated on my project over the last year, as I’ve always been able to call on Liz for help. To be someone I can share my latest ideas with… and then get more ideas back from her to go away and think through. We’ve just put in some proposals to jointly present at a conference together, which is very exciting.

I know that it’s not always possible to predict whether your supervisor will be caring and proactive, but I like to think that approaching someone who has a genuine interest in the subject area that you’re researching is a great place to start.

2.???????This would have been so much tougher if my employer wasn’t supportive

Studying part-time is hard, especially for someone like me who isn’t great at doing things in moderation. It’s challenging to find all of the time for your studies from within already limited free time. My employer (Middlesex University) have made it clear that what I’m learning from my studies should benefit my job and that I should find some time in the working week to put towards my PhD. I’m still using time in weekday evenings and some weekend time to work, but it’s not nearly as tough as some others have it. I completely applaud those who are doing a passion-project PhD that is in no way related to their job, but expect that it may be much harder for them to find time for it.

3.??????It’s okay if your supervisor moves institution

I found out about 8 months into my doctoral studies that my supervisor was moving institutions. It was a little shocking at first, but after some quick googling I realised that this happens surprisingly often and you do have options. Edge Hill University quickly helped to find alternative supervisors that I could be matched with – which made me feel confident that I could stay there if I wanted to. I already had a secondary and tertiary supervisor, so I wasn’t alone.

In the end, I decided to move institution to stay with my original supervisor. Yes, going through a new set of admissions and enrolment processes took a bit of extra time, but it all worked out pretty smoothly in the end. I’m now set up as a PhD student at the University of York and have already benefitted greatly from some new perspectives and expertise from staff members in their Education Department.

4.??????Consistency is key… and yet… variety is the spice of life

It’s important to find a good working pattern, but it’s even more important to not beat yourself up if you can’t always keep to it – life gets in the way. For me, I really liked doing my studies early in the morning before work. Personally, I find that I’m able to do deep work earlier in the day, especially before I open my work emails. However, that isn’t possible every day, as some days you don’t want to wake up that early – or need to get straight into day job tasks sooner.

Another approach was that I would book out Wednesdays in my work diary for doctoral studies – so that it looked completely full of meetings to those outside my team. My team knew that I was around to be contacted, and quite often a few meetings here and there would still take place on that day, but having it blocked out definitely helped keep it more free than other days. I guess the secret’s out now though!

I also found it really helpful after I’d done my early morning work to go out for a walk – letting my thoughts wander and to reflect on the new ideas of the day. Again, this wouldn’t always be possible, due to meetings and other commitments, but I have found it incredibly useful and would definitely recommend it as a practice.

I have a habit tracker app and I try to make sure that each week, there are at least three days when I have made some progress on my PhD studies. It doesn’t have to be a huge amount for any of those days, but I find that has helped me keep up some level of consistency, whilst also not punishing myself for a little variety.

5.??????Read. Read. Read. And then stop reading

Reading is crucial in the beginning to find your niche, which you only know once you’ve read lots. But you can’t read everything – there is just too much. Eventually you just have to park the reading and start writing. This was especially crucial for my first year at Edge Hill, as by the end of month 8 we had to submit our 15,000 Project Registration Document, which outlines exactly how we’d like our research project to run.

I read enough to know where there was a niche, a gap for me to fill, and so started writing my Project Registration Document. I then quickly came across more things to read and was tempted to pause writing to go back and read them, but I said ‘no!’. I parked all of those extra papers in a folder and said that I’d go back to them after I’d finished my registration document.

That was really helpful, as it gave me permission to just focus on writing, which allowed me to submit ahead of schedule. I have since gone back to all of those ‘parked’ papers, so that I can update my reading list and literature review.

6.??????Get your drafts in!

I don’t think that this will be the same for everyone, but for me… I am not a perfectionist. I much prefer to just get something written… make sure that it makes sense to me (something that I’m proud of) … and then submit to my supervisors. I learn so much from them critiquing my work and coming back to me with new ideas.

There are things that I have learned through that process that I would have never thought of by just sitting and thinking, planning and re-writing by myself. I very much subscribe to the idea that you shouldn’t let good be the enemy of great. It’s much better to put something on the metaphorical table of a supervisor meeting, discuss with them and then go away and write a better second, third and fourth draft. ?

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Thanks also to the friends, family and colleagues who have been a constant source of support over the last year as I've begun to navigate part-time doctoral studies. I definitely feel like I'm being stretched, which is exactly what I wanted out of this experience. Hopefully the reflections above resonate with others who have done part-time studies, especially if at a doctoral level... or give encouragement to anyone who's considering doing an EdD / PhD / etc. If you are, please let me know, always happy to chat about #PhDlife