summoner

Almost a year later! Time flies. Ok, slight update (if anyone cares) and then my new existential crisis: 1. All the data collection I needed to do wasn't done. It wasn't even started. However, a little less worried about it because I added a new major section to my dissertation that relies more on regulatory records, legal cases, etc. etc., and did manage to do a big chunk of that. Advanced to candidacy, and got a little more into the theory side of my field and am going to make theoretical discussion part of my work. 2. Also, my original existential angst was helped by downloading a bunch of dissertations by people who are in my field (or in a similar field doing the same type of dissertation, if not the same subject). For every 10 I skimmed it seemed like 5 or so weren't particularly impressive; I think I can do a better job (ranging from slightly better to greatly better, there are some astonishingly unimpressive dissertations out there). Importantly, my dissertation data was going to be largely interviews and it seems like the dissertations in my field based on interview data often don't interview THAT many people. And some of these things are surprisingly short. Anyway, anyone else feeling anxiety, I DEFINITELY recommend seeing what the competition puts out for their PhD. I had originally compared myself to people in my field who turn their dissertations into well-known books, which was setting the bar waaaay too high. 3. I'm pretty sure I can finish by next year; the dissertation itself still doesn't bother me too much, I have years and years of high-level pre-PhD writing experience so I can bang out the actually written product pretty quickly. 4. I've just given up on being the going-to-conferences, publishing-a-lot-of-papers kind of PhD student. I'm pretty much on my own and can do what I want as long as my overall project is approved by my advisor. Some students in my program have done dozens of conferences. Some have done 1 or 2. Same for papers. I never was that gung ho about going the R1 prestige chase route anyway. I'd be thrilled with a liberal arts college job, and have no problem working for the government, industry, etc. etc.. So residual anxiety: 1. While I think I can get my degree sort-of-on-schedule, I still feel a LOT of guilt over the time I wasted. I hear all these people complain about the crushing workload of being a PhD student and that just hasn't been my experience. I never have short-term deliverables for my advisor, he pretty much lets me just follow what I'm interested in. 2. A lot of days I'll come to the office and just waste the whole day. I don't mean spending too much time messing around online, I mean spending literally ALL my time doing nothing. Once in a long while I'll put in a full day of work and get a lot done. Over the course of my career I've probably averaged a couple of hours of work a day, if I include coursework and homework for that. I kind of feel like an impostor as a PhD student, though I feel that when I graduate I will be just as qualified in terms of knowledge as most other graduates, and feel my dissertation will be perfectly acceptable. So anyone else dealing with THAT kind of guilt? I mean all I see on places like this forum are how much PhD students push themselves and it just hasn't been my experience.

Thanks for the responses! I really do appreciate it. _____________________________________________________________________________________ fuzzlogician: "Have you talked to your advisor about this? Or is there someone else who would be able to give you a straight up assessment of how you're really doing? " I have, to some extent, but since this feels like a problem of my own making I'm worried about going to him and being like "you know all those things I was supposed to be doing? Yeah, not so much." "For what it's worth, I only started working on my dissertation project in my fourth year, and I wrote the whole thing up in about 3 months at the end of my fifth year," That actually helps a lot! Though my field it's generally thought you should be working on something specific at least after your first year. "A separate but related question is whether you can find a way to collaborate and get some publications out of it. Even if there is no one who you could work with at your school, maybe there are other students or faculty who share your interests at other schools?" I've been thinking about that, but not sure who/how to approach. I have a very strong background in certain things that a fair number of people in my field are not, so I think I would be a good collaborator but not sure how to start that up. I wrote a paper with another student in the department but they've been sitting on it for a while (due to personal issues they're dealing with I can't really push them). I have another thing lined up with someone else that might lead to 2 or 3 papers but they're super busy right now so not sure when that will start up. "In my experience, the best way to fight this feeling of being overwhelmed is to come up with a plan of action." I've done that at this point; I'm actually fairly clear on what needs to be done. It's just kind of so much work, like I'm cramming 4 years of work into the next 2. ______________________________________________________________________________________ risingstar: "Honestly, yea, I've been in a very similar boat. I did almost an entire extra year of coursework because people couldn't figure out how to count the stuff from my MA. But, I got over it by applying for grants to fund my dissertation research, diving head first into fieldwork and data collection, and writing an interesting dissertation in the end. The advice below is meant to be helpful. It may not help since I don't know what your field is but, I hope it does. Feel free to PM me if you want to talk about any of this in greater depth." My field is in a field of public policy. I appreciate the advice. I actually have good funding for the next two years, so that's not really an issue, though if I could find someone to fund me for an extra year that might help me feel better...I actually might PM you, thanks for the offer! "One thing you might want to do is consider who is working on even semi-related stuff that you could collaborate with on research/publications. These may be people outside your department/institution. A good way to find such people is at conferences. I would look for post-docs or junior faculty, as they're likely to have the time to put into whatever collaboration there is." That's an interesting idea but I'm not really sure how you go about doing that. I should probably look more into that. "Are there any secondary data sources you could use to write a paper? Would you consider writing and publishing a review article on an aspect of your research? If you do, then maybe that article could serve as all or part of the literature review for your dissertation. " I guess this is another reason for why I'm angry at myself. I do have some secondary data sources, and I actually have a fair amount written up. I just never have gotten around to pushing through this stuff to a publishable point. "Get out there and get some! See if you can get a part-time job or internship in an area that interests you. You can check general employment websites like indeed.com and idealist.org, or use your university's career services department. You might also see if you could get a part-time or Graduate Assistant position on campus in an area of your interest." Unfortunately I think working would pretty much make it impossible for me to finish. I'm currently technically a Research Assistant, so not like I'll have gaps on my resume or anything, and I have pretty decent professional experience prior to the PhD, but I'm worried I'm getting to the point where I'm not published enough for academia, and won't have enough recent experience for a decent job outside it. "Do you use a citation management program?" Yep, I use Mendeley, and I am actually fairly well-organized on it with several hundred papers, many categorized, etc. I think my problem is I'm a terrible note taker, but I've started writing up stuff I'm reading so hopefully that will help. ____________________________________________________________________________________

This is the beginning of my fourth year and I honestly am starting to freak out. I wasted too much time my first three years on courses (some of which I didn't need to graduate since I came in with a masters), a lot of background reading (which a lot I don't even remember at this point), and a lot of wasting time (and a few months of justifiable illness). I have done a little bit of data collection (mostly interviews), and it feels like I am like at least a year and a half behind where I should be. I have no publications at all (all my work is basically done on my own, with no opportunity to work with other people, and without original data there's not much I can write that's interesting). I have funding this year and next year and I am seriously doubting that I'll be able to pull together what I need to in time. I'm a nontraditional student (pushing 40) so if I don't finish I will be stuck on the job market with no recent professional job experience. Anyone else in a similar boat? Or in an equally bad boat and want to commiserate?

Nothing to worry about, it's quite common where I am for advisors to be in other departments. It's more about the research you'll be working on than the home department.

Oh you should absolutely go to your current advisor, sorry I wasn't clear about it. It's something you do want some guidance on from someone who is in your field (they'll definitely give you better advice than I could on the matter!).

I defiinitely would not include language like that; they would probably find it offputting that you were even asking if you should do it (some programs even require you to get NSF funding before they'll accept you). You could casually mention in your personal statement that you've applied for NSF/Ford/whatever grants and will keep them apprised if you receive any, but I would bury that deep in near the end. If you're interviewing you could also mention that you've applied if the topic of funding comes up, but again I wouldn't ask if you should do it or not, because there's no reason not to. With NSF and similar organizations, I think you just put in a project proposal, and if you get the fellowship it follows you wherever you go, to whatever school and to whatever professor. There are limitations on certain fellowships but the big ones basically fund you completely so you don't need much more.

The fact that she threatens to fire you is a terrible sign. Is this all verbally? It would be best if you have something on email or voicemail that provides evidence should you go to your department or the institution.

Absolute best advice, and I'm sure 80% of applicants know this, but -I- didn't when I applied: Get external funding. I had no idea you could get it before you even applied to schools, but half the people in my current program got in because they came in with NSF funding. A little too late for this application cycle, maybe, but keep that in mind. Even partial funding gives you a leg up.

"Leaving everything else out (POI, fit, location, funding), do you think a PhD in Civil Engineering will be much greater than, let's say, a PhD in Environmental Resources & Policy or Water Resources Science" In the US a PhD in Civil Engineering will provide much greater opportunities than a PhD in environmental resources. I can't really think of any job that would hire someone with the latter degree that wouldn't also take someone with the former, and plenty of jobs that would prefer the former. And I say that as someone who is doing a PhD in environmental policy myself.

Doesn't sound unreasonable for your advisor to have you help. Are you sure this is something that would render her PhD inadequate if she didn't do it herself? It's quite common to have someone with a specific skillset, particularly a methodological skillset, obtain results for the dissertation writer.

Unless your geology program was super quantitative I would be very careful, and if you want to do planning a lot of the stuff you'll have to learn will be useless but very time-intensive (I'm in environmental science and made the mistake of trying an environmental engineering course for a few weeks before I came to my senses). At least sit in a few of the classes if possible. I second going for the PG license, which if you combine with a good amount of hydrology, GIS/watershed modeling will give you a strong cv for what you want to do.