Want Writing Experience. Help?

[ajacot924]

I just began a ME.d program in Elementary Education.

My program doesn't require a thesis.

I specifically chose the school I attend because the final project was a class called Writing for Publication.

In this course, we would work on publishing an article and be a co-author with a well known professor.

I plan to get a Ph.D and hopefully become a professor myself, so this was great!

Unfortunatley they pulled that option once I had already accepted the offer to attend.

My current professor for one of my classes is the one who began this program.

Myself and another student (who I don't know well) decided to approach this professor about possibly mentoring us in doing some writing that may or may not be publishable. I am basically looking for experience for admission into a Ph.D program.

We met with the professor and she agreed to meet with us again to discuss it further. Not a yes, but not a no.

I think it was nice of her to even entertain it. I understand how busy she is.

Everything was all set, and then the other student I approached started talking about speaking with our advisor (we share the same one) about advice and maybe getting this to count for a degree requirment. I don't even want to bring that up because I understand that if that was an option, they would offer it. I want this for extra expereince, not to get out of doing what they have laid out as a requirement.

I feel like I should break away from this person and do it on my own. I don't want her to make me look bad. Also, I don't want to bail on her and make myself look bad.

I guess I just don't know what to do.

Would it beneficial for me to get this experience?

Should I give this person a chance and see what happens?

Should I bail on her and do it myself?

Should I bail on it period?

Thanks for your help!

[SeriousSillyPutty]

Interesting. Okay, I'm a first year who hasn't published a lick, so hopefully more informed voices will chime in. But for now...

A lot of departments have some version of an independent study, or a "research methods" course, or at least some thing that they enroll the PhD students for when they're working on their thesis. If something like this is on the books, then to me it wouldn't seem out of line to say, "Hey, for this independent study course, could my project be to work on a paper with intent to publish?"

If you're not trying to get out of other requirements so much as trying to document your experience on your transcript, I don't think that would look bad. (Of course, if you have to pay per credit hour, I'd just go for the free mentoring, if that's an option.)

I'm sure it all depends on the vibe of the professor. Maybe after you meet with the prof again you'll get a better sense of things. Good luck!

[Dal PhDer]

I have to agree with SeriousSillyPutty- this would be an excellent opportunity for an independent reading course.

My experience with my MA (and I'm not going to suggest that it's the same for all programs), is that you don't really spend your time focusing on other publishable work- you focus your time on getting in and out with a finished thesis. Now, that thesis product most often is written in a way that you can get at least 2 papers out of it. I would say a lot of students go into their PhDs with not a lot (if any) publications- it's mostly conference proceedings. That's not to say that it doesn't happen, I was lucky enough to work on some datasets that my professor had and was able to get a couple conference proceedings out of it, and eventually (after I graduate) two papers out of the work.

However, if you're looking for a paper, I might suggest that you talk to your advisor and ask if you can do an independent course with them that could be a literature review/synthesis or conceptual paper that would directly contribute to your thesis but also act as a stand alone paper.

As to whether you should separate from the students....I dunno...I feel your concern, because I would be the type of student who would also not want to push my advisor into saying no. I might talk with the student and say that you're interested in going the route where you can publish via your thesis, and then approach your advisor with the idea of the independent/guided course.