tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55418298702608291042024-03-13T02:11:15.955+00:00Research ZebraBecause research isn't always Black and WhiteLoracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.comBlogger28125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-65807824063891243312014-04-10T10:08:00.004+01:002014-04-10T10:08:59.716+01:00All you can tweet<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I have just spent a week at a highly regarded international research conference. A conference which like many these days actively encourages delegates to use twitter by providing a conference specific hashtag (#)to share their thoughts and opinions with other conference delegates and the wider community. An overseas colleague of mine opened the conference with an excellent keynote presentation on nursing resilience which was research based, international in perspective and initiated a lot of discussion...or it would have had her time not been cut short to allow someone else to have the floor to present on a topic which the speaker themselves acknowledged would only be relevant to UK delegates (although I would debate that had the speaker made more of an effort to internationalise their remarks)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">So, in the Twitter spirit of open debate I tweeted a mild criticism along the lines of</span>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i> 'Excellent keynote from @***. Shame it was curtailed to accommodate another speaker'</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS;">Fairly innocuous I think you will agree, so imagine my surprise when this tweet was removed from the twitter wall that was providing an overview of the all t</span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS;">weets that were using the conference hashtag - I had been censored!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS;">I have to say that this is not the first time this has happened to me at this conference a similar thing occurred last year, when I pointed out that it was quite rude to refer to three out of four nominees for a prestigious PhD award as 'Dr' and the fourth merely by her first name. I remain puzzled by the fact that a conference which exists to promote discussion and debate is so insecure that it feels the need to remove the mildest dissent from the twitter stream available to delegates. I am against twitter trolling as much as the next girl but is hard to see the offence in this gentle criticism and I would have welcomed any debate it may have inspired.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS;">I guess the message is dissent and risk being censored or be undefatigably sweet and positive, toe the conference party line and be retweeted to your hearts content.</span></div>
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Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-604682664609530302014-01-28T14:28:00.000+00:002014-01-28T14:29:54.490+00:00Adventures in academia: My first few months as a research student<br />
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">I have been searching for the right
words to describe my first few months of being a research student, dear
Research Zebra reader. It certainly has been an ADVENTURE IN ACADEMIA, full of
puzzles, twists and turns, and unexpected insightful joyous ‘eureka’ moments,
usually following extended periods being buried in literature.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Recently I went to ‘Go Ape’, which is
an outdoor pursuit where you get to <i>monkey
around</i> (even the grown-ups!) doing a rope-orientated obstacle course. It is
set high off the ground from the forest floor. Needless to say fear or heights
or not, it is at first a little scary. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Doing this grown up obstacle course,
or dallying around in any such adrenaline activity for that matter, is a great analogy
for what’s it is like in those first few months of a research degree. At the
beginning there is the pure joy and excitement of, firstly, being accepted onto
the research degree (hurray!) and, secondly, those first few weeks of being a
research student. Discovering your way around the literature continues to be an
exciting aspect of doing research for me, though it is qualitatively different
to the experience of those first few intense weeks where you sit in somewhat
unknown territory contemplating life, death and linguistic jargon! <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It is not only the unknown nature of
the rope course that draws comparison to those early days, it is also the leap
of faith that surrounded the task of doing a PhD. I feel being a researcher
hinges a little on fearlessness, in that you have to the confidence that you
CAN find ways to overcome the various challenges that present themselves to
you. The bit of the ‘Go Ape’ experience that was more than a little similar to
this was the zip-wire moments, which required I step off the high-up treetop
platforms and depend upon the harness taking me safely to the distant wood-chipped
landing area below. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">I would argue the safety harness
represents my supervisors, who support and guide me through the research
degree, ensuring I do not go off track. (Naturally, a research student is far
more autonomous than merely depending on their supervisors, though their role
is most certainly invaluable through the process). <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">I can certainly say, dear Research
Zebra reader, that my research degree has so far been an academic adventure
filled with the thrills of embracing the unknown, both metaphorically and
literally (for example, when discovering inspiring literature or wandering lost
through mountains of past research!) I wish you the very best in your own adventures,
and will ensure to send a postcard in the future when I get to my next landing
point! <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Devina is exploring the everyday
experiences of illness and intimate relationships in heterosexual women with
irritable bowel syndrome. </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-66970122359510041062014-01-27T12:28:00.000+00:002014-01-27T12:29:47.963+00:00Never too soon...<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Most PhD students would argues that filling in university forms, obtaining ethical approval, negotiating access to their research area and collecting data leaves then little time to be thinking about their viva - an event that may be up to 5 years in the future.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">However I would argue that the best time to start thinking about your viva is the first time you lay finger to keyboard to write something (anything) about your thesis, and my reasoning goes like this -</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i style="font-weight: bold;">You can be challenged on anything that you put into your thesis -</i> A lot of students, especially in the early drafts of their methodology chapter spend an awful lot of time exploring various philosophical approaches to their work, discarding them one by one until they begin the defence and justification of the approach they finally used. This is fine, it's part of the learning process and a discussion about <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Heidegger" target="_blank">Heidegger</a> versus <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmund_Husserl" target="_blank">Husserl</a> may help you clarify your thinking about which philosophical mast you want to nail your colours to. The problems occur if you leave that in the thesis because then your interpretations are cast in stone and ripe for challenge. The one thing you do not want to do is to send your examiners off down a blind alley, focussing on how they disagree with your interpretation of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans-Georg_Gadamer" target="_blank">Gadamer</a> rather than concentrating on what you actually DID.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>The thesis is a report about what you did, not what you didn't do</b>. If something happens that means your research has gone horribly wrong, think very carefully about whether you want to include your angst into your final work. Will it add anything to the thesis? Will it clarify why you did something? Or will it mean that you spend a long time at your viva talking about something that did not actually contribute in any way to your final findings? For example, it may be frustrating if it takes 6 months to get governance approval from your participating trust but will a six page rant about that enhance the quality of your final work or merely make the person reading the thesis lose interest?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Issues like these are better kept in a 'jottings' folder or even a reflective diary. They are important parts of the PhD process, especially the first one BUT if</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> it is in your final thesis the examiners have a right to ask you about it in great depth if they wish - so it is never too soon to start to take control of </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">your</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">viva</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> by being intelligent about what you </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">write.</span></div>
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Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-89847060253043948042013-07-30T14:14:00.002+01:002013-07-30T14:48:01.371+01:00Can you be friends with your supervisor?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Whether it goes well or goes badly, it will be one of the most intense relationships of your life - the one you have with your doctoral supervisor. Love them or loathe them they can't help but be a big part of your doctoral experiences, whether that's from being too hands on and demanding or too distant and disinterested. So, the question has to be asked - can you be friends with your supervisor?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">I would say that I have been friends with about 50% of the doctoral students I have supervised or am supervising. Some were my friends before they became students, some were students who sort of morphed into friends over the process and just kind of stayed on in my life once the PhD journey was complete. This doesn't mean I hate the other 50% who were/are perfectly charming people, it just means my relationship with them is not as deep as with my friends. The really important thing though is to have a conversation emphasising the difference between between Caz-who-is-my-friend and Prof-Haigh-who-is-my-supervisor because it needs to be clear that there is a difference; without that demarkation it can be difficult to maintain a supervisory objectivity when assessing the quality of a students work or assimilating a supervisor's comments.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And therein lies the problem, the PhD experience can be so complex and so intimate that what is professional academic interest and esteem towards each other can easily be misconstrued into something that it isn't. Recently <a href="http://mmu.academia.edu/LeeYarwoodRoss" target="_blank">Lee Yarwood-Ross</a> and I did some research on <a href="http://www.slideshare.net/carolhaigh/as-others-see-us" target="_blank">students opinions of their supervisors</a>. One student in an online forum asked "Is it normal for a supervisor to insist upon candlelit supervision sessions?" Er...NO!! That's <b>NOT</b> friendship, it's not even marginally appropriate academic behaviour and to any student in that situation my advice would be 'RUN. RUN AWAY AS FAST AS YOU CAN!' I would offer much the same advice to the supervisor whose student was perplexed because she had told him she was in love with him and was upset to find that now he was reluctant to see her alone any more.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">That, of course, is why having more than one supervisor, friendly or otherwise, is a condition to be devoutly wished !</span></div>
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Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-80673751510850966912013-06-25T12:21:00.000+01:002013-06-25T12:21:48.896+01:00Don't give up<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBRHWPjMF0D7n6z_t0ne44_Wy8FqWRLJXQSJW72XVkM2sLmk47pMUi-HomDyLaNxD_-qHWuYbgqBnx92HE3ePfcPIM_JB_orDaIRQKDvYNnW3upadNmW_2xX0rSbki_tiBbiBRLg8qVsfB/s1600/download.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBRHWPjMF0D7n6z_t0ne44_Wy8FqWRLJXQSJW72XVkM2sLmk47pMUi-HomDyLaNxD_-qHWuYbgqBnx92HE3ePfcPIM_JB_orDaIRQKDvYNnW3upadNmW_2xX0rSbki_tiBbiBRLg8qVsfB/s320/download.jpg" width="258" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">One of the [possibly] unforeseen outcomes of the rigorous ethical approval processes and some may say the even more draconian research governance processes that we have in the UK is the fact that, increasingly, health and social care researchers are resorting to increasingly innovative ways to recruit participants for their research. This is partly, I fear because NHS governance systems are cumbersome , and in some cases expensive,and slow down research studies to pre-global warming glacial speed. A number of tech-savvy people are beginning to look to recruiting via cyber-communities through project specific websites often hosted by an appropriate support group or charity. </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">This can be seen as a good thing since often participants are prevented from even hearing about their potential research involvement opportunities by over protective health care staff and this approach, at least gives them the chance to decide for themselves whether or not they want to be included</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"> However, a couple of my PhD colleagues had similar experiences the other day which made me ponder how much people outside of universities understand about what is meant by Doctoral level research. The assumption made when they approached the website owners was that either they were undergraduates or that they were undergraduates doing some kind of media course. They were told in no uncertain terms that they were unlikely to get any form of support from the website owners, even though all they had asked for was that a link to their study be added to the site.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Both were understandably disappointed but I suggested that they go back to the people concerned and explain exactly what level of study they were at and how their research could conceivably affect the client groups the charities had been set up to serve; that this was not a small six week research project designed with no other reason but to to complete a research methods module, but something requiring commitment and deep thought and eye watering amounts of hard work. Pleasingly, on having made clear to them that the doctoral candidates were engaged in high quality, long term studies that were rigorously conducted and reviewed they were happy to collaborate.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The point that I am making here is that it pays to go back and seek an explanation if someone turns down your request for help when doing doctoral data collection using online media. Sometimes, and I guess this is part of the it-isn't-good-enough paranoia that affects most people doing a PhD at some time, students can be a bit too deprecating about their work. If someone says 'no' have the courage of your conviction and don't give up!</span></div>
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Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-9696624788624285782013-06-05T21:09:00.004+01:002013-06-05T21:23:34.166+01:00Using Twitter in my PhD researchI felt I needed to come on here and write about my experiences of using the online social media platform "Twitter" where some definite learning has occurred, but for most of it, it has been a joyous experience. I set up a Twitter account to connect with injured veteran/ex-service personnel and from the outset I was not positive at all as I feared that keeping the account up to date would be time consuming and laborious. However some benefits I have seen in persevering with it are:<br />
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1) The ability to freely follow relevant people, groups, associations and charities which could be of interest to your research. Given time they may follow you back and this can lead to recruitment<br />
2) If suitable users follow you back you can "direct message" them which cuts out the concern over confidentiality issues and ethically inappropriate recruitment.<br />
3) On your Twitter page you have the opportunity to put a small description about yourself so that other users can immediately find out what you are about i.e. in my case I have put my PhD research title in this area and put a link to my website.<br />
4) Another benefit I have recently seen is the ability to receive recommendations of people to follow through my registered email address. Initially this annoyed me as it felt like a form of junk mail, but as I scrolled through the emails there have been some really good recommendations. You will also find some good recommendations on your direct Twitter page which can also be helpful<br />
5) Getting to know some useful hashtags can make you part of some good conversations i.e in my case #veterans and #beyondinjury<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;">Please bear in mind though that the dreaded 140 character allowance per Tweet/message can be infuriating but research is all about being succinct so it's</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;"> good for research development </span><a a="" addedbonus="" class="_hootified" href="http://researchzebra.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/the-joy-of-recruitment-online.html?spref=fb#" style="background-color: white; color: #bb2139; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px; text-decoration: none;">#addedbonus</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;"> sorry could not</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;"> help it! As you can see, using hashtags becomes a natural part of your life when you begin to use Twitter! </span><br />
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So having described all these benefits, how have they impacted on my research?<br />
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1) I have been fortunate to recruit participants for interviews<br />
2) I am beginning to increase my followers<br />
3) I have been able to keep in contact with people I have met from conferences and seminars. The benefit of this is that I stand a good chance of being visual to other relevant users which could result in more followers<br />
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Therefore, having a Twitter account has the potential to make you more visual to others. However, it will require self-motivation on the researcher's part to make Twitter part of their normal routine, keep send regular tweets and building followers.<br />
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Remember to plan your recruitment strategy with sensitivity and thought!<br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15473573512854031970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-49826929171768336672013-05-21T10:17:00.000+01:002013-05-21T10:17:06.976+01:00Don't cry for me...<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgckYFaIxuYQqU5duHSOMBtQysIdqdH2bHmo52sbgSABlv5g850jYljMJDE0sXefwy0UdEfXEA5ASpFV4z-kAdaBDexS667ghDxqtea2mjfZ4c2SKTZHt92kZCBwAnoYo-5On67EUz5kdmd/s1600/Madonna-Dont-Cry-For-Me-Argentina-C-Gs-Requiem-For-Evita-Edit1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="175" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgckYFaIxuYQqU5duHSOMBtQysIdqdH2bHmo52sbgSABlv5g850jYljMJDE0sXefwy0UdEfXEA5ASpFV4z-kAdaBDexS667ghDxqtea2mjfZ4c2SKTZHt92kZCBwAnoYo-5On67EUz5kdmd/s400/Madonna-Dont-Cry-For-Me-Argentina-C-Gs-Requiem-For-Evita-Edit1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I had a strange and inspirational experience a while back when attending as an applicant at a Local Research Ethics Committee (LREC) meeting - and that's a sentence you don't hear that often! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">My colleague and I were asked by the Chair of the committee, to specify, in view of the fact our research was centered upon a vulnerable group (the committee's definition, not ours, or indeed the research participants themselves), which "distress policy" we were planning to use. Now,I am not a novice when it comes to LRECs but I have to say that I have NEVER been asked that question before. Swift as you like, I came back with "which distress protocol do you recommend?' and it became painfully clear that the committee did not really know of any. The Chair dismissed my question with a wave of the hand and an airy "Oh, there are lots out there", however on return to the office a Google search quickly indicated that by 'lots' the committee obviously meant 'none'.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">So, in the interests of harmony, and getting our ethics approval, my colleague and I were inspired to set about writing our own, evidence based distress protocol. The result has a tripartite focus and covers;</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Participant distress</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Researcher distress</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Transcriber distress</span></li>
</ul>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">We felt the last one was particularly important since, as researchers, we do not often think about the people who are transcribing our interviews and how they may be affected by the things they hear. So, if you are involved in health & social care research or indeed any kind of research where the management of distress might be an issue please feel free to use our distress protocol. You can find it<a href="http://www.slideshare.net/carolhaigh/distress-protocol" target="_blank"> here</a></span></div>
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Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-51954130064129546532013-05-15T11:01:00.002+01:002013-05-15T11:04:37.644+01:00Guest Blog : Reflections on an application for NHS ethical approval<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQHc4QNjEDtBSk8trn__uQNB1pJGGqhyphenhyphenJ-ZsqZAqe5YabP5iFiLfHeJ-OcUTvv_8IkPiVe9rDhyphenhyphenGtsC2dreO5FPA3SwxB7a1sCPg_r8wH8W2DZX3hHVCzD_bV6Vku4SJN_wkLlvtBtflt5/s1600/hanselgretelbreadcrumbs.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQHc4QNjEDtBSk8trn__uQNB1pJGGqhyphenhyphenJ-ZsqZAqe5YabP5iFiLfHeJ-OcUTvv_8IkPiVe9rDhyphenhyphenGtsC2dreO5FPA3SwxB7a1sCPg_r8wH8W2DZX3hHVCzD_bV6Vku4SJN_wkLlvtBtflt5/s1600/hanselgretelbreadcrumbs.png" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Guest Blog post by Jennifer Watson</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>PhD Student Manchester Metropolitan University</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>The IRAS system: </b>The Integrated Research Application
System (IRAS) is an ingenious device whereby a potential researcher can
complete several application forms, all required in order to carry out research
within the NHS, at one time. “That’s
wonderful, why did no one tell me this before” you may cry. The reason nobody speaks about it is that the
pathway through it is strewn with the hopes and aspirations of hapless researchers
rather like Hansel and Gretel’s breadcrumbs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Of course, the concept is a good one and, having never been
unfortunate enough to apply for ethical approval in the pre-IRAS days, I can
only assume that this is an improvement.
The problem is, that the more you delve into the process, the more
complicated it becomes. The first challenge is to register with IRAS and to
complete the <b>on-line training</b>. Looking back, this could be where I went wrong
in that I didn’t (complete the online training course, that is) but I took the
“I’ll look back at it when I encounter a problem” attitude before throwing
myself headlong into my application.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Completion of the
forms:</b> Firstly, there is the screening process, whereby you fill in </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">some
answers and IRAS tells you which forms you need to complete. In my case I needed to satisfy the NHS
Research Ethics Committee (<b>REC</b>) and
the Research and Development (<b>R&D</b>)group covering the area in
which I wanted to carry out the research.
So far so good. IRAS then
supplies you with the questions you need to cover both forms to avoid
duplication and henceforth all should be plain sailing: answer the questions,
click the submit button and everyone will receive the necessary
information. This is where I realised I
should have completed the online tutorial.
“Submission” in IRAS-speak does not pass your well-considered replies to
anyone, it merely saves them in a form which can then be sent to…… who? We will return to this conundrum later.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Just in case you were planning to complete the IRAS forms on
a quiet afternoon as a break from the literature review, I feel I should
prepare you – <b>there are a lot of
questions</b>. Not only are there a lot,
there are a lot of “But surely I have just answered that” type of
questions. This need not be viewed
entirely negatively though as it does give plenty of opportunity to practice
your cutting and pasting technique.
Another word of warning here, it may well be that your DOS/supervisor(s)
wish to “look over” your answers before submission to the relevant bodies. Prepare for several weeks of reminder emails
followed by resulting amendments and more weeks of “looking over” the
amendments. Obviously, the more
over-lookers you have, the greater the delay, but this must be regarded as part
of the process and, if it can’t be enjoyed, at least you may learn something
from it. Which, can’t be all bad.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Submission:</b> I feel at this stage that I must confess to
receiving insider information from a former colleague who worked on an ethics
committee. I was therefore aware at least of the existence of <b>Local RECs</b>, i.e. the bodies who will
review our applications and grant ethical approval to carry out research within
the NHS. That’s fine, the REC form is
submitted to the local REC and I can sit back and wait for their approval. However, pondering over the submission
instructions on the IRAS form, I discover that I need to book an appointment to
attend the REC in person for the review.
In addition the earliest appointment is six weeks ahead and 30 miles away.
There is also the matter of the REC checklist of accompanying documents to be
forwarded, which must be submitted within four days of the booking. This begins with a straightforward request
for relevant documents such as consent form, protocol, patient information
sheet and so forth but gradually becomes more challenging: CV (got that saved somewhere), CV of
supervisor (ah, fire off an email), letter from sponsor (who?), evidence of
sponsor’s insurance (whose what?). None
of these documents are unobtainable however and eventually can be tracked down
with a little investigation. Even the
process of obtaining electronic authorisation instead of signatures can be
strangely satisfying.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In the early stages of this process, I naively believed that
REC approval would give me the green light to happily stroll into GP practices
and recruit patients for my study. That
was before I discovered <b>local R&D
approval</b>. In other words, I need
separate approval to work in a specific NHS area – hence the R&D form
completed through IRAS. We now return to
the “submit to whom/where” dilemma. Easy,
a bit of Googling provides me of the name of the lead for R&D in the area
in which I want to work. This is fine,
except the helpful reply to my email tells me that I need to get in touch with
the Greater Manchester Comprehensive Local Research Network (<b>GMCLRN</b>) who will be able to approve my
application for the area in which I plan to do my study. Oh, and, by the way, I will need an NHS <b>Research Passport</b> form to enable me to
work on NHS premises (in that case, what is everything else about?), copies of
which, when completed and approved, need to be sent to the R&D person in
every NHS area I may wish to use. That
brings me to another point, the very helpful person at the GMCLRN reminds me
that I will need a Site –specific form (<b>SSI</b>)
for any area I may wish to enter and that I will probably need to cover three
areas just in case I cannot recruit sufficient participants from my first
choice. At least the SSIs can be
completed as an add-on to the IRAS and can be submitted to the GMCLRN, with
more additional documents, all in a nicely zipped folder attached to an email.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Nearly there now </b>(six
months on!)<b>.</b> There is, of course, the matter of the <b>MMU ethics application</b> form but, having
weaved through the IRAS maze, the MMU ethics form is almost disappointingly
challenge free.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Just the Research Passport application to deal with now and
we’re off! Once I have my Criminal Records Bureau (<b>CRB</b>) check and <b>Occupational
Health Clearance</b> my passport will be granted and recruitment can commence!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Just the small matter of an ethics review and amendments to
consider, but I will leave those for another day………….</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment--></div>
Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-11062560901598731652012-12-12T12:43:00.003+00:002012-12-12T12:45:00.618+00:00Quantitative purgatory<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibLpeDoTPPonTZK5H8kr9IKlVBBXiH6Q0kP7PV-brijregHdnHh-XBpTTX3SYSq9PTaUVU9-BmEPyECI_28gJDJ3U729ewvEY2p1PfOkA50lHWGPbhwa476oQmcNNd4uESu4qCMJPEb34j/s1600/Purgatory%5B1%5D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibLpeDoTPPonTZK5H8kr9IKlVBBXiH6Q0kP7PV-brijregHdnHh-XBpTTX3SYSq9PTaUVU9-BmEPyECI_28gJDJ3U729ewvEY2p1PfOkA50lHWGPbhwa476oQmcNNd4uESu4qCMJPEb34j/s200/Purgatory%5B1%5D.jpg" width="182" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">According to the Catholic Church, Purgatory is a place or condition of punishment for those who although possessed of grace are not entirely free from sin. As an atheist I never really thought that purgatory was something I would need to concern myself about until I became a quantitative researcher. As a someone whose PhD was once described as 385 pages of statistical tables and some text, I flatter myself that although not a statistician I can make SPSS do what I want it to do and I can understand the results it gives me. I can look at a mess of data, know what questions to ask it and comprehend the answer I come up with. I know when to use non-parametric tests and I can identify scenarios when only a parametric test will do. In other words like <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Faraday" target="_blank">Michael Faraday</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregor_Mendel" target="_blank">Gregor Mendel </a>and <a href="http://www.thomasedison.com/" target="_blank">Thomas Edison</a> I am an amateur. However, being a keen amateur does not mean my quantitative activities are less accurate or appropriate than those of<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Spearman" target="_blank"> Charles Spearrman</a> (a well known statistician although really a psychologist) or Jacob Cohen (another well known statistician who started life a psychologist). I'm not asking you to believe that the Haigh Test for statistical complexity is imminent, what I am asking is - why, when the stats tests I'm using are really, <i>really</i> simple am I constantly told I need to have a statistician on my research team!?!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It's annoying for me as someone who can do simple stats such as cross tabs and ANOVAs (even, dare I say it, some multivariate regression) and it must be bloody annoying for statisticians who have studied for 3 years or more to be constantly asked to advise on what, for them, is the statistical equivalent of learning to use a spoon.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">So, here I sit, in statistical purgatory - in a state of grace because I understand what 'p' values are for but full of sin because I don't have a stats degree. The only good thing is...there are loads of us here.</span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 1.24; text-align: -webkit-auto; white-space: nowrap;"><br /></span>
</div>
Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-35119939971715128542012-09-26T12:11:00.000+01:002012-09-26T12:11:43.609+01:00What your supervisor will expect from you<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYHIXYAKtVn9q6D8BsG3Myx9jdtdG-nlQ_2mt3cObVh8w1zDQKbiyXn-KbHGLFWbGMLWgkf0Cl2gutnPuJCuQd8NiwRhFQXVQ83RvWO2M2ccCSTMBUezFDhDIzGX56WndT3TokAMk5oaD3/s1600/mutual-support.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="228" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYHIXYAKtVn9q6D8BsG3Myx9jdtdG-nlQ_2mt3cObVh8w1zDQKbiyXn-KbHGLFWbGMLWgkf0Cl2gutnPuJCuQd8NiwRhFQXVQ83RvWO2M2ccCSTMBUezFDhDIzGX56WndT3TokAMk5oaD3/s320/mutual-support.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">Whilst, in previous blogs, I have outlined the things a doctoral student can expect from their supervisor it is important to remember that your supervisor has the right to expect certain things in return. For example;</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">If</span><span style="font-size: 16.363636016845703px; line-height: 18.18181800842285px;"> you want your supervisor to review and comment on written work they will probably expect you to send it to them at least three weeks before your supervision session. It is pointless sending your supervisor the first 20,000 of your methods chapter the day before you are due to met and expecting them to have read it...or be happy about it.</span></span></li>
</ul>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-size: 16.363636016845703px; line-height: 18.18181800842285px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If you have an appointment with your supervisor - turn up! (pretty obvious I<i> </i>know but you would be surprised how often it happens)</span></span></li>
</ul>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-size: 16.363636016845703px; line-height: 18.18181800842285px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">They will expect you to be prepared to present to peers, within and external to the university.</span></span></li>
</ul>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span></span></span>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">If you are going to publish something with their name on it, make sure they see it before you submit. Academics are only as good as their last paper so it's important they have the opportunity to provide input.</span></span></li>
</ul>
<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;">Some supervisors will expect you to be the one to keep in touch, so if you drift or drop off of the radar they won't chase you up. It is a good idea to find out at the </span></span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">beginning</span></span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;"> of the relationship if they are expecting you to instigate contact.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;"><br /></span></span></li>
</ul>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">Of course the easiest thing to find out what your supervisor expects from you is to simply ask them. Your relationship will, ideally be mutually supportive and most supervisors will be pleased and touched if you show them this level of consideration - it will probably be the first time any one has!</span></span></div>
</div>
Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-3605683275897558832012-08-14T13:11:00.000+01:002012-08-14T13:12:23.786+01:00Pick a side!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQRzMo3kzZsp8IfcL_zPem2eAEp365zJFnSnKpU-QdEmLLL82h1E7Gny0NibzSnqQ4pJKzfB54xCTxNZyYGITAUMx4EqWOOpTPQoK5damXI0nFtTRUJo_ViBE6vJBj1dX_rkT1jHwjkDRJ/s1600/starwars.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQRzMo3kzZsp8IfcL_zPem2eAEp365zJFnSnKpU-QdEmLLL82h1E7Gny0NibzSnqQ4pJKzfB54xCTxNZyYGITAUMx4EqWOOpTPQoK5damXI0nFtTRUJo_ViBE6vJBj1dX_rkT1jHwjkDRJ/s320/starwars.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">When did it become desirable, fashionable or acceptable to shoehorn chunks of quantitative data collection into what is obviously designed to be a qualitative study? I'm not talking about genuine mixed-methods studies but doctoral theses, and it usually IS doctoral theses I'm afraid, that undermine perfectly acceptable and robust qualitative studies with a few badly presented descriptive statistics. If a student is focussed upon qualitative work then, generally,the inclusion of poorly analysed and weak quantitative data does not enhance their work - it weakens it. Examiners who know about statistical analysis will be irritated by things like appallingly bad response rates, inappropriate statistical tests (usually treating non-parametric data as parametric) and meaningless extrapolation of non-significant findings to the general population. Examiners who are knowledgeable about qualitative methods will struggle to find meaning in the inclusion of such data and be annoyed because it detracts form the richness of the qualitative elements. I think it may be time for researchers, students and supervisors to pick a side and stop sitting on the methodological fence. Neither approach is better than the other - they are too different. They explore different things, ask different questions and give different answers - not better, just different. So, </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">be whole hearted qualitative or be proudly </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">quantitative. PICK A SIDE!!!! </span></div>
Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-78296126871476056652012-08-04T18:36:00.000+01:002012-08-04T18:38:14.110+01:00Looking above the heads of the crowd<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I was having a research-y conversation with a colleague when he said something very profound. "The problem with me" (he said) "is that I'm interested in too many things"</span>. <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">My first thought was 'yeah, me too'</span>. I<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">f you ask my mentor 'what is the problem with Carol Haigh?' somewhere in the 15 volumes of documentation he would hand you in return would be the phrase "She has no focus". But my second thought was "why is that a bad thing? </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Without doubt we need people who are happy to spend their entire career concerned about the healing rate of diabetic ulcers in</span> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">women whose birth sign is Libra or are exercised about the life cycle of the Tibetan water snail</span> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">but we also need individuals who can't settle on one topic or idea, people who consistently poke their heads above the crowd to see what's coming next. These are the people who can adapt their research interest to changes in policy or technology. They are the people for whom cross-disciplinary collaboration holds no fear because they aren't afraid to knock on the door of other previously unrelated disciplines and say, ' I can help with this'.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">My fear for the next generation of researchers is that they won't be encouraged to celebrate their generalist tendencies and will be expected to slot themselves into the narrow confines of a specialist subject. Research has changed dramatically over the past decade - the age of the solitary researcher is coming to an end and </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">multi-site, </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">multi</span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">-institutional</span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"> collaboration is now the norm, </span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">interdisciplinary collaboration is already being seen as advantageous when bidding for large research grants and cross disciplinary research, such as between health, technology and industry for example, is the next logical step.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">For this to work we need to encourage the generalists, we need people who are willing to change focus and direction and use a macro gaze in order to move the whole of their discipline forward into the second decade of the 21st century as much as we need the micro gaze of the specialists </span></div>Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-38792637468080149832012-07-28T19:04:00.002+01:002012-07-28T19:18:50.968+01:00How to manage your supervisor 3 - Great Expectations<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="background-attachment: scroll; background-color: white; background-image: none; background-position: 0% 0%; background-repeat: repeat repeat;">So far in this short blog series we have looked at <a href="http://researchzebra.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/how-to-manage-your-supervisor-1-finding.html" target="_blank">how to select a supervisor </a>and <a href="http://researchzebra.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/how-to-manage-your-supervisor-2.html" target="_blank">how to manage the first supervisory meeting</a> </span>but there are things that you should expect from your supervisor. Most universities and research supervisors take student demands very seriously and will try to support them in any reasonable requests. Unfortunately though they rarely tell students what is on offer and so students don't know what is available and what they can ask for. The following are just a few of the things you can expect your supervisor to help you with.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><i>Provide </i><span style="background-color: white;"><i>guidance in planning the research project </i>- A PhD is a research training program, no-one expects a new doctoral student to have their research project completely planned from day one. You can expect your supervisor to be able to discuss different approaches to answering your research question. You should also be able to look to them to provide suggestions and guidance with regards to suitable places to start literature searching as well. In addition, if you have identified and area in which you feel you need further training or education, your supervisor should be able to help you find internal or external resources that will help or be able to provide access to supplementary </span></span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">instruction.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white;"><i>Help with ethics</i> - In the UK, if you are doing research in health and social care, you are likely to have the lovely experience of attending a Local Research Ethics Committee (LREC). Although ethics committees tend to be forgiving to applicants who are doing Masters degrees, understanding that they are relative novices in research, they will treat doctoral students projects with the same level of rigour that they apply to the studies of experienced </span></span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">researchers. If you are invited,your supervisor should attend the ethics meeting with you. This is partly so that they can provide support for you, partly because they should be able to field any questions that stump you and mainly because ethics committees love it when supervisors attend with their students as it reassures them that a novice researcher has the full support of an experienced one. Even if you are not facing LREC you will probably have to submit your study to the approval of the university ethics panel and you can expect your supervisors help in this too.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><i>Integrating with the wider academic community</i> - Part of the doctoral process is engaging with the wider intellectual community in your discipline. For most people this usually means attending a suitable conference. SOME universities (but no means all) have small pots of money that doctoral students can apply for to fund conference attendance. It is worth asking your supervisor if such funds exist and getting them to help you apply or seek other forms of funding if none are available at your university. Another way of engaging with the external community is via publications and you should be able to expect your supervisor to be able to provide guidance on suitable target journals and the writing styles and standards expected.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><i>Be the map reader on your doctoral journey</i> - Your supervisor should be familiar with all the bureaucratic university milestones you are likely to encounter. Obviously it is your responsibility to keep such milestones in mind as well but you should be able to rely on your supervisor to be able to guide you on the preparation of progress or transition reports and, at the end of the process make informed suggestions with regard to the selection of examiners.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">I know some doctoral candidates will read this and roll their eyes muttering 'my supervisor didn't do this'. None of the things I have outlined in the blog should be onerous or outside of the remit of the supervisor. But remember, you have to be the proactive one in this scenario, so think carefully about what you want from your supervisor and make your expectations clear to them. You can rest assured they will be making their expectations crystal clear to you!</span></div>
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Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-24355151649854331292012-07-19T12:17:00.002+01:002012-07-19T12:56:21.238+01:00How to manage your supervisor 2- Entering the lion's den<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif;">Once you have found a supervisor that you feel is right for you, you face the challenge of the first supervision meeting. The important thing to remember here is to</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif;"><i>start as you mean to go on. </i> One of the biggest mistakes that many new doctoral students make to is under estimate how much power they have in the doctoral candiate/supervisor relationship. They assume that the association will continue along the pedagogical lines of their previous studies in which the supervisor is all knowing and the student is the passive recipient of their knowledge. This should not be the case. <span style="background-color: white; text-indent: -0.38in;">The
relationship between supervisor & PhD student is very different from other
supervisory relationships, it should be a partnership of equals so n</span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">egotiation
is key. </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">The
expectations of both parties</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">should be made clear at the start. If you have found yourself an excitable supervisor who is easily distracted by attractive avenues of discussion (yes, I know all my students are looking at me) take an agenda with you so that you can keep them on topic.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">One of the first things to discuss is how often you plan to meet, for how long (two hours is a good start), whether those meeting will be face-to-face or via Skype or e-mail and where they will be (supervision doesn't necessarily have to be on-campus). The frequency of supervision changes across the course of the PhD so you may wish to see your supervisor every month in the early stages but less regularly during data collection or writing up phases. Regardless of frequency it is always a good idea to make your next supervision appointment before you leave. It is easier to cancel an appointment you suddenly find you don't need than to make one urgently.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">It is a good idea if you have a broad idea of the focus you plan to take with your thesis but it's not a good idea if you are not open to debating or amending that plan. Many new doctoral students will start their PhD absolutely confident that they know exactly what they are going to be doing over the next 3-6 years. Equally as many complete a thesis which bears no resemblance to those original plans. So, be ready at your first meeting to have a long discussion about your chosen topic and all of the different ways you could explore it. Remember at this early stage nothing is carved in stone.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">Most universities have set milestones that you will need to achieve and so it's a good idea, if you can to find out what they are ( they are usually outlined in the Post Graduate Research Regulations and the majority of universities have these available online) and discuss them with your supervisor. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">Even at your first meeting it doesn't hurt to be thinking about papers you will be publishing from your work and to discuss issues around what support your supervisor will be able to provide to help you, especially if you are a publishing virgin. Most supervisors will expect to have their names on papers you publish from you PhD, particularly if they have contributed in a more substantial way than just editing or proof reading but it is not inappropriate for you to expect to be first author.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">So, for the first meeting;</span><br />
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li><i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">Negotiate how your relationship is going to work.</span></i><i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;"> </span></i></li>
<li><i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">Negotiate what you expect from each other.</span></i><i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;"> </span></i></li>
<li><i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">Be ready to discuss what you want to do and to explore different ways of doing it.</span></i></li>
<li><i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;"> </span></i><i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">Be clear what the University set milestones are and how they fit into your project plan</span></i><i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;"> </span></i></li>
<li><i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">Be ready to discuss a publication plan and authorship.</span></i></li>
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',sans-serif; text-indent: -0.38in;">The first supervision session is a bit like a first date - you will probably both be on your best behaviour and trying to impress but you will also get a sense early on as to whether this is a relationship that has potential. Unlike a first date it isn't necessary to buy your supervisor flowers but don't be afraid to take biscuits. </span></div>Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-5825226697022855222012-07-12T13:57:00.000+01:002012-07-12T14:05:19.961+01:00How to manage your supervisor 1 - Finding the needle<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">As the new academic year looms ever closer and new doctoral students start to search Amazon for books with titles like 'How to get a PhD', it seemed to be the right time for a series of short blogs on </span><b style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">How to manage your supervisor. </b><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">This first blog explores the qualities you should look for in a good supervisor</span><br />
<b style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /></b><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">At the risk of paraphrasing Mrs. Beeton - first find your supervisor. Many new doctoral students do not realise that they can actually have a say in who supervises them. So it's a good idea to consider the following when you are looking for the perfect supervisor;</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; text-indent: -18pt;"><br /></span><br />
<div style="text-indent: 0px;">
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; text-indent: -18pt;"><i>Find a supervisor who is knowledgeable and </i></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; text-indent: -18pt;"><i>who
understands the nature of PhD work - </i>Every supervisory team should have at least one person on it who has supervised doctoral students to completion before. This is important because it shows you that they understand the quality and standard expected from a PhD and suggests (but doesn't guarantee) that you can have some trust in their judgement. It's helpful if you can have a supervisor that has some expertise in your field or your chosen </span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">methodology but ensure that they are open enough to respect your ideas and planned approach to your thesis otherwise you will just end up replicating their PhD (which, incidentally, it might be a good idea to skim read if you can get hold of it to get a feel for their standards of writing and ideological position and also allows you to giggle at the things they got wrong).</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; text-indent: -18pt;">Make sure that they have enough time for you</i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; text-indent: -18pt;"> - Talk to the doctoral students they already supervise, if they tell you that it's difficult to pin them down for appointments or, worse, if they make appointments then </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; text-indent: -18pt;">cancel</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; text-indent: -18pt;"> them regularly then approach with the utmost caution! You want someone who will read your work, comment on it intelligently and help you through the process, not someone who 'collects' students to supervise because it makes them look important.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; text-indent: -18pt;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; text-indent: -18pt;"><i>Consider some professional
supervision (as well as academic)</i> - If the focus of your doctoral study is around your professional environment you might benefit from asking some one from you work place to contribute to the supervision process. If your supervisor is methodologically sound but doesn't have a lot of insight into your clinical or work based reality then a supervisory 'buddy' at work can really help. This person doesn't necessarily need to have a PhD, they just need to be expert in their/your field and someone you respect.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; text-indent: -18pt;"><br /></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; text-indent: -18pt;"><i>Find someone with whom you can
get on </i>- Most importantly you must be able to get on with whoever ends up as your supervisor. </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">This should not be a surprise, this is the person that you are likely to spend the next 3-6 years with so you need to have someone with whom you can sustain a relationship. Most PhD students will spend longer choosing a sandwich than they will choosing their supervisor, which is why lunch is often more enjoyable that doctoral study.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Finding a good supervisor can feel a bit like finding a needle in a haystack, you have to know what you are looking for, rummage around a lot and... erm, if you are not careful there may be bleeding? (I possibly should have thought this simile through a bit more). Most novice doctoral students are too worried about whether they will be able to do a PhD to think about how important it is that the person who will be taking the journey with is the right one for them but this is a very important first step.</span></div>
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</div>Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-11003287869882767812012-07-04T15:54:00.003+01:002012-07-04T15:56:22.562+01:00Seven things you need to know when your partner is doing a doctorate<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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There are many useful books and
websites that outline to the embryonic PhD student how the process works and
what to expect from there doctoral journey. However there is a dearth of sites
aimed at telling the partners/spouses/friends/families just how it will be for
them, this helpful blog post aims to remedy that.</div>
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<i>1. There will be emotional
instability</i>; this may come early on in the doctoral journey when your partner
convinces themselves that they are totally unable to do a PhD. They may be
angry with you for encouraging them in thinking that they could do one in the
first place or for not being encouraging enough. Or both. Often at the same
time. It may come mid-way through when
the three thousand questionnaires that were sent out, at great expense and envelope stuffing
inconvenience to family and friends, show
a response rate of 1% or it may come toward the end of the PhD when coming home
to tempestuous tears, incoherent sobbing and a three hour temper tantrum that
appears indicative, at the very least, of massive family bereavement/trauma or loss
of the family pet or the cancellation of ‘The Simpsons’ is eventually
discovered to have been caused by the printer cartridge running out. You can’t
predict when it will come; the only thing you can be certain of is that it
will.</div>
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<i>2. Sooner or later they will need
their own space;</i> I don’t mean this in a ‘I need my own space so I’m leaving you’
kind of way, I mean it literally. One day you’ll realise that there are so many
text books and journal off prints in a specific order that ON NO ACCOUNT must be
disturbed scattered across your bed that your only option is to sleep in the
cat basket. This may be a time to think about finding space for your partner that
belongs exclusively to them, it doesn’t matter if it’s a proper study, the
cupboard under the stairs or a corner of the dining table. They need to know
they have a work area of their own and you need to know you can turn over in
bed without dislodging 3 months worth of important data.
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<i>3. Re-think what constitutes
‘romantic’</i>; no matter how much you have
used fine wine, back rubs, chocolates and flowers to express your devotion in
the past, nothing says ‘I love you’ like Tabachnik and Fiddell’s classic text
‘Using Multivariate Statistics’ or Heidegger’s ‘Being and Time’. Knowing which
expensive text book to buy and when will get you massive amounts of supportive
partner points and fulsome praise in the acknowledgement section of the
finished thesis. In extreme cases, it may even save your life
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<i>4. At some point your name and who
you are will escape their memory</i>; If this happens in the first six months of
your partners PhD then you have a big problem...at any time after that, relax
it’s quite normal. It just means that your partner is analysing focus group
data in their head or trying to remember if a ‘p’ value of .001 is good (hint -
it is, be impressed). This will happen more and more as your partner becomes
more immersed in their studies so it’s probably a good idea to introduce
yourself to them and remind them of your place in their life at the start of
each interaction that you initiate (NB – especially important during sex). Take
solace with the thought that this memory loss is quickly reversed once the
thesis is submitted
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<i>5. Some one new (and possibly dead)
will join your relationship</i>; As your partner becomes increasingly obsessed with
their PhD you will often find then with the sort of dreamy/concussed expression
on their face that you recognise from the early stages of your relationship
when you were both falling in love with each other. You may fear your partner
is falling for someone else and your instincts would be right. It may be <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heidigger" target="_blank">Heidegger</a>,
it may be <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anselm_Strauss" target="_blank">Strauss</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Spearman" target="_blank">Spearman</a> or <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_Cohen_%28statistician%29" target="_blank">Cohen</a> , but
get used to it – someone else has joined your relationship and there is nothing
you can do about it. When your partner talks incessantly about Martin, Anselm, Charles
or Jacob don’t be threatened, yes they are important to your partner but take comfort
in the thought that this infatuation will not survive completion of the thesis.
Plus they are all dead which gives you a massive overall advantage.
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<i>6. You will learn new things</i>; not
just because your partners sole topic of conversation will be about their
thesis – my beloved knows more about post-menopausal osteoporosis than any man
in a non-healthcare related profession needs or wants to - but also because
sooner or later many of the things they do as their part of an equal
relationship will become your responsibility. Doesn’t matter if its topping up
the oil in the car, filling and/or emptying the dishwasher, mowing the lawn,
cooking, shopping, feeding the cat, once
they are in ‘the zone’ and furiously writing it’s easier just to pick up the
slack yourself than risk the inevitable physical and psychological trauma (did
I mention emotional instability?)
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<i>7. Nothing that happens will be
because of you but everything that goes wrong WILL be your fault; </i>sometimes you
will feel that you are little more than a supportive spectator as your partner
careers down the doctoral route but be warned – on no account allow yourself to
believe that your non-participatory observer status means that you are exempt
from blame for anything and everything that can go wrong throughout the 3-6
year doctoral journey. This will be hard but do not waste your time and effort
in defending yourself or trying to point out that your partners PhD is grounded
in field about which you know little and care less. In the long run it’s easier
just to apologise.
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I realize that this sounds as if
the PhD process is a complete nightmare for the partners, family and friends of
the doctoral candidate and this is because it is, but hold onto the fact that
this is really, really important to them, you will be SO proud of them when you
see them in their gown and bonnet at graduation, their career prospects will be
enhanced giving you the option of becoming a kept man/woman and most
importantly when it is all over they will love you more than they ever did
before, even if it’s only to make up for the hell they just have put you
through.
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</div>Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-67185195494968077552012-06-23T22:05:00.001+01:002012-06-23T22:06:14.194+01:00Using 'SMS' in PhD Supervision - The supervisors perspective<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTggfCMA7meFxyBaGJMGmBQbQ99Tn2NnWa_2MtDAUpzuNKS6b83u3dBXBbA3uOYu-yCMFP-gV0ppOmN7FCoe6OD9MPUIjMTLm8sqsp0irlO4RA3ST5l7BfL0UbzIePuo613NrZLhLRN7U0/s1600/People-texting-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTggfCMA7meFxyBaGJMGmBQbQ99Tn2NnWa_2MtDAUpzuNKS6b83u3dBXBbA3uOYu-yCMFP-gV0ppOmN7FCoe6OD9MPUIjMTLm8sqsp0irlO4RA3ST5l7BfL0UbzIePuo613NrZLhLRN7U0/s200/People-texting-2.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"> I would suggest that t</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">here are two things that challe</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">nge most supervision relationships in their embryonic stages. One is developing a relationship between the new doctoral student and their supervisor that is sustainable for a minimum of three years and the other is dealing with the questions that are important to the doctoral candidates but which occur outside of scheduled </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">supervision</span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"> session and can delay a candidates progress until a satisfactory answer is available. Lee Yarwood-Ross has eloquently explained one way to address these challenges is via <a href="http://researchzebra.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/using-sms-in-phd-supervision.html">SMS supervision</a>. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">As a supervisor I think this is a great idea - the well documented phenomenon of cyber-space disinhibition means that a strong working relationship can be developed even before the first off line face to face meeting which can only expedite the progress of the doctoral student. Thinking back to my first meeting with my own PhD supervisor, I was so intimidated that it was difficult to get the boundaries of my own research articulated. This set the scene for all our subsequent encounters which did not make for a happy experience!</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">In addition, the middle of the night questions that come to all doctoral students can be dealt with in a timely fashion (although hopefully NOT in the middle of the night!). Sometimes it can be something really simple such as what literature databases to start a search on or the difference between a research aim and a research objective. A simple SMS can help enormously.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The only problem that I can see with this is that some (possibly most??) supervisors may be reluctant to hand their mobile phone number over to students. However, and I've made this point before, doctoral study should be a collaboration between peers rather than a pedagogic student/teacher relationship and should be open to negotiation. A clear discussion of </span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">boundaries and ground rules to support satisfactory SMS </span><span style="background-color: white; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">supervision that is agreed between supervisor and supervisee can add another helpful dimension to the relationship and facilitate the PhD journey. </span></span></div>
</div>Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-13583766592765718132012-06-23T19:55:00.002+01:002012-06-27T08:12:56.663+01:00Using 'SMS' in PhD Supervision<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">F</span>or the
social media crazed PhD students out there (including myself), I have personally
found so far that supervisory support via SMS/text messaging is greatly
beneficial. It is quick, easily accessible and any excuse to use the Samsung
Galaxy Note to its maximum capacity is fine by me (beautiful gadget). Some
people may read this and think “why not just use email?” and I would argue that
there is nothing more frustrating than having no Wi-Fi or internet access when
you’re out and about and the need to reply to a super busy supervisor cannot be
achieved *pulls hair out*. With the use of SMS you can normally guarantee some
form of network signal and the communication between supervisor and supervisee
can therefore be timely and harmonious.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I agree that
technology in PhD study cannot replace ‘Face to Face’ contact with the supervisory
team but I feel it is about what is appropriate for the area that needs to
be discussed. Let’s face it, when somebody rings us, more than likely we rush
to the phone (like the intro to Baywatch) and miss the call resulting in a
voicemail that says “call me back”. When you call them back it then goes to
voicemail *blood pressure rising*.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
have found small issues can easily be dealt with via SMS. The bigger issues can
be discussed through pre-planned meetings. </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">I imagine
that it would be useful if someone could invent an ‘out of office’ tool for the
use of SMS as currently I believe we have one of two things in the world; no
reply = I am busy or don’t want to talk to you; or the little box you can tick
in your settings that lets you know when the message has been successfully
received by the recipient and you sit waiting for a response with baited
breathe!</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Someone said
to me recently that the use of SMS has resulted in a loss of spoken human
communication and the rapport with the supervisory team can become fragmented; but
in my experience so far this is not the case. I think what is most important is
discussing at the beginning of your studies how the ‘supervisee’ wants
supervision to occur and in what form. Some prefer the use of social media and
some do not but if we add the use of SMS to our communication toolkit, it will
only have a positive impact on the doctoral research.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">One needs to
be cautious though that they check their contractual message allowance as no
PhD student wants the horror of paying out a humongous bill at the end of the
month especially with the small amount of pennies in the bank account. I would
also stress that users be aware of the character allowance in their SMS as I
have noticed that if you type too much in one SMS it will convert to MMS
resulting in an unexpected charge! However this can be resolved through
splitting messages into two and it doesn’t take an academic to work that one out!</span></span><br />
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</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Reap the
benefits of all forms of communication is my opinion and SMS is only one of
them. Please be sure though to rest your fingers and eyes as much as possible,
text induced finger ‘ache’ and headache is a killer!<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
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<br /></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15473573512854031970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-2907451387188943542012-01-24T11:06:00.004+00:002012-01-26T15:29:22.570+00:00Keep it short!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUE-LCVVqzYr35Ld3HUST2yfg5wLDWm-iltxaBwbLFwlyaO83pcr7pmNk6xPy1V0Od_DmhGorimgKwnZxBT3PXCIuG4fwQeLFq6vf-WGS-Ly5-DNkbFA3ef38x6uLibj_nywQkJivVqfeU/s1600/seo-for-small-business.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUE-LCVVqzYr35Ld3HUST2yfg5wLDWm-iltxaBwbLFwlyaO83pcr7pmNk6xPy1V0Od_DmhGorimgKwnZxBT3PXCIuG4fwQeLFq6vf-WGS-Ly5-DNkbFA3ef38x6uLibj_nywQkJivVqfeU/s200/seo-for-small-business.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">People seem to struggle with developing a research question and this struggle seems to get harder rather than easier the more advanced the degree. So, whilst undergraduates may think for a week or two about what they want to investigate, doctoral students tend to take months (or in some cases, years - yes Dr Fiona Duncan I'm looking at you!) before a simple, understandable research question is arrived at. This could be because many academics and students work on the theory that the cleverer something is the more complex and incomprehensible it has to be. I disagree - after all the most crucial questions in life are often the shortest - 'will you go out with me?', 'how can I help?' 'Is everything OK?' ''Do you want fries with that?' Even the </span><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">BIG</b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> topics start with small questions 'Is there a God?' 'When will we understand the universe?' 'Why are doughnuts so yummy?' It seems as if the more important the question the more likely it is that it can be communicated as a twitter message in 140 characters or less.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Big answers don't necessarily require big questions - just thoughtful ones</span></div>Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-23432035554367896512011-07-04T12:47:00.002+01:002011-07-04T12:50:02.223+01:00It's easy criticise....and fun too (apparently)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">This time of year many students and university lecturers spend their time preparing and submitting papers for publication. I have recently been doing just that. Now let me me say from the outset, when one puts one's work out into the public domain for review it is not unsurprising to receive comment and feedback. What I do find surprising is the nastiness that some reviewers feel the need to insert into their reviews. I don't mind being asked to make changes in any paper I submit, I don't even mind being asked to include specific references (although I am always suspicious as to the motivation of such requests - it's a great way for a reviewer to up their citation rates) but I do object to reviews that are, at best smug and patronising and at worst down right nasty</span>.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">As a reviewer I always try to make sure that any review I send out is constructive and helpful, I do not use phrases such as " This author is clearly a novice" (That's one I got) or "Clearly English is not this authors first language</span>" <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">(That's one that a native English speaking friend of mine received)</span>. <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Such comments do not serve any useful purpose. If the author is a novice, they certainly don't need to have it pointed out to them by a reviewer, and if they are not a novice, assuming they are will be seriously annoy them. Furthermore such patronising and smug statements serve to dishearten authors and under line perceptions that the academia and publishing worlds are snobbish, exclusive and unkind. There is also a danger that any useful information that would strengthen the submitted paper is lost in the vitriol that upsets the author.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Some reviewers seem unable to differentiate between reviewing activity and marking. A journal asks its reviewers to ensure that the content, focus, subject and level of writing are appropriate for the journal - not to criticise the direction that an individuals study has taken them or to mock their approaches to investigation. It is also not the place of the reviewer to insert serious amounts of content into the paper that has been submitted, and by serious amounts I mean proposed content that increases the word count of the submitted paper from the required 5000 words, to well over 8500 as recently happened to me!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I must admit to being at something of a loss to account for why some reviewers (and it's not all of them by any means) would chose to behave like this</span>. <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Most reviewers are authors as well one would hope that they would treat prospective authors as they themselves would wish to be treated, and there are, indeed some extremely helpful and supportive reviewers who make the publishing process a pleasure and a learning experience</span>.<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> I suspect that the double blind system that most nursing journals operate in which the author and the reviewers are blinded to each other means that there is little or no obligation for the reviewers to take responsibility for the comments they make. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> I would argue that journals should consider training their reviewers to an industry agreed standard or, failing that, invite author feedback on the helpfulness and usefulness of the review. I would also tell prospective authors not to be destroyed by an mean or nasty reviewers that they come across, it will only be a matter of time before the reviewer will have a paper of theirs reviewed by someone as deeply unpleasant as themselves. </span><br />
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</div>Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-38508650459134087052011-06-14T14:25:00.000+01:002011-06-14T14:25:44.145+01:00Let's get together<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I was speaking at a Nutrition Nurse's Conference this week about practitioner research and was struck by the things that,as a professional group, seems to be exercising nutrition nurses across the UK. Judging from the comments of other speakers and some delegate, what seems to be bothering them are things like, lack of basic assessment of nutritional status, lack of exploration of common sense approaches before calling the experts and poor documentation</span>. <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">If you take out the word 'nutrition' and replace it with the words 'pain management',what you have is a nice description of all of the clinical issues that are exercising the nations pain teams. All of which got me to thinking....when I talk to practitioners about research I always highlight that there are probably loads of already published studies in their speciality that they could learn from and suggest that, rather than re-inventing the wheel with their own small local study, they should be collaborating with other in the field to produce robust research that has decent sample sizes and therefore the chance of making a useful impact upon patient care. Maybe though</span>, <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">what I should be doing is encouraging them to contact other services within and external to their own speciality to start looking at areas of commonality. Nutrition nurses and acute pain practitioners could liaise to explore why suitable assessments are not carried out and to workshop educational techniques that would benefit bother disciplines. This would have the advantage that both sets of practitioners would develop tool and techniques that would benefit their specific patients but they would also get a working insight into another speciality and both would benefit from having their service subject to scrutiny by a knowledgeable outsider</span>.<br />
<div style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">May be it is time for unversity research courses to promote cross-speciality research with the same enthusaism it espouses cross-disciplianry research. In terms of making an impact on aptient care it could well be the way to go.</div><br />
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</div>Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-43138352425631779182011-06-01T20:10:00.002+01:002011-06-01T20:20:55.553+01:00Academics: Should we be more image conscious?At this time, I am preparing for my first attempts at conference presentations for my PhD research: one oral presentation and one poster presentation. I’m committing myself to doing the best possible job of communicating my research to my audience. I work hard at my PhD and want people to feel some degree of enthusiasm and interest in it. I strongly believe in the use of images and pictures to help illustrate my messages. Quality pictures can say a lot more than words do and are more engaging than bullet-pointed lists and paragraphs of text (he says, writing a blog post!). <br /><br />The use of images is important to me because I believe researchers should aim to do more than impart information cold. As an audience member, I want to feel something about what the researcher is doing. I want them to succeed in delivering an engaging presentation. I want to be moved a little, not just intellectually, but on an emotional level, too. In fact, I’m desperate to have this experience when I go to a conference. I don’t want a mechanical presenter. I want to feel something of what inspired that individual to do their research in the first place – it will hook my attention. And as a newbie to presenting, I would like to nurture this style too. Though this is in large part down to the personality, confidence, and experience of the individual presenter, I believe that the carefully considered use of images, and design of posters, can assist with this as well. <br /><br />But image hunting isn’t easy. Sometimes, I have problems finding and using the ones I want. I can’t just use any that I like the look of – there are copyright laws and to take these without consent would be illegal. There are some excellent images that can be used but these may have to be paid for. They can be expensive but, unfortunately, I don’t have access to the funds that would enable me to buy these. For example, today I was quoted £50 to use an image that would have looked great on my slides (that includes a student discount too!). Of course, this left me feeling disappointed but I feel unable to hold the cogs of capitalism responsible for this one: these prices seem to be the standard and I can’t blame other people and organisations for wanting to earn a living from their work.<br /><br />But my point is this: I don’t think, yet, that we value highly enough the need to communicate our work to others. Is there anybody that makes allowances in their research bids to buy high quality images? We do think about dissemination in general but I can’t say I’ve sat with researchers and tried to answer questions such as: what is the best way to communicate our research to others? What resources do we need to do this? Are we prepared to pay to access professional resources to help us? I think that we need to address this. I don’t like being denied the use of resources I need to do the best job I can. It’s embarrassing. I just want to present my work to the highest possible standard.<br /><br />Anybody have thoughts, opinions, or experiences they would like to share? Am I asking for too much? Or maybe too little?<br /><br /><br />And, just in case you’re interested…<br /><br />I’ll be delivering my first PhD oral presentation at Salford on June 9th – do come along and listen if you can. I will be speaking about the great civilization of Stoke-on-Trent and why we can’t rely on traditional scientific methods to inform us of the rich experience of our love for such places. See <a href="http://www.pg.salford.ac.uk/sparc11">SPARC</a>. <br /><br />My first poster presentation will also be at Salford on June 16th. I’m very excited about this one. It would make me immensely happy to see you there and we can discuss progressive ideas in poster presentations. More <a href="http://www.sobe.salford.ac.uk/about-us/news/cst-research-showcase-event-on-16-june ">here</a>. Can’t wait!Gareth Morrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14561045099117136649noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-6273781147566450112011-04-29T14:24:00.000+01:002011-04-29T14:24:20.385+01:00Re-thinking the viva<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I've had a lot of conversions recently with numerous colleagues and students from various different universities who have had less than satisfactory experiences in the doctoral vivas which left me wondering....what the hell is happening to the viva? All of the books and website that students routinely read prior to their doctoral examination say useful and helpful comments along the lines of;</span></div><ul style="text-align: justify;"><li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> "you know more about your work than anyone else on the room"</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">"The examiners do not want you to fail"</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The viva should be a discussion amongst peers</span></li>
</ul><div style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">However from the individuals I've spoken to lately there is a real sense that students felt that their work was more under attack than under review with examiners dismissing the approaches taken, the epistemological underpinnings of the work and the standard of writing, leaving them demoralised and disillusioned. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">This made me think that may be students and their supervisors are under estimating the importance of careful selection of examiners and independent chairs. Indeed I was surprised to find that some universities do not have an independent chair for vivas which makes the student even more vulnerable. Is it fair, or even appropriate that the work of, for some students , 5 years or more is approved or otherwise by two people on one day? It's time for a re-think. Maybe it is time for a feedback website so that students can highlight good examiners or even for an examiners registry so that potential examiners can upload their areas of expertise and methodological interests so that examiner selection can be focused and relevant rather than being based upon who a student's supervisor think will be OK as it is at present</span>. <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Or should we go further and try to think of a new way in which PhDs can be assessed - maybe by open access peer review?</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">If PhDs could be loaded onto secure websites for, say, a month and could be thoroughly reviewed by a minimum number of global reviewers - how much more valid would that be?</span></div><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"></span></div></div>Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-77890394958195627672011-04-06T10:11:00.004+01:002011-04-06T10:26:44.237+01:00The High Cost of Low Risk Research<div align="left"><span style="font-family:verdana;">I write this post immediately after attending a seminar on the ‘Psychology of Sustainability’ and feel inspired to write about my views on the trajectory of the sub-discipline. I also invite responses from readers who are far wiser than I about the whys and wherefores of academic research, generally.</span></div><br /><div align="left"><span style="font-family:verdana;">I will begin by saying that I enjoyed this seminar. I have learned to expect variety in the intelligibility and quality of the conferences and seminars I attend but this one was particularly satisfying. For the majority of the day, apart from the odd daydream here and there, I held my attention and actually <em>followed much of what the speakers were talking about</em> – a not insignificant personal success.</span></div><br /><div align="left"><span style="font-family:verdana;">But as the afternoon drew to a close and the speaker rushed through her presentation in an attempt to bring the timing of the day back into its rigidly pre-prepared schedule, my mind began to drift towards some ‘metathoughts’ about the state of the discipline as I have observed it by attending this seminar series (this was the third of three which have been held over the last six months or so). I don’t claim to have stumbled upon some original thoughts or insights on the matter and I apologise if I have ‘borrowed’ somebody else’s analysis -- probable and likely -- but am unable to reference or credit them for it.</span></div><br /><div align="left"><span style="font-family:verdana;">What I want to talk about is the incremental, slow-build approach to developing knowledge in the environmental psychology discipline. Environmental psychology began to emerge in the latter half of the last century and has its theoretical roots in the more established social psychology domain: this is clearly evident in contemporary environmental psychology research, for example, in studies of social norms in pro-environmental behaviour. This is a sensible and worthwhile endeavour; however, research invariably concludes that the findings that were expected to be found were realised and that “<em>more research in this area is needed to understand demographic differences/underlying psychological processes</em>”, and so on. In other words, future research should concentrate on uncovering ever more elusive truths in ever more finely defined detail. Justifying this approach to research no doubt is a conviction that “<em>this is how we build knowledge; this is how we sculpt the fine details of our theories</em>”. This may be so but I would argue that there is an <em>opportunity cost</em> to this: while the best minds in the field are focused on sharpening what there already is, they are not imagining any great leap into the untried and unchartered territory that may deliver the knowledge that we need for the future. The everyday language of academia is hyperbolic and boasts of a commitment to innovation, but to what extent do we follow through on our talk? Are we willing to let our imaginations run riot with regards to research ideas? Are we willing to stake time, finance, and reputation on research <em>just to see what happens</em>? Alternatively, will we continue to design studies that only serve to confirm what we probably intuitively knew already? More broadly, this makes me want to ask: to what extent is prospecting for new research fields restrained by the commitment academics are expected to show towards intellectual rigour (its only rigorous because we already know it or can expect to know it) and narrow theoretical development? I am not suggesting that we abandon all sensibilities towards our research endeavours, but instead that we can begin to endorse an attitude towards research that is not so risk-averse. Truly, if the consequences of human behaviour for climate change are to be believed, and if environmental psychology intends to throw its weight behind the search for solutions, then is it not worth loosening the restrictions that may restrain the intellectual creativity that the discipline needs? </span></div>Gareth Morrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14561045099117136649noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5541829870260829104.post-45024003141062131382011-03-28T10:59:00.015+01:002011-03-28T11:02:01.523+01:00The purpose of education?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="110" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimAGx15HpukCNZw3dnkd53leO8IEbJxwpyqeu43o3Zion-pf8kzaxKMOapOHYCYqblWChKTdrd9XzFY0H7pjCIIdtXAbNesWjCfwjKkIvaz7AfGruk7lbPtEK-XnWfKkRsGLZzUly9ryGB/s200/purposed-badge.png" width="200" /> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://purposed.org.uk/campaigns/500-words/">Vist the Purpos/ed site</a></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Purpos/ed is is an on-line debate about the purpose of education. Throughout February and March 2001 a number of people offered to provide 500 words on this topic. This blog is my contribution</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It is clear that all of the contributors that have posted thus far are passionate about education and the contribution it can make to the world. One of the (dis)advantages of being near the end of this debate is that the exposure to everyone else’s brilliant thoughts leads me to the supposition that everything has been said far more eloquently than I could manage. So I offer this by way of something different -</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Education sets you free,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">To be who you want to be.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It gives you speech,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It gives you wings.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It helps you achieve</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">ANYTHING!!!!</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It moves you from</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Your allotted place</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It helps you to claim</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Your unique space.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It moves you up</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It moves you out</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It helps you whisper</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It helps you shout.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It’s the one true friend</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">You can call your own.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It can be a companion,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">When you are alone.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It’s there for you</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Whenever you need it</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It’s always safe,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">No-one can steal it</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Those who seek</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">To dominate us</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Aim to silence those</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Who educate us.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">To read, to write,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">To think to know</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Should be free to all</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">The fast, the slow,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">The boys, the girls,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">The young, the old,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">The poor the weak,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">The shy, the bold.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">All we have been</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">And will ever be</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Begins with this –</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">a...b...c...d....</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">The ones who teach </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Stay in our minds</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">The right mentor,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Is hard to find.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">But when once found</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">The debt we owe</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Is greater than </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">We ever know</div></div>Loracenna@gmail.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18195902043884586453noreply@blogger.com4