Discipline Envy

I recently ran across a great quotation from the late Bill Lane, who was a longtime professor at Western Kentucky University: "Never despise your own gift and never covet another." This caused me to ponder something I see repeatedly: discipline envy.

A sense of envy that can so easily turn into rank jealousy finds fertile ground in the "perks" of other academic disciplines, whether they occur in the form of greater institutional support, higher pay, lower teaching loads, elevated

Faculty Relations With the Governing Board

The February meeting of our board of trustees starts this evening, and so this afternoon we held an orientation session for two incoming members of the board. As part of this orientation, I give a presentation on academic freedom, the tenure-and-promotion process, and other matters in which the work of the board is likely to intersect with that of the faculty.

We have a pretty small board—fewer than 25 members. Several of them are prominent local citizens, though

Starting Dates and Pay Gaps

Many institutions are starting to offer contracts to their new faculty members. It's an exciting time all around. For the hiring departments, it's fun to think about the energy and talents the new colleagues will bring. For the incoming faculty members, it's joyous to celebrate leaving the job market behind successfully.

For the new hires, there is often a shock, though, that comes in August: either no paycheck or a reduced paycheck. At many institutions, new faculty members report

Earn Your GED- Find Success Tomorrow

No, not your General Equivalent Degree. The GED to which I refer is “guest experience design.” What the heck am I talking about? I’ll tell you. Old words: customer service. New words: guest experience. Disney, where I am this week, has a concept called a Moment of Truth. A moment of truth is “any time a guest comes [...]

Pursue the Goal Not the Method

In the back of a town car hired to take me to the Kansas City International airport, talking to Jeff, a driver with two kids, self-proclaimed ADD, and a history of quitting rote sales jobs every few months, I realized something of importance to the story of what’s brought me to this place: I [...]

Your Blog From the Prospect’s Point of View

When you use your blog to complain or report sideways about the industry at large, what message is that sending to your potential new clients? If you’re spending your time analyzing what other people in your space are doing, citing why they’re wrong, and providing your commentary about all the things they’re doing, what does [...]

When writing is like the end of a hot dog eating contest

Dear Dissertation Diva, You know that hot dog eating contest on Coney Island? Whenever I open the file of the final chapter of my dissertation, I feel like I've eaten 180 hot dogs. I can't stand to even see one...

Minnesota Graduate School writing resources

A plethora of helpful dissertation writing resources from The Graduate School at University of Minnesota here -- including a link to Dissertation Diva's instant classic, "Practical Advice for Writing Your Dissertation, Book, or Article" (thanks!)

funny update

That professor I posted here about who kept calling on me last semester. I am taking a lecture hall class with him now AND I have not been behaving myself. I am pissed off about what happened last semester so when he calls on me I pretend to not know the answer and I do not smile at him. I roll my eyes and act really bored.

He made everyone in the class meet with him. During my meeting he RANDOMLY says to me, "You need to talk more in class. Last semester I would always call on you and you always had something to say. You were my secret weapon."

He just brought this up to obviate my thinking anything amorous was going on. He knows he was attracted to me and lead me on by calling on me every five minutes. Now he is trying to act like it was purely academic.

UPDATE: I am being completely serious. If you guys can guess what large research university this tenured professor teaches at I will post a link to his profile.

Academic Peer Review, 1945

I don't know whether you guys have already seen it , but I just find the subtitles so hilarous. Have a nice day!

Doing a dissertation via distance,

Since it seems to be doctoral student day here, I guess I need to check in with a problem.

I'm ABD on an Ed. D. in Curriculum and Instruction, focusing on instructional technology and instructional design. I finished my comps in July.



In August, I relocated 600 miles away from campus. My college had no work for me--no GA positions, no GRA positions, no teaching (since I only had a year and a half of public school teaching--in spite of seven years of college teaching--the administrators would not place me as an instructor in EDG classes) positions, nothing. All the while, the adjuncting positions I had in central Florida dried up, and financial aid was refusing to fund a loan for me. I did two MAs at this institution, so my Ed. D. classwork put me over the number of hours allowed a grad student, and FA couldn't look at the common sense of it--that I was making adequate progress on my doctorate. So with no means of making a living in central Florida, I took an offer from a friend to relocate to North Carolina, both to work on my dissertation as well as start a new life.

While my program advisor understood the situation, my dissertation advisor was furious, and the news of this decision was met with a long speech about how I'd never finish if I didn't get the first three chapters of my dissertation done before I moved. But again, with no support from my university, there wasn't a lot I could do.

So for four months, I've been working on the dissertation. In the fall term, I collected research--about 100 articles that I pared down to 84 that were appropriate for the topic. The actual data has been collected--gathered on a project on which I assisted in the 07-08 academic year. When I left, I was given the dissertation of one colleague to look at and model from. I last heard from my advisor in September, and I was told to mail in something when I had it done--again, not even having started the research.

I've almost got the prospectus done--which I've been told is essentially chapter one of the dissertation. I'm hoping to have that done this week. But I've been looking at the second chapter--the literature review--and I'm feeling lost here. In the past, when I've done literature reviews, the piece has opened with some contextual framing, the actual review (broken up into themes or units), and some synthesis. But looking at the dissertation I was given, the lit review looks nothing like that. This author talks about models of lit reviews, discussions of search terms, and things like that before even getting into the review.

So my questions:

1) Has anyone done this before--done a dissertation via remote? What are the coping strategies that helped you survive it?

2) Should I feel like I've essentially been abandoned by my advisor and department?

3) I'm feeling really overwhelmed by the lit review. Those of you who have done a dissertation in education, how did you put yours together? Again, the one I saw in that model dissertation looks nothing like anything I was required to write either during my MA or Ed. D. classwork. Can anyone point me to some reliable online support to help me on the lit review?

4) Being an Ed. D. doctoral student, is there a different rulebook for the dissertation than the Ph. D. That is, since the Ed. D. is a considered a practitioner's degree (in spite of the strong research background), should I be considering a different approach on the lit review? I'm just trying to figure out this disconnect between what I've been taught and what I'm seeing in the model dissertation.

5) Is this overall feeling of anxiety and hopelessness normal for this phase of the degree?

I'm not quitting. I can't quit. I've come too far to quit--or settle for an Ed. S. But at the same time, I'm feeling really lost and overwhelmed on the project right now.

When I want your opinion, I'll ask for it

Too many people, when asked for their opinion, dissemble. Instead of giving an opinion, they push back. They ask, What do you think? Did you do any research? Can we do a focus group? What did Will say? There's a...

TEDthink

Can you factor this? If you're like most people, you get a little queasy at the thought. And when you were in tenth grade, you surely wondered why they were bothering you. (the answer is (x-2) times (x-2), in case...