Community: Your Secret Weapon
By Jamie Patterson, Dissertation Editor
I don’t
want you to be afraid, but only a little over half of all students who enroll
in a doctoral program actually complete the program with a degree (Wao & Onwuegbuzie,
2011). Those who do complete the degree tend to take about double to quadruple
the amount of time prescribed by most programs, with the delay occurring during
the dissertation writing process.
As a
dissertation editor I work with student writers who are at all stages of writing
the dissertation. They all approach me with the same plea: tell me how to write this monster of a document.
I’m
afraid the only advice I can give to them, and now to you, is simply: write.
Seek out help and write. The seeking out help part is the key, and here at
Walden we’re trying to develop services that will provide relevant help at just
the right time. For instance, we have been piloting capstone study writing
groups and are hopeful that this will be a service available to all students in
the near future. For now, if you are an EdD student in your first course of
8090 we have a pilot writing group beginning July 16 and running for 6 weeks.
If you’re interested in learning more, email us at writinggroups@waldenu.edu. If you
don’t meet the criteria for this pilot, not to worry, there are options for you
too.
Between
now and the time the editors can offer writing communities for all students, we
still encourage you to embrace the need for community as you write your
dissertation. Reach out to classmates from your previous courses, ask your
chair to connect you with other students, seek out group members in an eCampus
forum or at a residency, or attend a writing intensive.
That is
how you’ll write this monster of a document: with a community of peers, your
committee, and us here in the Writing Center. Even now, you can submit chapters
to tutors through your portal (under “Make an Appointment,” then “Writing
Center”), and tutors will work with you on things like clarity, APA style, and
basic formatting. We want each of you to be in the half that completes the dissertation
and we’re devoted to helping you find and then access the services and
communities to achieve this. It can be done!
----------------------------------------------------------
Reference:
Wao, H. O., &
Onwuegbuzie, A. J. (2011). A mixed research investigation of factors related to
time to the doctorate in education. International Journal of Doctoral
Studies, 6, 115-134. Retrieved from
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This is an interesting and encouraging post. It led me to a search for other posts you have written, and I have printed a couple of them to go in my "capstone instructions" documents. The pilot writing group you mentioned sounds very interesting, but I will not be in 8090 until January 2013. Can you tell me more about how the group will work? Since it is 6 weeks long, I assume it will be an online group. How do you see it working?
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