PhD Discussion Forum

It depends on the requirements during the first year. My university required for autumn: a mandatory class (3 hours/week), plus a 4-hour block once a week for meetings. I can technically only show up for two days during the week, if I wanted to. No classes needed for spring semester, though or going forward. Supervisor meetings are usually only once a month and are an hour or less.
I'm also encouraged to be affiliated with a research centre, and they have meetings/talks every two weeks or so.

The first substantial piece of writing is due on the one-year mark (8,000-10,000 words, usually a literature review chapter. Considering the first six months is usually reading and notes, with some writing building up, I think you would be okay working part-time while being a student full-time. You need some strong self-discipline, but I gather you're good with that if you've been running your own business! I know several students who have to work part time, time is tight but they easily meet all their deadlines. Some students have admitted to only needing to really work on the PhD 3 hours a day. Make sure you have a good reading and note taking method, and you should be fine.

I'm in a humanities/social science discipline. You might need different advice if you're going into the hard sciences.

Hey N,

I'm studying Politics at Nottingham. Self-funded, international and classified as a 'mature student'. :) Although, I think most of us first years are 35+ . I've had to make a decision to either work part-time and take all four years, or really push hard to finish in two and live off savings, and I think the latter plan is what I'm going for! Which uni are you attending? (also feel free to PM!)

What's Politics at Nottingham like? Its also my field, and I hope to start in 2018. I did think about Warwick and Birmingham, but decided against the idea as it would mean relocating. Maybe we could grab a beer/coffee and exchange some ideas when the weather is more conducive to driving (I am based in the North East).

Haha can I join this group if I say that I'm currently learning social science research methods for my vet science phd? :-)

I just wanted to go back to the original question in that here at the RVC very few people seem to be in all the time and many people seem to come from quite a long way away. I share an office with someone who lives in Bournemouth and another in Oxfordshire.

We have various commitments in terms of research seminars and some mandatory training, but realistically I'd say that I only really have to be in one or two days max... Plus I hate driving the country lanes in the dark so often leave early at the moment to make the most of the daylight! I suspect for me, work load will vary depending on what stage of the project I'm at... At the moment I'm still doing a lot of reading so I tend to break it up and do some work in the evenings and at weekends rather than do a 9-5, Mon-Fri

the more the merrier! Is it possible to create a group here (if not, maybe we could create a FB group?), so that all who are interested can arrange meetings etc.?

Chaotic

I have PM'd you.

N

Hi all

I have created a FB group entitled "PhD student exchanges" for anyone who fancies joining it!

N