Tag Archives: Work-Life Balance

Finishing the Dissertation

Energy Stream (1/5) by Flickr User Joe Skinner Photography
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Advice from Graduate Students To Graduate Students on Finishing Your Dissertation

by Yalidy Matos

Graduate school can be an extremely isolating and lonely experience for many students. It is hard to make time to join social organizations, or for anything other than courses or your dissertation, thus, adding to the isolation and loneliness of it. However, one of the main factors that has helped me is the support from other graduate students. Their friendship and advice has been instrumental to my success in graduate school.

Writing a dissertation can be a daunting and overwhelming experience. It can very easily overwhelm you to the point where you feel immobile; you’re not sure where or how to start. The following is some advice from women graduate students who are either working on or have successfully finished the dissertation.

First, remember that “You can’t eat an elephant in one bite.” Writing a dissertation is a process, it needs to be taken one step at a time. Many of the graduate students emphasize pre-planning, outlining chapters, daily scheduling and writing, weekly goals, and making a dissertation calendar as some of the most important ways they were able to write and ultimately finish their dissertation. Setting feasible weekly goals such as “draft literature review section,” or “edit introduction to chapter x,” are both feasible weekly goals. Each goal focuses on a section of the dissertation, not the entire dissertation or even an entire chapter. Feasible weekly goals allow you to actually meet those goals and reward yourself for it. Another bit of advice from graduate students is to reward yourself for completing a milestone and/or your weekly goal. One of the graduate students, for example, treated herself to a movie when she finished a weekly goal. You are your own cheerleader and advocate!

On that note, get rid of any “negative energy” and speak positively about your dissertation. Getting rid of negative energy can mean many things. Negative energy can come from others, but it can also come from your inner critic. If you have other graduate students who are always speaking negatively about you or your work, make an attempt not to have conversations with them. Always do so politely and professionally. As graduate students we should be able to choose not to have any kind of negativity around us; it hinders our own progress and work. It is the case, however, that we can be our own worst critic. Find a way to release negative energy (exercise, yoga, meditation, counseling, graduate student support groups), and surround yourself with people that cheer you on and love and support you and your work. On a related note, make use of university resources. If your university offers counseling services or graduate student support groups, join! There is no shame in wanting a supportive group of people to talk to and with which to share experiences. Additionally, if your university or department does not offer these types of services, then take the initiative and create a dissertation workshop/group where you only have supportive positive graduate students. Such a group can serve many purposes; it can be a writing group or more of a support group.

Finally, seeking positive energy includes having a supportive dissertation committee. The dissertation process is already difficult and time-consuming; you want your committee to be supportive of you and your work. Committees are not set in stone until you turn in your paperwork to graduate to the graduate school. Seek mentorship from other faculty members with whom you feel comfortable. At the end of the day your dissertation committee should be a group of people who believe in you and push you to be and do better. The relationships with your committee members will not always result in happiness (dissertations are hard work, after all), but they should always be a relationship marked by professionalism and guided support.

Thank you to the following faculty and students who generously contributed tips and advice to this essay: Devyn Gillette, PhD, Post-Doctoral Researcher, UNC-Chapel Hill; Danielle Olden, PhD, Assistant Professor, University of Utah, Department of History; Desiree Vega, PhD, NCSP, Assistant Professor, Texas State University, School Psychology Program; Delia Fernandez, PhD Candidate, Ohio State University, Department of History; Gisell Jeter, PhD Candidate, Ohio State University, Department of History; Tiffany Lewis, Graduate Student, Ohio State University, Arts Administration Education & Policy.

Suggested Additional Resources:

Books:

Single, Peg Boyle. 2020. Demystifying Dissertation Writing. Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing.

Miller, Allison B. 2009. Finish Your Dissertation Once and for All!: How to Overcome Psychological Barriers, Get Results, and Move on With Your Life. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Evans, David., and Paul Gruba. 2002. How to Write a Better Thesis. Australia: Melbourne University Press.

Blogs:

Get a Life, PhD at http://getalifephd.blogspot.com

The Thesis Whisperer at http://thesiswhisperer.com

Yalidy Matos is a graduate student in the Department of Political Science at The Ohio State University. Her dissertation focuses on the dynamics driving public opinion on U.S. immigration policy. Matos is currently a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow.

Dichos: Motivation for Grad Students

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January 14, 2013

Photo by Sharyn Morrow (Flickr, 03/26/05)

By Sara A. Ramírez and Profes

Today, the Mujeres Talk Collective brings together a series of dichos for graduate students as we kick off the year 2013, the winter quarter, and the spring semester. Because many of us do not have frequent access to Chicana camaraderie and mentorship and more of us cannot wait until the Summer Institute to solicit advice, I asked some professors who are MALCS members for their gut/heart-response to the following question:

In a few words, what advice can you give to MALCS graduate students as we resume our work this semester/quarter?

Below are their answers. May the words of these mujeres sabias, this chorus of fairy godmothers, enter our hearts and guide us as we continue on our journeys to do the work we have been called to do. And please, use the comments section of the blog to share dichos that have been helpful to you.

Querida/o [Insert your name here],

Keep from sabotaging yourself. We have to learn to recognize the “worm” of self-sabotage every time it attempts to invade our organism with its tactics and skills of sabotage. It may well have a symbolic relation to Gloria’s “serpents.” Or is it “maggots” I mean to call up? Among those “worms/maggots” is the feeling of incompetence which is our heritage, that is to say, as a colonized people we have always already been judged incompetent, and we become overwhelmed by the “proof” of history. Keep from sabotaging yourself.
—Norma Alarcón, Professor Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley

Make sure to make time for sleep and laughter. Both are good medicine for what ails you. I think of sleep as horizontal meditation, your mind and body enter a new state in which it can heal from the demanding often bruising world of academia. Sleep still helps me process readings and arguments. As for laughter, nothing beats a loud, open-mouthed, body shaking, roaring carcajada!
—Lourdes Alberto, Assistant Professor, The University of Utah

My mom advised when I started first graduate school: Aprende todo lo que puedas. She didn’t mean just what was taught in school, I am convinced, but she was telling me to LEARN … and I have not stopped yet! Otra cosa que se me ocurre is to be patient and not think you are a failure if you don’t do EVERYTHING all at once. Be patient with yourself and acknowledge what an incredible accomplishment it is to be a Chicana/Latina in graduate school.
—Norma E. Cantú, Professor Emeritus, The University of Texas at San Antonio

Find yourself a mentoring circle/support group—preferably one that includes good food!
—Debra A. Castillo, Emerson Hinchliff Professor, Cornell University

There are always little rituals that I have before writing—I clean the house, feed the animals, light candles, clear the air. Sometimes it is a good thing to change the ritual, to change the hour of my writing, the directions, places, mix it up a little with poetry, fiction, a short sexy-funny-clever list of words to begin my writing day. These breaks in routine help me de-stress because if I am stressed, I cannot write.
—Cindy Cruz, Assistant Professor, University of California, Santa Cruz

“Quien adelante no mira, atrás se queda.” Create a year-by-year plan for how you will complete the Ph.D. Study the requirements of your program and map out your course loads, your exam schedule, dissertation preparation schedule and fieldwork time if required. If your program allows it, research classes in other units that you will want to take or professors in other Departments with whom you want to study. Plan how and when you will fulfill language requirement. If your Department offers workshops or orientations on preparing for comprehensives or writing the dissertation proposals, be sure to attend those. (In my graduate study these were organized and led by the graduate student organization in the Department and featured advanced students who discussed their own preparation strategies) If your Department doesn’t offer these, then work with peers to create them with Department help. Ask whether your university offers dissertation support writing groups, which are different than writing groups. In the former, students from across disciplines meet with a counselor as a group every few weeks to share challenges and keep on track. In the latter, peers share and critique each other’s work. Talk to your advisors about your plan every year and be sure to get their feedback on it. —Theresa Delgadillo, Assistant Professor, The Ohio State University

Don’t feel guilty saying no, and trust in your abilities.
—Dora Ramírez-Dhoore, Associate Professor, Boise State University

Don’t compare yourself to other people. Remember you are on your own journey.
—Elena Gutierrez, Associate Professor, University of Illinois at Chicago

Contemplative practice is good, even deep breathing, even remembering to breathe! Find your optimum writing time and be faithful to it, be loyal to yourself, to your obra—that is, you.
—Inés Hernández-Avila, Professor, University of California, Davis

Mija, in all you do know what your spiritual anchor is and tend to it. It may come from your traditions, you may find it in community or perhaps you feel it when you are in nature. It is in this anchor that will always reflect back your greatness and your deep interconnectedness to la vida. The academic part is easy. You’re brilliant and you’ve been admitted, punto final. El camino es lo dificil. Cultura cura … however, spirituality is the preventative piece. —Sandra Pacheco, Associate Professor, California Institute of Integral Studies

Trust your gut, your intuition, your own judgment; avoid anyone, situations, or theories and scholars that make you feel less, badly, disempowered.
—Laura E. Pérez, Associate Professor, University of California, Berkeley

As someone who was also a first generation grad student, it was imperative that I created a strong community of friends/colleagues and a structure of mentorship across cohorts of graduate students and faculty within my department. There is so much knowledge and experience that can be passed down to lessen the anxiety of embarking on such an enormous endeavor.
—Felicity Schaeffer-Grabiel, Associate Professor, University of California, Santa Cruz

Don’t over-do. A chronic thing that haunts me is over-doing. I think that it can be equally detrimental to do too much than to do too little. And for us chronic perfectionists, it can really be debilitating. Also, I’ll say yes to too many things and then land up not doing some very well and then punish myself for it. Not over-doing is about self-care.
—Patricia Trujillo, Assistant Professor and Interim Director of Equity and Diversity, Northern New Mexico College

¡Feliz 2013 y échenle ganas, mujeres!

Sara A. Ramírez is a doctoral candidate in the Ethnic Studies Graduate Program at the University of California, Berkeley.

Comment(s):

Sandra D. Garza January 14, 2013 at 9:31 AM

This is fabulous! Thank you Sara and all the mujeres that contributed to this post. I’m sharing it on FB <3
Annemarie Perez January 14, 2013 at 2:33 PM

Thank you so much for putting this up. It’s wonderful for all of us to read, graduate student or no.
Brenda Sendejo January 14, 2013 at 2:35 PM

Thank you so much to Sara and the contributors for this blog post! I think this is amazing advice for graduate students. I am also grateful for these wonderful words of wisdom as a junior faculty member. They are inspirational and beautiful reminders of how to be, become, and stay healthy and grounded in mind, body, and spirit on our paths. Mil gracias!
Jean Rockford Aguilar-Valdez January 14, 2013 at 10:35 PM

Muchisimas gracias for these little pearls of strength. I’ve been through a lot of pain in my doctoral program, and these words help me find survival and sustenance to carry me through.
Li Yun Alvarado January 16, 2013 at 5:10 PM

Thank you so much for these! They’re fantastic.
Angie Chabram, Professor, UC Davis January 16, 2013 at 10:01 PM

I just decided to forward my own pearl of wisdom:

Watch out for the snakes. They come in all colors and genders. Don’t assume that the academy is your home or that your colleagues are all friends. Remember that you are at work. Yes academics “work.” Live your life to the fullest. Fight hard when you need to, then rest. While you may have comadres, it is you that must wage your fight con ganas y corazon. Be a pragmatist as well as an idealist!
Sara Ramirez January 16, 2013 at 10:08 PM

I’m so happy these words could be useful to so many of us! Please, contact me at sara@malcs.org if there are any other stories you’d like to see posted for grad students!
Claudia Serrato January 29, 2013 at 9:31 AM

Medicina all the way! Gracias! <3
Noemi Martinez February 3, 2013 at 12:17 AM

Lovely, thank you.

Las Madres Profesoras in the Academy

1 Reply

September 3, 2012

Castañeda and son, Miguel Angel

By Mari Castañeda

For the past twelve years, I’ve lived in Amherst, Massachusetts, an iconic New England college town that has a high-income and predominantly white population that often boasts about a family lineage that dates back to the first pilgrim settlers. Luckily for my son Miguel Angel, who is now a seventeen-year-old and about to enter is senior year at the local high school, he’s learned to meet such boasting with his own story of a family lineage that pre-dates those settlers and is tied to the Yaqui Indians of California and Mexico. It has not always been smooth sailing—such as the time his elementary school teacher called me because my son upset his white classmates by telling them with a typical nine-year-old bluntness that “they didn’t belong in this land.” We worked through the incident together, making it the prototypical “learning moment” with his class. For my son Miguel Angel, such historical positioning became necessary in order for him to claim a space in a place that was not originally intended for him. Yet we learned from other friends of color who had a longer history of making space for themselves in the region, and over time built a diverse community of family friends. The making of home and community are indeed socially constructed, in addition to being passed on from generation to generation.

At the 2012 MALCS Institute, Susana Gallardo and I organized a roundtable titled, “Las Madres Profesoras in the Academy” in an effort to create a space to discuss the joys and challenges of working in academic environments while also being a mother/parent. What we found most enjoyable about the roundtable was sharing about how each of us were succeeding and struggling with creating such a balance. In doing so, we learning from each other’s strategies and sabiduria, especially since most of us were the first mujeres in our families to forge this professorial path. We also discussed the institutional realities of faculty positions, which often causes us to be far away from our extended families, thus forcing us to rear our children in communities that are regionally, culturally, and even economically radically different than the ones we grew up in.

When we introduced ourselves at the beginning of the session, we also noted the ages and names of our children—something which often doesn’t happen at conference panels. Although the ages of our kids ranged from four years old to seventeen, it was clear that despite the age differences, we were all trying to figure out how to reconcile our lives in academia (which often negates the personal lives of students, staff, and faculty) with the fact that our children and broader families were at the forefront of our lives.

At the roundtable, we discussed the importance of building such homes and communities on our own terms, regardless of where we were located. Each of us had stories of the lengths we went—whether driving across town, or flying across the country—to make sure our children had a range of experiences that would help them develop a healthy and well-grounded sense of identity. We also discussed ways in which we could influence our institutions to be more sensitive to motherhood/parenthood issues so that we can be in a work environment that allows us to be successful in all the areas of our lives. Increasingly (although perhaps grudgingly), academic institutions are recognizing that they must change their insensitive practices and unrealistic expectations if they are to remain as cutting edge and relevant scholarly environments in the twenty-first century. Creating a work place where mother-scholars are welcomed, encouraged and expected to succeed is central to this shift. For instance, the chair of my department when I first started at UMass Amherst (a white male) was incredibly sympathetic when I told him I needed to teach between 9am-3pm because my son’s inability to be in an after school program as a five-year-old. Not only did he schedule my courses T/Th between those hours, but the faculty meeting was also scheduled between 12-2pm. These seemingly simple accommodations made a world of a difference in mine and my son’s happiness and success.

When I was a graduate student mother in the early-1990s, virtually no conferences held panels, workshops, or roundtables on the topic of balancing motherhood with academia. At this Summer Institute, our panel was one among several on mother-related topics including Danielle Barrazza’s “My Baby Bump” and Karleen Pendleton-Jimenez’ wonderful reading of her memoir on butch pregnancy and motherhood (http://labloga.blogspot.com/2011/11/how-to-get-girl-pregnant.html).

Things are starting to change and it’s great to see that MALCS is once again at the forefront of this important discussion. At the roundtable, it became clear that we wanted to continue the conversation outside of the institute, and thus we are starting a queer-friendly parenting list for MALCS members and affiliates. We hope you will join us in our effort to share experiences, best practices, and a safe space to get advice. Please join us on our new email discussion list! To join the “Madres Profesoras” email list, please email Susana@malcs.org

Mari Castañeda is an Associate Professor of Communication Studies at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. She studies new media and telecommunication policy, Latina/ethnic media studies, and transcultural political economy of communication industries. Her latest book is Mothers’ Lives in Academia, a collection of essays co-edited with Kirsten Isgro, forthcoming from Columbia University Press.

Comment(s):

Theresa (Mujeres Talk Co-Moderator) September 5, 2012 at 7:54 AM

Mari, Your essay highlights how much the question of Chicana/Latina/Native American women’s inclusion in the academy is not only about whether an institution provides affordable and quality child care – which is vitally important, but also about the practices of the profession and the services that we can all make use of to help that next generation. I like how much your essay emphasizes that even the seemingly small gestures matter. Thank you!