Dissertation — Blog — Jenn Dumoulin

How to Write a Dissertation: Just Keep Writing

“Wow! Time flies when you’re… sitting in front your desk for large chunks of time several days a week.” Does that sound… frustrated? Or pessimistic? It shouldn’t - sarcasm doesn’t travel well in text format. Let me re-phrase.

WOW! Times flies when you’ve been focused and diligently chipping away at the first chapter of your dissertation. That statement is true. Time flies and deadlines loom. It’s a fact of life. In just over two weeks, I’m aiming to submit a draft of the first chapter of my dissertation to my supervisor. And I couldn’t be happier!

I won’t say that it’s been easy getting here, but in the past month I’ve written more than 30 pages (and most of is decent, which is a HUGE win). I still have another 10-15 left, but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel - and the week off that I plan to take before beginning Chapter 2. With that said, I thought I’d share some of the challenges and tips that I’ve used to overcome them along the way.

Ph.D, LifeJennifer DumoulinJune 12, 2020Dissertation, Wri, Ph, Academic

How to Write a Dissertation: Getting and Staying Organized

About a month ago, I blogged about how I was finally getting started on writing my dissertation and some of the challenges that I had overcome to get to that point - including writing my chapter outlines (or creating my roadmap) and establishing my timelines (or figuring out how long it would take me to hit each landmark).

While writing a dissertation or thesis comes with many challenges - everything from picking a topic to finding a supervisor, to doing a Boolean search or triple-checking your spelling, grammar or citations - early on in research and writing process, it’s important to get and stay organized. Having an organization system that you’re comfortable with is key. This applies to both researching and writing.

Everyone’s system will be a bit different, based on how we think, what tools we like to use, whether we like to read online or in print, and even how we envision the final presentation of our research. This post explores some of the tools that I’ve started using for this ginormous project

Ph.D, ResearchJennifer DumoulinMay 7, 2020Research Process, Writing, Organization, Dissertation