Getting going under a lockdown: PhD Journal Month 2

My first full month as a PhD student was spent in a second national lockdown, though in many ways day-to-day life wasn't tangibly different for me. Despite having nowhere to go, I didn't feel like I was amazingly productive and this month still felt 'bitty', interspersed with some more induction events and admin. It was good to join the welcome events for the White Rose DTP and meet some staff and fellow PhDs, but I did feel a tinge of sadness about not being able to meet in person (and regret that I opted not to go to the induction in my MRes year!). At the same time, making the effort to get together regularly with other PhD students in virtual writing retreats and focused working blocks has really helped with feeling connected and remembering that there is a research community out there - even if I have to stay in here for now.  

November included my first supervision meeting (as a PhD student) with both of my supervisors - and the news that I'd be getting a second Sheffield Hallam supervisor, making a supervisory team of three! I'm excited to meet Dr Jean Harris-Evans - virtually - in December. In this meeting we spent some time discussing the options for reworking my MRes dissertation into a journal article. This will take some work (it's 15k words now and will need to be 7-8k works for my target journals) but I'm keen for the research to reach a wider audience and feel like writing and submitting a paper will be really good practice. We also talked through some initial ideas for reading and data collection approaches for my PhD project, which will feed into my RF1 submission (approval of research programme) due in January. This month I got around 650 words of the 'details of proposed research programme' section written, the meatiest part of the document which should provide a succinct literature review, methodology and schedule for completion of the project (c.1000 words). While tricky to write at this early stage and likely to change in some ways, I'm finding it a useful exercise for getting my thoughts in order. 

The rest of the month was spent doing some reading (ten journal articles/book chapters/reports read and summarised this month according to my log) - I particularly enjoyed 'Integrating critical realist and feminist methodologies: ethical and analytical dilemmas' (Parr, 2015) and 'Constituting neoliberal subjects? “Aspiration” as technology of government in UK policy discourse' (Spohrer, Stahl & Bowers-Brown, 2018). I also set up a number of personal development actions in the RDF Planner; for this academic year, these include finding a low-key opportunity to present my MRes dissertation research or early PhD work, building my networks, joining a relevant membership association/learned society, and creating a project plan for the next three years. Finally, outside of PhD life... I moved house! I'm now an official resident of Kingston-Upon-Hull and haver of spare bedrooms for the first time in my life. Yikes!

November development 

General doctoral skills

• White Rose DTP welcome events
• Doctoral skills webinar - Critical writing for your Doctorate 
• Staying well and being productive (while social distancing) - WRDTP
• How to plan your PhD - WRDTP
• Media engagement workshop 
• Virtual writing retreat with other PhD students 

Subject related events

• Equivalent qualifications: alternative routes into higher education 
• Taking stock of social theory in education research: Hybridity, methodology and critical reflexivity 
• Social Policies and Distributional Outcomes (SPDO) event: Trends in Adolescent Disadvantage

Photo credit: Patrick Tomasso