First Deposit Accepted

Yesterday, my first deposit of my dissertation to the Graduate College was accepted.  They require that I make 13 minor edits before I make my final deposit.  However, I may have more to edit and revise.  Within the next few days, I should receive feedback from my proofreader for grammar, spelling, and mechanics edits and my co-chair for minor content revisions.  Once I hear from them, it should take me a week or two to make all the necessary revisions and edits.  And then I can make my final deposit.  And then I will be done with the dissertation process.

Proofreading

I am fortunate to have a friend who worked as an editor for a few newspapers volunteer to proofread my paper for grammar, spelling, and mechanic errors that I have continued to miss over the many times I have looked over my dissertation.  He has already looked through half of the dissertation, and I have corrected the errors he pointed out for the first few pages.  It's alarming to find so many minor issues that I and my committee have overlooked.  Luckily for me, most of these errors did not interfere with understanding the main points.

My friend volunteered at the right time.  I just posted my progress on Facebook and that I was about to hunt for a good proofreader when he volunteered.  I didn't even think of asking friends to proofread my dissertation because that seemed like an incredible burden to put on a friend.  Admittedly, he had some interest as he is part of the target population of my research interest, a sojourning English language teacher.  However, having an interest in the content may be distracting when proofreading.

Reflecting on the Revision Process

Now that I am about a month removed from the revision process, I would say that revising Chapter 1 was the most difficult as it frames the whole study.  Revising Chapter 1 probably took twice as long as any chapter.  Revising Chapter 4 also took a long time, but it was mostly an organizational change.  I had to make sure that all the rearranged sections had new or improved transitions that improved the chapter's coherence and cohesion. 

I expected Chapter 5 to take a long time but I found that process the most enjoyable so the time flew by.  Chapter 5 is like the playground of ideas compared to the massive apartment building of ideas of Chapters 1-4.  I'm using this metaphor because it seems like Chapter 1 provided the foundation for the rest of the dissertation to stand.  The ideas in Chapters 2-4 had to be in the right place and in the right order for the readers to walk there way around from chapter to chapter and from section to section.  Previously, some chapters were more like mazes.  Once the reader finishes Chapter 4, the can go outside and enjoy the playground of ideas in Chapter 5 which I believe has a better view of the apartment building of Chapters 1-4.  After reading a few dissertations and many research articles, I have found that it's the discussion and conclusion at the end that I really look forward to reading.  The ideas I find there help me form ideas for continuing an investigation, which is like playing.

Editing

The first couple of weeks in June, I used my APA Publication Manual on my iPad as a reference while I went through all of the citations and references in the dissertation.  I am glad to report that the majority of these things were done correctly.  However my biggest issues were with amperisands and writing et al. correctly without italics.

What surprised me most was the room for flexibility the APA Manual gave me for formatting my tables and figures.  I expected excruciatingly constrictive guidelines, but those seemed to exist mainly for quantitative studies with lots of statistics to report.  It seems that quantitative researchers have to grapple more with that issue than qualitative researchers who usually have to write more.

Conclusion

I'm not done yet, but I feel like all the major obstacles of getting done are gone.  My co-chair and proofreader are letting me enjoy the waiting time, which I am using to contemplate life after the dissertation.   That reminds me, I need to plan the graduation party.

Post-Defense Revisions, part 2

Several weeks have passed since my defense.  The drained and somber emotions of the defense have passed, replaced with a determination to make all the revisions based on recommendations and suggestions from the committee.  A lot of bullet biting has helped me sweep through revising the first four chapters.  It's Memorial Day weekend, and I only have one chapter left to revise.  I'm taking the day off to enjoy the thought of laying down the last piece of this five-year long puzzle next weekend.  It's been quite a reflective time.

Biting the Bullet
Over the last year, I have been tied to the thought that I was using grounded theory for my dissertation.  Although I have been using some of the techniques used in grounded theory for my data analysis, I had always had a theoretical framework in the back of my mind.  My issue was that this theoretical framework is based on a model designed for teachers.  The model was created by a well-published researcher in my field, but the model itself was not grounded in research.  Instead it was based on his personal experiences and observations as an English language teacher and as an educator of English language teachers.  My committee helped give me the courage to credit this model as my theoretical framework as my research helps ground the model. 

I was also tied to involving a popular theory used in culture shock studies, but my committee helped me finally come to the conclusion to drop it from the dissertation.  Although I have evidence to support this theory, it distracts from the bigger theoretical framework mentioned in the previous paragraph.

My problem was that I wanted to show how my research supported many theories and models used in second language education, intercultural communication, and acculturation psychology.  What I learned from the defense is that I should show how my research supports just one of the theories or models as it makes for a tighter argument.  This was a blessing in disguise because I can publish other articles showing how my dissertation research supports the others.  I really don't feel qualified to publish much in acculturation psychology, but I feel that my experiences, training, and research in intercultural communication qualify me to publish in that field.  I will sound find out as I will be presenting my findings at a conference on intercultural communication.  Fortunately for me, many of the organizers have backgrounds in second language education.

Revisions
After my defense, I reopened my Facebook account and I have been keeping my friends and family informed of my post-defense revision process.  I closed my Facebook after my I completed collecting data.  That social network was an easy temptation to distract me from data analysis and writing Chapters 4 and 5.  With the defense behind me, I feel like I can handle the distraction again.  (I also discovered that I like Facebook even less now, and I'm looking to close the account again soon.)  Below are my reports that I posted on Facebook.

Friday, May 9, 2014

• Post-defense revision, step #1: I just gutted 10 pages from Chapter 1, thus providing me a sense of both pain and relief at the same time. This is how my weekend begins!
• Post-defense revision, step #2: I just spent an hour combing through and correcting grammar inconsistencies in Chapter 3. My work for Friday is complete. How's your weekend so far?

Saturday, May 10, 2014

• Post-defense revision, step #3: I have re-framed and strengthened my arguments in Chapter 1 ahead of schedule. I can now take it easy until I receive more feedback from my committee co-chair.

 Sunday, May 11, 2014

• Post-defense revision, step #4: Chapter 1 completed! Proofreader needed when all chapters are revised. Goals for the weekend are accomplished.

Friday, May 16, 2014

• Post-defense revision, step #5: Removed 6 pages from Chapter 2 that will never return in another form. May remove up to 10 more tomorrow. This is how my weekend begins.

Saturday, May 17, 2014

• Post-defense revision, step #6: Reorganized half of Chapter 2 and wrote a much stronger introduction. Added 4 pages and removed none. That was my Saturday morning. How was yours?
• Post-defense revision, step #7: Streamlined the middle third of Chapter 2 this afternoon. I removed more pages than I expected, so I'm back to 10 fewer pages than the draft used in the defense. I will finish chapter 2's revisions tomorrow. Picnic time is coming!

Sunday, May 18, 2014

• Post-defense, revision, step #8: Chapter 2 revisions have been completed with even more pages removed. The incision was easier than I imagined. And it's only 8:15 in the morning!

Monday, May 19, 2014

• Post-defense revision, step #9: I spent my morning revising Chapter 3, which needed the least revisions of the 5 chapters. This is how I spend my vacation day!      

 Saturday, May 24, 2014

• Post-defense revision, step #10: Reorganized two-thirds of Chapter 4 this morning. I didn't realize that I neglected to report an important finding that added as many pages as I removed in the past 2 days. This process took twice as long as I expected. Ugh!
• Post-defense revision, step #11: I have completed my Chapter 4 revisions! One chapter to go, but first I must enjoy the remainder of the Memorial Day weekend,   

Looking back at my Facebook status updates, I seem to be very conscious of the page count.  I don't really care what the final page count is, but I like to see how my revisions affect the page count.  When I first submitted my first draft of all the chapters, it was over 300 pages long.  When it was delivered to the committee, I cut about 30 pages from it based on my co-chairs' suggestions.  Now it's 20 pages shorter with most of those pages cut from Chapters 1 and 2.  Chapter 4 was the most interesting to view as I removed nearly as many pages as I added.  I think I ended up with one page fewer than when I began Chapter 4 revisions.

In revision step #10, I noted that I neglected to report an important finding.  I was surprised because the finding was clearly in my brain and in my introductory presentation at the defense, but it was missing in Chapter 4.  This error alone shows why it's important to go over your dissertation several times.  A third-party proofreader would most likely not catch that as he or she is not familiar with your content.

I am still considering a third-party proofreader mainly to catch APA-style problems.  I have a friend that may be able to be this proofreader who may do it for free in exchange for me proofreading one of his articles.  I think this is more than fair, with me on the more beneficial side.

Next Steps
By next Sunday, June 1st, I should have Chapter 5's revisions completed.  So on Monday, June 2nd, I will submit my revised dissertation to my co-chairs to show that I have considered their suggestions.  During the week of June 1st, I will see how easy or difficult it is to edit my dissertation to APA guidelines.  If it is difficult, then I will contact my friend to proofread it.  If it is easy, I will give myself a week or two to do it myself.  By the end of June, I should have heard from my co-chairs, the APA editing should be complete, and I can make my first deposit to the Graduate College.  Then it's in their hands for about a month.  They are the final gatekeepers of the PhD degree.

Post-Defense Revisions

Let me start this post by saying that I did not expect the defense to wipe me out physically, emotionally, and cognitively for such an extended period of time.  Now that I am sleeping better, I wonder if I am still suffering from post-defense fatigue or from allergies.  Probably both.  I'm still a bit in a mental haze in my day-to-day routines.

Aren't you done?
No, I need to make a lot of revisions to my dissertation before I submit it to the Graduate College, which is the last step before earning the PhD.

But you passed--
Yes, under the condition that I make these revisions.   Ideally, I would have liked to have had another month or two to edit my dissertation before defending.  However, I wouldn't be able to defend during the summer because most of my committee members would not be around at the same time.  I wanted to defend before the spring semester ended.  I knew this meant that my dissertation would not be as polished as I and my co-chairs would have liked for the defense.

How much do you have to revise?
My first impression to the defense was that I had to revise more than I expected.  But after thinking it over (obsessively: therefore lack of sleep), I had many of these revisions in mind before defending.  My committee made it clear that I had to make all of them, plus a few more.

I haven't confirmed with my co-chairs yet, but it seems that Chapters 1 and 2 need the most revision in terms of reframing and/or strengthening my argument for the research project.  Chapter 4 and the first half of Chapter 5 also need a lot of revision, but that seems to be more of reorganizing than rewriting.   Chapters 1 and 2 will probably take at least one week each to revise.  Chapters 4 & 5 will probably take a week.

What about Chapter 3?
My most embarrassing mistake was here.  In February, I changed the verb tenses in Chapter 3 so it read more like a descriptive process narrative than a proposal.  Those changes were saved on Dropbox on one computer.  I then made content changes a few days later on my flash drive on another computer.  When I saved those new changes on Dropbox, it saved over the previous version with all the grammar changes.  That was the last time I looked at Chapter 3 for revisions, unfortunately and embarrassingly.  Making those grammar changes were tedious, but I must repeat the tedium again.  Ugh!

How does this change your original revision plans?
Yes, well I foolishly thought my committee would suggest a few minor changes.  I thought this would take a week or two and then I would spend the rest of June checking and double-checking the format according to APA and the Graduate College template requirements, which is probably more tedious than checking the grammar in Chapter 3. 

Now it appears that May and June will be too tedious for one person to bear (I lightly jest), so I am now more seriously considering to hire a proofreader for APA and the template.  This will afford me more time to make better revisions to the content and organization of the paper.

Do you recommend others to follow your path?
Not really.   One reason is that it's hard to follow most PhD candidates' paths because the situations and contexts are different.  Even if someone had the same dissertation committee and a similar dissertation as mine, that candidate's writing and revising strategies may completely differ from mine.

Will you be able to get it done in time?
Yes, I am not worried about that.  I am looking forward to not having to worry about it anymore.  That is in August. 

Chapters 4 and 5

This past Wednesday, I met with the co-chairs of my dissertation committee about Chapter 4 and possibly graduating this May.  It was surprise to me that they suggested that Chapter 4 could be split into two chapters, thus making my study a six-chapter dissertation.  For the next month, my co-chairs will read through my 102-page chapter to see if it would be better represented in two chapters.  The reasoning for two chapters, besides the length, is that it has two major parts. The first part reports the shared patterns across the multiple cases and the unique findings of the single cases.  The second part ties these findings to one model and one of the acculturation theories from the literature.  The end result is a new model that I created.

After discussing my concerns about my current revisions to Chapter 4, I found it much easier to complete my first round of revisions yesterday.  I had a list of 19 revisions to make, but I decided against most of them that suggested expansion and collecting more literature.  I will save those suggestions for future papers associated with the dissertation.  So yesterday I completed my first round of revisions and my second draft of Chapter 4.  I will wait to hear from my co-chairs next month to begin the third draft of Chapter 4 and perhaps creating Chapter 5 out of a significant portion of Chapter 4.

For now, I will continue as if Chapter 5 is the final chapter.  March is dedicated to writing and revising Chapter 5.  I will have less free time compared to February, which granted me more time than I allotted for Chapter 4 thanks mostly to the harsh winter weather.  In March, I will have three weekends partially or wholly taken up by conferences.  And it is the weekends when I make the most progress in terms of writing.  Fortunately, Chapter 5 will only be about 1/3 of the length of Chapter 4.

As for graduation, I doubt that I will graduate this May.  I have to apply for my degree by Thursday this week and submit the first draft my whole dissertation to the Graduate College by the end of March.  I could do both, but I would be doing so without any feedback and I would be in a rush.  These three conferences in March make it more hectic as well. 

What makes graduating in May most difficult is to gather my dissertation committee before the Graduate College's deadline for the final draft in early May.  I would have to assume that my committee would request no major revisions so I could turn it in within a week or two.  If I didn't have a full-time job, this would not concern me.  However, I work in another institution of higher education that shares a similar academic calendar as the University of Iowa, so I will be facing crunch time at the same time in both institutions as the spring semester winds down.

After March and my next meeting with my co-chairs, I plan on revising all the chapters in April.  The biggest revision may be turning Chapter 4 into two chapters.  If that is not the case, I am sure that my co-chairs will still have some major suggestions for revising Chapter 4 anyway.  I plan to dedicate at least half the month on this.  The other half will be spent on revising the other chapters, so I will be ready to defend in early May. 

In March, I will be sending out a Doodle poll as part of my request for a dissertation defense in early May.  Sometime in the first half of April, I will send my committee the current drafts of all my chapters.  I feel mostly ready to defend Chapters one through four, and I look forward to writing Chapter 5 very much.  I am certain that I will feel ready to defend Chapter 5 by late March.

All this means I will most likely not be able to graduate in May.  Instead I will apply for my doctoral degree in June to graduate in the summer.  With my defense behind me, I will have more time to make final revisions and correctly format the dissertation.  For a summer graduation, the Graduate College needs my first draft in early July and my last in late July.  However, I won't be able to walk in the commencement ceremony until December, which is all right by me.

Revisiting Chapter 1

Upon having my research proposal accepted back in March 2013, it was suggested that I concurrently revise Chapters 1 and 3 while I collected and analyzed my data.  Although I took the suggestion for revising Chapter 3 as that made the most sense to me, I held off on revising Chapter 1 until now.  I believe that revising Chapter 1 after writing the first draft of Chapter 4 is more beneficial because that process will better help me connect Chapters 1 and 4 when it is time to write Chapter 5.

Today is the day that I finally revisited Chapter 1, and I did this by first listening to my research proposal, which I recorded on my Macbook Pro using Garageband.  I have to admit that the sound quality of the recording was superb being that my computer was on the other side of the meeting room from most of the committee members.  Sadly, this has been my best use of Garageband.

I remember that my co-chairs recommended me to listen through the proposal about a month after the meeting, but I was not mentally prepared for that.  I took notes on the most vital elements concerning participant selection and data collection to begin the process, so I did not have an urgent need to listen to that meeting, which now seems less painful than I remembered it to be.  All I remembered was that I would need to listen to the recording once it came time to revise Chapter 1.

A mix of emotions hit me while listening through this proposal.  After the initial feeling of discomfort, I felt delighted because most of the sticky points in the first half of the meeting have already been resolved.  Most of the difficult issues were about participant selection, a process that has come and gone long ago.  I think what made this part of the proposal difficult was that I had more confidence than my committee members since I was unable to show enough evidence of participants. 

Another eye-opening moment was learning about how stubborn I was.  Even though I took much of their advice, I did not convey this to them.  I should have said something like, "Thank you.  I understand your point, and I will make the changes as you suggest."  For some items, I had a high degree of uncertainty, but I did not want to take all of their suggestions, especially because some of them conflicted with earlier suggestions given by my co-chairs.

In retrospect, I am glad I was stubborn with a few points, but I should have acknowledged that my committee's advice was helpful for the many other points.  I also believe I was a different person at the time because my anxiety of the research proposal may have been eclipsed by the anxiety of being on the market and on the cusp of getting hired.  I survived.

While I was listening to the research proposal meeting, I took notes on all suggestions for change concerning Chapter 1.  I was surprised that the suggestions were fewer than I remember.  However, there was one important suggestion that is contentious because there was a disagreement between my co-chairs and the rest of the committee.  And most of this disagreement occurred when my co-chairs were not present at that time of the meeting.  I know my co-chairs would like me to disregard most of this suggestion, but I need to confirm if I should disregard most or all of the suggestion.  If it is all, it would make a far easier revision of Chapter 1.

There were a few surprising elements in the research proposal that seem to end up in my favor.  The first is that some members of my committee did not like a research question that I was unsure of when I wrote it.  Now that my data analysis is (mostly) complete, I have found that I can take out this question.  The other surprising element was that one of my committee members already had a clear idea for publishing my results that did not become very clear to me until I had completed my data collection.  I will be writing more on this later, but this element has given me more confidence to pursue a certain publication path once this dissertation is completed.

My next step is now to revise Chapter 1, but I can't completely revise it without confirming a few items with my co-chairs.  Depending on the input from my co-chairs, this revision to Chapter 1 could take as little as a day or as much as four days.  Nonetheless, this revision is not as lengthy as I thought it might be.