FERSA University of Cambridge Blog
Faculty of Education Research Students' Association
The PhD journey is also not always fair or objective.Some people have money, some people have creativity, some have great social support, some have romance, some have their family around, some have familiarity with British society, some don’t look like outsiders, some never have problems with their supervisors, some have charisma, some have native English, some have peace, and some have good health.It is not fair, but everyone has something valuable.
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I’m a Cambridge graduate, a scholar, well into my second post-doc year, and I manage anxiety and depression. I’ve managed it all my life, even long before people talked about it, or understood what it was. And yes, I managed it whilst completing a stressful academic programme at one of the top universities in the world.
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Walking yourself to physical and mental health has become a thing, but like the Knight in Alice in Wonderland, I claim: “It’s my own invention!” At least when it comes to walking supervisions. Some of my former students, as far back as seven-eight years, may remember moments when, after a long and frustrating session in my hot, dark office I suggested going for a walk.
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As my country, the United Arab Emirates, celebrates its second-ever Emirati Women’s Day (August 28 2018), I wanted to share some personal reflections about being a single mother navigating the PhD experience here at Cambridge.
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If you go around asking people in academia for things that would make students write higher quality PhDs, I doubt many people’s first answer would be a furry friend. I doubt it would even be present on most people’s list. I may be a bit biased (ok, I’m totally biased), but I’m here to say that it should be! Here are five reasons why pets are an excellent way to give your PhD a boost. Disclaimer – this post might just be an excuse to look at cute pictures of furry PhD assistants (but it’s still all true).
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I am Lina and I like pictures. If asked to introduce myself to a group of academics, I would say: “I am Lina and for my PhD thesis I explored how children engage with wordless picture books.” Given my love for visual stories and my PhD topic, I hereby succumb to a temptation I always had in mind: to summarise my entire PhD life in 8 pictures. A complete thesis for the Faculty of Education at the University of Cambridge is equivalent to approximately 80000 words. Based on the famous saying “a picture is worth a thousand words”, for the sake of this blog post, let’s equip images with even more power and try to visualise a four-year PhD experience.
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This week a new cohort of PhD students is about to embark on their doctoral journeys in Cambridge. Although this is surely an exciting time, filled with many hopes and expectations, starting a PhD can also feel scary and overwhelming – How should you organise your work? Are there any tools or strategies that could be particularly helpful in staying on top of things? And how do you build good professional relationships during the PhD? With some of these questions in mind, we asked current PhD students and academics for advice and encouraged them to share their best #PhDlifehack with us on Twitter.
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Before 2011, I had never thought that one day I would choose to do a PhD. But I did it! I have not suffered from ‘Permanent Head Damage’, though it is true that I find it a ‘Probably Hard to Describe’ experience. What I hope to share with you are some of my thoughts when I look back on my journey 2 years after my PhD viva.
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In this blog post, Amy Haidi shares a poem which represents the thoughts she had during her first term as a PhD student at the Faculty of Education in Cambridge. Amy also reflects on the joys and challenges of undertaking a PhD, highlighting how Cambridge is a special place for learning.
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As storied and unique as Cambridge is, its collegiate system is perhaps simultaneously the most baffling, interesting, and worthwhile. Particularly as a foreigner, I had little idea how to go about selecting one, or what would come with being a member of a college. I was originally bemused by this system and thought little more of it than an idiosyncrasy of an eight hundred year old university. It was after my arrival that I came to understand its value and appreciate what it had to offer.
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