Starting and finishing school: the bar has been set

Presenting your research idea to an audience is hard enough but when it is a requirement to continue your research it is quite daunting. Completing this seminar at 'starting school' means a PHD candidate moves from probationary to confirmed. Then at the 'finishing school' at the end of the research journey there's the final presentation similar to the viva in other countries.

Yesterday, I attended one of each seminar for my school, the School of Education, and it was my first time seeing these types of presentations that I will be also giving in the future. I plan to hold my confirmation seminar early next year (so hold me to that!). It was a privilege to be there for my fellow students and listen to their research journey. 

I now see why my supervisor has been encouraging me to go to these presentations. Not only did I find them enjoyable because they were also from the school of education but because of the following benefits too:

*meet students from other fields and own field

*meet more academic staff

*develop my own ideas

*broaden my knowledge on other topics, methodology and methods 

*learn what works and what doesn't work when presenting own ideas and research

*support fellow students- hopefully they will return the favour when it's your turn!

I'm sure there are many more and I'm looking forward to attending future 'starting and finishing school' presentations. One thing I know is that for the first presentations I attended yesterday, my fellow students certainly set the bar high.