Dissertation Help: What Can I Expect Out Of My Defense of Proposal?

By E. Alana James
Doctoral students frequently feel unhappy or upset after both their defense of proposal and defense of dissertation processes. Maintaining a positive attitude when receiving criticism is part of the task, but it also helps to understand the defense in light of the entire journey. This article is one of a series offering dissertation help to doctoral students faced with the challenges of graduate work and it focuses on the frequently asked question, "What can I expect out of my Defense of Proposal?" There are two ways to address this challenge: one is to understand the process from your reader's point of view and the second is to set yourself up for success by developing solid and supportive expectations. Both situations are addressed in this article.

The Defense from the Professor's Point of View

Professors generally work in the role of helpful guidance and we enjoy encouraging students while supporting them in learning new skills, and tackling new ideas. Our job changes from helper to one of guardian of the systems we represent when we moved into defense of proposal or dissertation. Half of our job remains helping the students do the best they can, but we also need to be aware that it is our task to make sure that all of the work from our universities passes the scrutiny of the regional certification boards. Having been on both sides of the dissertation defense process, as mentor and advisor on the one hand, and as a reader on the other hand, it is always amazing to me that things I see as a reader I don't always see as an advisor. I've come to understand that this has to do with the fact that when I am advising I have a deep relationship with a student and so I am blinded by the progress they have made and cannot always see the deficiencies they still face. This will likely happen to your mentor and advisor as well. That is why the university requires that your work is overviewed by people who have not read your work up until this time. It is guaranteed that they will see things you have not up until this point understood. Therefore, the best thing you can do for yourself, as a student, is to expect new and substantive criticism when you pass your work into a defense situation.

Set Yourself up for Success

Setting your expectations is critical to your sailing through difficult criticism with ease. Expect that you will receive criticism, and that it will lead to more work on your dissertation than you or your advisor previously thought you needed.

You should expect to be closely questioned on your methodology. Be prepared by double and triple checking for a one-to-one correspondence between your questions, your methodology, and your outcomes. There should also be a correlation between your literature review, your questions, and the variables you expect to measure to answer those questions. You have written chapters and sections as separate pieces, the defense should ensure that they now become one integrated whole. You can save yourself some time at the end by doing a lot of upfront work and massaging those correlations so that they become evident and specific.

Understand the positive potential of the defense process and be on the lookout for those lessons. Going through defense of proposal and dissertation should leave you with a better understanding of the academic process. The rigors of peer review don't get easier with time, although they do become familiar. Therefore, especially if you want to publish, consider that this particular process will repeat itself over and over for the rest of your life. Get comfortable with how it feels, and how you respond to the sticky parts such as strong criticism. An understanding of academic rigor is also a key lesson. It takes a certain kind of strength and courage to revisit work, throw out entire sections, and redo them in order to meet higher standards than we ever knew existed prior to starting. Doctoral work is not for fools or lazy people. This is where you prove the strength your made of.

In summary, you will learn the most from your defense of proposal or dissertation by first understanding the process from your professor's point of view, doing some serious editing yourself before you get there, and then keeping an overview of what you are learning through the process in mind as you go through it. Consider these ideas a few more tools for your doctoral toolbox and pull them out when you need them.