The ABCs for ABDs: Tips for Working Your Way through Dissertation to PhD

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Brief Abstract

All-But-Dissertation (ABD’s) are candidates in the last stage of a Ph.D. This BoF is intended to support Ph.D. students that are just beginning dissertation work to well established ABD’s. Topics open for discussion include working with your advisor, parsing down your research topic into a workable dissertation, time management, balancing life and work, self-contracts, positive attitude, perseverance and motivation. Participants are invited to add their own topics and questions.


Follow-Up after GHC'08 BoF

Hi All! If you were able to attend the BoF, we hope you enjoyed it and found it informative. The ABC's for ABD's PPT slides posted here can be used with our permission and must be cited properly.


The template is a Microsoft Word Template that I use as a general guideline for my daily "logs." These questions were taken from Bolker's "Writing your Dissertation in 15 Minutes a Day" book. Feel free to use / edit / modify the template as you see fit. I welcome new ideas for the log, so if you add something that's useful to you, please send me an email at ssteinfa@cs.kent.edu and let me know about it. To actually use the template, load in the directory where you can find the user installed / created templates for Word and copy it there. Then when you start a new project, you can use that template for your files. OR you can just save it as a document file and let it be at that.


RESOURCES (in italic the most influencial ones)

Books and articles useful before and along ABD - What are the rules of the game?

  • Bolker, Joan (1998). Writing Your Dissertation in Fifteen Minutes a Day. Holt and Co.
  • Cockburn, A. (2000). Writing effective use cases: Addison-Wesley Professional.
  • Hamming, R. (1986). You and your research. Unpublished manuscript, Morristown, NJ, USA.
  • Kelley, R. (1999). How to be a star engineer. IEEE Spectrum, 51-58.

  • Rugg, G., & Petre, M. (2004). The unwritten rules of phd research: Open University Press.
  • Zobel, J. (2004). Writing for computer science: Springer.

Online dictionaries, encyclopedias

Online digital Libraries or search engines

Software

  • Besides: track-changes option in Microsoft Word and Adobe Acrobat Professional J

Other resources THAT WERE VERY USEFUL

* Byrne, R. (2006). The secret: Atria Books/Beyond Words.

* Covey, S. (1989). The 7 habits of highly effective people: Free Press.

  • Covey, S. (2004). The 8th habit: From effectiveness to greatness: Free Press.
  • de Bono, E. (1992). The 5 day course in thinking: Penguin.
  • de Bono, E. (1999). Six thinking hats: Back Bay Books.

* Goleman, D. (1995). Emotional intelligence: Why it can matter more than iq. New York: Bantam.

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