by Augie Morado The University Writing Center’s Virtual Study Program for Thesis/Dissertation Writers is nearing its conclusion. As mentioned in the May post, I enrolled in the program to make progress on my dissertation this summer. The camp runs Monday through Thursday with sessions in the morning, noon, and afternoon. Morning sessions are straightforward: we log in via Microsoft Teams at 10 am. Ashley Bartelt, a fellow English Ph.D. student who works in the UWC, delivers morning announcements, discusses the day’s itinerary, and then asks each attendee share their goal for the day. Individua ..read more

by Augie Morado This year marks both an anniversary and a turning point for the NIU Grad School. First, our very own Carolyn Law will complete her 25thyear in the Thesis and Dissertation Office. Additionally, Brad Bond, Dean of the Graduate School, will be stepping down to take a sabbatical and will likely return later to the History Department to teach and research. For this post, I asked both Law and Bond to reflect on their time at NIU in their current roles as well as changes they’ve seen over the past quarter century and significant challenges they’ve worked to overcome. Carolyn Law ..read more

by Augie Morado Theses and dissertations are traditionally written and published in print. Given that this remains the standard, you will more likely than not write and publish yours the same way. However, some masters and doctoral students are choosing to publish their theses and dissertations as multimodal projects. These offer novel ways of creating and presenting academic research, and in this month’s blog post, I will further describe the shape some of these projects may take, some recent examples, and options NIU offers for students who are considering completing a multimedia thesis or d ..read more

There’s a lot on your mind when you’re writing your thesis or dissertation; very likely, copyright law isn’t one of them. However, it is extremely helpful to you as a writer and researcher to know how copyright law applies to your dissertation and various forms it may take throughout its lifecycle. Copyright in Academic Contexts According to Kenneth D. Crews, copyright in academia is “primarily about getting the most from your scholarly work, and it is less about the legal complications with threats of possible liabilities” (3). In other words, the purpose of copyright here is not to restrict ..read more

It’s been a solid year and a half since I’ve been in a classroom to teach. I took a break from teaching after the Spring 2019 semester to explore other GA work opportunities at NIU; this is how I came to be in the Thesis and Dissertation Office. During that time, I’ve been working on my dissertation proposal and struggling mostly with how to structure the document. When I began work on my master’s thesis in 2015, I wrote a proposal which I defended, and while I realized that my scope was a little broad, my advisors’ comments were helpful in narrowing my focus to something manageable for that p ..read more

by Augie Morado The first few weeks of the COVID-19 shutdown in mid-March this year were kind of fun. I learned that almost all of my work as a writing tutor and grad assistant could have been done from home this entire time, plus I didn’t have to commute, which meant saving a lot on gas. The best part was that the students I spent the rest of the semester working with caught on quickly to the new challenges of working and learning remotely, an easy learning curve for most involved. All things considered, life was good, and this felt like something I could get used to. At the end of the spring ..read more

Six months after the shutdown back in March, COVID-19 continues to affect what students, staff, and faculty can safely do on campuses. As NIU continues remote learning through the Fall 2020 semester, all departments are adapting to best serve students’ needs now as well as in the future, when things will hopefully return to normal.  One way The Graduate School at NIU continues to support students is through its Graduate Career and Professional Development Program. While many workplaces offer career development programs for recent grads they hire, NIU’s program, one of national repute, off ..read more

by Augie Morado The Department of Counseling and Higher Education at NIU offers doctoral students in its Ed.D. in Community College Leadership program the option to submit a “dissertation of practice” rather than a conventional, monographic dissertation.   According to the Community College Leadership page on the Department of Counseling and Higher Education’s site (pictured above), the dissertation of practice, also called “dissertation in practice,” “takes an innovative practice-based approach to research.” Although the page says little else at the moment about this genre ..read more

by Augie Morado and Tiffany Messick Augie   As masters and doctoral students, how can we continue making progress on our theses and dissertations during the COVID-19 shutdown? To begin, it would be helpful to review the “COVID-19 Guidance for Research, Scholarship and Artistry” on NIU’s website. This page outlines NIU’s definition for “essential research”: “research that has the potential to address the COVID-19 crisis; human-subjects research that would endanger research participants if stopped; or projects where termination of the activities would lead to loss of long-running experi ..read more

It can be difficult when deciding on a thesis or dissertation project to figure out what you’re your methods section will look like – what method to choose - whether to choose to conduct quantitative or qualitative research based on your interest. Quantitative data are used when a researcher is trying to quantify a problem or address the "what" or "how many" aspects of a research question. It is data that can either be counted or compared on a numeric scale.  Qualitative data describes qualities or characteristics. It is collected using questionnaires, interviews, or observ ..read more