What a PhD is/isn’t
A PhD is a degree which signifies expertise in a certain field. It is evidence to everyone that the person holding the degree is qualified to teach within his/her respective field and conduct original research unsupervised. The degree holder has contributed uniquely to knowledge within his/her field, i.e., moved the needle forward in some respect.
A PhD is not a taught or research masters, or a Master of Philosophy (or MPhil). In these degrees, the bar for original research and significant contribution to knowledge in one’s field is lower.
Contrary to popular belief, it is not completely necessary for you to be sure or convinced of the decision to do a PhD before starting. Many people with a lot of determination at the beginning of their programme give up or lose interest halfway. Some others who weren’t sure about starting their PhD in the first place see their programmes through and finish strongly. In fact, we’re part of those people. Ideally, it would be great to have one’s mind made up before starting the PhD programme, but it is not a necessity.
What you need to know to make an informed decision
There are a few things that are important to know before deciding you want to go for a doctoral degree. They include:
- Research area: The first thing you should know to make an informed decision is the research area you want to go into. There’s no way around this. The PhD is mainly research-based. There are some programmes with a taught element to them, for example, EngD programmes, though the taught part is quite small. Therefore, you would need to know what research area you want to go into. Ideally, this should be an extension of what you decided to research for your masters thesis. It doesn’t have to be, but for most people it is. In both our cases, it wasn’t. It was however, based on things we had done in the classroom during our masters. So, you should at least have some background in it.
- Funding: Another thing you need to know is where your funding will come from. Now funding encompasses tuition and living expenses. You need to know or at least have a plan for where this will come from. A lot, not all, of doctoral degrees are funded through scholarships from external bodies. These can be from companies, universities, government or professional bodies like the IET. If you don’t have a scholarship, then the PhD will have to be self-sponsored i.e., by yourself or likely your parents. Sometimes, there’s an option for financing it with both (part scholarship and part self-sponsored), which we did. It’s just important to have a plan or plans for where funding for your degree will come from even if you do not have the funding to hand yet.
- Supervisor: While most universities (especially those in the UK) require you to have a specific supervisor lined up before applying for a PhD, this is not cast in stone. In most cases, you have to first have “acquired” an experienced academic who is willing to supervise your PhD. It’s usually only when you have this commitment that you can go ahead and create an application to the school which that academic belongs. In some cases, it is your potential supervisor that even submits the application on your behalf, so this is quite important.
- Visa: While you don’t have to have your visa ready before deciding on whether to apply for a PhD, you do need to know what is required to actually get the visa. This includes the requisite amount of money you need in your (or your sponsor’s) account, proof of your scholarship, your actual admission letter, etc. While this is not absolutely necessary, it’s just best that you know this information beforehand.
How we transitioned
None of these things have to come in the right order. While reading up on different research areas, we were getting in touch with proposed supervisors. Since we were looking for opportunities in the same university we had our MSc, we had access to the emails of faculty and those who took some modules in our programme. The steps we took can be seen below:
- Read up areas of research development we had an interest in
- Searched for potential Universities that offer scholarships/grants in related areas
- You may have to send a couple of applications, so try to begin before you have all ducks in a row. It doesn’t need to be perfect because this may change in the course of your future programme.
- Sent emails and arranged meetings with potential supervisors
- Depending on the supervisor’s use of personal assistants (PAs) or not, you will need to build relationships with them. Schedule-wise, you may have need to follow up based on the dates “they” are available and try to adapt to suit their schedules.
- Narrowed down ideas into a research proposal
- Drafted our proposals (around 1000-2000 words) and sent proposal for supervisors to review before final submission/application.
- Drafted our PhD and application letters.
- Applied for the PhD – you will be asked to provide the names of your proposed supervisor(s). This was more straightforward since we carried the proposed supervisors along all the way until the application.
- Applied for a new student visa.
Links – Sites for info
There are a number of websites/blogs you can go to in order to find updated information on how to make the transition. These include:
- www.findaphd.com
- www.academicpositions.com
- www.postgrad.com
- www.phdportal.com
- www.studyin-uk.ng/services/phd/
By Tosin Adedipe and Tobi Elusakin
Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash