I have to start somewhere.
The second week into my final semester at University of Virginia. It's been rocky, but I can see the light at the end of THIS tunnel. Just this past weekend, my wife, Gwyneth, and I visited Greeley, Colorado so I could interview for a PhD program in Sport Pedagogy at University of Northern Colorado. The interview went very well, and following some texts with my prospective advisor, Scott Douglas, things are looking really good. After hours and papers, exams and presentations, despite some of my best efforts to screw up, it looks that I will have a chance to chase the title of "Doctor."
But there's much more to be done. Last September I was hoping that I would have completed the data collection for my thesis (the process of which has been arduously frustrating) by December. Jeanette, my mentor, and I will just be starting next Wednesday. After that, the chasing of activity devices will begin.
The Thesis...
This is a fun topic in and of itself. Last spring I was approached by my former advisor (who left for UMass after the school year) and was told of someone who was doing a study measuring activity. The idea was to obtain a new pedometer, namely the Omron HJ-324U, and add a questionnaire to the IRB protocol (the piece of paper that says your study is approved and ethical) and then collect data from the subjects that the other researcher is already recruiting. This was supposed to help because 1.) I wouldn't have to start a new protocol, 2.) I wouldn't have to recruit, and 3.) The analysis would be simple; look at the measurements of the pedometer, and the previously validated accelerometer, namely the Actigraph GT3X+, and see if any differences are significant. Mind you...measuring physical activity is related to public health which is not in any way what I am interested in professionally. However, at the time, I was really stretched thin (a separate story in itself which was completely my fault) and the idea of simplicity over interest seemed to make sense.
So cue the complications. As I mentioned, my advisor was slated to leave when we found out that the exclusion criteria for the existing study was so strict, that they weren't able to get anyone for it. The last bit of advice I got from my advisor was to write my own protocol and recruit college students for the study. After he left, my program director, and now default advisor, assigned Jeanette, a doctoral student, to be my mentor for the remainder of the thesis. We found there was no handbook of how to write a thesis, which meant we made it up as we went. Seems simple enough, however, this meant finding out expectations retroactively and then redoing things. Example: Getting IRB approval for the study. This was supposed to be straight forward. Simplified, the study involves wearing two devices on your belt for seven days, writing some information in a log, and returning everything. After writing up the whole protocol, and several delayed email interactions later, we find out that because this pedometer is a "new biomedical device," that we had to fill out a different type of approval - a form that is 8 times more extensive. This delayed everything by 6 weeks. Finally, a little before Thanksgiving, we got approval. However, we determined that we would wait until the beginning of the new semester to start collecting data as we figured exam time would be a bad time to 1.) expect students to be active and 2.) get students to come to the lab when they need to come.
So...with a new semester the adventure continues with more unforeseen forks to be encountered I'm sure. Which leads us to the question..."do I really want 4 more years of this?" Mark Smith, the program director at UNC gave me an article before I left, "The Three Qualities of PhD Students." Mixing whit with insight, the author states:
"There's a ruinous misconception that a Ph.D. must be smart. This can't be true. A smart person would know better than to get a Ph.D."
Well...I guess I fit that mold then. Gwyneth, she herself a Ph.D. student in nursing, reacted as I read that to her in the emergency room, where she is being treated for flu symptoms (normally she's working here...tonight is an exception) confirming that one must be truly out of her mind to take on the task of getting a Ph.D.
The story of UNC will have to wait, but the text I got from Dr. Douglas sums up what lays ahead:
"...Things look good for u guys if we can get you funded."
We'll see Dr. Douglas...we'll see. Until then, I'll start taking a piece of insight from the article from Dr. Smith along with the whit that makes me laugh at my motivations to pursue a doctoral degree. The author advised that "cogency," or the ability to articulate and communicate is crucial to the Ph.D. Many throw around the magical number 10,000 hours of writing to really become an expert at it. Over six years it would take five hours of writing a day to get close. Well...I'm almost two in, and let's count my [one year] online master's, so maybe we can say I'm four a day away. So this post is the first installment of adding more work to my already growing list of assignments in order to do really well that to some may define me as nuts.
Well...as we established. A smart person would know better than to pursue it in the first place.
