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How to Choose an Adviser for Your Dissertation

Many doctoral students face difficulty choosing their advisers and committee members. Every university has different parameters about the choice of advisers. Sometimes scholars have advised their supervisors upon entry to the programme and recommended to stick to those advisers until viva preparation. Some departments provide liberty to scholars to keep switching their advisers. You should think the following questions at the time of considering an adviser and a dissertation topic as the answers to these questions will help you decide about choosing an adviser.

Does the adviser have expertise and interest in the topic?
Which theoretical approaches does the faculty member use?
Which research methods does the faculty member use?
Will the adviser have funding to support you?

If you are planning to pursue research in your professional field, for instance, research based on your practical knowledge built while in the workforce, you will have more latitude in choosing a dissertation topic. Your professors will appreciate your expertise in the field and will allow you to advance your knowledge with professional training and career prospects. Your constraint will naturally be the availability of an adviser. However, this constraint lingers even though you have the flexibility to choose an adviser. This is because your adviser will constrain your choice of topic, research methodologies, and conceptual approaches for analysis.

So you can conclude that though you have rights to decide your adviser, some decisions will be influenced by the common practices of the programme or university. Therefore, you have to balance your own interests with the resources available to you.

Here is a matrix designed to balance between working on a research topic and working with an adviser.

Chances are your adviser will be involved in your research topic and help you with issues related to the literature review, data sources, conceptual approaches, methodologies, and the like. It is called a mentoring approach. This is the best situation irrespective of your research area and topic because you get full and acute support from your supervisor.

Your approach will navigate from mentoring to coaching if your interest in a topic is more important than the involvement of your adviser. Implicit in the coaching model is helping you with practices in your research field. However, your adviser will not guide you the latest developments in the field and identify areas where the field needs improvement. The coaching model is embraced if you are pursuing your research in your professional field. You will benefit from your work experience to meet your research objectives.

Another option is an inadvisable model. This is the approach when you have limited interest in the topic and your adviser has limited involvement in your research. You will spend several days and nights, holding caffeinated drinks, and eventually end up with giving up your research in the middle.

It is better if you choose either mentoring or coaching model. If you do not want to suffer from the torturous grip of a PhD, you should select a topic that keeps you engaged and a dissertation adviser who helps you persist.

You got to finish your dissertation? Protect your time!

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Today’s blog is dedicated towards writing a dissertation in a timely manner, which is a common obstacle for most of the doctoral students. There is a way in which you can protect your time and how to do that in a way that is most productive?

Nobody cares whether you finish your dissertation on time or no. But it surely matters to you. Time is one of the greatest challenges for doctoral students, as there is never enough of time because almost all things you have to do in your PhD are competing for your commitment. How do you ensure that you finish your dissertation in a timely manner? All suggestions are easier said than done.

The most important thing that you got to do is to put your dissertation first. A lot of people will be expecting many things from you. Timely completion of your dissertation is your goal and not theirs, so you must know how to say no to others when it is dedicated time for your dissertation work. It is tough to find out that “dedicated” time for writing your thesis when other expectations revolve around lab time, teaching, meetings, job hunting and so on.

The best way to do it is to schedule the agenda for the week and your working hours which also includes your dissertation time. On an average requirement for calculation of daily time required, twenty hours a week or four hours a day on a consistent basis should help you to meet the deadline. Further meticulous planning and strategy would be to block off all the mornings, lets say 8:00 am to 12:00 pm each day being complete dissertation time. It should be time when you are away from your mail, phone and are all ready to go with the work. If you are able to maintain this routine, you are going to see some incredibly productive results as when you get into the habit, you aren’t waiting for inspiration and at the designated time everyday, you are just ready to write and ideas will start to flow in at that time, in a few days.

The important thing to remember here is, to not give in to pressure and temptations for meetings, fun time or anything else that comes up during your dissertation hours. Eventually people will understand and know that you are serious about the time that you devote to your dissertation and you are going to stick up to the schedule over and above everything else.

Protect your time well and you would be able to finish your dissertation. That should be your first goal as a doctoral student and nothing should come in the way to derail its timely completion and progress. Always remember that!!

How editing can do wonders to your writing

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Let me start this by asking you a simple question: What are the important consideration to look up to for academic writing?

We recommend candidates to consider the following aspects, such as:

The required word limit
The desired level of academic writing
The requirement to present content in a clear and logical order
The necessary high standard in grammar & spelling
Citation & References

All the above mentioned aspects may fit well into editing and yes, it definitely can do wonders to your thesis/ dissertation.

But the point is, how?

We advise researchers to make a clear separation between the process of writing and editing. Editing takes care of the critical attention and refinement that ensures your writing will reach the required standards. The editors at AccuEdit suggest the following process to work on during editing:

The logical structure and balance of the dissertation/thesis
Observance to the stated topic(title)/ research question/ plan
Linking of content
Checking the headings for appropriate content
The consistency of the line of argument
Use of tenses, active and passive voice
Clarity of expression
Length of sentence
Economy of word use.

Editing can be more positive than writing as it is a process where candidates can really raise the standard of academic writing, here is how:

1) Reducing Redundancy: Simplifying and Shortening

The major part of academic writing may be true, interesting and well written but the redundancy may affect the value of a well writing thesis. Editing helps in reducing the redundancy and simplifying the content by identifying and removing unnecessary duplication, explanation and irrelevant material. See few examples of removing the redundancy and simplifying the sentences.

Longer Version	Shorter version
On a regular basis	Regularly
If at all possible	If possible
During the month of May	In May
During the time that	While
Has an ability to	Can
It may well be that	Perhaps
Take into consideration	Consider
Conduct an investigation into	Investigate

2) Checks for consistency:

A dissertation/thesis is a large document that takes almost a year or more to be completed. The problem with consistency is inevitable in this case and editing solves this inevitable mistake.

Consistently avoiding the use of first person and using third person in the writing.
It checks for consistent use one tense throughout a section.
It checks for consistent use and formatting of heading & subheading.
It checks for consistent use of bullet or number list
It checks for consistency in referencing style.
It checks for consistency in labelling images, tables, figures and other items.

3) Achieving Academic Rigour through Editing

This feature is typically related to the essence of academic writing and one prime thing that makes editing wondrous (though, it takes a lot of time). The three basic aspects to ‘editing for academic rigour’ are as:

The first one focuses:

® What did I plan to do and did I do it?

® What am I trying to convey and do I convey it.

It helps in checking whether you are going in the right direction or not.

The second aspect checks for:

® Overall reason for your research

® What did you find?

Basically, it helps in check for a well-supported and clear thread of logical reasoning throughout your research.

The third aspect challenges:

® Why should I believe this?

This makes you an awkward reader of your own writing which helps in ensuring that initially the claims you have made are either supported or removed.

4) Linking:

Editing takes care of linking that is an essential aspect of any writing. It guides the reader through different sections or paragraphs to highlight the logical structure of writing.

There are some words that are used for linking:

® As described in the previous chapter…..I’ll

® The method just presented is the……the next section describe

® This is the background as far as……the next section will explore.

I hope, it is clear by now that editing a boon to the researchers and makes wonders to the writing copy.

For any query and suggestion, write us at info@accuedit.com.

Select the Right Journal: Rely on Journal Selection Services

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When you decide to get your paper published in a journal, the first question striking you is about the right journal to which you should submit your hard work. There are types of publications that can give space to your research study. However, you need to find a journal that suits your creation well. If you are confused about finding an appropriate journal for your purposes, then we can help you sort out this problem.

Selecting the Right Journal

Our journal search service is launched to look out for journals in different academic fields that are suitable for a variety of publishing needs of our varied clientele. We consider every client’s personalized requirements and suggest the right fit. An insight to the systematic Journal Search service that we provide is as follows:

Receiving your manuscript
Initial search of the journals according to the subject area
Studying the Journal’s scope
Comparing your findings with the scope of the target journals
Shortlisting the journal for paper submission

Our research professionals consider each individual study and assess its scope. Our team also evaluates the reputation and popularity of different journals in your academic area.

We judge each journal by its impact factor and target readers. Accordingly, we suggest high-ranked journals for you. While searching the right fit for you, we also consider your time and budget. We try to find such reputed journals in which your study could be timely and easily published. You may rely on our services if journal search seems to be a complex task. Simply contact us at info@accuedit.com .

Impact Factors & Citations

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Impact factors are heavily criticized as measures of scientific quality. However, they still dominate every discussion about scientific excellence. They are still used to select candidates for positions as PhD student, postdoc and academic staff, to promote professors and to select grant proposals for funding. As a consequence, researchers tend to adapt their publication strategy to avoid negative impact on their careers.

The importance of high impact

Young researchers are well-advised to strive for publications in journals with high impact factors especially if they are not sure yet whether they want to pursue a career in academia or in the non-academic job market. Several funding organizations worldwide started to reduce the influence of this parameter on their strategy to fund excellent science.

One of the many critical points is that impact factors describe the average quality of a journal and should not be used for single publications.

Alternative metrics

Many alternatives for impact factors have been suggested for example the h-index (or h-factor) which are primarily based on citations and not on the impact factor of a journal where a paper is published.

Young researchers often wonder whether the impact factor or the number of citations is more relevant. This question is difficult to answer, however citations become increasingly important with increasing maturity of the career of scientists. Young researchers often have only one or two publications which are pretty new, thus, the number of citations is limited. Therefore, for pragmatic reasons, funding institutions and universities will use the impact factor of the journal as a proxy of their scientific excellence. To evaluate the output of more mature scientists the h-index or the m-index may be used which are both based exclusively on citations and not on impact factors.

Thus, young researchers are confronted with the problem that their scientific quality will be judged based on the impact factors of their publications, especially in contexts which are highly relevant for their early careers.

How to Find a Relevant Journal for Your Paper Publishing Needs

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If you are a PhD research scholar, then you might be seeking to get your paper published in a respectable journal. However, it can also be a confusion to find the right journal for making a submission. Here are some helpful tips that can guide you to choose an apt journal.

Determine the coverage

All journals cater to different audiences and covers separate subject areas according to their target readers. Thus, you should know the subjects that your shortlisted journals cover. It is very important to check that a specific journal gives space to your type of studies. Else, you will not be able to reach the right audience.

Know the audience

It is also important to know the audience that a journal serves. Make sure that your target readers match this audience type.

Type of published literature

You may be doing a review study or a case study. Thus, it is significant to see whether your selected journals prefer to publish such articles or not. If a specific journal gives priority to original research, then you can also benefit if you have conducted an original study. When you are high on its priority list, your chances of being published go higher too.

Impact factor value

The impact factor value is one of the determinants of a journal’s reputation. Its readership size is also determined by this value. Thus, make sure that you choose a high impact factor journal when you make a selection for getting your work published. Your chosen journal should also give an open access to readers.

Publishing time

Every scholar would want to submit to a journal that can publish studies on a quick basis. Thus, check the time your chosen journal usually takes to accept and publish articles. This will support a better decision.

Academic Editing

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Any document consisting of mistakes is of no use; this is why the criteria of editing have came into existence. Editing of thesis, dissertation, grant proposal, course paper, or academic job application is very important element of success for a student’s academic career. It is nearly impossible for a student to edit their own work. Hence, it is always an excellent idea to hire professional editors. We at accuedit.com offer various types of editing and our academic work editing service is up to the mark.

We have editors like Developmental Editors and Comprehensive Copy Editors; they work in close co-ordination with college students, students’ doing their master’s to assist them succeeding with their academic writing projects. Now you can just have a look on what is developmental and comprehensive editing and how our editors will help you.

Developmental editing is a kind of editing which focus on development, and organization of the project. An early stage editing is there in the writing process requiring more than one round to address the issues completely.

The help provided by our developmental editors is related to:

1. Incorporating facts, support, and sources.
2. Identifying gaps in content and suggesting the ways to fill those gaps.
3. Balancing the argument.
4. Providing background and context.
5. Ensuring paragraph unity and progressive expansion.

Whereas, comprehensive copyediting includes editing of line, copyediting, and proofreading. It can take more than one round because of the back and forth process of editing and correcting.

Have a look for what a comprehensive editor can do.

1. Diagnose and give suggestion for formation of sentence, and flow.
2. Helps attending evenness of style, inclination, and voice.
3. Edit for active voice, or passive voice as appropriate.
4. Helps suggesting titles.
5. Helps attending to the academic audience, together with jargon issues.
6. Helps in correcting punctuation and mechanical errors.
7. Helps in formatting the fonts and tables.
8. Helps ensuring alphabetical and numbering sequence accurateness.

Meeting the Word Count Rules for a Post-Graduate Essay

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One of the aspects that students have to keep in mind when they are working on their post-graduate essay is the word count. Whether it is too little or it is too much, it can cause trouble for the students either way. The colleges give what the correct word count should be in their regulatory documents. The students should read it religiously and make sure they follow it to the last letter.

Each department will have its own style guide rules. If the students are part of the history program then they should read the rules that have been laid down by the history department. One of the rules that some departments would laid down is that the word count should be written on the title page or the cover sheet.

The word length is calculated by including all the main text and footnotes. However, it is important to note that many universities do not insist that the title and the bibliography be included as part of the word length. In fact, the statement that describes the word length is also not part of the overall count. Quite a few departments have lain down that while images do not constitute a part of the overall word count, tables do.

Students include appendices in their dissertations. However, this content does not go as part of the overall word count if they are providing illustrative reference material. On the other hand if they are including substantive argument as part of the appendices then it is necessary that this content should be part of the word count.

Many students use the word check facility in MS Word to calculate their word count. When they are doing this, it is essential that they set it in a way that it calculates the words in the footnote as well.

How to Learn The Rules of The Latest APA Editions

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As students sit down to work on their project, they are aware that they have to follow a certain style of formatting. The university has laid down the rules that they have to obey when they are preparing the written content of their research. In some cases it could be the APA style that the review board has prescribed for the students. The APA style manual is quite popular for its simplicity, and it is often used across disciplines.

However, for many students following a formatting style causes a lot of problems.

There are different versions of the APA style, and they are called editions, and there are quite a few differences between one edition and the next.
The university board might tell the students which edition to use and in other instances they might leave it up to the students themselves, leaving the student at a loss for which formatting style is ideal for them.
Incorrect formatting will make the students lose marks, which is why many students get low final grades

So what are the solutions to this problem?

There are many free tutorials available both online and offline and in print, visual and audio that allow students to learn the intricacies of the formatting style.
The students can buy a book on the latest edition of the APA, and keep it with them for reference when they are writing a project.
They should be especially careful when putting the headings and following grammar rules because it is easy for these minor rules to be overlooked by them.

It is a good idea to practice the formatting style even when doing small projects since the preparation will come in useful when they are handling all the long term assignments.

On Line Bibliography Tools

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Bibliography is a list of sources referred by the author and needs to be listed in accordance with prescribed or chosen style of writing such as APA, MLA, Harvard etc. Bibliographies which run into several pages say more than ten can be especially difficult to compile, online tools not only compile bibliographies as per prescribed styles but also have tools for recording and identification of source and information. Some of these tools are equipped with features which can be used to create a bibliography library.

Some of the tools are:

Easy Bib: can be used for developing reference list, citations including parenthetical citations, footnotes and checking source credibility.

Citelighter: besides creating bibliography also enables select webpage sections and save them.

Refdot: enables quick recording of online sources in the bibliography, upon finding an online resource researcher needs to just click on the RefDot icon in the browser to create a bibliography, this tool also suggests inclusion of important information within the source.

Noodle Tools : enables creation of bibliography from almost all sources, users need to fill a form to get their desired bibliography or citation style.

Google Docs Bibliography Templates: enables formatting of created bibliographies, there is no need for using a browser extension or signing up for an account or paying for the services, this tool however does not provide any prompter to the users.

BibMe: can be used to create a bibliography, citation guide and also saves the created bibliographies, it is equipped with a prompting feature and when users enter the information they have they can get suggestions for the information they need for each type of citation.

Other tools available are citation machine, citefest, citelighter, Illionos Mathematics and Science Academy, citation wizard, Oregon Public Education Citation Maker, Recipes 4 Success, Zotero, End note etc.