Preparing to defend my dissertation

[Adoniram]

Hi everyone, I'm going up for my defense in a few weeks and just wanted to get some insight from others as to what their experiences were like. I've been to many of my colleague's defense presentations, but there is always a ~60 min private session afterwards. Professors are very reluctant to share anything about what happened in the closed-door session, so I wanted to see what others have experienced.

Even if you believe your experience was a true snow-flake-unique moment, I'd still appreciate hearing what you were asked, what the conversation was like, etc. Thank you!

 

[Orodruin]

Hi everyone, I'm going up for my defense in a few weeks and just wanted to get some insight from others as to what their experiences were like. I've been to many of my colleague's defense presentations, but there is always a ~60 min private session afterwards. Professors are very reluctant to share anything about what happened in the closed-door session, so I wanted to see what others have experienced.

Even if you believe your experience was a true snow-flake-unique moment, I'd still appreciate hearing what you were asked, what the conversation was like, etc. Thank you!

This is way too general to give you any advice. Thesis defence procedures vary greatly between countries and sometimes even between universities.

 

[berkeman]

Well, based on his Profile page, he's in Texas in the US, and his dissertation is either about IT or Cosmology. But it doesn't look to be a PhD dissertation, if I'm reading his recent posts with Cosmology questions correctly...

Location:
Roanoke, TX
Occupation:
IT Analyst
Completed Educational Background:
Undergrad
Degree in:
Physics
Favorite Area of Science:
Astrophysics

 

[Choppy]

I agree that the process can vary considerably from school to school, but I think there are some common elements.

I've been through the process as a student, supervisor, and examination committee member.

Often there are parts of the defence where you have to wait outside. In the beginning, the chair will go over the rules, sometimes they will talk about your, reviewing your history as a committee, etc. Then following the defence there's a closed deliberation where the committee arrives at a consensus.

Usually there's a presentation. Whether this is open to the public or not is a school-specific thing. From a candidate's POV, this is something you want to put a lot of effort into because it's the part of the defence you have the most control over. You want to make sure that you cover the work that you've done, and that it's clear what you did as opposed to what was accomplished by the collaboration as a whole. Keep your audience in mind too. Your examination committee will have read the thesis prior to the defence and will be familiar with your work. (If it's a fully public presentation, you might have to spend more time introducing the basics.)

Following the presentation there are several rounds of questioning. In my experience the first round tends to derive directly from the presentation (just like you're giving a conference talk). Then the next round will delve into the details of the thesis. Make sure you know specifically what the rules are and prepare for the specific format. In some cases, the chair of the examining committee is supposed to keep the committee focused specifically on the thesis details. In other cases "background knowledge" questions are allowed.

Practice answering questions orally. Get your friends to fire questions at you and stand in front of them and answer. The more practice you have the better. Practice using the whiteboard (or whatever tools you have available). Practice breaking down the questions.

It's okay to say that you don't know the answer to something. It's better to follow that with "here's what I do know" or "here's how I would figure that out."

Practice listening to the specifics of questions. Sometimes candidates will hone in on specific words or phrases and answer what they believe the examiner is asking, but miss the details. Restate the question in your own words. Take the time to clarify.

EDIT: I was assuming PhD defence in the North American system.