For Thesis Writers: Important Indicators and Research Objectives

AN OVER-CONFIDENT DOCTORATE student wanted to finish his course fast that he did not even consider what would take place in the research proposal stage. Perhaps his Department did not require a defense for the proposal. What was clear was that he went ahead and conducted his research. Then came the final defense. Since he was taking Doctor of Sociology, the question went to what happened to his cultural indicators? What was the culture of the majority of respondents? He had no answer for that. He merely assumed culture would not make any difference.

It happened that his mentor was not a Filipino. Naturally, he wondered if results would be different if the culture differed. Wasn’t he consulting him? In Sociology, culture always mattered.

Michael A. Costello, a sociology professor and native of Crystal Lake, Illinois died February 2, 1998 in a plane crash in the Philippines, according to Chicago Tribune News. This was some four years after his mentee failed to defend. According to the report, Mr. Costello was visiting his family in Manila when his commercial jet crashed into a 7,260-foot mountain 30 miles outside of a city where he had lived and worked, south of the country.

Off-topic, why do we mention this? Because the failed student can always say, “my mentor died so I was not able to finish my course.” The reason is not exactly true.

It is not unusual that we hear reasons like this. The mentor died. But the truth is that the mentor died from waiting way too long for the student’s input.

Culture as an indicator could not be surveyed again separate from other indicators. Research is not done that way. You have to prepare your instrument well and administer it one time.

Another student wanted to study how students could populate their school as his objective for doing research. How could that be a tenable objective when the course is School Administration? It would take on an Economics angle. Even if one’s bachelor’s degree is on Economics, it will not do justice for a thesis to a Master of Arts degree in Administration. The study should contribute to administration or school management, the current course.

Again, always consider your course.

 

Yo, Novelists! What do You Place in Your Chapter 1?

Character sleeping, dreaming, and  waking up to nothing? Funeral calls, death, psycho lurking around? Terrorist planting a bomb, rape scene? Protagonist in the middle of a bodily function like jerking off, peeing, vomiting? Cheesy beginnings with a play of words like “opening”? Opening what?

These are items literary agents dislike to see in a novel’s Chapter 1, writes Writer’s Digest University. If you want your book published, it is best to follow them. After all, literary agents are also editors, and they know what’s saleable to publishing houses. Working with an agent for publication or not, the recommendations are worth considering.

Here are more of their pet peeves: Starting your story with a battle, projecting characters as perfect heroes and heroines, inauthentic dialogue, over- description of the scenery.

More: Beginning with a killer’s point of view, sex and violence; a laundry list of character descriptions.

All of these slow down writing and it shows in their nature: Prologues that have nothing to do with the story; long, flowery descriptive sentences for introductions, character’s back-story, information dump.

These are patently unnecessary:  Introducing the narrator to the reader, introducing the character, setting up the scene, description of the weather, addressing the reader as in “Gentle reader.”

These are boring: An ordinary, predictable outlook, too much accounting.

And these cheat the reader: Adventure-dream stories where at the end, the author says it was only a dream; Character would find out later this and that; Character dies at end of chapter.

What do they want to see in Chapter 1? Action that hooks the reader, some mystery. Moreover, you do not tell but show through the character.

 
 

 

Publishing in Scientific Journals: Ten Principles for Improving Manuscripts

A CHINESE DOCTOR WHO submitted her paper for publication to us couldn’t understand why her manuscript was taking a long time to be processed. Processing included review and editorial advice to improve her paper. She insisted she did her best and followed what was told her. After two reviews, it was becoming clear there was no research method systematically carried out. She was finding it hard, therefore, to return her manuscript to us for another review. If done after the study, this kind will find it hard to fix a research instrument  and then prepare it to fit results. In fact, this practice should never be done.

 

For those who did their work properly but are finding it hard to have their study published, here are 10 principles for increasing the likelihood of manuscript publication written by James M. Provenzale.

Principle 1: Properly Organize the Manuscript

Principle 2: Clearly State the Study Question and Study Rationale

Principle 3: Explain the Materials and Methods in a Systematic Manner

Principle 4: Structure the Materials and Methods and Results Sections in a Similar Manner

Principle 5: Make the Discussion Section Concise

Principle 6: Explain If—and Why—Your Study Results Are Important

Principle 7: Avoid Over-interpretation of the Results

Principle 8: Explain the Limitations of the Study

Principle 9: Account for Unexpected Results

Principle 10: Fully Incorporate Reviewers’ Suggestions into a Revised Manuscript

What Is News Today And What’s Not

SAD NEWS, THE WAY news is going now.  Scandal is news, but poverty is not. Scandal is news but injustice is not. Scandal is news but the cancer that eats up society is not. Hear it from Pope Francis:

 

Today, and it breaks my heart to say it, finding a homeless person who has died of cold, is not news. Today, the news is scandals, that is news, but the many children who don't have food - that's not news. This is grave. We can't rest easy while things are this way.