06-FEB-B-12
PLANNING THE TRANSITION
FROM PRE-CANDIDACY TO THE POINT OF “COMPS”
TO THE CANDIDACY AND PROPOSAL STAGE
WITH MY ADVISOR AND THESIS COMMITTEE CHAIR,
PROF. MICHAEL MARQUARDT
From:
Glenn Geelhoed
To:
MJMQ@aol.com
CC:
Huda Ayas
Date:
Saturday - February 25, 2006 12:46 PM
Subject:
Re: Welcome back from the Far East!
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Thank you so much for your note!
I knew you and I were both swimming in a
fog of lost calendar days, but I
had another series of
"catch-ups" to do in addition to the usual re-entry.
I am trying to do the assignments ahead
for the ELDP Cohort 16 March
session in two weeks, since I must miss
that time as it coincides with GWU
spring vacation for the group of eighteen
students and paricipants I am
leading to Rwanda.
What is also bubbling in the background
is the team preparation for the
Comps on April 6--8 in which, after a few
hitches, I am going to be
participating, taking them with the team
which will be bunked in at my
home for the week before the events to
study and coordinate.
I had spoken with Andrea Casey and Jae
Hoon Lim, but have not reached
Sharon Confessore after attempts through
phone at her Rockville worksite.
What was most helpful is the visit I had
with Huda, whose various
iterations of her proposal I had read,
and I am excited that she is going
to make it to her June first defense!
In order to avoid any glitches of the
kind that had derailed her, such as
the cancellation of the Haiti trip I was
scheduled to lead on which she
would have gathered data, I had been
working on piloting the kinds of
questions and inquiry into the
expereinces my students have always
expressed to me have been
"life-altering experiences, unlike anything that
has ever happened in me
before!"
Since that has been such a uniform report
of a transformational kind, I
had tried to characterize this epiphany
that had also happendd ot me when
I had first experienced this at the same age and
stage. I had given the
first pilot group before and after
questionnaires (I had mailed to you
eighteen months back on return from a
DR/Haitian Mission in summer 2004 on
which Huda had accompnied me) and revised
it a bit to give to the four
students who had already experienced such
a trip with me who had gone
again with me this past month to Mindanao
Philippines. Again, the same
report of a totally transformational
experience was unanymous, and this
group is reporting to the rest of the
studenst at GW on Monday noon
2/27/06 about the qualitatively different
learning experience they have
had with me on this trip (06-FEB-B-10.)
So, in order to get another pilot project
to refine the inquiry, I had
assembled a group of eighteen
participants, almost all novices, to
accompany me to Rwanda in time to give me
some interviews and other data
for the Phenomenologic Research Proposal
Project in Jae Hoon Lim's class
in progress now. She went over some of the qualitiative
methodology, but
was not at all sympathetic that the
project would involve missing a single
class, and had actauly recommended
dropping out if that were to happen.
There is no way that can happen in favor
of any other time when I might be
able to do so, let alone trying to do it
when the students would have to
miss two weeks of classes, so I am
proceeding.
It was then that Huda had suggested I
might look into a semi-quantitative
study since I am catching "before
and after sanpashots" of these students
as well as guiding them through the
experience along the way. She had
strongly suggested that I NOT try to use
an instrument of my own devising
or modification since it would take
longer than the thesis to validate
such a home-made questionnaire and that
the qualitiative approach might be
frought with soft conclusions. From my far more extensive background in
quantitative biomedical research, I would
have agreed with her and have
made an appointment to visit wtih LIsa in
the Ashburn Campus Library to go
through the Mental Measurement Yearbook
to try to find an appropriate "off
the shelf" instrument already
validated with a lot of use behind it. I
am
actaully responding to your note now from
Ashburn where I have been
looking over such resources.
But, I also agree with you, that the
study is richer with the kind of
qualitative input that comes from the
kind of Moustakis study, which is
why I got enrolled in the Phenomenologic
Research Course to begin with. I
want to proceed with my student medical
mission this next week when I will
be in Rwanda (so that I will not be
available to meet with you on March
10, as I return on the 18th of
March.) I will get from this experience
the
further refinement just in evaluating the experience and grade-giving
for students for whom this is
appropriate, but will not be using these
data in my proposal unless it is
appropriate later to do a retrospective
questionnaire of all the many students
whom I have shepherded through such
an interantional experience.
I want to adhere to the timetable you had
outlined, and fully plan to
proceed through the Comps into the
Candidacy phase, with a proposal I will
develop with your critique this summer
toward defense on the schedule you
have outlined. I then will go to the IRB and through the
other hoops, if
necessary with any instrument you think
would be good to have within the
proposal, and then gather the critical
data on future proposed medical
missions I am planning now under the
proposed dissertation research plan.
The students with me in both Mindanao and Rwanda are informed that I am
going to be using the data from the
evaluation questionnaires and
interviews that I have always done on any
such mission for both quality
control of futurre missions and also
their grading and evaluation, and
extracting from this the plan for my
dissertation proposal into
transformational learning occurring in
international medical missions (
see "final pre-departure Rwanda
preparation letter" in which I distribute,
among other items, the pre-trip
questionnaire 06-FEB-B-8)
These data will give me a presentation
for the Phenomenologic Research
Proposal presentation scheduled for our
May ELDP session. But, this may
also be the time we would get the
dissertatoin proposal started in regard
to chapters 1, 2, and 3.
I am delighted with your reference to Dr.
Milie Mateu, and will look up
her dissertation here at Ashburn and also
try to contact her. I had
previously sent an email request to Skip
Williams after having received
your acceptance of me as your advisee and
committee chair, asking him if
he were available to be a member of the
committee. Your suggstion might
make for the third member as you had
suggested, and I will try to arrange
to meet with her and ask after I return.
The Cohort 16 may well be in a position
to celebrate or commiserate with
colleagues one month after Comps, so on
the Friday evening of our next
session on May 5 (I note that we are
released at 5:00 PM) I hope to be
hosting the "Post-Comps Springtime
Welcome to Candidacy Phase" party at my
home.
This will be the time you had recommended for the full court push
into proposal phase and further
development of my hopes for this idea to
become a dissertation to be defended, as
you had outlined, in 2007. I
hope we can all get together then and
express to our faculty our
appreciation for leading us thorugh this
very transformational "Action
Learning" experience of our own!
Thansk again!
GWG
>>> <MJMQ@aol.com>
02/25/06 4:48 AM >>>
Dear Glenn,
Greetings from the Academy of HRD in
Columbus, Ohio. I am still adjusting
for jet lag and thus going to bed early
and waking up early (do you have
any
secrets for adjusting?).
Huda's dissertation is clearly on track
and I have no doubt she will
defend
with great success in June.
Your dissertation topic sounds
great! If I could offer a recommendation
at
this early stage, I think that you should
consider doing a
phenomenological
study (Moustakis). It will be a much richer study and I believe can be
done
quicker and better. A quantitative study, as you know, would require
much
greater numbers of people and we may not
find the instrument that really
measures what you would like to measure.
Relative to Mezirow, one of my ELP 9
students - Dr. Millie Mateu - did a
phenomenological study on US expats from
Japan with Mezirow and
transformative
learning as the basis. She used Moustakis, and her dissertation
was
recognized "with
distinction." We might even
consider her as a committee
member
(especially if we discover that Sharon
Confessore may see herself as too
busy to
serve as a committee member).
I am prepared to meet with you and get
you on track for defending your
proposal in summer 2006 and defending
your dissertation by March 2007 (if
you
are
willing and able to dedicate the
necessary time over the next 12 months.
I will plan on being at Ashburn sometime
on March 10, so we can chat
briefly.
It will be a pleasure working with you,
and I am confident that your
dissertation will be an excellent
contribution to the literature.
Best regards,
Mike
Dear Mike:
I was not sure if you were
back yet, as I had heard from Meg that you were in
In both the Mindanao
Surgical Mission with four medical students and in the Rwanda Medical Mission
with eighteen, I have been doing the kind of pilot study to help determine the
proposal I will be working toward after the April Comps. I have talked with Andrea about the
pre-candidacy process going toward candidacy post-Comps and she had advised I
see Jae Hoon Lim for methodology if it were to be a qualitative study of the
changes I see in medical students with international experiences, and also to
speak with Sharon Confessore if it was based in the theoretic constructs of
Mezzirow. I am leaning toward a
semi-quantitative before and after assessment of the students' international
experience form a long history of biomedical research in quantitative analyses.
I had also been a reader of Huda's proposals
and her changed thesis direction caused by the unfortunate change inflicted on
us by the US State Dept denial of visas to
I am going to be perusing
the "Mental Measurement Yearbook" book to try out the right kind of
validated instrument, but would like to have some experience in using it before
I build it into the proposal stage. Do
you have a recommendation for a semi-quantitative instrument from what you know
of my model already, or is summarized (attached) in the Phenomenologic Research
Proposal for Jae Hoon, incorporating the construct and lit review from Andrea's
course, in a study of the students in the bracketed two medical missions in
Mindanao and Rwanda I am running with students this month?
I would like to meet with you as I begin the
next phase of the candidacy to get launched rightly in the process, and
appreciate your willingness to shepherd me through the process.
Thanks again!
GWG
PS This mythic tale gives some comfort!
One sunny day a rabbit
came out of her hole in the ground to enjoy the
weather. The day was so nice that the rabbit became
careless, so a fox
sneaked up to her and
caught her.
"I am going to eat
you for lunch!" said the fox.
"Wait!" replied
the rabbit, "You should at least wait a few days"
"Oh yeah? Why should
I wait?"
"Well, I am just
finishing writing my D.Sc. dissertation."
"Hah! That's a stupid
excuse. What is the title of your
dissertation
anyway?"
"I am writing my
dissertation on 'The Superiority of Rabbits over Foxes
and Wolves.'"
"Are you crazy? I should eat you up right now! Everybody knows that a
fox will always win over a
rabbit."
"Not really, not
according to my research. If you like,
you can come
to my hole and read it for
yourself. If you are not convinced you
can
go ahead and have me for
lunch."
"You are really
crazy!" But since the fox was curious and had nothing
to lose, it went with the
rabbit into its hole. The fox never came back
out.
A few days later the
rabbit was again taking a break from writing and,
sure enough, a wolf came
out of the bushes and was ready to eat her.
"Wait!", yelled
the rabbit, "you cannot eat me right now."
"And why might that
be, you fuzzy appetizer?"
"I am almost finished
writing my D.Sc. dissertation on 'The Superiority
of Rabbits over Foxes and
Wolves.'"
The wolf laughed so hard
that it almost lost its hold on the rabbit.
"Maybe I shouldn't
eat you, you are really sick in your head, you might
have something
contagious," the wolf opined.
"Come read for
yourself, you can eat me after that if you disagree with
my conclusions." So the wolf went to the rabbit's hole and
never came
out.
The rabbit finished
writing her dissertation and was out celebrating in
the lettuce fields.
Another rabbit came by and asked, "What's up? You
seem to be very
happy."
"Yup, I just finished
writing up my dissertation."
"Congratulations! What is it about?"
"It is titled 'The
superiority of Rabbits over Foxes and Wolves.'"
"Are you sure? That doesn't sound right."
"Oh yes, you should
come over and read for yourself."
So they went together to
the rabbit's hole.
As they went in, the
friend saw the typical graduate student abode,
albeit a rather messy one
after writing a dissertation. The computer
with the controversial
dissertation was in one corner, on the right
there was a pile of fox
bones, on the left was a pile of wolf bones,
and in the middle was a
lion.
The moral of the story is:
The title of your dissertation doesn't
matter, all that matters
is who your doctoral advisor is.