What to Expect When Writing a Dissertation

Writing a Dissertation What To Expect? Writing a dissertation is the pinnacle of your academic life as a student; so, you definitely want to do it right and produce a high-quality paper. However, many students feel frustrated when getting started on their thesis. While this can certainly be the case, you may be surprised by how little the dissertation writing process differs from that of any other piece of academic writing. In this article, we provide some tips, which can give you a better understanding of what to expect from this journey. 1. Select Your Topic Carefully Choosing a research topic is perhaps the most important decision any student takes when getting started on the dissertation. Here, students usually struggle for ideas since there are so many areas in existing research that could be further explored. A good piece of advice is to research academic journals, course materials, newspapers and other media to prepare a short list of what topics you find meaningful and engaging. After the topic is selected, take your time deciding whether it is important enough to tackle and what will be the focus of your research. Although it may seem irrelevant at this stage, you should also think of appropriate methods. This can save you a whole lot of time and effort as realising that the topic you have selected is not feasible for analysis is very discouraging. 2. Check What Is Expected of You Make sure to study your university’s module handbooks and ethics protocols to avoid some silly mistakes, which would lower your marks. You should have a good idea of how academic writing in your discipline looks like and what word count should be allocated to each dissertation chapter. Also, take a look at format requirements such as font types and sizes, page margins and referencing style. Remember that the devil is in the detail and what may seem trivial at the first sight can have a strong impact on the overall quality of your dissertation in the end. 3. Get the Right Supervisor Having the right supervisor can give you a great advantage in writing your dissertation. If there is choice, consider someone who has a reputation for getting students through. You should select the most academically and socially engaged supervisor who really pays attention to the requirements for the degree, clearly understands the process and can provide you with the right advice. If you struggle to understand your tutor and still have questions on the dissertation writing process, don’t be shy to apply for our tutoring service. Some supervisors simply don’t have enough time to give a quality consultation to each student.