PhD blog: 5 | Prospects.ac.uk

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More distractions

This week’s slice of postgraduate life has been written in more of a flustered hurry than usual. Last Monday was my first day teaching and, while solving many of my financial problems and meaning I don’t have to slave behind the till point of a department store, it comes with a vicious, time-consuming worry. I have been chasing teaching ever since I became a PhD student, hoping to earn enough money to cover my unfunded study. I was successful in getting a job teaching Writing Skills to first year undergraduates.

There are pros and cons to teaching while studying. It’s a great relief to earn money doing something that interests you (assuming teaching is of interest), and working within the university environment allows you to interact with faculty and students, slotting into department life and learning more about the institution in which you are studying. And in my (limited) experience, teaching is vastly satisfying, watching students rise to the challenge of assignments and exercises, and seeing your lesson plans develop as the students interact with them. Plus the fact that the money is good, theoretically leaving more time for you to continue your own studies.

It’s the money that lures many people to teach while they are studying, but it’s not easy money. There is a reason why the hourly rate is so high, and that is to do with the fact that preparation, marking, answering emails, filling in the register, photocopying, meetings and countless other tasks are performed in your ‘spare’ time, for no extra cash. It’s also these tasks that can overflow, filling your entire week until your next class. For me, being distracted is bad news. I will often embrace the distraction, letting it take over, and letting my study fade into the background. And with teaching it’s easy to let this happen because it’s important work. You, as the teacher, are earning money, and your students have paid fees. It’s just not on to go into a class ill prepared. There are too many people to let down.

Seeking attention

That comes to the most heartbreaking part of the job. No matter how well you have prepared, and how stunning your class is, there will always be students who look bored, texting on phones or yawning. This makes you want to prepare even harder for next week, so you will snare their attention. It’s too easy to get caught in a cycle that will consume all of your week, and leave you looking longingly at the stack of books you have earmarked to read next to further your exciting thesis.

Universities will actively discourage PhD students from teaching in their first year. Quite right too. How are you ever going to complete your doctoral thesis if you are busy looking after dozens of undergraduates? You can even do a PhD all the way through without doing any teaching, and universities would not really be upset (although it is a good idea to get teaching experience at some stage). But as with everything in real life, it’s not quite as clear-cut as that.

I’m doing an unfunded, part-time PhD, so I need to earn a living somehow, and it just so happens that I was successful in getting teaching work. I would say if you do get funding, it’s a terrible idea to work at all; it would just cause unnecessary distraction. Unfortunately for me, that distraction is a necessity. The trick is to be determined not to let your own study fall by the wayside, which is a difficult thing for me to say at the moment because for the last week I’ve been rather guilty of that. It is hard, but I’m getting used to it. I can once again hear the gruesome ticking of that clock, and I can once again envisage that terrible deadline creeping towards me. If you are like me, you will constantly remember why you started the PhD, and that excitement will never fade away. It’s easy to get on with it when you actually realise it’s what you want to do. And as for all the distractions, they don’t have to be distracting…

Read Graham's previous blogs:

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