Masters thesis

[CatherineM]

I got my outline approved today. Now onto compiling the bibliography. I can't believe I'm actually going to finish this thing. It's been so hard. When I began, the college was west of Edmonton. It took me two hours one way on the bus to get there. The building was old and not too accessible. Then the Province decided to build a highway through the middle of the Seminary chapel, so we moved to temporary quarters while the new building on the pastoral centre was completed. We rented a former community college campus east of Edmonton. I could not take the bus there, so we had to buy a vehicle for me to continue. Two years later we moved into a state of the art palace which Pope Francis would have raised his eyebrows over. 

In the beginning, I struggled with ultra liberal professors. The new Archbishop cleaned them out pretty quickly. I struggled with aphasia from my head injury. I had to be excused from oral exams eventually. They handled it by making them optional. It ended up helping the non-English speaking seminarians too who struggled with oral exams. I was often the only female or only older student in class, sometimes both. I struggled when my speaking calendar got so full that time for class work got squeezed.

I really struggled when the new registrar took a dislike to me and refused to let me take a course on church law and instead assigned me a reading class with one of the fired former professors in a subject I didn't want to take. I knew I was in trouble when I had to buy the text book at the Wiccan book store. He told me the day after the drop class deadline that he wanted me to drop the class or he'd give me a zero no matter what I turned in. I finally quit after she threw out some of my previous philosophy classes so that I'd have to take more under grad classes. 

After a year and a half, the Dean of Students talked me into coming back and finishing. The registrar is still there, but treats me with indifference now rather than overt animosity. She did try to assign a thesis advisor who would have literally been the worst fit in the world. Luckily he agreed, and I was assigned to someone who teaches in my area. My paperwork is now handled by the President of the college to avoid further issues. As long as she doesn't try to sit on my thesis defence panel, I should finish by April. 

[truthfinder]

Congrats Catherine - it's hard enough to get to writing when everything's going right! I hope it all goes well and smooth for you.  A question, is it common for there to be oral exams before writing a thesis in your field? particularly at the masters' level?

[Amppax]

Congrats! I'll keep your work in my prayers. I'll be writing mine at the same time, please pray for my work. 

[Gabriela]

Congrats Catherine - it's hard enough to get to writing when everything's going right! I hope it all goes well and smooth for you.  A question, is it common for there to be oral exams before writing a thesis in your field? particularly at the masters' level?

Not common. It's the old way. One has to pass preliminary exams before writing the thesis. Today we still do that at the PhD level, but it's rare at the MA level.

I'm so sorry to hear all this, Catherine. I'd have told those people to go bleep themselves ages ago.

[truthfinder]

Not common. It's the old way. One has to pass preliminary exams before writing the thesis. Today we still do that at the PhD level, but it's rare at the MA level.

I'm so sorry to hear all this, Catherine. I'd have told those people to go bleep themselves ages ago.

Yeah, I'm currently reading for my comps so to hear this surprised me.  Had to defend my MA thesis though, and that is becoming increasingly rare. 

[CatherineM]

Oral exams during courses. My first was in pastoral theology. That whole class was a nightmare for someone like me who has oral aphasia. You could say banana to me, and my brain might translate that into pencil. The professor was born in Vietnam, and had just spent 7 years at the Pontifical in Rome. The class had no textbook, all oral lecture with a prof whose accent I just couldn't get the hang of, then an oral exam. It's never good in that kind of exam for the professor to answer the question for you. I'd say, yes I know that, and he'd say he knows I do because I talked about it in class, but he needed to actually hear it from me. My aphasia is worse when I'm tired or under stress which I was during exams. 

[truthfinder]

 The class had no textbook, all oral lecture with a prof whose accent I just couldn't get the hang of, then an oral exam. It's never good in that kind of exam for the professor to answer the question for you. 

That's like the complete opposite of anything I've done at the grad level.  Endless class readings, no lecture, class discussion, and final papers for all the courses. 

[CatherineM]

That's like the complete opposite of anything I've done at the grad level.  Endless class readings, no lecture, class discussion, and final papers for all the courses. 

That's the way most of the other classes have been, lots of readings, assignments each week, term papers in each class, class discussion that counts towards our grade and final exams. We have lecture too though. Classes are three hours long, so that actually helps. My pastoral ministry prof wanted to give us handouts instead of texts, but the college wouldn't let him because the page total was over the copyright limit. I think it was the expense too. It was too late then to order texts to get them in time. Everything takes forever to get to Canada, plus the only text he was willing to use was only in Italian. He was a very smart guy, but almost too smart if that makes sense. 

[Amppax]

I think oral exams are somewhat common in theology. I know if a couple of programs where their comprehensive exams are oral. 

[truthfinder]

I think oral exams are somewhat common in theology. I know if a couple of programs where their comprehensive exams are oral. 

My comps are both written and oral which is pretty standard. But thinking about this being a seminary, it almost makes sense (at least in my head it does). 

[CatherineM]

I think what made me the angriest was having to take another philosophy class. I have an undergraduate degree in pastoral ministry. I've had so much philosophy that I learned to truly hate the subject. They had to tailor a philosophy reading class for me before I was willing to come back. 

[tinytherese]

Wow, if someone in authority hasn't already, then they need to have a serious talk with that registrar. How he or she views individual students needs to have absolutely no impact on his or her job. 

I had to do pop oral quizes in my moral theology class and an oral exam in my Theology of the Trinity class. Both of these were at the undergraduate level. 

Edited October 8, 2015 by tinytherese

[truthfinder]

Wow, if someone in authority hasn't already, then they need to have a serious talk with that registrar. How he or she views individual students needs to have absolutely no impact on his or her job. 

 

As much as you're right, there is an incredible amount of petty politics that occur in graduate programs (between students, faculty, and administrators).  Some even see it as a right of passage. 

[Luigi]

My pastoral ministry prof wanted to give us handouts instead of texts, but the college wouldn't let him because the page total was over the copyright limit. I think it was the expense too. It was too late then to order texts to get them in time. Everything takes forever to get to Canada, plus the only text he was willing to use was only in Italian. He was a very smart guy, but almost too smart if that makes sense. 

He wasn't a Jesuit, was he?

As much as you're right, there is an incredible amount of petty politics that occur in graduate programs (between students, faculty, and administrators).  Some even see it as a right of passage. 

The smaller the pond, the meaner the fish.

[CatherineM]

She is the wife of the head of the sacred scripture department. She is great with anyone else. She just didn't like me.