Phase 1 : Meeting My Supervisor & Finalising A Topic

-Orientation Day-

Orientation day was basically an induction day to the madness we all signed up for. We were a group of both first and second year Masters Students along with new and existing PhD students. The most intimidating thing was knowing that I was amongst working class people, some were people I have studied with and others are lecturers and other UWC staff members. I was definitely one of the youngest in the room, meaning I had the least experience. I honestly felt like I was in the wrong place and wanted to drop out before I had even registered (sometimes I still have that feeling lol). On the plus side, I knew I had two friends of mine (Sethu & Pozie) from the Honours class of last year. Having them around gave me some peace of mind, knowing that I can count on them to understand all the venting, stressing and procrastination. During this orientation session, a list was put on the board showing the students and their provisional supervisors. I am sure we all had a specific person in mind that we wanted to be supervised by, but obviously the universe works in the opposite way to what we expect. Personally I think it is always for the right reasons.

-Meeting Prof Shaun-

My supervisor is Professor Shaun Pather, who now runs the post-graduate study program. He is new to the University and our Information Systems (IS) Department so I had seen him around, but I was yet to meet until this day. A supervisor is basically someone to guide you and support you from the start to the end of your degree. They have enough experience and expertise in a specific field which should be beneficial to you and your research topic .

It is advisable to meet with your supervisor regularly just to make sure you remain on track, to get feedback (and in my case to make sure you are actually getting some work done! ) However from my experience things do not always work out as advised. A word of advice from me, avoiding your supervisor only makes it harder when you finally do meet (or bump into) them! Running from your supervisor is normally for you own silly reasons which I can attest to. For example, not having any work to show, the deadline passed and your still at a standstill,  or you are just scared to actually show what you have. In the end the meetings have to happen and it feels so much better once its over – so bite the bullet and keep it moving.

First impressions of Prof Shaun…. I could tell he was going to be a tough one, someone that was not going to let me get away with any slack. I later found out that he is an Editor-In-Chief for a South African electronic journal (EJISE). As much as I am grateful to have such a supervisor.. it just makes me even more nervous. You never want to sound silly in any case, but now dealing with someone with decades of experience AND expertise in the field of your study, I am forced to be on my A-Game (or at least try). Back to the point,  I was extremely intimidated and was worried, but of course I could not let it show. Our first one-on-one meeting went smoothly but I found myself drowning trying to find answers to questions he posed. Straight upfront I was politely informed that as a masters student I have not done enough reading. Basically what he was saying was that I came into this degree not entirely prepared, or lets just say I had not done enough reading to prepare myself to be a masters student. In all honestly, it was painful to hear but you know what they say about the truth – which leads me to the topic discovery mess.

-Topic Discovery-

Topic discovery is the process of generating a topic of which you have interest in to do research to try resolve a problem- or so I thought it was. To my surprise, there is a lot more that goes into choosing a topic for your thesis. When finding a topic for your thesis you need to consider a few things, then go do days of research into your “idea”.

Some preparation for topic discovery would include

1. Define the problem you are looking into
2. Explore the background of that problem
3. Get an understanding of  similar literature already published on that topic/problem
4. Decide how you will collect data to analyse and come to a conclusion or solution.

I had close to 10 different topics that I approached my supervisor with. All of which he gave enough reason for me to start from scratch. In all honesty, after each topic rejection, I would become more and more discouraged; it was like a punch in the gut. At some point I was under the impression that Prof Pather would never accept anything I brought to him. There were so many different reasons for my topics being rejected and so much extra reading to be done after each rejection.

Here are some of the reasons for my proposed topics not being accepted: 

(I hope it will be of some help to those struggling or even helpful to those who would want to attain a Masters degree in the future)

1. The topic is not an Information Systems problem 
   • The topic was fine but the foundation of the study is not to do with Information Systems.Something to note here is to ensure that your study is directly in line with your department you are working under. The study can be based on information systems but the study is from an Educational perspective which is a NO.
2. The topic is already well researched
   • The problem here is that your study must be bringing something new to the existing literature. There is no point in conducting research on a topic that has been thoroughly studied. A way to get around this could be to look at the topic from a different perspective or narrow the topic down based on what existing literature has concluded. (This is what I did)
3. The topic requires access to new developments
   • One of the topics I had brought to the table required me to have access to a new technology in America & Europe. With situations like these, it all depends on your contacts and who you know that can help support your study and give access to the relevant information & or technology. So make sure you can access all the relevant information or equipment needed.

But not to worry these are minor setbacks which can be fixed in no time. Staying productive,dedicated and motivated is key. Passing these small obstacles in the beginning definitely seem like childs-play compared to what comes after.

The day my topic was finally accepted, I really could not contain myself. The first sign of progress after almost a month and a half of trial and error, this had to be some kind of milestone? Now I laugh at how happy that made me, because now I can see that was only preliminary work, I basically achieved nothing. But regardless, at that moment it felt like I had finished my thesis and I was ready to graduate again.  Little did I know, I jumped a small hurdle to see a rocky Table Mountain (Phase 2: background & proposal writing) in front of me . 

 

 

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