By: Olivia Payne | April 25, 2021
This survival kit will give you information you need to know from before capstone class starts and over the duration of the course leading to defense.
This survival kit was developed based on the input of the MSTC ENG 675 capstone students.
GET STARTED EARLY
Don’t wait until the last second. There will be no room for procrastination on your capstone. It is best to set aside time each day to work on it and the earlier you do it, the better. You only have a few months to complete your capstone, so don’t overwhelm yourself.
- Pick something you are passionate about so it is easy to stay engaged with your topic. Have a plan, but be ready to adapt and modify your focus/scope/project according to how your thoughts shape up or what your advisors say.
- Give yourself enough time to rabbit hole down interesting research fields to find something that’s interesting and addressing a current need.
- Make sure that the scope of your work is manageable and you’ve played around with the functionality of your idea.
- Write it all out in a draft for yourself. Now, cut the amount of work you think you want to do in half. Literally in half. You will probably try to do too much. Save both copies and bounce that half-length idea off of a professor at least 3 months before you need to start your capstone. Take their feedback and adjust as needed.
READ ALL THE THINGS, NO REALLY, ALL THE THINGS
Read A LOT of articles on your topic(s). More than you think you will need, and come up with a CODE for note taking/reading early (i.e. if you have two or more crossover topics – tech comm and industry, or UX and productivity – whatever it is, find a way to differentiate and organize your notes).
- Start reading papers as soon as possible- identify the fields you’re probably interested in and/or an idea, and then start reading papers and taking notes on them consistently at whatever volume is sustainable for you. This means you’ll be building the base for your project early.
- Download PDFs and highlight topics or themes by color and save in different folders. Whatever works for you to organize, do it as early as possible.
THE COURSEWORK
Planning is so important. When you turn in your proposal in the first few weeks of class, be as detailed as possible with your goals and objectives. It’ll help you out a whole lot when trying to finish manageable chunks of work in a tight timeframe.
- Read ahead in the schedule. Be one step ahead of what’s due. There will be time to go back and fix things based on advice in class, but don’t wait until the deadline to submit the bare minimum.
- Dr. Ding provided us with breakout sessions in class to get direct feedback from our peers and advisor.
- Schedule more check ins with your advisor than what is suggested to keep you accountable. Receiving consistent feedback on your draft will help you have a polished product by the defense date.
THE DRAFT
Get it all on the page. Even if you think it may not be useful, write it down. It may help you discover something or put an end to the dreaded writer’s block.
- Try to have all the sections written by class time. The workshops are as valuable as you make them, so if you have nothing to share, they will not be as valuable to you.
OUTLINE YOUR PRESENTATION EVEN BEFORE YOU FINISH YOUR DRAFT
Before you even finish writing your project, go ahead and start working on your presentation. It could help you think through some elements of your paper, and it could help you be more prepared when it comes time for your defense.
Best of luck to the next capstone students!!