Helping Students Ace the Dissertation Defense

Everyone’s Zoom box looks to be on mute. All eyes in the virtual space are focused attentively on the student presenter. The last five years of coursework and long nights writing have come down to this one special moment: the dissertation defense.

The student proceeds to move through their slide presentation with grace and ease. At the end of their presentation, they masterfully respond to the questions posed by their dissertation committee. And after quick deliberation, you get to say, “I’m so proud to introduce to you, for the first time, Doctor …”

Each academic year, thousands of doctoral students successfully reach the dissertation-defense milestone. Yet, through my conversations with doctoral students across disciplines, I can assert that the preparation for the defense varies widely.

I often hear that while coursework is straightforward and structured, the dissertation defense remains a somewhat underdiscussed yet extremely high-stakes aspect of the doctoral journey. But what if as faculty we better equipped our students with insights on how to confidently approach their dissertation defense?

Set Clear Expectations and Parameters

One of the most frequent questions I receive from doctoral students is “I have a dissertation defense coming up, but I haven’t been given much direction. What should I do?” This question is a loaded one, and typically my response includes a series of questions back to them to see what they understand so far. Some of those questions include:

• How long do you have to present at your dissertation defense?
• Is your defense an in-person, virtual or hybrid event?
• Can you have individuals from outside your committee attend your defense?
• Does the question-and-answer aspect of the defense happen during or after the defense?

After having many of these exchanges, I realized that as a faculty member we can better guide our students by giving them specific parameters for the defense. This can be a short conversation to give them a road map of how the defense will proceed and the key requirements they need to understand to help with preparing, such as presentation time and modality of the defense.

After all, if you think about it, when we go to give a lecture at another institution, how would we feel if we had no idea about whom our audience would be and how long we were expected to present?

Conduct Mock Sessions

For many doctoral students, the dissertation defense is a pressure-producing event. Even as a student myself, I felt this pressure of having worked for years on a project to have it culminate in my dissertation defense. Because of this pressure, I have found it very effective to provide opportunities for students to practice their defense presentation with me before their actual defense date.

You might be wondering, “At what point should I have my student practice?”

From my experience, I have found it helpful to have a student conduct their first practice session 10 to 14 days before their defense date. This time frame gives the student enough time to incorporate any suggestions you recommend and also allows a buffer for another one to two practice sessions (if needed).

Get Ahead of Any Committee Challenges

There is absolutely nothing worse for a doctoral student than preparing for a presentation and then being blindsided by a committee member (or several) with critiques of their dissertation.

As a dissertation chair, I do not want the student or myself to be surprised at their defense—I’d rather iron out these types of issues beforehand. One strategy that has worked well for me to get ahead of any committee challenges is to provide ample time for committee members to review the document. I like to provide the committee with the dissertation three to four weeks in advance of a defense date so they have time to read and bring up any issues with the document before the actual defense.

In addition to providing the document to my colleagues early, I make sure that the student embeds any critiques they have received into their presentation so that they are able to get ahead of questions. However, I know there are situations where time constraints preclude students from addressing all committee concerns in the presentation. To address this challenge, I will have students prepare extra slides just in case some of those questions arise during the question-and-answer portion with the committee. I have found doing this has led to very positive exchanges between students and faculty and shows faculty that the student has reflected on their critiques.

As a dissertation chair, I want the dissertation defense to be a memorable experience for my students for all the right reasons. My hope is that we continue to push our students to be great scholars and allow the defense to be a moment in time that serves as the catapult for their careers as researchers who will change the world for the better.