Date/Time
Date(s) - 29/04/2025 10:00 am - 4:00 pm
Audience:
NARTI Online Training & Development
‘Preparing for the Doctoral Examination (VIVA)’
With Professor Rowena Murray
Tuesday 29th April 2025
(10.00-16.00 BST) – Online via Zoom
This workshop covers definitions, purposes, criteria, examiners’ reports, roles and responsibilities, ‘originality’, ‘contribution’, outcomes and appeals. Two key topics we will look at in depth are (1) the types of questions that regularly come up in doctoral Vivas and (2) strategies for constructing good answers to these questions. This workshop includes short activities to practise these strategies and time to consider their relevance for your Viva. Finally, throughout this workshop I address participants’ questions about doctoral examinations, and I will be available after the workshop to discuss follow-up questions by email.
For further reading: Murray, R. (2015) How to Survive Your Viva: Defending a Thesis in an Oral Examination, 3rd edition. Maidenhead: Open University Press-McGraw-Hill.
Timings
10-4 UK time
Lunch break 12.30-1.15
Mini-breaks 11-11.15 and 2.15-2.30
Professor Rowena Murray graduated MA (Hons) from Glasgow University and PhD from the Pennsylvania State University. Formerly Professor in Education at the University of the West of Scotland, Head of Business Writing at Strathclyde Business School and Honorary Visiting Scholar at Liverpool University, she is now Adjunct Professor at Strathclyde Business School and Visiting Senior Research Fellow at the University of Leeds. A Principal Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy, she was nominated for the Research Culture Award at Stirling University in 2021. She researches academic writing, the subject of her articles, books and chapters. She does online and in-person writing retreats, courses and 1-2-1 sessions with academics, researchers, doctoral students and others through her company, Anchorage Educational Services.
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