Research Presentation and Proposal

KSU has an interesting way of performing qualifying exams. My major professor actually apologized for it. They combine the exam with a proposal meeting. This makes it longer, but it does help provide structure? 

How? 

Well, by combining the two, there is specialization. For example, my research proposal is on VR and adult learning theory, especially as it deals with and revolves around emotion in eLearning and long-term memory development. 

Why is this worthwhile?

Well, what's the point of asking me about Erick Erickson's theory of Stages of Psychosocial Development if I deal with long-term memory development in VR. It's a miss, right? Can I talk about it? Sure. Can I talk about it as well as Andrew or Will? No fucking way. 

By that same token, what's the point of asking Andrew about how VR exercises and simulations create memories in adult learners, or asking Will and Anne if emotion plays a part in creating greater self-motivation or self-efficacy when provided in a 360-degree completely immersive VR headset if it's delivered as a video story narrative?

Really nothing. They don't specialize in that. 

Again, could I have a decent answer . . . a PhD answer to a question about Erickson or Keegans theories? Yeppers. Instead, though I had most of my questions around Dewey and Kolb. Then I added in some of my own thoughts on Haskell's theories on Transfer of Learning. 

It's a good way of doing things because it allows the student to focus on their specialty instead of dealing with things that are not. It allows the student to further specialize. The bad news? It makes the qualifying exams far more in-depth and longer. 

I remember at the end, my professor actually apologized for that aspect of things. 

Since I had to do it all via Zoom, it was recorded. Now, I could share that entire video with you, but I'm not that much of a masochist. I look like an idiot. I will just show some of the better slides from it. If I hear from enough people that they'd rather see the entire presentation video, then I'll trim it down just to the presentation and upload it. 

One thing I'll say, I usually use a TON of images in my presentations. My professor warned me not to be too text heavy, so I used a bunch of images and a ton of animations. At the end, he said, "Wow, you've really added a lot of images and animations since the rough draft." 

"I wanted to make sure I kept everyone engaged and awake!"

I think it worked.

Again, glad it's over.