What I learned about doing the portfolio/thesis

• Ask other graduates if you can see their portfolios. I wish these were online, and they soon will be, but it really helped to see how others articulated their practice.
• More reflection less collection.

• Don't just regurgitate what you did, say what you got from it, and reflect on the place this process had in line with your contemporaries.
• For me, a huge leap came when my advisor reminded me that my podcasts where a big part of my study. ( I have three podcasts the Creative Christian Podcast and the inspiration Generation podcast, found at blog.godsword.net and the Art and Technology podcast found at Digitalsculpting.net )
• Focusing on what I gained from these interviews and how it pushed my study was pivotal for me. I suppose the same thing could be done by looking at a bibliography.

• Walking away from it for a while did me good
• I preferred to work long, long stretches on the portfolio when I did work.
• There were things that my advisor and second reader, and proofreader said did not go together, however, they really did in the end. It was that I could see the "design" of the portfolio in my head. Something that did not come out until the last couple of packets.
• Hiring and editor like Genie Rayner was really helpful. It cost me about $300.

• Another suggestion I received by my advisor was to take your entire portfolio and highlight the areas where you have met the degree criteria. I'll take this a step further, in a podcast I did on revising a novel. Darci Patterson suggests to reduce your novel down to really small type say 7 point, and then lay it out on the floor and highlight different areas. Now she is asking to highlight other things, but this could be done with a thesis and the degree criteria. So if the first degree criteria is given a yellow color, highlight each area of the thesis that talks about this. If you find you are lacking a certain color then you can beef up your thesis in those areas. NOTE: this will also help you when your advisor says, Sorry this is not meeting the needs of a graduate portfolio. Then you can list the areas that you have covered and where.
• Graduate school is about learning to articulate what you are doing or "defending" what you have done, than anything else. Don't take it personal, just learn this is how you play the game.
• The thesis did not feel like mine, when I was given all of the direction of what was needed or where I was supposed to go. Frankly it is not yours. I mean, it is about your practice and study, but it is to fulfill what you need for graduation. Do that, and you can revise it into something you want later.
• Keeping something in- it is kind of like what a writer said at a recent writers conference, when she was talking about using run on sentences. I asked her if an editor ever gave her flack about it. Her response was that if she had a good reason for using it and she could articulate that, then it stayed.
• Taking things out- If they are asking you to cut back in some areas, seriously consider it. I think my advisor said something about how much does the reader need to know, in comparison to what I am attached to? This was hard to determine, but act like an editor and cut, cut, cut. When you get down to the basics it is really good stuff.
• SAVE EVERYTHING YOU CUT! I was then asked to put more of it back in.
• If advisor or second reader was leading you in a different direction, something that you did not study then that means that you have not stated this in your portfolio. Don't freak, they are not trying to get you to go in another direction that you don't want to go. You are just not being clear enough. It may be as simple as saying, I was introduced to this topic within my study, I gained this from it, but I did not pursue it further because.... Or I see the need for further investigation after graduate school. [More on this: I got one of my revised copies back and said, "she doesn't get it." SHE missed the entire point. It is not that SHE missed it, I just did not clarify it for her to get. Many times it was as simple as adding one sentence. Sometimes it was pivotal to a portion of the document. For example, Part1 I got irritated that I was asked to reflect on a topic as compared to what others said about it. Then I simply realized. I can't... it was an introspection. It was examining it from inside of me. This was not wrong, it was just not clarified. It actually ended up in my title "Introspection of a sculptor and writer... Taking it all in."
• It is o.k. to clarify that you did not study a certain thing within your time at Goddard.
• Use your SIS evaluations that you created- they are so valuable. FYI when you are creating them through your time at Goddard really focus on the above information and it will go a long way to help you with your portfolio/thesis in the end.
• If you are stuck with a degree criteria, brainstorm with someone about it. You probably have met it, but can't figure out how to articulate it. Again this is where my podcasts came in. When my advisor said to look at those it really came together.
• Connections. As I wrote the thesis/portfolio I was able to find connections that I did not know where there. Some were astounding. This is the coolest part of this process.
• Don't wait until packet 4 or 5 to be sure you are on track. Get confirmation early! No one wants to have to take another semester.
• The title came about 2/3 of the way through. Don't fret about it.
• In the end, it is a better document than it was when I started. I do own it and I am very thankful for the suggestions of my advisor and second reader.
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Anyone else have things that they learned? I'm sure I will add more later.

I'm on the last round of the portfolio

It is hard to believe, I'm almost through with the graduate program at Goddard.

This semester was very hard for me. not so much for academic reasons but for personal reasons. I had a project with a huge time constraint, an 11 foot panther for Prairie View A & M. A bronze that was due by the 11th of November. I worked many 14 hour days on this thing.

Add to that my father passed away in the middle of the semester. Everything stopped as I tried to take care of his affairs.

And we had found ourselves fostering 17 kittens.

Finding time to write the thesis was difficult. Plus I was going in the wrong direction when I started. More on that in the next post. The panther will be installed this friday, the last portfolio/thesis packet is due the following monday and the end of school is just in a few weeks. So there you go. I have never, ever been so glad to hear the words from my advisor, "you are good to graduate."