Why do a doctorate?

People decide to do a doctorate for a range of reasons. Here are some of them:

• you may have a real desire to further your knowledge in a particular subject area and have decided to do that via a doctorate
• a doctorate may be necessary for your chosen career path
• you may not have previously considered a doctorate, but have achieved a better degree than you expected and realise new doors have opened for you
• you may be invited to do a doctorate in your existing school or department if you have done really well in your first degree. This can be very flattering and may tempt you to change existing, but different, plans. An invitation can be particularly tempting if you haven't made any plans for your future yet. But is it right for you?

Making the decision

For anyone who is considering a doctorate, there are issues to think about before coming to a decision. Below are some practical things you can do to decide if a doctorate is the right career step.

• consider the advantages and disadvantages of studying for a doctorate
• list the advantages that having a doctorate will give you in terms of your future employability. Can you identify how the subject knowledge, research and generic skills you will gain would improve your future job prospects?
• can you think of any disadvantages of doing a doctorate? Will it have any negative implication  for your future employability? Will employers will think it essential, useful or perhaps irrelevant?
• read what employers have said about recruiting doctoral graduates
• find out what employment doctoral graduates go into after graduation
• investigate issues of funding, including Disabled Students' Allowances (DSA)
• think about whether the funding will cover additional expenses that you, as a disabled researcher, may incur. That funding can enable you to get the most out of your doctorate and increase your chances of appropriate employment afterwards (e.g. attending conferences, research training opportunities, lectures, networking events)
• if these expenses will not meet your requirements, research and consider other sources of funding
• if your doctorate has to be self-funded, consider how you will pay for it.

Choosing an institution

For everyone the first step is to identify the university or universities you are thinking of applying to. Check that there is a research specialism where your proposed area of study will fit and whether there is a person with appropriate research interests and expertise to supervise you.

Accessibility

Depending on your support requirements, it would be a good idea to check out the university's accessibility practice. Contacting the university's disability service is a good way of doing this. The service may also be able to put you in touch with other disabled research students or staff to gain insight.

Self-audit

It is helpful to identify strategies, skills or qualities that you have developed in your first degree, masters and/or employment that would continue to be useful to you if you went into a research environment. These could include:  

• having a strategy for effective work planning and time management
• being aware of your accessibility and learning support requirements and being practiced at requesting adjustments and support
• being able to market your skills positively and to counter potential arguments about your suitability and capability to manage a particular situation or environment.

The nature of a research degree

It will be helpful, too, for you to identify the differences between doctoral study and your undergraduate study. What new challenges may you face ? To find examples of issues that disabled postgraduate researchers (PGRs) have identified, you could talk to other researchers. You will then be able explore what new learning management strategies you may need in addition to those you already have. Disabled PGRs in the Premia research identified differing challenges that included;

• the need for long periods of concentration;
• the need to organise a huge amount of material and retrieve relevant information from it as and when needed;
• long periods of reading or sitting;
• meeting targets and managing time to include bad days, bouts of illness and/or regular hospital visits
• heightened feelings of isolation, over and above that which any postgraduate researcher may experience.

Reading the university's code of practice and the relevant department's handbook and/or attending open days for postgraduate researchers will help you clarify what the department expects of you and what you are entitled to as a postgraduate researcher.

Sourcing background information about the research environment, you can identify the areas which may be problematic for you. From this you can anticipate and identify strategies for managing and overcoming them. Then you will be able to separate the disability-related factors from others that may influence your final decision. These could include your academic suitability or your career intentions and/or institution location and reputation.