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Having a research assistant as a PhD student?
Hi,
I am a PhD student (end of second year) and I was wondering if there is anything speaking against me having a research assistant?
I was thinking about searching for Bachelors or Masters student in my field (Computer Science) who wants to help me with some of the time-intensive and mundane tasks (total of 10hr/week) - unpaid. She/he would receive tasks such as 'search for contact details of AI labs in Europe for a potential research collaboration'. The person would not directly contribute to data collection and analysis and would not be a co-author.
Before approaching my supervisor with this idea, I thought I could turn to TSR for some input. What do you think?
Parakins
I am a PhD student (end of second year) and I was wondering if there is anything speaking against me having a research assistant?
I was thinking about searching for Bachelors or Masters student in my field (Computer Science) who wants to help me with some of the time-intensive and mundane tasks (total of 10hr/week) - unpaid. She/he would receive tasks such as 'search for contact details of AI labs in Europe for a potential research collaboration'. The person would not directly contribute to data collection and analysis and would not be a co-author.
Before approaching my supervisor with this idea, I thought I could turn to TSR for some input. What do you think?
Parakins
Reply 1
I can't tell if you're joking or not... Why on earth would anyone agree to do your "time-intensive and mundane tasks" - for a quarter of the working week, for no discernible benefit?
Reply 2
18
Good luck in finding a mug for unpaid RA work in CS.
At my uni, a PhD student in his third year shared a RA, but it was a well paid (!) position with promise of publication byline.
At my uni, a PhD student in his third year shared a RA, but it was a well paid (!) position with promise of publication byline.
Reply 3
As a PhD student you shouldn't have anyone helping you with your research. Your research should be your own work only. Having help is something you can get into trouble for in the UK at viva depending on your examiners and uni.
If you'd like to gain supervision experience I suggest you ask your supervisor about getting a BSc or MSc student. They can do things like supplemental experiments for a paper as part of their project for their course. I've had a student optimise an assay for me for their project. I've then used the assay to generate some data for my thesis. I've also had a student carry out her experiments for her project and I've done the same experiment and generated my own data for my thesis.
I can't see BSc or MSc students wanting to do time-intensive or mundane tasks for nothing, as the previous poster has said.
If you'd like to gain supervision experience I suggest you ask your supervisor about getting a BSc or MSc student. They can do things like supplemental experiments for a paper as part of their project for their course. I've had a student optimise an assay for me for their project. I've then used the assay to generate some data for my thesis. I've also had a student carry out her experiments for her project and I've done the same experiment and generated my own data for my thesis.
I can't see BSc or MSc students wanting to do time-intensive or mundane tasks for nothing, as the previous poster has said.
Reply 4
You don't want a research assistant, you want an unpaid administrative assistant. Good luck finding someone interested in doing that.
Reply 5
18
The unpaid thing isn't a problem as such, there are undergraduates who want research experience and will work for free. The real problem is that what you are offering is clearly not research experience. You want a secretary.
Genuine examples of research experience would be things like data collection, programming support, preprocessing data, preliminary analysis, etc. And I doubt your supervisor would want you to outsource this at this stage, since its stuff that you need to know how to do yourself.
Genuine examples of research experience would be things like data collection, programming support, preprocessing data, preliminary analysis, etc. And I doubt your supervisor would want you to outsource this at this stage, since its stuff that you need to know how to do yourself.
(edited 10 years ago)
Reply 6
The whole point of postgraduate research is that YOU do the research - including all the donkey work
The idea of palming it off to some undergrad to do (whether its paid or not) is, frankly, utterly ludicrous.
The idea of palming it off to some undergrad to do (whether its paid or not) is, frankly, utterly ludicrous.
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