I feel so lucky and happy!!!
Yesterday I had my thesis oral (1 year of my master's degree, in which we have one thesis for each year). For those who've been around for a while, you might know that I struggle a LOT with academic writing. Papers of a couple pages are already tough for me. The thesis has to be between 40 and 60 pages. Obviously, it was done in bits, many steps to build this document, but it was still very hard. >:c
I knew I needed help to achieve this, I had no misplaced confidence about it lmao, so instead of going for something I genuinely loved with a professor I didn't trust to give me the help I would need, I went to a professor I trusted to advise me on the long run — especially as I am doing a 2 years master's in 4 years, with a year off in the middle. Turns out the first professor might retire before I fully graduate too! So I got my second best liked subject instead of the first one, not bad at all. And I trusted entirely the professor I went to to be my thesis advisor. She invited another professor that I already knew as well, who's more experienced in the academic world, so I had two thesis advisors! and it was amazing to have them talk together about the possibilities, and they brought different insights and literature.
I really grew so much academically over these two years. My health has Not been my ally, and I've yet to do my last oral to make up for a dramatically low grade I got, but still, I am so proud of my work. And so are my thesis advisors! They've seen my writing grow with the experience and with their advice.
And the last stroke of luck: for my oral, they invited an external examiner, which in my case was a researcher from another university—another country even 🫣 Usually it's just a researcher from our research lab! anyways. She is AWESOME. My thesis subject was right up her alley, except I focused on French adverbs and she does Swiss adverbs. And she was so interested and excited about it!! she had prepared a document with lots of comments, and she sent an email after the oral with that document, saying that all the comments are not because my thesis was lacking, but things she's thought of that might be interesting for my next thesis. And!! cherry on the cake not only has she made it clear she welcomes any question I might have about her comments, she's also available to discuss my next project 🥹 It's like I've won a 3rd thesis advisor 🥹
I also had the grade I was hoping for, so I'm very happy about it, and the comments I got with my grade (right after my oral, yesterday). Yes I have a margin of progress, obviously, it was never going to be perfect and even I noticed issues when I prepared my oral, but it's also not bad at all, very promising, and it's so good to have Certified Adults look at me and say yes it was hard, you made a lot of progress, and your work was very interesting and we want to see more.
May everyone live this 🙏
