PhD Progress Reports are a characteristic type of document that illustrates the ongoing academic journey of the candidate(*).
(*) I say ‘candidate’ and not ‘student’ following the convention in the Netherlands, where I work; here, we consider PhDs researchers, not students.
Normally, a report is produced on an annual basis; the most important one is in the first year, when there is the decisive moment of the go/no-go, i.e., whether the candidate should be qualified to proceed or not. Sometimes, these reports are included in the rules of the game, that is, there is a specific description in the doctoral school or the research centre to which the candidate belongs; for example, at the University of Amsterdam, the ILLC research centre asks the supervisor to redact the second year progress report, not the candidate.
After a while, I concluded that progress reports are very useful not only for the candidate but also for the supervisor(s); furthermore, they may be produced more informally on a monthly basis or, at the very least, regularly. In this way, before any meeting between the supervisors and the candidate, every participant is on the same page on the PhD academic journey. So, I decided to share my experience here.
Before proceeding, I would like to note that this conclusion is mainly based on the reading of the progress reports of one of the PhD candidates I am currently supervising, Erik Vellinga — he is an expert in argumentation and rhetoric, so it may not come as a surprise. However, I would like to offer some general remarks on this matter.
Why report even if it is not officially requested
First, let’s face it: normally, supervisors do not work constantly with PhD candidates, so they have to wrap up the point where the candidate is, before every meeting. And the best person to do the wrapping up is the candidate. Thus, it is not a randomly taken extra task that the candidate should undertake, but rather an opportunity for self-reflection on the academic journey that also serves as the meeting's agenda.
Moreover, this periodic informal progress reporting practice is beneficial for everybody, fulfilling at least the following three functions: (a) the candidate knows what the supervisors know, and no time is wasted on updating about the state-of-the-art of the journey; (b) the candidate is empowered, as the control of the agenda is in their hands; (c) there is a written trace that protects both parties, i.e., the candidate and the supervisors, in case of controversy; furthermore, it facilitates the writing and editing of the official, formal, progress report to be done on an annual basis.
What should the periodic progress report contain
The main point is that this type of informal periodic report should be concise, ideally 2 A4 pages long, at most. The title (usually, ‘progress report’, nothing fancy) should contain the name of the candidate, the date and the number of the report. Once the structure is decided, unless it proves to require changes, it should stay as it is. This has two advantages: first, the candidate can copy the structure and focus on the content, thereby saving a significant amount of time in writing the new report; second, supervisors can quickly read the report, as the structure is already familiar.
The structure is determined by the sections of the report. In particular:
Introduction (may even not write the word, just start writing) is the self-assessment of the progress in the research project (for instance, the state of a manuscript, e.g., ‘I’m waiting for the reviewers after having submitted paper X in date DD-MM’); it may also contain milestones achieved as described in the overall plan, as well as challenges, dead ends, difficulties, as well as solutions or proposals.
Discussion points are the questions, issues, or pointers to manuscripts or other materials that the candidate expects to be addressed or at least taken into account by the supervisors for receiving feedback. Any request for an update of the original plan or an adjustment of the timeline should be included. The report should include no personal information; any clarification of the motivation behind the requested change can be made during the meeting. In fact, discussion points are there to facilitate communication with the supervisors; any repetition of information contained in papers or other documents should be avoided.
Tentative Content of the PhD dissertation is also recommended. After all, the final step of the academic journey is the PhD dissertation itself. For instance, a good move is to include the following crucial points before starting to write the dissertation:
The Research Gap;
The Research Question;
The Outline, i.e., the commented Table of Contents.
The third section needs more clarification. Some PhD candidates do not want to write down the Outline or even just the Table of Contents, without any comments, before starting to write. I think that they do so because they are afraid that what is written is set in stone. The opposite is true: writing the tentative content is a way to keep the goal of completing the PhD dissertation always on track, despite courses to follow, conferences to attend, and all the other tasks a PhD candidate has to do besides actively conducting research. The goal should be, if not always, periodically in the mind of the candidate, and any adjustment to the structure of the dissertation to be written should be communicated to the supervisors, just in case.