About Carol Whittington Expertise Ask me questions about creating training for adults. As an Instructional Designer, I have experience in eLearning, instructional systems design, instructor-led training, adult learning theory, instructional design, using new technologies, such as web 2.0 technology, for training, and synchronous online training, such as webinars.
Experience Over 11 years expertise in instructional design including not only formal instructor-led training and eLearning, but also applying Web 2.0 technologies to informal, social, and mobile learning programs. This includes developing community management best practices, blogging, and including social features such as ratings and comments within courses. I have designed instructor-led training and eLearning for both biotech and high tech corporations. I have also designed and developed online tutorials and led online webinars on various topics and currently run my own business designing and developing learning solutions.
Organizations ASTD, eLearning Guild, Women in Consulting, Phi Kappa Phi
Education/Credentials MA Education, Instructional Technology
BA Biology
Past/Present Clients Partial list includes Cisco and Google as well as several biotech firms.
My name is Mohammed and I'm living in Iran. I got my master degree 10 years ago in accounting field and now I want to continue my education to get my Ph.D., but I know that I'm not ready for this after this long time. I thought it's better to take a short master degree like master by coursework in finance( 1 year length) and after that I'll be ready for Ph.D., but I don’t know if it’s a right way or not.
Please give me some advice.
Warm regards
Mohammed
Answer Dear Mohammad,
I can certainly understand wanting to get back into the student frame-of-mind by taking a short course for a degree before embarking on a larger goal of completing a Ph.D. program. My main concern is that you say it's a "master by coursework", and I'm not exactly sure I understand what you mean by that. My initial thought is that it's a distance learning degree that you do at home (no classes to go to on a campus). There is nothing wrong with these sorts of degrees from legitimate schools, but you would need to ensure that whatever Ph.D. program you were interested in applying to accepts this as a legitimate degree. Also, even though it's in finance, would this sort of coursework really prepare you for a Ph.D. program and the kind of courses and research that it would entail? That should be the question you ask yourself. If it does not give you a good preparation for they type of work you would have to do as a Ph.D. candidate, then it may not be a good use of your time.
Since you already have your Master's degree, technically you do not need to go back to school prior to applying to a Ph.D. program. I would recommend talking with current Ph.D. students in the program you are interested in and finding out more about what their coursework and research is like, the time commitments involved, and what they did to prepare and apply to the program. You may find that after doing this type of research into the program, that you have a better understanding of what you need to do to prepare yourself for application to the program.
