Each workshop attracts a diverse set of participants from a range of cultures and disciplines at various stages in the Ph.D. process; in addition, however, each group of participants, as doctoral students, also shares a set of common experiences inherent to the doctoral process. This combination--an assembly of people bound by common circumstances, distinguished by diverse studies--produces a unique graduate student experience. Unlike a traditional lecture format where students are given information about generic "graduate experiences," the workshops provide a space for participants to interact-across disciplines and across experiences--with peers. In a framework of structured activities, graduate students are able to voice their individual concerns and share strategies they have developed to address those concerns.

While much of the material covered in the workshop is available for students elsewhere, the workshop brings information together for the participants in a coherent way, which many have welcomed. Still, this is not what makes this workshop series so successful. What distinguishes the workshops is that they provide occasions and means for graduate students to mentor one another. The workshop leaders are themselves Ph.D. students who developed the workshops in response to their own graduate student concerns. Centering on the graduate student experience from the inside locates participants in a setting in which they can quickly take charge. Together participants, including the facilitators, develop solutions and strategies for each group's particular concerns. This participant-constructed context creates a community of graduate students in a process that is too often isolating.

The workshop is, ultimately, the enactment of Discussion Guide prompts, taking its shape each time in participants' responses. These prompts invite participants to write and talk about their individual experiences and concerns (e.g. a dissertation chair who has taken another position at another university), grounding discussion in local settings and particular experiences. The workshop leaders use locally identified settings and experiences to ground a developing discourse that addresses issues of broad concern and general interest to doctoral students (e.g. committee construction, time to completion, relevance of research). Although each workshop takes on its own unique shape, its constituative activities, framed by the Discussion Guide, render it generalizable, portable.

One of the reasons that the workshop is transportable to other settings, can travel to other universities, may be found in the Discussion Guide itself. Designed as a series of prompts and suggested strategies, the Discussion Guide is intentionally incomplete, open-ended; it is through the workshop experience itself that each group of participants fills in the gaps, completing their own Guide. Promoting participation across learning styles provides an environment within which community is cemented through personally shared experiences. Each section of the Discussion Guide moves participants back and forth between writings and discussion about their individual and common experiences. These activities begin with each participant individually reflecting on and responding to questions in writing, then partnering and sharing their individual responses, and finally moving to whole group discussion.

This range of activities creates a space within which peer mentoring becomes the mode of interaction. As peer participants coach and advise each other on a variety of topics (e.g., writing strategies; time management; how to deal with writer's block; how to juggle the demands of family, graduate school, and work; and how to work with committees), they offer one another strategies for overcoming obstacles and encouragement to maintain productivity and satisfactory progress toward completion of the degree. The diversity of the participants further promotes the peer mentoring that has become central to the workshop. Cross-cultural exchange, for example, takes place as students from various cultures share their expectations about the Ph.D. process and their experiences in that process. Such gained appreciation also spans other domains, including the various disciplines represented at the workshop, the various stages of completion of the doctoral process, as well as various life experiences.

The topics that are covered in this workshop are the following:

• Demystification
  • Characteristics of a dissertation
  • What a dissertation is designed to do
  • Persistence and planning
    
    
• Personal Management
  • Time management
  • Deadlines and procrastination
  • Strategies to make better use of your time
  • Maintaining productivity
  • The role of personal relationships in the PhD process
    
    
• The Committee
  • Choosing an advisor
  • Getting the most out of your committee
  • Maintaining a productive relationship with your committee
  • Utilizing committee feedback
    
    
• Topics and Proposals
  • Sources for topics
  • Evaluating and selecting a topic
  • Characteristics of a proposal
  • Writing a proposal
    
    
• Writing and Revision
  • Starting a dissertation
  • Researching and drafting
  • How to keep writing and overcome writer's block
  • Structuring your dissertation
  • Revising your work
  • Evaluating your writing
    
    
• Defending the Dissertation
  • What the defense is for
  • Preparing for the defense
  • Possible questions
  • Handling questions and suggestions
    
    
• Forming Graduate Student Writing Groups
  • Starting a graduate writing group
  • What graduate writing groups are designed to do
  • Writing Center support