By Any Other Nerd

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes Since graduation, two things have happened.  The first is that the dissertation itself has been published on ScholarWorks at UMASS Boston.  You can look, download, read, enjoy(?) the full text here .   I am particularly happy that I could make it open-access and ready for everyone to freely access.  One of the running jokes I had with the participants in the study was explaining the process of the next steps.  I would say something to the effect that, "Once I defend the dissertation, I will be putting it up on my website for a reasonable fee of $99.99."  It got a chuckle because, well, it still strikes me how many articles and books are about open-access research and are prohibitively expensive.   Now that it was available, I did my best to return to some of the communities on Reddit and elsewhere to let folks know that it had been published.  Because of the levels of anonymity with participants I mainta...

Estimated Reading Time: 7 minutes The day began in an unfamiliar bed, in a rented space. We had arrived the night before so that we could avoid the typical chaos of Boston commutes and just give us some breathing space before and after the graduation. It was an early start like many of the early starts throughout my time at UMASS Boston.  Rising around 5am (though I do this normally) and driving into the city to avoid tedious traffic and white-knuckling my steering wheel (audiobooks only help so much).  I did that trek for 3 years--during the 3-week intensives in June and Fridays for the Fall and Spring semesters.  When I arrived at campus, I often went for a run along the Harbor Walk, a beautiful vista of the harbor and surrounding city and islands.  Some really great sunrises to capture as well.   This morning, I would also get up and go for a run along that path to take in the morning, exercise the demons, get a hit or two of nostalgia, and sit with a pr...