led by Xin Miao, PhD student at the University of Stirling, and Chantelle Boyle, PhD student at the University of Glasgow
Role Play Your Viva is an online training session (3 hours with two breaks) open to all social science doctoral researchers in Scottish universities. It is an interactive, immersive event where participants will play three roles involved in the viva process: examinee, examiner and viva chair.
The organisers collected ideas from people who passed their viva, examiners who sat in vivas and chairs who organised vivas in 2024. Examples from different universities in Scotland were collected through facilitators’ inter-disciplinary networks and the Early Career Researchers network at Scottish Educational Research Association. These examples have been developed into cards with tips for each person to take when they role play.
In this event, we will have a discussion around your pre-conceived ideas on worst case scenarios, and most likely scenarios, as well as what questions do you expect. Attendees will know how to combat their fears and turn them into a plan of action.
The aim is to prepare attendees to be familiar with different perspectives and possible scenarios in their upcoming viva experiences. This will include playing the examiner’s role, which will help examinees to better understand what examiners expect from their answer; playing the chair’s role, which will develop assurance that the viva chair is on their side; and playing the examinee, which will be a useful experience to rehearse their performance with peers who support them.
This workshop is most suitable for those nearing their viva, but PhD students at other points in their journey are also welcome. The introductions and explanations will be recorded for future use, but attendee contributions will not be recorded.