#25 - Defend My Dissertation

What an emotional roller coaster.  So cliche, but I can't think of any other way to describe this process.  Here's the brief story of how this all happened.

In 2012, after 6 great years at Northeastern Illinois University, I decided I wanted to do more.  I wanted to get a Ph.D. with the hopes of pursuing a path to a Vice President of Student Affairs position, where I could effect greater changes on a campus than I could as an Aquatics Coordinator.  Plus, with a Ph.D., I'd always have the option to go the faculty route if I so chose.

Man, did I sob when I left NEIU.  It was my first full-time position in collegiate recreation and it became my home.  Most days, I loved going to work.  I worked, I played, I learned.  It was at NEIU that I first learned about privilege and started to think about my role in the systems of higher education and our nation.  I also learned I had a unique perspective about student mental health as a child of two mental health professionals.  And I learned that what I love most in the world is community building and creating safe, fun spaces that promote genuine connections.  Plus, we laughed and played a lot, things I never really realized could be incredibly valuable components of a workplace.

Just another day on the job

Very soon after starting my doctoral program in Leadership Studies at the University of San Diego, I struggled with my place and professional goals.  I didn't get a graduate assistantship and I couldn't find a job.  I finally went to the recreation office.  They rejected me.  Twice.  They kept saying they didn't take unsolicited resumes and I could visit their job opportunities website.  I did.  It only advertised a kickboxing instructor position, one of the few positions in recreation for which I have absolutely zero qualifications.  Eventually I e-mailed the Intramural Coordinator who met with me, frowned a lot at my resume, told me he'd obviously give me a job, passed on my resume to the director who gave me 20 hours a week between the office and intramurals, and eventually became my friend.

As I voiced my desire to pursue a path to the Vice Presidency, my colleagues and instructors told me I needed to get experience outside of recreation and to put my studies in another context.  My reaction was always the same: "I agree, but...  You don't have to get experience in recreation.  And recreation is just as important if not more important than other Student Affairs offices."  Then I realized that my defensiveness came from my reluctance to leave recreation.  I loved recreation.  I had wanted to become a Vice President to effect greater change, but I could effect change from anywhere, and I chose collegiate recreation.

I still struggled with finances and my not-well-defined position with USD recreation.  I eventually moved over to work part-time at San Diego State University with intramurals and sport clubs.  I love my position, my coworkers, and my students, and I'm doing my best to remain in denial that I have to leave soon.  I finally feel valued, valuable, challenged, and supported again.

Although I finally found a position that fits me, I have struggled financially throughout my entire time at USD.  When USD told me that they worked with students to ensure they had reasonable financial aid packages and that if I worked hard, I would be eligible for graduate assistantships and scholarships, I believed them.  I've worked incredibly hard.  My grades are great.  My work is even better.  My financial aid package has been comprised of student loans with decreasing grants every year even though my estimated family contribution is $0.  I have continued to pick up flexible part-time jobs so that I can pay my bills and at this point, as a Ph.D., have 5 jobs that I juggle and work as much as possible, which is usually 20-30 hours a week on top of my academic obligations.  I never have a day off completely.  The few that I have taken off, I'm riddled with guilt because I know that near the end of the semester I'll struggle to pay my rent and bills... again.

One of my happy places

When I started the program, holding a teaching assistant position and even teaching in the undergrad leadership program was voluntary.  I pursued both anyways.  Eventually they added a 1-credit stipend, which was nice, but only in that I have fewer loans as the amount was subtracted from my financial aid package, so I was still in the same place in the short run.  Every semester I requested a teaching and/or teaching assistant position and only received 2 in 4 years, including summers.  The process for choosing teaching assistants has been revamped and is supposedly more fair, giving preference to students without graduate assistantships, but I've still lost out positions to current graduate assistants who are receiving full tuition, a stipend, and benefits.  I also acknowledge it's not fair pitting us against each other.  We all want the experience on our resume.  It's just incredibly frustrating.

Another happy place

While my fruitless pursuit of funding has been overwhelming at times, the most frustrating aspect of the process is that nearly every single semester, my financial aid was incorrect.  By my second year, I was in the habit of writing to our "One Stop Student Center" a few weeks before the semester to confirm my financial aid was set to be disbursed correctly and on time.  I do not think there was a single semester that happened, and only once was it my fault (as we have to state how many credits we are taking, I registered for a different amount, but there was no where to check to see how many I had stated, so I couldn't check it).  By my last year, I accompanied each e-mail with a line to the effect of "I am registered for 1 dissertation unit, which qualifies me for full financial aid as I am a doctoral student.  Before you explain to me that 1 unit does not qualify for financial aid, please check with financial aid."

Yet another happy place

These financial struggles really affected my mental health, which was curious as throughout the program I focused my studies on campus mental health.  That, and the competitiveness I felt from some of my peers.  I still can't quite figure out why I feel as if I have to appear casually flawless in my academic and professional pursuits in the context of my academic colleagues when I do not feel that same pressure with my professional colleagues.  I do know that affected my social relationships to the point that I made a conscious decision to be less social in general and less social through my academic program in particular.

At the end of my third year, I decided to focus entirely on my dissertation and working as much as possible.  I chose the outlets of physical activity, nature, literature, and the relationships I have that make me feel the most like myself: with my parents, a few, select friends outside of San Diego, and even fewer in San Diego.  It was a difficult decision and I still feel guilty for neglecting some friendships.  However, I know that it was the right decision because the care and kindness I was able to show myself has led to healthier life choices and a confidence in my own capacities as I completed my dissertation (the biggest accomplishment of my life) and transition back to professional life.  I'm thrilled I took the time to really fall in love with San Diego and all of the activities that brought me energy and life when I needed it most.

The dissertation itself has been a bizarre process.  I was always open to changing topics and assumed I would throughout my four years, just as I had in my master's program.  However, I ended on a more-developed version of the same topic I had written about in my application to the program: campus mental health.

Growing up with two mental health professionals as parents and having mental health treatment as a common dinner table conversation, I had a unique perspective as a Student Affairs professional.  I realized how important outside-the-classroom learning opportunities and communities are for healthy campuses, how my role as a Student Affairs professional allowed me to connect with students and to create spaces for students to connect with each other, and how my knowledge of mental health and campus treatment options were vital in connecting students to care.  Not surprisingly, my dissertation results support just those ideas.  I am thrilled to have found results that support environments to intentionally foster genuine relationships and caring campus communities.  The work we do as Student Affairs professionals is so important to protect students from unnecessary distress and to respond to distress when it arises within our communities.

I am eternally thankful for my parents, who supported me emotionally, cognitively, financially, physically, and socially throughout this process.  They are and will always be my favorite people.  I was able to put my guilt aside to spend real time with them when they came to visit or I was able to visit them.  I'm thankful for the way they see me and that we have so many activities that we enjoy in common.

I am so lucky that I had courses with my dissertation committee members, Dr. Christopher Newman, Dr. Zachary Green and Dr. Lee Williams, and that they later agreed to be part of my dissertation journey.  I invited them to join my committee because I knew that they all had my best interests and academic greatness at heart.  While at times I was nervous for their feedback because I had worked so hard and the work itself was so dear to my heart, receiving the feedback was comforting as it was always given as a gift to push me and my work to be better.  I felt as if they truly believed in me and my work and were eager to see what more I could do.

I am particularly grateful for my dissertation committee chair, Dr. Christopher Newman.  I had many moments of frustration and distress, yet he always received my concern with an easy confidence that I would be fine, that I was more than capable of everything of which I was being asked.  That confidence kept me working and writing so that I finished the process a week earlier than timeline we had set.

I am thankful to have had so many supportive people in and near my dissertation defense.  I had not fully admitted how stressful the final process had been.  I had not been eating nor sleeping well.  I coped by working and working out a lot.  I had lost a lot of weight.

Before my defense, Mariko Peshon offered to practice with me.  Her feedback and willingness to spend her time while I stumbled through my first verbal reading of my material was tremendously helpful.  Grace Bagunu let me call her late at night to run through my presentation the night before, which really helped me iron out some kinks for the next day.

The night before my defense I went to yoga at Mosaic where I felt the love from Sophie, Kevin, Gracie, and later, Kevin again plus two other instructors when they happened to be at Luigi's when I went to get pizza.  (To be fair, Kevin had mentioned pizza before class, and then I couldn't stop thinking about it, so it wasn't quite a coincidence, but it was still lovely.)

The Committee and me

The day of my defense I went to a sport club council meeting in the morning and felt genuinely supported by my coworkers and the students with whom I work closely.  I was excited and nervous that my two supervisors were planning to attend the defense itself.  When I arrived at the room, my dear friend Maria Trias texted to ask if I needed anything.  She came to meet me, helped me ensure the technology would be ready, waited in line with me when I went to purchase chocolate milk, and offered to meditate with me, which I wish I would have taken her up on.  She promised to laugh quietly anytime anyone (a.k.a. Zachary) asked an incredibly difficult question, and she delivered.  After Maria, in walked another dear friend, Kai Matthews.  She was full of the warm, excited energy she is always able to bring to tense events.  I was so grateful to have her unrelenting smile in the room through the entire defense.  I was also happy to see Warren Whittaker, another classmate who is always full of encouragement and some sports talk, which is such a relief.  DeJuan Benford and Andrew Lutz, my supervisors at San Diego State, had some issues with the USD tram, but they made it in time for the questions, the wait, and the celebration.  It meant a lot to me that they took time off to support and celebrate with me.

My committee was tough but allowed me to engage with their questions in ways that were beneficial to my work as a whole.

I was so happy to see my parents sitting outside when the defense itself was over.  It was a nerve-racking 20 minutes or so, but it was fun to introduce them to the people who had supported me from near while they supported me from afar.

Christopher came into the hallway and immediately said, "Congratulations, Dr. Krone."  I still haven't processed that.  Their suggested revisions were consistent with their feedback throughout the process: all items that would improve my work and allowed for my knowledge of the work to shine through.

I celebrated with my parents, DeJuan, Andrew, Kai, and two other coworkers: AJ Gonzalez and his fiancee Lacy that night.  It was so pleasant.  The celebrations continued the next day as my parents and I drank and ate around the city.  It was a really great day.

I was able go to Chicago the following week to celebrate with some of my very favorite friends, including a nice stay with the Zanns.  It was a fantastic 5 days.

I still haven't processed that it is over.  I am just now getting back to a regular eating and sleeping schedule.  I'm so thankful and happy and relieved and proud and encouraged.