Juggling Priorities: Navigating Parenthood and Postgraduate Studies with Grace

Starting yesterday, the University of Birmingham’s Parents and Carers Fortnight 2023 is a programme of events from the Parents and Carers Network. Natalia Hartono, a final year PhD student in Mechanical Engineering, shares how she balances her research programme with her responsibilities as a parent.

Balancing the responsibilities of being a postgraduate researcher and a parent is a unique challenge that demands sacrifice and unwavering determination. In this blog post, I will share my personal journey, highlighting the valuable lessons I’ve learned along the way. Despite the difficulties, maintaining a positive mindset, embracing personal growth, and having positive supports have been instrumental in navigating this demanding lifestyle.

Embracing Scholarships and Responsibilities

Receiving scholarships to pursue my postgraduate studies was a privilege, but it also came with significant responsibilities. Meeting requirements and achieving milestones demanded substantial time and effort. I am grateful for the opportunity to pursue my studies and acknowledge the sacrifices my family has made to support me on this journey.

Finding Joy in the Journey

Natalia competing in the final of the 2022 UoB 3MT

Participating in university events and competitions has truly enriched my academic experience. Instead of fixating solely on winning, I have always prioritised embracing the joy that comes from the process itself. I firmly believe that the true value lies in the growth and learning that occur along the way, regardless of the final outcome. This mindset is something I am wholeheartedly instilling in my child, teaching her the importance of embracing both successes and failures as opportunities for personal development. By embodying resilience and persistence, I am actively laying a foundation for my child’s future, emphasizing the fulfilment that stems from the journey rather than the pursuit of victory.

The Price of Pursuing Higher Education

Behind the accomplishments lie a multitude of sacrifices: sleepless nights, working on weekends and holidays, and missing out on leisure time have been part of my journey. However, I always make an effort to find dedicated time for my daughter, showing her that she is loved and cared for. While the path has not been easy, my family and I have prioritised my studies, knowing that these sacrifices are temporary and will ultimately benefit our collective future.

Overcoming Challenges During the Pandemic

Starting my PhD and adjusting to a new school for my child in a foreign country coincided with the pandemic’s challenges. Lockdowns and school closures disrupted our routines, but through resilience and unwavering support, we navigated through. My husband’s understanding and our commitment to prioritising our daughter’s needs played a vital role. Night-time chats became our solace, fostering stability. I adapted my study routine to dedicate focused time at night, balancing academics with my daughter’s emotional well-being. This experience taught us the value of flexibility, adaptability, and family support in challenging times, strengthening our bond.

The Power of Supportive Networks and Services

Building a strong support system is crucial for successfully balancing parenting and postgraduate studies. My relationship with my supervisor and research group has provided invaluable guidance and encouragement. Additionally, utilising resources such as Library Services and joining networks like the “Shut Up and Work” community have improved my time management skills and created a supportive environment. Importantly, I’ve also recognised the importance of seeking help when needed and accessing mental health support during periods of burnout.

Navigating the demanding yet fulfilling phase of balancing parenthood and pursuing postgraduate studies requires sacrifice, understanding, consistency, and a positive mindset. Throughout my personal journey, I have come to appreciate the significance of embracing the process and cherishing the valuable lessons learned from both triumphs and setbacks. The unwavering support of my family and the resources available to me have been invaluable. Although the path may not always be easy, prioritising and fostering a supportive environment enable us to navigate this demanding yet fulfilling phase of our lives. Remember, you are not alone—seek support, maintain a positive outlook, and find joy in gracefully managing these intertwined priorities.

Exploring AI Tools for Researchers

Following on from our last post on Potential Uses of ChatGPT in Research, this in depth post by James Barnett, Research Skills Advisor from the Research Skills Team in Library Services, covers wider emerging AI tools for research.

What did you make of our previous post, written by ChatGPT in response to a couple of prompts? Did you think the response was thorough and authentic? Did you feel that points being made about the potential uses for ChatGPT were backed up by enough detail for you to be convinced?

How do you feel about content that is in any way intended as being advisory to the research community being generated by an AI tool – uneasy, or just a logical technological progression?

An image of a fantasy world generated by DeepAI.

Whatever your answers to these questions, there can be no doubt that the release of ChatGPT in November 2022 has heralded a sharp focus on the role that generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools – and developments in AI more broadly – will have in the way we live our personal and professional lives going forward. In some ways, it’s easy for us all to get wrapped up in the narrative that these developments should be seen as at best mildly concerning and at worst downright frightening – particularly when news breaks that leading scientists and technologists are signatories to an open letter calling for the further development in advanced AI tools to be paused, or that the so-called “godfather of AI”, Geoffrey Hinton, has resigned from Google in order to warn of the dangers of further developments in the field.

While wrestling with profound questions around the role and risks of recent developments in AI are undoubtedly necessary as we adapt to them at a societal level (and the case has already been made for the significant role the academic research community should play in this), we should also balance this up with taking account of the wonderful opportunities these developments might bestow – in the context of academic research generally, and the workflows and processes associated with the research cycle in particular. For example, one of the frustrations about the scholarly communications landscape that we frequently hear in the Research Skills Team is that everything moves too slowly – that the time gap between generating findings and getting them published can take years. There is the great potential to use AI to cut these inefficiencies. Using AI to speed up peer review is one area that has already been identified from the publisher perspective, but there are many ways that AI tools can be useful to researchers to augment their existing processes in a way that saves the researcher time.

Potential Uses of ChatGPT in Research

This post (except for this editor’s note) was written entirely by ChatGPT, in response to a couple of prompts about the potential and appropriate use of ChatGPT in research. The text is presented unedited (except for removing sub-headings and combining responses to two separate prompts). Note that it proved to be non-trivial to get ChatGPT to produce suitable text – there were a number of network errors which interrupted some responses, and ChatGPT wasn’t great at working to suggested word counts.

As a postgraduate researcher, you’re always looking for ways to streamline your work, increase your productivity, and produce high-quality research outcomes. One tool that may help you achieve these goals is ChatGPT, a language model based on GPT-3.5 architecture.

The ChatGPT logo

ChatGPT is a powerful tool that can assist you in a variety of research tasks, from generating ideas and hypotheses to performing complex analyses and interpreting data. In this blog post, we’ll explore some of the potential uses of ChatGPT in research and explain how it can benefit postgraduate researchers.

One of the most challenging aspects of research is coming up with new ideas and hypotheses. With ChatGPT, you can generate a wide range of ideas and hypotheses based on the topic of your research. By inputting a brief summary of your research area or question, ChatGPT can generate several ideas that you can explore further. You can also use ChatGPT to refine your research question or problem statement, making it more specific and focused.

Writing a research proposal can be a daunting task, especially if you’re not sure where to start. ChatGPT can help you write a compelling and well-structured research proposal by providing you with relevant information, suggestions, and tips. You can input your research question, methodology, and desired outcomes, and ChatGPT will generate a proposal outline that you can use as a starting point.

Once you’ve collected data, you need to analyze it to draw meaningful conclusions. ChatGPT can help you analyze your data by suggesting statistical tests, visualizations, and other methods to explore your data. By inputting your data and research question, ChatGPT can help you identify patterns, trends, and relationships in your data, allowing you to make evidence-based conclusions.

Interpreting research results can be challenging, especially if you’re dealing with complex data or statistics. ChatGPT can help you interpret your results by providing you with explanations, definitions, and examples of statistical concepts and methods. By inputting your results and research question, ChatGPT can help you understand the implications of your research findings and draw meaningful conclusions.

Finally, ChatGPT can assist you in writing research papers by providing you with suggestions for sentence structure, grammar, and syntax. You can input your research question, methodology, and findings, and ChatGPT will generate a draft paper that you can revise and edit. This can help you save time and effort in writing a high-quality research paper.

In conclusion, the use of ChatGPT can greatly benefit postgraduate researchers in various stages of their research projects, from generating ideas to writing research papers. However, it is important to acknowledge the ethical implications and appropriate use of this technology. Researchers must ensure that they are not plagiarizing or relying too heavily on ChatGPT-generated content. Additionally, researchers must take responsibility for ensuring that the data they input into ChatGPT is accurate and ethical, and that the outputs generated align with the values of scientific research. As with any tool, it is important to use ChatGPT in a responsible and ethical manner, and to ensure that it supports, rather than replaces, the skills and expertise of the researcher.