Janeth Canama

So today we are officially DOST-ASTHRDP scholars. Just received word from one of my classmates. Finally! It's been a long time coming. I would say the news has less impact than I expected. Maybe I grew tired of waiting. But I was relieved. Relieved that it's actually happening. At last! Relieved that there's gonna be support from DOST. To be honest, I was ecstatic for a while. Yay! But it only lasted a second? Three seconds, max. Because I remembered that I have so much to do - exams to take, weekends to study. I am way behind on my coursework. I also have job responsibilities to fulfill before I officially resign. It's funny how my mind works. It's like it doesn't want me to celebrate. But I'm gonna freaking celebrate. Shut up, mind! I deserve this. Live life one day at a time. Do things one at a time. Ciao, for now. Remember, life is beautiful.

So some students have been asking me what's the point of doing a PhD? What are the advantages? And I answer that usually a PhD is needed to be a school principal. I gave that answer because that's the context that they can relate to. But that's not really my answer. I don't plan on being a school principal or have a management role anytime soon. So, why pursue a PhD? The main reason is because I wanna do something that I'm naturally good at. I'm good at math so I want to lean more into that. Because that's where my advantage lies. Which is funny because I wasn't always a natural at math. Yes, I was good at math in my elementary and high school years. I was even an MTAP participant at one point. But I didn't think of doing math as a career. Until I had no other choice. But that's a story for another time. High school and college math might have come easy to me. But proper math was a different beast. Rigorous thinking did not ...

PhD 2023 is a series of blog posts that I'm planning to write regarding my experiences as a PhD Math student at MSU-IIT . Photo by  Pixabay  from  Pexels As you may or may not know, I was a board exam topnotcher in the September 2016 LET . And I regret that I haven't documented the whole journey. That would have been epic.  So now that I'm starting this new journey, it would be a waste not to document it all - the highs and lows, the sighs and the woahs.  I even suspect that I enrolled in this program simply because I want to document it. I may be joking but there's some truth to this. Anyway, this PhD series is going to be non-linear.  So is life. So is research. It's going to mirror the process of doing research. If all goes well, I'll graduate by 2023. Hence the name. But that's a long way to go. There's no rush. I wanna enjoy the process. 

According to investopedia.com , "b aptism by fire is a phrase originating from Europe that describes an employee that is learning something the hard way through a challenge or difficulty." I regret to start this series with this post. But this experience prompted me to document it all. Something to look back to when all is said and done. So here’s what happened. I just took my first exam as a PhD Math student. And I did poorly. Not zero, but pretty bad. Photo by  Andrea Piacquadio  from  Pexels   Our first long exam on Abstract Algebra was on the 20 th  . I asked to take the test the day after because I didn’t have enough time to finish the exam that day. I had other obligations. Also, I haven’t studied anything. No notes nor printed copies of the reference book which is Algebra by Hungerford. How could I? I haven’t attended a single lecture. But that’s not an excuse not to prepare beforehand. More on that later. So the exam day came. And ...