Getting everything with my thesis "officially" complete turned into quite a nightmare. The process, which I thought would take a couple of months to complete, was crammed into 7 days (really 5, but who's keeping track). Needless to say, I'm all done :)
You're probably dying to hear the whole story - and I certainly don't want to forget the pain I went through - so I'll tell you (but trust me, I won't blame you if you stop reading now).
Now, I was told this whole semester, and even after my defense (which was on the 9th), that as long as I defended my thesis before the end of the semester that I would not have to pay tuition during the summer.
But THEN, I got an email Thursday (the 12th) afternoon saying that, actually, in order to not have to pay tuition I had to get everything completed - which meant making all my changes suggested by my committee, getting it approved by my advisor, getting it approved by the department and dean, getting an electronic copy approved by the department and dean, and finally turning in papers to Graduate Studies. (See how I thought this would take a while???). So you can imagine how excited I was to hear that I actually had one week to get all of this done, otherwise I would have to pay over $600, for nothing.
Considering I had yet to look at/change my thesis at all since my defense, I hurried home and spent all night and some of the morning making changes (thankfully, and by some miracle, I had very manageable changes to make). I sent it to my advisor on Friday, and by Monday morning we had a perfect version (because my advisor is amazing like that. really though, talk about miracles. she is one).
I seriously was running around campus all day on Monday. I thought that my advisor had my forms, so I waited to hear from her so I could get them. But of course, she had already given the forms to the department office (meaning I didn't need to find her in the first place haha). So I ran over to that office with my paper. But guess what, there was a signature missing, and nothing could be done until it was there. So i had to wait a while to get in touch with that teacher. And once I did, she was only going to be on campus for 20 minutes. So I ran (literally) to her office, got her signature, and ran again over to the department office. Then I went to work and waited (not so patiently).
I heard Tuesday morning while I was at work that the hard copy of my thesis had been approved and was ready to be submitted as an electronic version - and this version had to be all fixed up so that everything had bookmarks and links; it was complicated. Thankfully I had already prepared my electronic version over the weekend (with a prayer that I wouldn't have to change anything - and I didn't, woot). So I submitted it right away.
On 4:30 on Tuesday they emailed me that my electronic version was approved. Now I just had to get my forms from the department office and take them to the Graduate Studies office. This would be super easy if everywhere on campus didn't close at 5 (and sometimes earlier). I rushed to the department office and had to wait (as always) for several minutes - just for a form! By the time I got my forms, it was 4:50 - and the Grad Studies office is literally on the other side of campus. There was no way I would make it. So I went home. ha. No big deal because I thought all I had to do was give someone my forms and be done.
Little did I know. Wednesday morning I took over my forms and my title page. Yeah, it was not drop it off and leave. Of course my title page had problems! Which NO ONE caught - and how many people looked at it?? Yeah I was furious. They were the stupidest formatting things (don't bold this, this needs to be lowercase, you need another space here). Oh and the best part? The girl there said it could take a couple of days to "process" after I got it back to them. Yeah, I didn't have a "couple of days". Furious again. Within the hour I had everything fixed - I emailed it over and waited (ok, freaked out to Jantz is more like it. What was I going to do if it did take days?). Luckily (cue another miracle here), later that day I got news that everything was ready again. I took it back over and got all cleared.
I. WAS. DONE.
It's been almost a week and I still can't believe it. Come June, I will officially have my Master's degree. Good job me :) haha.
You're probably dying to hear the whole story - and I certainly don't want to forget the pain I went through - so I'll tell you (but trust me, I won't blame you if you stop reading now).
Now, I was told this whole semester, and even after my defense (which was on the 9th), that as long as I defended my thesis before the end of the semester that I would not have to pay tuition during the summer.
But THEN, I got an email Thursday (the 12th) afternoon saying that, actually, in order to not have to pay tuition I had to get everything completed - which meant making all my changes suggested by my committee, getting it approved by my advisor, getting it approved by the department and dean, getting an electronic copy approved by the department and dean, and finally turning in papers to Graduate Studies. (See how I thought this would take a while???). So you can imagine how excited I was to hear that I actually had one week to get all of this done, otherwise I would have to pay over $600, for nothing.
Considering I had yet to look at/change my thesis at all since my defense, I hurried home and spent all night and some of the morning making changes (thankfully, and by some miracle, I had very manageable changes to make). I sent it to my advisor on Friday, and by Monday morning we had a perfect version (because my advisor is amazing like that. really though, talk about miracles. she is one).
I seriously was running around campus all day on Monday. I thought that my advisor had my forms, so I waited to hear from her so I could get them. But of course, she had already given the forms to the department office (meaning I didn't need to find her in the first place haha). So I ran over to that office with my paper. But guess what, there was a signature missing, and nothing could be done until it was there. So i had to wait a while to get in touch with that teacher. And once I did, she was only going to be on campus for 20 minutes. So I ran (literally) to her office, got her signature, and ran again over to the department office. Then I went to work and waited (not so patiently).
I heard Tuesday morning while I was at work that the hard copy of my thesis had been approved and was ready to be submitted as an electronic version - and this version had to be all fixed up so that everything had bookmarks and links; it was complicated. Thankfully I had already prepared my electronic version over the weekend (with a prayer that I wouldn't have to change anything - and I didn't, woot). So I submitted it right away.
On 4:30 on Tuesday they emailed me that my electronic version was approved. Now I just had to get my forms from the department office and take them to the Graduate Studies office. This would be super easy if everywhere on campus didn't close at 5 (and sometimes earlier). I rushed to the department office and had to wait (as always) for several minutes - just for a form! By the time I got my forms, it was 4:50 - and the Grad Studies office is literally on the other side of campus. There was no way I would make it. So I went home. ha. No big deal because I thought all I had to do was give someone my forms and be done.
Little did I know. Wednesday morning I took over my forms and my title page. Yeah, it was not drop it off and leave. Of course my title page had problems! Which NO ONE caught - and how many people looked at it?? Yeah I was furious. They were the stupidest formatting things (don't bold this, this needs to be lowercase, you need another space here). Oh and the best part? The girl there said it could take a couple of days to "process" after I got it back to them. Yeah, I didn't have a "couple of days". Furious again. Within the hour I had everything fixed - I emailed it over and waited (ok, freaked out to Jantz is more like it. What was I going to do if it did take days?). Luckily (cue another miracle here), later that day I got news that everything was ready again. I took it back over and got all cleared.
I. WAS. DONE.
It's been almost a week and I still can't believe it. Come June, I will officially have my Master's degree. Good job me :) haha.
