Three Minute Thesis (3MT)
An 80,000 word thesis would take 9 hours to present.
Your time limit...3 minutes!
About Three Minute Thesis (3MT)
We are delighted to invite you to compete in the 2019 University of Portsmouth 3 minute thesis® competition final. We have a grand total of £1000 to award to PGRs who are ready and able to excite us about their research!
3 minute thesis® is an academic competition that challenges postgraduate researchers to use their very best communication skills to enthuse a non-specialist audience about their work and its significance. The catch? You have only 3 minutes and one static PowerPoint slide in which to do it.
Prizes
1st prize - £500 towards your research and entry into the national 3 minute thesis competition run by Vitae.
People’s choice winner - £300 towards your research.
Runner-up - £200 towards your research.
All finalists will be awarded a copy of the ‘53 interesting ways to communicate your research’ book.
Eligibility- who can apply?
Current doctoral researchers from any discipline (who have not yet had their viva and excluding ProfDocs in the taught phase) are eligible to take part. Please note that unfortunately, MRes are not eligible.
How will the competition run?
Shortlisting: The judging panel will review each submitted 3 minute thesis presentation against the judging criteria, and shortlist a maximum of 12 University finalists. Entrants will be notified whether they have been successful by Monday 10th June.
Final: All finalists will be invited to compete (alongside the winners of the Faculty competitions) at the University 3 minute thesis final at the Festival of Doctoral research on the 20th June 2019. Each presentation will be assessed by a panel of judges who will award a first and runner up prize. The audience will vote for a people’s choice winner. Please note we will be filming the presentations.
National competition: The first prize winner will be entered into the national 3 minute thesis competition run by Vitae. Following a shortlisting process, finalists in the national competition will compete at the Vitae Annual Conference in Birmingham on the 16th September 2019.
Entries will be judged on: comprehension and content, and, engagement and communication (for more details see the judging criteria).
How can I prepare?
There’s no doubt that it takes a lot of hard work to squeeze years of work into just 3 minutes in a way that engages and enthuses your audience. But don’t worry, to help you prepare for the competition we are running a workshop on Thursday the 16th of May, 3.00pm-4.30pm with University of Portsmouth Lecturer, Dr Sarah Marley, who won the Asia-Pacific 3MT in 2014. She will be presenting her award winning 3MT, talking about what she did as a winner and what opportunities arose from this, as well as working on 3MT with you. Book your place here.
Let us know you're interested
Please submit your application to docfest@port.ac.uk by 11.59pm on Friday 7th of June, 2019. This must also include:
Your name, student number, faculty and department/school
Your presentation title
150 word abstract
Your presentation slide
A 3 minute video of your 3MT presentation- Please note that you will not be judged on the quality of the video itself so you do not need to go to great lengths when filming your presentation to enter the competition. Possible methods of recording your 3 minute thesis entry include:
Using the ‘Record Slide Show’ function in PowerPoint (see here for more details on how to do this).
Using the video camera or audio notes function on your smartphone to record your presentation (this does not need to include your PowerPoint slide, which can be sent to us as a separate file).
Contact email address
Completed consent form