Mastering the thesis

Over the past eight years, the entrepreneur has honed her skills and says this has allowed her to apply her natural talent to help people succeed. “I love hearing people say to me that they gained so much clarity and I often feel like I didn’t choose this profession, but it chose me,” Morris beams.

She explains that the consulting aspect involves helping clients brainstorm ideas and find solutions to challenges they may be having with their Master’s theses programmes.

“I may advise them to go into a particular direction or perhaps open their minds to another avenue for consideration.” The coaching entails working with the client for six months and providing them with a customised blueprint, as she assists them to systematically build the different components into a whole, much like Lego blocks. She also uses a lot of imagery so students can visualise what it looks like in their minds. “I believe that students can finish their Master’s theses within six months. It does not have to become a situation where you can’t graduate and get on with the rest of your life.” She says the tool that allows her students to meet their deadlines is the guidance and writing strategies she offers.

Morris explains how she discovered this calling. “I started getting calls from former co-workers to assist with their theses after I became unemployed when my contract ended in 2010.” She recalls the period being very disheartening, since it happened one year after she was accepted to Syracuse University in New York to pursue her Masters in PR and also Andrew’s University, Michigan to study Inter Disciplinary Communications.

She felt a deep sense of loss that she could not fulfil her dream of attending grad school due to her sudden unemployment.

It was especially painful, since she had been granted a discount on her tuition because of her high grades in her undergraduate degree. However, this was not a defeat for her. “You know when you have reached a point when you are down and the only other way is up? That’s how I felt, so I decided to shift my mindset. I was determined to find another way and I was going to keep on living!” Morris declares.

She was still getting jobs, but they were all temporary. However, the bright side was that she was getting private work based on referrals. “People really needed me for the value I brought to their educational goals and now I had the time to assist full time, so I couldn’t refuse. Indeed, I was fulfilling my dreams by helping them all ace their Masters.” she says.

Eventually, she realised she was no longer unemployed because the former co-workers she had assisted started referring students to her.

“After that, students would come to me crying and I worked with them and turned it around, and I was thankful for that.” She explains that some of her clients were Master’s students who were lecturers and requested her guidance and editing.

“Soon the students of those lecturers also became my clients based on referrals, and I later started editing for PhD students and administrators,” Morris recalls.

Last year she conducted a free workshop at the National Library and Information System Authority. “There were people who were stuck for months and became clear on their topic in two hours,” she says proudly. This year as part of the Tunapuna Library’s outreach efforts and her way of giving back to her community, Morris is conducting an Ace your Master’s Thesis workshop that runs every third Tuesday of the month. The tag line is “so you can get on with the rest of your life”.

The workshop began in January and she has covered the introduction, literature review and theoretical framework.

April through June she will be discussing the methodology and the process behind writing your theses. June’s class will cover the technical aspects of writing, such as style and formatting e.g. APA, Chicago and Harvard styles. “I will be discussing those things that can either make you or break you, like how wide the margins are supposed to be, how much allowances you need to make when binding your theses, and the different formats to be used when using sub headings,” Morris says.

To sign up for her workshop contact: lleuella.morris@ gmail.com or call 733-1044.