You can do a part-time PhD; I'm living proof of it. But that doesn't mean it's easy or recommended.
I did it while married with two kids, and a third born in the middle. I effectively worked on it part time, because I was consulting at night and on weekends to make ends meet. After my four years of coursework, we returned to Israel; I flew to Chicago 3-4 times each year (at my own expense) to meet with my advisor and make some progress.
These were extremely difficult years for me, and for my family. I was working extremely hard, sleeping very little, and making very slow progress in my research.
Oh, and my advisor didn't know that I was working during my years on campus; if he had found out, he would have revoked my funding and/or have me thrown out of the program.
My wife and children were very supportive in every way, and I appreciate that. They even agreed for me to go away for the entire summer to write my dissertation. (Which my advisor didn't even look at until six months later, but that's another issue.)
I'm glad that the author feels good about doing a part-time PhD, but what I did to myself and my family isn't something that I wish upon anyone unless they really want a PhD.
That said, I should note that I'm happy (and extremely proud) to have finished. By the skin of my teeth, perhaps, but I managed to do it.
That completely depends on the subject and on your expectations. A PhD is not very well-defined in terms of energy you have to invest, nor is it a good indication of intellectual capacity needed to complete it in a reasonable amount of time. PhD programs are just too different to say anything meaningful about these things. Also your supervisor plays an important role, which is usually another unknown variable.
It works really well if there's some synergy between your job and PhD. For example, a friend of mine is working at an R&Dish job while doing a PhD. His thesis is essentially an excuse to dive more deeply into the problems he's currently trying to solve during working hours. Everybody wins!
Barring that, I think it's going to be difficult or impossible. My current (wet) lab would not consider a part-time PhD student. Most of the experiments we do are time-consuming and can't really be done piecemeal like that. Theoretical stuff works a bit better, but I think there is a lot to be said for being "around."
I did it while married with two kids, and a third born in the middle. I effectively worked on it part time, because I was consulting at night and on weekends to make ends meet. After my four years of coursework, we returned to Israel; I flew to Chicago 3-4 times each year (at my own expense) to meet with my advisor and make some progress.
These were extremely difficult years for me, and for my family. I was working extremely hard, sleeping very little, and making very slow progress in my research.
Oh, and my advisor didn't know that I was working during my years on campus; if he had found out, he would have revoked my funding and/or have me thrown out of the program.
My wife and children were very supportive in every way, and I appreciate that. They even agreed for me to go away for the entire summer to write my dissertation. (Which my advisor didn't even look at until six months later, but that's another issue.)
I'm glad that the author feels good about doing a part-time PhD, but what I did to myself and my family isn't something that I wish upon anyone unless they really want a PhD.
That said, I should note that I'm happy (and extremely proud) to have finished. By the skin of my teeth, perhaps, but I managed to do it.