Could you summarise three years’ work in less than three minutes?

It sounds impossible – but six students from Deakin Business School and Deakin Law School recently accepted the challenge by participating in the coveted Three Minute Thesis competition (3MT).

Pioneered by the University of Queensland in 2008, 3MT is an exercise that assists higher degree by research students with the development of academic and research communication skills.

The rules are simple. Students must present a compelling oration on their thesis topic, and its significance, in language appropriate to an intelligent but non-specialist audience. The challenging part is that contestants only have three minutes to do so.

After a morning of fantastic presentations, and much deliberation by DLS and DBS academic representatives, two winners were chosen.

Dakshina Chandra and Katrina Hogan will both go on to compete for the top spot at the Deakin finals in August.

Contestants and topic excerpts

Trang Tran, Department of Marketing: Intersection of country of origin effect and acculturation: how Vietnamese and Chinese migrants in Australia assess their home and host country goods

Mohammad Shihab Khan, Department of Economics: Electoral behaviour in Bangladesh

Katrina Hogan, Deakin Law School: Promoting ethical, international business activity by leveraging corporate codes of ethics and continuous disclosure legislation in Australia

Daniel Pelchen, Department of Management: What HR might learn from football

Akshaya Kalmanath, Deakin Law School: Gender diversity on corporate boards

Dakshina Chandra, Deakin Law School: Global metamorphosis of the legal profession

Deakin 3MT final

Date: Thursday 18 August 2016
Time: 3-5 pm
Venue: Reach Lecture Theatre
Room: DD2.101
Campus: Geelong Waurn Ponds