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Research guide

Advance a project you already have

For someone already doing coursework, a final-year project or a task inside a group. Take one paper apart, practise one skill for two weeks, and ask for feedback on that page.

Last checked 2026-10-25

This is a method, not a university rule

This page is for someone who already has coursework, a final-year project, or a task inside a group. It does not name statistics, lab work, or code as the correct method, and it does not replace what your supervisor asks of this project.

Who it is for

Undergraduates and taught-master's students at a Hong Kong university who already have a project underway. If you do not, start with the first-try guide instead of this page.

Last checked

2026-10-25. The sequence below is practice. It is not an admission rule.

The point

Take one paper that bears on the project apart into four cells, practise one skill you can finish in two weeks, then ask your supervisor to mark that page. Do not ask them, in the same note, whether you should do a doctorate.

The four cells are: the question the paper asks, the material or data it uses, what it does, and the limit it states itself. A cell you cannot fill stays unknown. Unknown is not a failed grade, and it is not a standard method you invent to fill the gap.

What to do

  1. Write the result you want to move forward this week in one sentence. Do not write "improve my research skills".
  2. Choose one paper tied to that sentence. If you can read the abstract and not the method or the data, those two cells stay unknown. Do not rewrite the abstract as a result you have reproduced.
  3. Choose one of the following. Skip any practice this project does not need.
  4. Turn the four cells and that one practice into half a page. Ask the supervisor or the person running the project: "Which cell is wrong, and which item should I change next week?" No reply means the request is unanswered. It does not mean you have been supervised.
  5. The literature matrix, the feasibility note, and the lab record are practice already on the learning paths. They are not a new course. Finish one before you add a second.

One example

The project supervisor says "read more papers". You can read the abstract and not the rest. The question cell states the paper's question. The data cell says the paper names a database you have not checked you may use. The method cell stays unknown. The limit cell quotes the authors' own last paragraph and says so. This week you complete the first row of the matrix. You do not also apply to a new summer programme.

Easy mistakes

  • Writing the paper's result as a result you produced.
  • Treating a public tutorial as the method this project requires.
  • Asking for a judgment of you, rather than of one page of work.
  • Treating two unknown cells as proof that the direction is a bad fit.

Template

Use the direction card's two-week task for that one practice only. Blanks stay unwritten.

Next

Return to Getting started. If you have already contacted more than one group, use the comparison after contact.

Direction card

Narrow an interest into a question, a subject, what you know and a two-week task. A blank is unwritten, not a negative.

Question: 【未填写】
Subject: 【未填写】
What I know: 【未填写】
What I do not know: 【未填写】
Two-week task: 【未填写】
Next decision: continue, change the question, change the method, or pause. Blanks stay unwritten.

Blanks stay unwritten. Copying does not mark this as sent.

Sources

This record has no public source yet.