CUIN 8320 · Fall 2026
University of Houston · Fall 2026
CUIN 8320C&I Doctoral Research Seminar
A working seminar for doctoral candidates — accountability, method, and the honest conversation about where you actually are.
Course code CUIN8320-F26
The course site is for enrolled students. This page is open to anyone who wants to see what CUIN 8320 is and who teaches it.
Trouble signing in? Use your @uh.edu address — that is the one to give us. (A @cougarnet.uh.edu address will also work if that is what you have.) If it still will not let you in, email rchausmann@uh.edu and I will add you.
About the class
The dissertation is not a writing problem.
Most stalled dissertations are not stalled on writing. They are stalled on a decision the candidate has not made yet, or a question they have quietly stopped asking. This seminar exists to surface that.
We meet every other week. You keep a logbook you share with the seminar: a question about your process, what you know now that you did not know a month ago, and your next move. It is short, it is regular, and it is honest.
The Action Plan holds you accountable for finishing. That is the whole design.
How it runs
The shape of the semester.
Every other Tuesday, six cycles, and a defense at the end of it.
- Tuesdays, every other week, 7:00–8:30 PM Central
- Organising meeting September 1, then six cycles
- A dissertation logbook you share with the seminar
- Probe · Make Sense · Respond against your own research
- Your scheduled Candidacy Defense in December
How the seminar runs
Two-week cycles. Six of them.
Week A you read alone and write the guide. Week B we meet for seventy-five minutes and take the article apart in role — six roles, rotating, so every student plays each one once.
- Week A · asynchronous. No meeting. The Discussion Leader circulates the article a week ahead; everyone else completes the Structured Reading Guide.
- Week B · 75 minutes. Student-led: context, four fifteen-minute passes, then a synthesis note for the cohort.
- Six roles, six cycles. A Latin-square rotation — you take each role exactly once.
The reading guide, the rotation schedule, and the full run sheet are inside the course.
Learning objectives
What you will be able to do.
By the end of the term, you should be able to do each of these in your own setting.
About the instructor
Dr. Robert Hausmann
Educator. Facilitator. Pilot. Observer of human systems. Robert is a professor in the University of Houston EdD Professional Leadership program and an international leadership consultant. His work sits at the intersection of leadership development, organizational learning, and making sense when the stakes are high.
He founded the Open Sky Leadership Institute. The belief that runs through this class is simple: where we gather shapes what we are open to seeing. Different places reveal different possibilities. This course is one of those gatherings.
Inside the course
Everything you need to start is behind one sign-in.
Enrolled students get the course site: the dates, the calendar file, Week 1, and the whole syllabus.
Enter the course →
Use your UH email (@uh.edu). First time in? Choose your own password. Your course code is CUIN8320-F26 — it is filled in for you, but write it down in case you need it.
Trouble signing in? Use your @uh.edu address — that is the one to give us. (A @cougarnet.uh.edu address will also work if that is what you have.) If it still will not let you in, email rchausmann@uh.edu and I will add you.