Yesterday’s meeting with my committee chair went really well.  We had discussed the four case studies in my proposal previously and my task was to develop and more fully explore it using the various lenses I’ve chosen for my dissertation.  Focusing on only one case this month has helped to refine the research problem.  It has taken many months for the proposed research to develop into something that can be acted upon, and we’re almost there.  Now that we’ve worked through the methodology, it’s a matter of maturing the other three cases and rounding out the proposal.  It will still take quite a bit more work to finish, but we’ve had a breakthrough and I’m feeling better about defending by the end of the year.