Rising to the occasion
So someone did an oral defense that was just terrific: had chosen to take one of the more difficult approaches to a particular question, came in and made an immediate clarification of some of the complex points that hadn’t been adequately addressed in the written response, gave an excellent example to reinforce those points, was able to relate them to other relevant issues that came up during the question period, and went on to tell the panel how that particular topic might be helpful in future work.
I don’t know whether it made the stress of having to go through an oral defense at all worthwhile, but it was certainly a great instance of someone impressing the heck out of the faculty, because that person made the most ambitious (and risky!) choice and then took advantage of the defense “opportunity” to expand on the original thoughts in a more interesting way than was possible in the written exam context.
I doubt that this will catch on as a popular strategy for approaching the comps “experience”, but it’s useful to know that it can be done!
