Day zero
Every tool set up free, with the steps written down.
Module one is a full module and it happens before the clock starts. Every tool used anywhere in this course comes with the exact steps to get it without paying, and the reason it was chosen over the alternatives.
Where a tool genuinely is not free, and SPSS is the only one, that is said plainly and free stand ins are given that produce work your department will accept.
- An AI assistant that can hold a whole chapter, free tier, no card
- Zotero, its browser connector and its Word plugin, installed and tested
- Five free routes to real papers, including African Journals Online, plus the extension that opens paywalled ones legally
- Word and Excel free, including the education licence most students never check
- A statistics package: your university lab, or the free equivalent that opens SPSS files and produces APA tables
- R and RStudio, both free, with an honest lesson on whether you should choose R at all
- Backup, transcription and similarity checking, honestly explained