Very few of us escape UChicago unscathed by a Regenstein all-nighter, but the Graduate Student Association would rather their students get their work done while the sun shines. So they held their most recent Dissertation Write-in—August 12–16, during which 20 students committed to a workweek with four hours of writing a day—in a more exclusive locale: the basement of the Woodlawn Social Services Center. There’s no cheat code for productivity (I’ve looked), but the GSA comes close. Students slap down a $50 deposit that they lose if they don’t show up—there was one casualty during their last session—in exchange for free coffee and food from local restaurants. Kalee Ludeks, who manages the GSA’s programming, says that accountability is one of the biggest reasons why students keep signing up. The GSA has held 12 write-ins to date, with about 30 or 40 writers applying each time. Beyond that, the students started each day by entertaining guests: Doug Culver from Student Counseling Services on motivation, Allison Kallo from IT on online resources, Patrick Houlihan from Career Advancement on the dissertation as professional development, and, critically, a masseuse. More than anything, the program is a nudge in the write direction. The 19 students there on Friday—spanning six divisions, ranging from fresh faced to silver haired—seemed veteran, with realistic expectations and an understanding of their own best practices. Dissertations are massive beasts, and, after their week of work, students were happy with having written a couple dozen pages, revised 45 of them, or simply gotten through their proposal. Even during lunchtime, half the room had their laptops out, chugging away diligently, and four stayed in WWSB 071—the Dissertation Writing Room, reserved for write-in alums—for the afternoon. I expected the graduate students to be like my college friends for whom procrastination means Gilmore Girl marathons, Thirsty Thursdays, or unstoppable naps. The difference in maturity between undergraduates and graduates, though, was evident. “I’m one of those people who procrastinates by doing other work, cleaning, cooking,” says Christina Ortiz, AM’08, AM’11, whose dissertation is on parental racial socialization in multiracial families. After checking her Facebook five times during the first day, she not only disabled her account but also changed the password to a string of random characters stashed in a word document. The GSA doesn’t go so far as to cut off Internet for the writers—they need it for research. Another student said that her worst moment of procrastination was a 20-minute walk when she “really needed to see the sun.” She claims not to have checked Facebook once, and that her $50 deposit was going right back into her bank account. The last goodie for the students was a T-shirt with the Latin motto “scribe, ergo conficiam”: I write, therefore I finish. It’s a bit of a misnomer, as these 19 diligent dissertation writers aren’t done just yet. But thanks to the write-in, they’re closer.