Yep, depends on the journal and timing. I submitted to one journal in May and heard back within three weeks that it was accepted. This was so quick because this journal has an editorial committee who ALL read everything rather than send it out to others (so there were 6 people reading it rather than 2) and I had submitted a couple of weeks before their scheduled meeting. Any later and it would have been 6 months before they made a decision.

By contrast, I am currently editing a special issue of a journal which is out for review, and that has been AGES. Maybe 5 months? But possibly it was submitted at the wrong time (not much gets done between May and September regarding reviews, I think, in my field). But they possibly also had problems finding someone willing to spend the time reading all 6 articles: quite a commitment! If I haven't heard anything by the end of September, I'll start chasing more.

Long-winded way of saying it depends! But if you are in a humanities discipline, I would prepare yourself for a longer rather than quick decision!

Congrats! That's brilliant! Well done.

I got a library fellowship thing recently that's pretty prestigious and I totally wasn't expecting that either but, as you say, someone has to get them. You have to be in these things to win them!

Thanks. The lecturer just replied to me and said basically what you just did, Poppy! That is is probably time this student was taken out of her 'comfort zone' a bit, to avoid meeting her if possible (or make it very brief and discreet if she insists) and remind her that students tend not to do any worse on this exam than any other, despite the hard subject matter.

Thanks for all your advice, these things are surprisingly stressful! Now just got to work out how to word the e-mail tactfully...

Thanks to both of you. Poppy, yes - the lecturer spent the whole of the last lecture talking about the exam and revision strategies and my last seminar was also a revision session, where we went through past papers, etc. Both were relatively sparsely attended so I feel a little bit reluctant to do it all over again - I'm not sure what else I could add? The student in question, however, was at both the session and lecture, and still 'isn't coping' but I don't think I can do what she wants me to do. She wants me to go through past papers and explain what each question is asking for, but I can't see how this would help her because I'm not going to be in the exam to help her decipher this exam paper. Am I being mean here, do you think? I have to say that I have found this group of students to need more hand-holding and clarification of things than any other (this is the third time I've taught this course), and I'm caught between thinking they need to take more responsibility for their own learning and feeling a bit sorry for them, because it IS a hard exam.

The lecturer (my supervisor) doesn't seem to be around this week; I think he may be away. Thanks again for the advice.

In case it wasn't clear, I was a teaching assistant on this course, not the lecturer.

I have just finished teaching a course which, compared to a lot of courses on the degree programme, is a difficult course. It is also a course which has changed a lot over the last few years and has been taught by different lecturers with slightly different angles on the material.

The exam is also generally a difficult one, with varying types of questions ranging from the very braod to the very particular. So I have just received a panic-filled e-mail from a student saying she's looked at past papers and doesn't understand them. She has asked me if I would be willing to meet with her to go through past questions with her (the exam is next week).

So I am wondering a) if it is fair to meet with her when I'm not meeting with the rest of the group (although she rather ominously says that she knows she 'is not alone' in feeling this way)? And, b) should I be worried about unwittingly misleading her about the exam? I mean, I haven't produced the exam paper (not that I would give any info if I did) so I am unsure as to what she expects me to say, other than revise as well and as broadly as you can.

My other problem is that I don't think the course has been taught particularly cohesively this year for various reasons, so I'm almost as clueless as the students in this respect.

Has anybody had a similar request? How did you deal with it?

This is quite a controversial topic at the moment. This article covers the issue quite well.

http://chronicle.com/free/v55/i07/07a01001.htm

I do know somebody (one of my supervisors) who submitted in 2.5 years. BUT, he only did it in this time because he had to due to being an overseas student and having to go and do national service in his own country. He was (and he is quite open about this) referred at his viva and he openly admits that his thesis wasn't great. Luckily, he has done great stuff since, made Professor before he was 40 and is now a leader in his field.

I don't know if it's really possible to finish in much less than three years and produce a really good thesis. I know people who have submitted on the dot of three years and have produced really good stuff, but this is the exception rather than the rule around here. Most people seem to take between 3 and 4 years, and I don't really know why anyone would want/expect you to do it in any less.

======= Date Modified 03 Apr 2009 11:50:25 =======
Am I the only one whose acknowledgements resemble a gushing Oscar acceptance speech, then? Although I did stop short of thanking God...

I haven't submitted yet but have written the acknowledgements in an attempt to spur me on. I suspect I will have to cut them down a bit. If the department had a cat, I'd probably acknowledge it! The (genuine) gushing about my supes is almost vomit-inducing. I didn't use their titles, though, because it didn't seem right as I have never called them anything other than Firstname Lastname and these are quite personal, warm thanks. Am I really breaching some unwritten rule here?

I'm sorry that this has happened to you and hope you find some procedural reason to appeal. It appears that you have been ill-advised by your supervisor and treated weirdly by your examiners.

But I am slightly confused as to how your supervisor was in the room, but not facing you and the examiners. Surely it was just you, your examiners + your supervisor in a small office or something? Or are you not in the UK and your vivas are different?

Also, how can they have failed you and not given any indication there was a problem DURING the viva? If this is what happened, you need some serious explaining from somewhere. Did they seem to be okay and then tell you at the end that you'd failed, or what? I think most of the people I know who have major corrections etc knew from the minute the viva started what direction it was going in. It would appear that you have been treated oddly, to say the least. I hope you get some answers from somewhere.

Personally, I wouldn't reply further. You don't want to get into tit-for-tat argument. I ended up being drawn into something like this a couple of years ago regarding my comments on an essay. In the end, I decided that it was stupid trying to defend myself because I had nothing to defend. I would just keep an eye on the student and if you think there are likely to be further problems or there is further cheeky correspondence, make the course unit director aware of possible problems. In my case, they were very supportive.

Hi - I think from some other things you said that we may be at the same institution. I changed a panel member about a year and a half into my PhD. In my case, he was actually officially my joint supervisor. He wasn't hostile to me but was almost ridiculously disinterested in me or my work. He just didn't care. I talked to my other supervisor about how he had stood me up at meetings (about 4 or 5 times!), not replied to e-mails, etc. Luckily, my other supervisor agreed with me and he is the more powerful in the institution (and is in my subject area, the other was from another arts discipline), so he approached somebody else who had shown real interest in my work to take over. We both told the ousted supervisor/panel member that we thought that my work was going in a different direction and that there was another person whose expertise seemed more suited to the project. He still says hello in the corridor - which is more than I ever got when he was supervising me!

Anyway, the moral of this is speak to your supervisor. Maybe don't say that you want to get rid off this woman off your panel yet, but that you have found the nature of her criticism difficult/puzzling, and ask what she thinks of it? Maybe you could come to an agreement about it.

Of course, if we are in the same place, your third panel member is only your third panel member. They may criticise you till kingdom come, but they won't (unless in special circumstances) be your internal examiner, and they don't hold sway as to whether you should submit or not. Heck, when it comes to it, neither officially do your supervisors - but you would be stupid to submit without their go-ahead. But I don't think that applies to the third panel member, who works only in an advisory capacity - especially if your supervisors are happy. Of course, they're the ones who have PhDs and understand the process more than this woman.

Good luck!

======= Date Modified 05 Feb 2009 11:56:06 =======
I just wanted to thank you for saying that it's okay not to love your thesis anymore in the writing up stage. This is something I have really been struggling with lately. I know the thesis is not that far from being a full draft. But I feel nothing towards it at the moment. I don't care about it at all. The motivation is just not there. I think it's because in my head I've already moved on from those ideas. I want to do a different kind of history and this topic just doesn't really do it for me anymore.

So I've been feeling really ambivalent towards it and wondering if it meant that I'm not cut out for this lark. But maybe it's only natural. As a part-timer, I'm now in my fifth year with this topic. This is why it needs to be my last. I need to move on to bigger and better things. Thank you for the motivation!

"DE is a creature from before time, a creature that would make Gandalf wet himself. He’s been over to the dark side, bought souvenirs and a small timeshare and come back .. with no expression.

And poor SG, sitting there, UN Peace Observer to the inhuman act of viva supervision, thinking “I’m actually the principal supervisor here, I should be running this meeting”. "

Ha ha! I would be convinced that we have the same co-supervisor if the initials weren't wrong! Yesterday, I heard of the devastation he caused to another student to whom he is the third panel member. We shared alcohol in solidarity while thinking up ever more creative insults that we will, one day, if pushed, hurl towards him. "Dawson's Creek-loving knobjockey" was definitely my favourite. (He once let slip, in a philosophy of history course no less, that his favourite TV programme, possibly of all time, is Dawson's Creek.)

I was supposed to be taking a week off from yesterday, but I woke up this morning with lots of ideas for a paper I'm giving in late January. So I have spent most of the morning writing. Why is it that I spend most the time I'm supposed to be writing feeling blocked, but as soon as I give up trying it comes out semi-effortlessly?! Weird.

Anyway, whatever happens, I'm definitely having Christmas Day and Boxing Day off. Have a good Christmas everyone, no matter what you end up doing!