======= Date Modified 11 Sep 2011 10:30:56 =======

In a previous role I was paid three-monthly. It can be hard to budget that way. Something that might be worth considering is setting up two bank accounts and setting up a standing order to sort of 'pay yourself' a monthly amount into the account you will use regularly.

======= Date Modified 06 Sep 2011 16:52:03 =======
I get paid monthly, though perhaps cos my funding comes via a programme grant. Same amount each time but the date seems to drift around a bit which is annoying!

Unless you need to set up a bank account before you arrive, the best thing to do might be to wait until you get here and you will probably find a lot of advice from your uni's student union aimed at new and/or international students. 'Freshers fair' might be a place where this information is available. You will probably need multiple bits of ID and proof of address/student status to set up an account

Yes it's worth checking what your university IT department can provide you with.

Alternatively Mendeley is pretty similar (http://www.mendeley.com/). It has its limitations but so do most citation managers.

If the offer letter has come from the university's general admin then it's probably fine. Offer/fees letters can be very standard and don't always take into account the funding status of the student - it's then up to the student to make sure the fees are paid, either by notifying finance that it's covered by a studentship, or paying themselves.

Contact your prospective supervisor or his/her local admin support and ask for clarification. Try to get in writing the funding offer that was made as you may need to pass this on to finance.

You're probably the only forum member to have submitted, been viva-d, successful acquired a new job and submitted corrections all in less than a fortnight. I am in awe of what you achieved. These things do take their toll though, so I'm not surprised there have been some knock on effects.

So please be gentle with yourself and give yourself some breathing space. Would it help you to try to set up support systems at your new location in advance of getting there? Can your GP or any other people you've had support from help you source new support in the new place? Now your other half has witnessed your panic attack maybe he will be wanting to do what he can to help you avoid a future one - do talk to him and be honest rather than dismissing your stress as stupid. I'm sure he'll want to help you sort things out.

You've done some amazing things lately but they haven't been easy. You need to give yourself a chance to recover.

I'd go for it... BUT I would get in touch with them before applying. You say you've basically applied for this job before and also another one with the same PI. If you don't make personal contact it could look like you're indiscriminately applying for anything going. If you do make contact then (i) you can convey your enthusiasm for the specific job and (ii) remind them that (as far as the feedback from last year went) you were previously considered a good candidate. Might help your chances perhaps, or at least give you an honest impression of your chances this time.

I wouldn't get too hung up on your perceived lack of progress. That's PhD life. Maybe they will mind, maybe they won't but there's nothing you can do about it (though be prepared to confidently answer a question on it in the interview).

Good luck :)

I've realised my last post sounded a bit harsh. I should add that you should definitely pursue the option that is better for you, because you need to choose an opportunity that is good and a topic that inspires. The pay off is just that you might have to accept upsetting some people. But that's life.

You're not under contractual obligation to pursue the first option - it's more an issue of diplomacy and respect.

Arguably it would have been best if you could have stalled the first decision to avoid this scenario. It might have been perfectly fine to say you needed time to think. If the second option pans out and you go for that instead then contact the first place asap. It's hard to know how they will react but it doesn't automatically mean a black mark forever, particularly if you are very careful in how you approach the matter.

As a general point it's worth thinking through the consequences of this kind of thing for other people - it may now be too late for the first place to re-advertise for this year. There was a funded PhD place in my department that vanished cos the person who accepted it just didn't turn up and by the time they got in touch to say they weren't coming the timeline of the grant made it no longer possible to have a PhD student start.

The fact that you're posting at 4am is probably not a good sign.

I hope you don't mind me saying this, but have you thought about speaking to a counsellor? You sound pretty traumatised. I think it might be helpful to you to have somewhere to vent and get support away from your work environment. A good uni counselling service will be familiar with some of the particular experiences of students and should be able to lend a supportive ear.

Bad working experiences can really get under your skin and take over your life. I've been there. Things can heal but they take time and support is useful. Give it some thought.

There are fewer truly unique ideas out there than we would like to think. The attitude to overlap varies between fields - when I worked in lab science there was more pressure to 'get there first' whereas in epidemiology/public health it's regarded as a positive thing when different people produce similar clinical trials or cohort studies because if the results are similar then it's viewed as a good thing as it's more likely the findings are correct!

As far as your PhD goes... when I started mine I attended a grad school session where they basically said that as long as your topic was novel on the day you started, then your PhD would be valid i.e. a lit search should be carried out early to ensure that you're not ploughing a well worn furrow, but you can't really control what other people do in the next three years. So check with someone in your faculty who has a broader overview of PhD projects as to whether this is your university's attitude too. Get something dated in writing if you can, in case this comes back to bite you at the viva stage. Don't rely solely on your supervisor's perspective on this one, though obviously if you want to go against it this will need to be done diplomatically and you need someone else on your side.

The implications for your career may need further consideration if you want to stay in academia in the future. It's hard to advise without detailed knowledge of your topic, but perhaps you could identify an niche or different angle that you can exploit. The big groups with the funding are advantaged in some ways, but may be focussing on the more obvious aspects - perhaps there is room for you to identify a more nuanced aspect that you can focus on. Don't be afraid to critically appraise the approach the other groups are taking and see if there are improvements or gaps that you can pursue on a budget.

Good luck :)

Prob best to keep it as is. Though I guess you could use (sic) but it's not the best start to a thesis to be pointing out errors in someone else's grammar!