Overview of Mackem_Beefy
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Let me get this straight - Dr title.
Shouldn't be a problem now as medical doctors tend not to bother treating people off duty for fear of being sued.
Fair comment Charmless, but from what I saw flying back from Thailand a few years ago, there are still people willing to put themselves forward. A diabetic fainted on the plane and the call for help led to the poor woman being treat by 5 different UK GPs. So some out there will still take the risk thankfully.
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
Contact authors of article...
You might contact an author to verify a few aspects of a paper. Most people are ahppy to answer the odd question.
However, I would keep contact to the bare necessities as often the authors are busy people and serious nuisance e-mailers end up being ignored or marked as junk mail senders.
The other reason to contact an author might be to suggest a collaberation.
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
Quiting PhD, how to address it?
Are ou quitting because you do not feel a PhD is for you or because of your PI's attitude towards your work? I assume your PI (primary investigator???) and primary supervisor are the same person?
If this is due to difficulties with your supervision, could you look to talking these problems though or asking for a change in the supervision team as a last resort? It happens that sometimes certain personalities cannot work together (no-one's fault, it just happens) and a change of supervisor to someone you can work with may make all the difference.
I know this situation all too well, having had supervisors I could work with reasonably well during PhD and a first post-doc, but stuck with a couple of people I couldn't work with during a very damaging second post-doc.
You haveve got funding for to the whole period? I wouldn't throw away the chance so readily.
I will point out in the real world you'll be expected to follow the 9 to 5 routine (or rather the 9 to whenever the work is finished routine).
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
funding, and PhD help/advice need!
hi, i'm currently a final year Mbiol student at Bangor university, and i intend to continue on to a phd. however the ins and outs of this process alludes me. especially funding. i have asked lectures for advice but they have been extremely vague in there responses.
so far i understand there are for simplicity two types of phd aviable with in the uk, funded and self funded. funded is self explanatory, as the uni/research team has the resources to provide the funding for the phd student. the self funded is again self explanatory (pay your self) , but is it possible to find/apply funding (from another body ect) for a potentail phd student?
any advice any one can give would be greatly appreciated
Auronv
Perhaps this may help you (link below).
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
Submitted incomplete PhD thesis
Dear psychresearcher,
Thank you for your response.
I don't think I have the privilege to get my thesis retrieved and submit one with a conclusion. Once I submit my thesis to the Registry, I think that is it and there is not much that can be done.
With regards to the conclusion, I am under this impression maybe because my supervisor hardly ever brought it up with me and with lack of sufficient communication I failed to appreciate the importance of a conclusion. Now I realize its importance. Although I have gotten conflicting advice that the missing conclusion may not possibly fail me.
Ah, I know that I asked for honest responses/advice. But I must admit they have been very difficult to take and I am starting to feel really low.... Because reality hurts and this is my very sad reality.
Thank you for your time :-)
Don't be silly lad, you can but try. Ask the registry and at least give it your best shot. You may find they're used to students having to do this and it's not a big deal to them provided the thesis hasn't gone to the examiners.
Don't give up hope!!! Fight!!! :-)
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
Submitted incomplete PhD thesis
Hopeless,
"Psychresearcher" offers some good advice, from the point of view of a supervisor.
Way before PhD I submitted my Masters dissertation missing an appendix. In my case, the omission was completely accidental and unintended - this was back at a time when we were still using floppy disks to transfer data. I mislaid the floppy with the appendix in question and genuinely forgot about it. I found the floppy disk a few hours after I submitted and on realising my mistake, managed to retrieve the dissertation, add this appendix and resubmit one and a half weeks later. I was then told the dissertation was good enough to obtain the Masters, even without the missing appendix!!! At least I gave my supervisor a laugh. :-)
The point is provided your thesis has not gone to the examiners, there may still be a chance to rectify the situation. However, you need your supervisor on board also. Whether you present this as just forgetting to insert the conclusions section in the thesis or you are completely honest about what you have done is up to you.
But you need to act quickly.
I actually forgot about my faux pas until "Psychresearcher" posted to this thread!!!
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
Submitted incomplete PhD thesis
Hopeless,
I've just looked at my old University's regulations - it says is a standard of 'excellence' must be achieved. Basically it's open to interpretation what the examiners might do. However, you not submitting a complete thesis might suggest you not reaching that standard of 'excellence'. The thesis could thus be rejected and you could be failed without viva. Your best hope seems viva then 'revise and resubmit'.
Your depression and health issues could have been used as 'mitigating circumstances', to apply for a suspension buying you more time. Also, your French-sourced data might have been used to apply for a further 'extraordinary' extension beyond four years provided you could show your research was still 'relevant' and that you originally couldn't speak French.
However, this should all have been looked into before you submitted and the fact you have lied to your supervisors and ultimately your examiners about the condition of the thesis could act against you. You need to look at your own University's regulations to gain a clearer picture.
I hope you do sort something out, but I think honesty here is a better course of action. Go talk to your supervisor as soon as possible and admit what you have done. It's not going to be the most pleasent tasks, but probably your best hope of rescuing the situation. Perhaps the submitted copies could be replaced with more complete versions within a short space of time the examiners may look more kindly on.
I remember having to play a part in failing a Masters student as their dissertation was all but incomprehensible. I'd expect at the very least to have a complete and comprehensible document in front of me to examine.
As I said in my previous post, I would probably "assume" in the first instance that you had "accidentally" left out the conclusions to give you the benefit of the doubt. However, whether other examiners would do the same would very much depend on the person.
Sorry to be harsh, just trying to be honest.
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
Any UK students applying/accepted to a PHD with average grades around Europe?
I got onto an EPSRC funded PhD with 2(ii) and Masters (actually, two Masters) in the UK.
I would not worry too much about your degree grade if you are accepted. I'd say a practical aptitude and the knack of being able to spot detail that stand out in the data or physical specimens is more important, as is the ability to write in a succinct style that means any new findings stand out and are shown to be properly scrutinised with respect to existing knowledge in your field.
I had a tendency to freeze up in exams that did not help me during my first degree, however, good practical skills and ability to handle experimental work meant PhD was within my abilities, sucesfully concluded what seems quite a while ago.
Translated, if you really want to do a PhD go for it. An enthusiastic 2(ii) who is willing to give it a go is probably more likely to succeed than an unmotivated 1st at PhD.
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
Let me get this straight - Dr title.
Yes Ian you are right, even younger people out of college are often told not to even put A levels, esp if they just need a job, any job and are going for shelf stackers or cleaners. BTW my previous company ran many Jobcentre Plus contracts, still do in some local areas, so you could well have had that advice from them. I think it's a sad state of affairs not to give your achievements. I don't think it's dishonest to not put a qualification you do have but it's def dishonest to say you have one that you don't.
I'd love to see you argue about this on the LinkedIn group "PhD Careers outside Academia", where the mainly North American / USA posters roasted the opening poster of a thread for even suggesting this.
I participated in the discussion, noting advice being given out in Europe to leave off the PhD in order to assist in the search for a job, any job. However, that was basically ignored with the perception being that leaving out information was as bad as lying. Perhaps there are cultural differences between Europe and North America as regards truth being the whole truth in the latter and lying being anything short of that.
I don't think a PhD should be left off a CV, with instead the CV being tailored to suit the assets a candidate had to suit a position. However, I do understand why an omission might happen if the candidate is economically desperate to find a job and I personally would not hold it against them. I would be interested in what the candidate might offer the company with experience (more so) and qualifications (less so the older the qualifications are) playing their respective parts in that assessment.
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
Submitted incomplete PhD thesis
I know people are often encouraged to submit at some Universities before the 4 year limit (full-time) is reached, even when their thesis might not be 100%. More time is bought in such cases, with the candidate taking the major corrections hit and resubmitting six months or a year later.
However, you're submitting an incomplete thesis rather than an unpolished one. In your case, you might also be examined and have to take the resubmission hit. You also risk having the thesis being rejected by the examiners and if you have not been able to submit a complete document by the end of the four years you may be failed under University regulations. I'm afraid a complete but imperfect document is better.
I have to admit if I was an examiner, then I would probably reject the document in it's incomplete form, though with a recommendation the candidate adds their conclusion and resubmits. I might give the benefit of the doubt and assume the candidate has accidentally forgotten to include it - ahem!!! In other words, I'm not out to fail the candidate and am trying to buy the candidate extra time. Others might take a harder line though.
All I can suggest is if you do go forward to viva, is you have the conclusions and other corrected work ready and have a reasonable excuse as to why your thesis is incomplete and the conclusions are missing. That is assuming you are examined and University does not fail you.
You have taken a big risk by doing this and would have been better to be honest with your supervisor before submission. There may have been the possibility of you being given a few extra weeks if there were extenuating circumstances. I think you have been very silly.
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
PhD done before?
Thanks for the replies everyone. I have just met with my supervisor over the previously published work and he was concerned. I threw up the points that others made here and he seemed content enough.
As for the publishing and plagiarising of your own work, I am a little more concerned. The man who said it to us often acts as an internal examiner for the viva.
Thanks for the help!
How can you plagerise your own work may I ask? What a strange remark, to me at least?
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
Let me get this straight - Dr title.
I hope I do well enough to get my PhD and will certainly love being Dr and would love to use the tilte, but I would probably go with PhD instead.
I have found that excellence and academic achievement isn't always condusive to gaining employment in the private sector particularly. I have a teaching and advice and guidance background working in employability. and it is sad that we regularly advised people to 'tailor' their CV and applications to the level of position they were applying too and to omitt some achievements.
This is because you get the "you are over qualified" This is partly due to HR procedure matching skills sets and renumeration They literally can not take you if you are more qualified than the job spec. The other is jellousy and suspicion. Many managers are put out by the arrival of highly qualified 'others' into their department for fear of being supplanted or worry about managing someone with probably a higher academic ability than themselves, they become fearful. Slap me down for my sweeping generalisation but lots of 'older' managers got their positions through experience not qualifications, It's not like that now, you need more and more quals to get in the door meaning some managers who have fewer or no quals are worried about well qualified newcommers :-( A senior manager at my last place openly said she is suspicious of people with firsts!
BTW non of my lectures use Dr :-(
Wowzers, I'm curious.
By omitting some achivements, does this include omitting direct reference to the PhD (i.e. passing it off say as a research assistant post or similar)? This was directly implied to me by the dole when I was out of work a few years ago and I know in Spain this was advice given by the funding bodies out there not so long ago.
In North America, such omission is conversely seen as gross dishonesty.
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
PhD done before?
Actually if I could just bug you about one more issue. In my School we have been told not to publish anything until the PhD is done. They say that we could be accused of plagiarising our own work and be denied the PhD in the viva. They have no specific examples of this happening. I was talking to a post-doc who thought this was very odd and said he would judge a candidate's possibility of employment based upon research published. as anyone come across this before?
That is nuts. Unless there's a confidentiality clause, it is advantageous to have publications (or at least a commitment to produce them) in place when approaching viva in a PhD. Firstly, you have peer reviewed information in place the examiners can relate to and secondly, the examiners can see you have information in the public domain that is accessible and of benefit at least to other people working in your field.
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
Let me get this straight - Dr title.
Yes I agree of course that for some jobs holding a PhD could be something of a hindrance. I guess my point was that there seems to be a range of non-research "science-y" jobs for which a PhD is not required, but nonetheless it is not uncommon for people in those jobs to hold PhDs. So my theory was that in some disciplines holding a PhD may be more common, or more widely accepted/understood.
Point taken and I agree. Pharmacy seems to be a good example of that and in industrial terms, a PhD is less of a hinderance and probably more of an advantage.
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
PhD done before?
This happened to a colleague of mine who close to the end, found he'd replicated the work of another group. In such circumstances, you need to acknowledge the other gorup's work and look at areas which differentiate your work from theirs. Doing this can allow your thesis to be seen to build on their work and take that forward to develop it. Alternatively, duiring your critical assessment of their work (as you are supposed to do with all relevant literature) you can identify weaknesses that your own work seeks to address.
In my colleague's case, he was given a six month extension with funding (his supervisor admitted a little self-blame for the situation when they discussed it and should have picked up on this other group's work). That allowed him to run a few extra experiments to truely differentiate his work from that of the other group.
I think your supervisor will probably offer similar advice when you speak to them and it may even be an advantage to you this has happened as you may end up with a stronger thesis as a result.
Hope that helps.
Ian (Mackem_Beefy)
