Resisting the urge to ask why going through the motions of PhD research this year is tolerable, while actually finishing a PhD next year is like eating an asbestos sandwich, 2 questions/suggestions:

1.) are you sure having a PhD might not help you out in your teaching career? I can imagine it might carry some weight depending on the school/age group/subject you're talking about. (Some independent secondary schools seem to like to employ PhDs, for instance).

2.) alternatively, have you thought about working as a teaching assistant for a year? That would replace your PhD stipend quite nicely (if it's at research council rates?), be clearly relevant to your chosen career path, and avoid the whole moral dilemma you've set yourself.

Walminskipeas, I'm sure you're quite right about paying for essays being a lottery, I'm glad to hear it doesn't pay off in many cases, and I hope those observations are enough to put people off (OP especially). Still, one can hardly fail to be disturbed by the fact that Cwilson79 has frankly admitted that paid-for work enabled him/her to gain a Master's qualification he/she would otherwise not have got, and ultimately take a (funded?) PhD place that would otherwise have gone to somebody else.

I wonder what it's like going into Uni every day knowing that the goodwill, trust and respect of everyone around you - supervisor, peers, undergraduates - is built on a lie? Presumably that's not how Cwilson79 chooses to see it, but you can bet that's how the other people in that equation would see it.

One thing you can say for Cwilson79 is that they're quite a brave individual - not only are they prepared to put themselves in the firing line for the righteous indignation of users of this forum, but they've done so under a very transparent-looking username. I certainly feel sorry for any current PhD students called C Wilson and born in 1979 who DIDN'T cheat on their MA - I've a feeling they might start getting some funny looks off people this week.

Oh, the other thing I love about Cwilson79's rhetoric is the 'I don't condone it - I understand it' stuff. Erm... we all UNDERSTAND it, mate! There's no mystery as to why someone who wants a qualification but isn't able or willing to do the work required might decide to cheat instead. I knew before I even started my MA that I was going to let myself down on the examined (rather than essay-assessed) module, because I've never been great in exams. I suppose I could have started looking for someone I could pay to sit the exam for me, but funnily enough, instead of doing that, I just did my best and made damn sure my other marks were high enough to pull my average comfortably over the Distinction threshold. It's called 'working'.

Well, I've been proved wrong - someone DID want to help.

CWilson79, I hope you're comfortable with the fact that one day Mlord's CV/application will be sitting in the same pile as a group of other students who've got their degrees honestly. If he (or she?) is like you and manages to buy an exceptionally good mark, maybe he'll succeed in cheating himself to the top of that pile and the person who SHOULD have been there will find that their academic career is over, or their dream job has gone to someone else.

Moderators - I hope the address of that essay-writing website will be removed?

The people on this forum are working hard to earn qualifications that accurately reflect their abilities in and commitment to their chosen subjects - qualifications that will then help them to compete for (e.g.) jobs and funded PhD places.

I struggle to understand, therefore, why you would expect anyone to come forward and offer friendly advice on how you can cheat other, honest students - including ourselves! - out of those jobs and those places by buying your way to the same qualification.

Still, maybe I'm underestimating the selflessness of my fellow forum users. Anyone feel like helping? If no-one's used an essay writing service, I'm sure general advice on successfully concealing plagiarism, or perhaps sabotaging one's competitors' work, would be just as useful. Come on, don't be shy!

Congratulations! It's a weird feeling when you've been building up and up to something and then wallop, it's happened and you have to absorb that fact and adjust your brain so that it's able to think about other things again. (During my MA I was terrible for sitting and re-reading essays I'd just submitted, just because they were still so much on my mind - even though on one level I was sick of the sight of them!)

Anyway, congrats again - you deserve to feel thoroughly smug!

I don't see that you have any reason to worry, especially if you're self-funding. I worked for 10 years between my BA and MA (in a thoroughly irrelevant job) and no-one seems to have held it against me! In fact, on one studentship application form I deliberately drew attention to the fact that I'd given up a successful career to go back to uni & implied that this was evidence of a high level of commitment to my studies. I also suggested that general 'transferrable skills' gained in my professional career - e.g. giving presentations, project management, contributing to training of colleagues, interpersonal skills - might be relevant to my PhD studies and subsequent academic career.

Of course, I've got no way of knowing if anyone was impressed by any of this - at the end of the day I think applicants must be judged mainly on their MA performance and research proposal - but I did get the studentship, so it can't have hurt!

Best of luck!

Triplesteve, this is not my area at all but I just Googled 'pubmed' and the sites I found (e.g. UK Pubmed Central) let me access full articles without any sort of login or registration process - am I missing something?

As I understand it, to apply for a PhD you either need to have a research proposal of your own, or find an existing, ready-defined project to attach yourself to. But as I say, this really isn't my area - I'm on the arts/humanities side. I'd suggest you do some digging round the websites of the departments/institutions you're thinking of applying to. They'll probably give you a much clearer idea of the application process, and the sort of projects/funding opportunities that are out there.

Youngsta - gosh, I've never heard of a Distinction cut-off of 80 - I always think of 70 as the standard. Feel a bit silly now as I've tended (when applying) to talk about my marks without spelling out the criteria for distinction!

Now you've mentioned your family situation I can understand much better why you're in such a frustrating position. As I say, I was lucky enough to apply to my nearest uni at a time when they were looking to enhance their strengths in my research area - but I was always very aware that I wasn't in position to do what everyone says you need to do, i.e. up sticks and go wherever your ideal supervisor happens to be.

I feel really bad for you and wish I could come up with some magic solution, but at the end of the day I guess your options are just the obvious ones: either you need to cast your net more widely - since you'll be studying part-time, maybe you could consider a uni an hour or two away from home? - or you need to come up with a new project. Maybe someone in the dept. could help you identify a different direction in which you could take your MA thesis research that would still hold your interest? Something that would let you lay the groundwork for doing the sort of research you REALLY want to be doing further down the line?

(NB: I had a 2-hour commute to the Uni where I did my part-time MA, and it was OK - but saying that, I did always feel slightly at 'arm's length', especially when I was working on my dissertation and only had to be there once a month. Being so far from the library was also a pain, but still - might be doable?)

Very best of luck whatever you decide.

Youngsta - something I don't quite understand is why you suggest pressing on without funding as an option. As I understand it, your dept. has turned you down for a place, not just for funding... which suggests to me that your real options are a) come up with a new proposal, or b) find a new department.

The AHRC are obviously looking for a degree of innovation, but equally obviously they're not going to throw money at people whose research is SO innovative that it's not set in any recognisable context and no-one is qualified to supervise it! (I'm not suggesting for a moment that your proposed research is like that - just pointing out that there is a balance to be struck. Very roughly, I guess what the AHRC is looking for is new approaches to clearly defined, probably familiar problems.)

It really sounds to me like what you should be doing - especially if you're playing to your strengths with a proposal that builds on the work you did for your MA thesis - is find the right institution/supervisor for you and keep pursuing funding. There's no reason to think it's your ability or qualifications holding you back; I'd take your dept. at their word when they say they just don't have the appropriate expertise.

If that's not something you're in a position to do - e.g. because you're tied down geographically (like me!) - then I think it will be a question of coming up with a new or radically revised proposal that's a better fit for your department. Maybe you could be doing that in collaboration with a potential supervisor?

It might just be worth making a couple of points in relation to my own experience in case they're relevant:

1 - I got a fairly consistent set of marks for my MA modules (mostly 74s) and got a very solid distinction overall, but didn't produce any publication-standard, 'unprecedented' work. I really don't know what sort of balance institutions tend to strike between judging applicants by their best work and looking for a consistently high standard... my guess is that an MA thesis *that* good would be taken as a very strong indicator of your ability to deliver the goods at PhD level, but it's possible (e.g. if you didn't achieve a distinction overall) that someone without that sort of 'standout' piece might still be perceived as a stronger candidate.

2 - it's probably fair to say that the dept. I applied to isn't *particularly* strong in the area I'm researching in - but they are actively looking to enhance their strengths in that area. I suspect they saw taking me on as fitting in well with that strategy. So finding the right department for you doesn't necessarily mean finding a department that's packed to the rafters with people researching in your area.

Stick with it - from what you've said I'm sure there's a department out there that would be glad to throw some funding in your direction! Maybe you should focus on getting that piece published - that might swing it.

I wouldn't worry too much about how to get your complaints about this guy across. You know what he was playing at, and so does your supervisor. Once you start talking constructively about where you go from here - i.e. how you address whatever valid points he made, and maybe how you demonstrate that his other objections were off-target - I'm sure that will become crystal clear!

Focus on the big picture - you're well thought of by people whose opinions you value and respect, and have your upgrade to prove it. If you don't also have the approval of a second-rate academic who's plainly wrong in his assessment of the fundamentals of your project - so what? My guess is that he probably walked out of that viva looking rather worse in the eyes of his colleagues than you did - not just because he acted like a bully, but because he so ostentatiously displayed his own ignorance.

Talk to someone in the department - your potential supervisor, maybe, or the admissions tutor. There's no reason you should have to guess what they're looking for from you; they may even agree to look at a draft and help you to get it as strong as possible. (I got some very useful input from my dept. on my Case for Support.)

I really think a lot of people miss out because they're afraid to ask 'stupid' questions - it's the same story in the seminar room. My advice would always be to just ask! People are usually happy to help and it could make all the difference. I've had quite a dialogue with several people at the dept. I applied to (everything from: is there any 'flab' I could cut in this draft? and, is this specific wording better? to, should I include a 'personal statement'?) - and I ended up being offered this year's departmental studentship.

Obviously you need to be careful not to impose on people - you need to sound them out before you start making assumptions about them having time to read drafts etc. - but certainly don't assume you're on your own.

Hi all

I've been lurking on here for a while, generally scaring myself silly about the whole process of applying for & then doing a PhD... but I think the occasion merits my first post, as I've just been told I've been awarded an AHRC-equivalent studentship!

Can't describe how relieved I am... I have kids, a mortgage etc. and just couldn't have done a PhD without funding. So for the past eight months or so (I finished my MA last year) I've been completely in limbo, not knowing whether I'd be a PhD student in October or scratching my head trying to work out what else to do with my life. (I've tried living in the 'real' world - the one in which you're expected to look up to people like Alan Sugar - and it was frankly rubbish.)

So hang in there, everyone who's applying for funding - in spite of everyone telling you otherwise, it IS possible for mere mortals to get their hands on some, even in arts/humanities subjects.