Hello
I filed a complaint against my supervisors for what they did to me. I had a meeting with the academic registrar and he was horrified about everything I was telling him and I had evidence for everything I said. He told me that he is going to respond in a week but it has been three months. I filed the complaint in December 2018 and now I have graduated and finished from the university but I don’t want to leave what my supervisors did without a punishment.
The university is in Scotland, any suggestions?
Best Regards

No it does not, I had a bad relationship with my supervisors and they did not read my thesis properly. I sent my thesis to a colleague to fix the English (he is native English speaker) and he corrected everything from English to figure captions. When I went to my viva, the external was in charge of the questions and she asked from chapter seven to chapter one and back to chapter five. She wanted first to make sure I am the one who wrote the thesis, and make sure I understood what I wrote and finally to make sure I understood the background of my research. Once I proved that to her, she was happy. She asked me to write her an equation that I did not put in my thesis, I apologised and said I do not remember the equation so she started half of it and I finished it. She asked me about a concept that I dealt with but I was not fully understood it and she explained it to me. It is fine if you don’t remember or you didn’t cover the material in depth, what is matter is you can answer honestly and prove that you are the one who did the work and why you did it in that way. She did not agree on one of my results but I showed her in the literature someone had similar conclusion to mine and explained why I took it in that way and why I was happy with that , I wasn’t wrong but in real world it can cost money, and I showed her I did understand that and she was happy with that and i got minor corrections. Guess what, English and add extra figures and extra equation. Read your thesis and understand everything in it and why you chose the way that you chose and show understanding of your thesis and your research and you will be fine. Good luck with your viva

Every PhD student face the point of not wanting to do anything even though when there is lots of stuff to do. My advice which has been shared by another PhD student is to take a break and go away for a week, you are not working either way but still you will benefit from taking a break and come back fresh to work. That helped me a lot during the last two years of my PhD specially when the stress started to increase. I organised a trip every two months to go somewhere and relax for 5 days and then back again to work. Look at the bright side it will finish at one point and it will worth at end .

Thank you, as I said believe in your self and if you do not find support from your supervisors you should seek it somewhere else and all the best to you too

Hello
I had a really toxic supervisors. The first one expressed his interest in publishing my research in his own name and gave the option by either getting my PhD or by getting a publication. There was a third option he forgot, I went to the the student coordinator and told him the story. Unfortunately this happened 6 months before my contract finishes for my PhD. He didn’t let me publish any of my research. The only time I went to a conference is by submitting the abstract without telling him. The only way I received a feedback from reviewers is by submitting the paper to a journal without telling him. He does not give me feedback or support after the first year. The second supervisor has no clue about my research at all. So I told the coordinator everything and of course he didn’t believe me but of course there is a chance I was telling the truth and the only way to fix the situation is by making the HoD involved. Of course the HoD is a dear friend with my supervisors and he did not believe anything I was telling him. I told him I want to submit my thesis this October and to have my viva in December. I finished five chapters and I am working on the last chapter. I was begging my supervisors to give me feedback but they don’t, i was begging them to have a meeting but they refuse so I don’t see the point of having supervisors at all. So he said I will be your supervisor so in this case I will avoid any further problems and make sure to receive feedback on the thesis. I got two feedback and it was mainly English and formatting (like heading number or figure caption) nothing technical at all. They told me I should apply for another six months to make the thesis more suitable, I said no we already agreed on the date. The HoD said I might end up with resubmission as the thesis as it is not good. I asked him is there anything wrong with the work he said no just the writing, I told him you had three months and you provided me with two feedback and it was only English and formatting so why I should end up with resubmission?so I submitted and got minor corrections. I filed a complaint against my supervisors as they were bad supervisors but the university did not do anything. The HoD Of course banned me from using the computer lab and from getting the master materials even though other students have the material. But I did not care, I submitted my final thesis today and proved them they are wrong.
My advice, do your work and believe in yourself, submit papers to journal as the reviewers feedback helps a lot like they helped me more than my supervisors, and all the best to all of you who is suffering from bad supervisors

Thank you everyone for your time to reply
First, I would like to tell you I passed my viva with minor corrections. Even though the HoD said I might get resubmission and my other two supervisors said I will get major corrections. They were shocked to be honest with you and I was more than happy for that of course.
Second, their attempt to make me not to publish a journal paper is because my original first supervisor said that he wants to publish the paper in his own name and put me as a co-author. If he said that in a nice way or at least give me something as a replacement like submitting papers to conferences. But no, he said I have to choose between publication and between getting my PhD. Of course I didn’t say anything and I went to the student co- ordinator (higher than the HoD) and told him. Of course he didn’t believe me but there was the option it might be true and I might file a case , which is something he doesn’t want. So the option was to replace him with the second one who has no idea about my research and put the HoD as a second supervisor to make sure that doesn’t happen again. But the second one was an asshole and I filed an official complaint in the university to kick him out of my research and I raised everything was happening with me. They usually take three weeks to make a judgment but because my case was complicated, they didn’t make a decision yet. So, what I did is sending an email to all my supervisors and cc the student coordinator that I am going to submit my paper to a journal and if the original first supervisor wants his name on it then he should sign the copyright form or I will submit it in my own name only. I told the other two they don’t have any contributions to my paper so it will not be ethical to add their name.

I do, I am going to raise the issue again to the student coordinator and tells him everything again. But I think our department is not a good department

Thank you very much for the reply
I did submit my thesis a week ago and my viva in a month
However, I was doing my research independently, I did ignore him as he was about to retired at the end of year 2 of my research.
The second supervisor was not involved in my research at all from the beginning of my research and he had no contributions to anything. So when I wrote a journal paper the first supervisor demanded the second one name to come on the paper I said that is unethical as he has no contributions to my research and he was not involved at all and that would be gifted author. He got angry and emailed the head of the department about that and said if I don’t put the second supervisor name on the paper as he said I should make appointment to meet the head of department and explain myself. Of course I did that and raised everything from the funding to the abstract to leave me alone and not helping me with my research. Of course the head of department sided with them but in the same time in order not to push me towards official complaint he made a middle solution where they have to provide me with weekly meeting and helping me to present my research. I think everyone knows how is that ended, by none of them keep their part of the deal. So after four months from that meeting, the first supervisor (the retired stayed as a supervisor because the HoD didn’t want to replace him) told me what is matter to me, my PhD or publication? I said what do you mean? He said focus on finishing your research and your PhD and go back to your home country and I will publish the paper in my name. I said why? He said life is unfair and I should live with it. Of course I was quite calm when I heard that, I left him and went directly to the student coordinator and told him everything. He and the HoD had a discussion, part of them didn’t believe that and the other part what if it’s true, so they removed the first one and put him as technical adviser as the second one has no knowledge in the area off my research (not helpful at all) and the HoS became the second supervisor.
I gave them my thesis in August to review it, they gave it back to me in October, the HoD said that there is some missing work if I added it he would be surprised if I got a major corrections. I did the work and the revision and gave it back to them and they gave me the feedback a week before the submission and the HoD said that I need to work more on writing the thesis as it might end up with resubmission. I asked him why would you say that in the week of my submission, is there something wrong with my work? He said nothing wrong with the work but the way I present the work? I told him why you didn’t say anything earlier, I gave you the thesis in August, he said no the thesis is improved a lot since August but there are some parts in the thesis needs more work, actually you need one more feedback and your thesis will be there.

Hello
I don’t have a good relationship with my supervisors and I don’t know how is that went wrong.
Every time I want to submit an abstract he tells me that I have to wait, it’s not a good time and I should have solid work to publish. When I want to apply for a fund, he says that the likelihood of getting it is very low as you don’t have enough reasons to support your application. When I get enough support documents for my application, he told me that I don’t deserve it, my other student deserve it more and she should apply for it. In very calm soundi asked but both of us are your students, he said there will be another chance to apply. I waited until I got a solid work with good results and there was a conference and I wanted to apply, at first he wasn’t happy and he said convince me. I tried to convince him but he was just a brick and he said that is not a good reason and I don’t see why you want to submit an abstract. If you still insisted in that bring the abstract and let me get a look . I gave him the abstract and he said this is rubbish and I don’t think it will be accepted. If you want to submit it go ahead and submit it but I am telling you that it will be rejected. I told him you are my supervisor and you should teach me how to write an abstract as you taught everyone in the group. He told me if I am going to do that then I will end up writing your thesis for you as well. At that point I snapped and yelled at him, I told him that every time I want to apply for a fund you say this person deserve it more than I do, why she deserves it more than me when we are both your student?everyte I want to submit an abstract , instead of couragimg me and help Me like your other students , you put me down and kills me? What did I do to deserve that? He said at this kind of behaviour you will not go further in life, life is unfair and I should live with it.

Hi
I know this is late reply but how is your corrections are going on? I hope you are in the stage of completion.