yeah well - how do you get all the important people together? you invite them all for drinks. then when everyone is there, you do some business, on the side.
cause the really important people can't be bothered to work and thus can't be invited to a work meeting, but of course some "work" still needs to be done, some decisions made...

next time i go to a symposium i'll expect there to be drinks!

thank you everyone, for being happy with me. i still can hardly believe it. going out to celebrate with a friend who also got a chunk of money now. cheers!

the ESRC guidelines state that all university registries should inform their students at the latest by august 7th. so if you haven't heard anything yet, perhaps you should make a copy of the passage in the guidelines which states this, and go to your university's registry/financial support office. or perhaps write them a friendly e-mail in which you also quote that passage.

good luck!

hey there,
out of about 9 funding applications i had made, one was still open. the one i had least hopes about, so, as all other applications were rejected, i kind of concluded that there was no point in hoping that this one would work out. the results were due sometime in August, but i was not aware of that.
well yesterday I received an e-mail welcoming me as an alumni. that got me concerned (turned out it was a mistake) as i do intend to continue studying... so i checked out my regristrastion status etc. online. with some surprise i saw there that apparently my uni owes me some money. what the...?
so i went to our student's service centre, and with a pounding heart, wobbly knees, and trembling hands, made some inquiries. and it turns out - the uni is giving me some funding! just enough to cover the fees and a little extra. wow - i still can't properly believe it. this means, that with my teaching job, and living cheaply, i can manage for the next half year or so. and by then, who knows, some major funding might have come through. whoohoo! :-) :-) :-)

me! winning!

I just found out that the newest version of MS Office has a bibliography tool included. I only had a brief look at it though, and it seems to be very basic.
I know of a number of free/cheap programs in German, of which I don't know if English versions exist:
Literat (free)
Lit-Link (free)
intranda (22€)
Liman (9.90€)
Liman Pro (98€)
Visual Composer (40€)
Bibliographix (75€)
Citavi (90€)
A independent test marked Citavi as the best of these, though each of these programs has their specific strengths. For example Lit-Link was designed specifically for historians.

I wouldn't worry. He is probably away or busy and simply doesn't think your request is important enough to bother, as it is sooo obvious. Supervisors sometimes have a hard time perceiving what might be bothering their students.
If you aren't worried about the number of years to completion, and think you won't be working on your project full time, then part-timing can save you fees-money. However, as part-timer you won't be eligible for much of the funding available, which is probably why he wants you to be registered (and pay) for full time. Apart from that, as long as you meet the required deadlines, no-one cares how many hours you actually work on it, and even less how often you are on campus. With the only exception that there might be a course or two for beginning PhD students that is compulsory for fulltimers, whereas parttimers can choose to do it in their second year.

Hi Addict, i'm just finishing my first year as a PhD student in Sociology. I found the beginning terribly daunting. But mostly, that was because I moved to a different country and away from my partner and friends. So starting my PhD meant getting used to the different coins, the logic of the transport system, the ways the bureaucracy works, etc. and meeting sooo many new people, while at the same time trying to keep social relations alive with those back home. It also provided the challenging task of orientating myself within British Sociology, which is different to Sociology in other parts of the world, and within the British educational system (what is my previous education worth, both formally and in practice? How does it compare with others?). It seems to me, looking back, that if you are already well settled where you are going to do your PhD, you would be spared more than half the challenges of the first year. So don't worry!

thanks PinkNeuron!

hi barnaby, it's really never all sorted. but good luck for sorting this next obstacle!
did you apply at that place specifically because you want to work with that supervisor? then it might be an idea to go with him/her, that is, keep the supervisor, change the university. if he/she helps, that should be possible even now, i think.
if you want to stay where you are, then look at the staff profiles, and contact those people who seem interesting. maybe your former intended supervisor can help you with that. i do believe the department WILL provide you with another supervisor. you might get someone temporary for a while in the beginning, until the replacement for your intended supervisor is found.

also keep in mind, especially since you are self-funded, that the proposal you are accepted with is not binding. where i study we spend most of the first year re-working/expanding our initial proposal. some people wrote a completely new project. and even then, we can still change it later...

interesting - and unfortunate. what about basic research? how should that ever get funding if it is evaluated on economic impact??

could you post the link to the article? thanks!

heya bunk-metal, way to go! you must be sooo excited. well, being funded to study and do research is a great thing. i hope it all works out well. good luck with everything!

grumble, piglet... i was enjoying the winning! well, on this thread i guess it is "to everyone their turn"

sorry to hear, j0euk. one would think, that if they make you wait so long, at least they should give you a positive response!

monkeytab, no i didn't get the marks breakdown. but they did say in the e-mail which i received that they had only received the results from the ESRC by fax, and that they would send an official letter confirming the decisions once they got the stuff proper. so i am expecting any additional info to arrive with that official letter.

anyone still waiting for results? they said 7th august at the latest, didn't they?