my hubby's dyslexic and has done an MSc and a PhD - but I kind of get the brunt of it, because I have to do his proofreading! :-s

I will give you the number 1 tip that I wish someone had given me earlier in the process - record your supervision meetings!

My hubby is going through exactly the same thing, he should really submit ASAP, but he is so tired from work during the week and is exhausted all weekend. However, I do sometimes think that he *could* get more done if he was more proactive about it. Several strategies you could try.

1) try staying on an hour extra at work a few times a week and doing your PhD work there, at your work desk - this means you don't have the journey home, sit down etc and then have to ramp up to work again (and then realise you can't be bothered).

2) write general chapter outlines, which you can then fill out paragraph by paragraph. yes its not the ideal way to write but at least after a week of spending an hour a day on it (that's only 60 mins!) you will have much more writing done.

I would also say you need to actually finish a report of some kind for the MPhil.

aww I want some chocolate!!

Isn't there some system, where this scheme funds travel to foreign unis? as long as you do 5 hours of teaching or something. Maybe you could set us all up for 5 hours worth Emmaki and then we could have a PGF meet in Greece.

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yeah, totally not with the whole 'austerity' thing. I have no idea how cutting public service jobs (i.e. people who used to pay tax and NI into the system, and will now claim job seekers) will cut ANY money. Especially when you think of the £millions that will have to be spent in a few years time when they realise they haven't got any 'talent' in public sector organisations, because they chucked everyone out, and they haven't recruited anyone! Anyway, that's an entirely different matter :p

Sadly though, I think £10k is likely. People still want to go to uni, so they'll stump up. Its like my train company. They put fairs up 8% most years - it is absolutely ridiculous, but until people stop actually getting on the train because of it, then they'll carry on. Its essentially holding us all to ransom (whether its train passengers or wannabe graduates).

ETA: Its not *my* train company - just the one I happen to use :p

I had to do a modul or 2 in my first year too. You just have to treat it like an 'extra' with your PhD being your 9-5 job. You're lucky not having to do exams/coursework as many people do.

I would say, yet its possible to complete in 3 years. But the vast majority of people finish within 3 and a half to 4 years, especially as it can take a few months between submission and your viva. I'm aiming for 3 and a half. I would advise aiming to have a very good draft finished in 3 years, then you can afford to take a job (and get money!) after your funding has finished.

My advice would be write from the word go, even if you think its rubbish and you won't use it, it will doubtless be invaluable in a few years!

I think one of the key issues is that if you're paying £10k each year (!?) for a course, then you are going to expect a good 'service' - so there will surely have to be some shake up of the current teaching system. I know they want all leacturers ideally to have the PGCHE thingy, but surely that will become a solid requirement. Maybe they'll have to operate a system where you have to spend 1 year researching, then 1 year teaching only or something, so you know your stuff, but can concentrate fully on providing £10k per year quality teaching.

good going Ev. My sup asked me to re-structure my paper all weekend. So I've had a go, but stuck on my hypothesis she's changed it from 1 hypothesis to 2, for the same thing i.e.

H1: Sneaks will eat more chocolate because she doesn't want to do her PhD
H2: Sneaks will eat less chocolate because she's procrastinating and not at her desk.

So I've sent it back to her half done and with a few qs about hypotheses.

I need to get on with some non-PhD work now and get it out of the way before the week starts.

urgh, what a horrible proposal! Surely that's just going to end up with poorer people going to the worse unis??

And I bet the extra money wouldn't be put into teaching salaries or research grants, it would just go towards universities supporting businesses in whatever they wanted to develop/produce, all under the 'impact' banner.

Why do they always consider these things in such isolation? Can you imagine the housing market in 10 years if every person under 30 has a debt of £30-40k before even applying for a mortgage?

my internet has been down all this morning :-s so I've wasted a few hours today.

Goal 1: get the start of the next paragraph sorted!

Sounds like you're having a bady day ev :-(

I got up at 8, but had to babysit my husbands little sister until 11.30, when her parents FINALLY decided to get up from a night of clubbing. We then had to drive an hour home. And I'm exhausted - don't really know why. I can hardly keep myeyes open. But I'm going to havea coffee and see if I can get some work done.

My sup has given me 2 days (sat and sun) to get my paper re-written and I've already wasted most of saturday :-( I think I might be coming down with something :-(

I'd say your "friend" should point out what her ideal guy is and that she *hates* people that have all the attributes of this bloke. E.g. "urgh, I HATE men with xxx colour eyes"

I think this thread has actually given her some publicity though - I actually clicked through to her website to see the comments discussed in the previous few posts, so I actually read the website and would consider using her service, now that i know its a joke AND if I had enough money (up)

Sorry, not really joining today, I've just got 2 meetings to attend. ALthough my sup gave me a ton of work yesterday that she wants by monday, so will be on here a lot over the weekend :-(

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I've lived with my hubby for 8 years. His parents bought a house when we were at uni, so they could make money off it by renting it out to us (yes we were charged rent :-( ) and our friends, and then they'd sell it on. But he went on to do an MSc and PhD at the same uni, so eventually his parents got bored and gave it to us (with the full £180k mortgage unpaid). So basically we got a £180k house without having to pay a deposit.

We are now 26, I'm at the end of my PhD, so we technically own the house - its all legally ours, but we only pay an interest only mortgage because my stipend has run out. He's a civil servant, so when we both get jobs we can start paying off the mortgage properly :-) Its a 3-bed semi detatched, with a garden, 2 ensuites and a bathroom (originally kitted out for 4 student rooms), and its in a really good location IMO, although not very near london which would, I suppose, be more convenient.

ETA: we only got the mortgage cos his mums our gurantor and her and her husband have I'd probably guess £millions (although we don't see any of it - boooo!) as he's a top city guy on £700k a year in his new job, so they can afford technically to cover our mortgage if we defaulted on a payment, but in 8 years we never have (up). If we did default they'd probably charge us 20% interest on that payment for them having to pay it anyway :-( so its not worth it.