Hi All, I have 3 supervisors (complicated story) who all attend every supervision which are currently every 3 - 4 weeks. I am also expected to submit a 20 page paper for each supervision. In addition to this, I was also required to complete a Social Research Methods Masters Cert. in the 1st 9 months of PhD (just completed). Needless to say I am overwhelmed. I am not reading enough, but also seem to write very slowly and according to my 3rd supervisor very badly. I agree I am not being very analytical. But it has reached the stage where I feel all I am doing is writing very badly written supervision papers that do not progress my thinking much and then being told in my supervisions that they're not good enough. I know I should be reading more and I need time to just get my head around that and concentrate on pulling my literature review together, but instead I feel I have to service these supervision papers all the time - HELP. Is this normal? If not, what do I do? I am now petrified of supervisions, when I know they should be the place where I am learning. I feel like a pathetic failure right now. I am 9 months, btw, doing a sociology PhD.

Be honest with them. Tell them what you've just written here and see what they say. You could ask for me time to produce the papers ie have them less frequently so that they can see that the quality will improve and they will appreciate more what you are capable of.

I'm not sure what other people's experiences are, but this seems like an awful lot. I don't know anyone who's had to produce 20 pages for each supervision. What rationale have you been given for this? In my first year, I had supervisions with one or other of my supervisors approximately once a month. I only brought a list of items for discussion and then after the meeting I would circulate minutes to both my supervisors.

You definitely need to speak to them. Find out why they are asking you to do this and explain your situation. They may have good reasons for it, but you need to know, and you need to have times to develop your thoughts and skills.

Good luck

Maybe it is their way to give him/her chances to improve on the writing.Usually it is expected that you already have the scientific writing skills when you start your PhD. At least in natural sciences they really focus on that component during the master, as the next thing you will write during your PhD is probably a paper. How should you do that if you did not learn how?
It is definitely not normal, but maybe they do it on purpose. You should definitely talk to them.

I think a lot of people learn how to write properly, or at least improve their writing, during a PhD. The term is 'PhD student' for a reason. People are not expected to be perfect when starting a PhD.

I completely agree with TreeofLife. My academic writing was rather rubbish when I started my PhD (and my supervisor made no bones out of telling me how crap I was). But just getting the student to churn out large amounts of bad writing is not a way to get them to develop their writing skills. Reading other academic scholars, attending an academic writing course, etc. would be more productive, as well as giving him/her more time to write, redraft, edit, and learn how the process of writing works for them.

If it's just about improving the writing, I think what is happening seems highly counter-intuitive and counter-productive.

Nobody is perfect. Even professors give their manuscripts to other contributing authors for feedback. However, there is a difference between not perfect and bad.

When, during your PhD in, let's say biology, should you learn that? What are you writing in that time? Maybe something for a conference, then of course paper (if you have something publishable) and then the PhD thesis. Maybe the expectations are different, as most UK students don't do a master (and therefore have less practice), but in the labs where I worked so far, a PhD student was expected to be able to write a structured paper in an acceptable manner. Of course you will get tons of feedbacks, you will get that as a Post Doc as well and usually also as a professor but it should not be "rubbish". I don't mean that offensive to UK students :) I just really don't get when you should learn that while working full time in the lab. I don't think that a supervisor has time to practice scientific writing with you.

In the UK most of us write annual progress reports so we use those to work on our writing. I'm lucky, writing is one of my strengths so I was already good at it before starting my PhD but others are not so fortunate. Some students are terrible writers when they start and they use the annual progress reports, papers and thesis writing to improve. There's nothing wrong with that. Of course it's better if you are good at writing to start with though.

Similarly, some students do learn their subject whilst doing their PhD. I feel like I forgot everything I learnt in my BSc when I started my PhD. I wish I could start my PhD all over again with the knowledge I have now.

So what I am saying is, yes, it's great if you know your subject, and know how to write effectively before beginning your PhD, but hardly anyone does, and that's why we are called PhD students and receive a stipend not a salary.

20 pages every 3-4 weeks does seem excessive. If I was churning that out for supervision, I wouldn't be doing any other writing. I would try talking to them and see if you can come to a more sensible arrangement (eg if it is that they want to focus on your writing skills, maybe you could try writing a specific piece and then editing it after getting their feedback, rather than constantly having to write the next report). If it's too daunting to speak to all three of them at once, perhaps you could try to get an informal chat with one supervisor first?

That doesn't sound right, it is just their own foible making you do that? You should raise the question with someone, ideally the one you get on the best with.