======= Date Modified 21 18 2010 04:18:57 =======


Hi all,

I started my PhD on Feb 2010. I did my MSc in north America studying a particular phenomenon in Ecology. For the PhD I wanted to expand my knowledge and skills so I shifted to another field in Ecology, this field requires a totally different set of experimental skills than those I gained during my MSc.

I was busy during the first 3-4 months working on my literature review. I expressed my concerns about not doing anything experimental but my supervisor felt that my progress is very good (he gave me 3 out of 4 for progression in the assessment required by the Graduate School). In fact, I believe that he was going to give me 4 but because I expressed my concerns about progression in front of the adviser he gave me 3.

On May, he took off for a 3-month course overseas. Until a month of so ago, I was drifting in the school do nothing but readings. I had to discuss a point related to the samples with another doctor in the department. At the end of the discussion, I asked her about the transfer report. She was shocked by the fact that I did not do anything experimental yet. I told her that I attended a training course and would be attending another one on September. Her answer was: "anyone can attend these training workshops, what skills have you gained and applied toward your project?". The answer was nothing.

I panicked and emailed him. He said: "Don't worry, we will figure out something experimental to do during Sep and Oct before the deadline for submitting the transfer report.

Although in these situations there are no angles and demons and I can list plenty of my mistakes, I do not think that my situation is acceptable or normal. He is knowledgeable, accessible (I can talk to him anytime, he never asked me to come back later even if he is busy), and very humble (if he does not know something, he says it upfront, not misleading students as many in academia do) but he is very laid back. I gave him an application that I completed with the exception of few administrative parts that I could not figure out, but he left for his overseas course without completing it. If that application was sent before, that would shorten my waiting period (it would mean that I would have an access to a nationwide center that would have trained me and worked with me on my samples) But maybe I gave it to him before his travel where he was busy.

He manages a successful lab (surrogate for success is the publications of his students). But I do not know what is wrong (if there is anything wrong), is it me? Is it that fact that this is "not his project" and he does not pay for me and I am the one who made the contact with the owners of the samples (a lot of samples that needed years to be collected)? Or maybe he is not interested in my work? (my work is in the same field [ecology] as the rest of the lab but the theme is a bit different).

Any feedback or suggestions would be truly appreciated.

Hi there

I was in a similar situation as yourself a few ago, I started my PhD with absolutely no experience in the practical work and no knowledge of one of the major techniques I'd be using. Seriously, nothing. I knew a bit of the theory for the context of the thesis but that's it! My supervisor made me spend the first 4-6 months just reading and writing reports, more for myself than him, so I could properly understand the topic and what I was going to be doing. He refused to let me do any lab work in this time, as it wouldn't have meant anything to me.
Everyone else who started the same time as me had previous experience in their field and were all working away in the lab and it was very difficult to be the only one just reading, but it was exactly the right thing to do. It helped me gain a thorough understanding of what I was doing and why, and I had to spend a lot of time telling my sups about my topic as they had never worked on it either. So I knew more than them, even then! Which was scary!
I have also had the feeling that were less concerned with my topic because it's not their main field, but it was just me being worried, they have always been interested and enthusiastic about my research. I'd say you should as your sup is you can do some lab shadowing at least to see what others are doing and learn some techniques that maybe you've not used before and get an experimental plan sorted so you can begin to figure out what you'll be doing once you get started. But don't be too concerned about what others are doing, it's your project!