I am very scared

I am in the second year of my phd and have passed the probationary period.
Someone has been saying things behind my back to his supervisor. This person used to be my friend and also helped me with a program (software writing). Now he seems to has said he wrote the whole program. This was while he was my friend. After we have hs a fight with some minor pushing involvd. This must have been mentioned to his supervisor also. Then my supervisor called me in andtold me this is quite serious and that it could endager my candidacy. He told me to keep very far from this peson until MARCH WHICH IS WHEN HE IS LEAVING. I now dont know what to do. I also had some results which could have even been published but the supervisor told me to take a different approach to the program and that there is a paper ready but it is not for right now. So basically he has asked me to redo the thing but in a different kind of way. I have to also mention that some of the results were wrong.

So now my questions are

1) Do you think I will be thrown out?

2) How possible is this in general?

3) Has this ruined his impression of me and therefore the phd even if i dont get thrown out?

1) Do you think I will be thrown out?

It all depends what you actually mean by fighting and 'minor pushing' (who was doing the pushing?). If the other guy has formally accused you of assault then it's quite possible you will be thrown out. The question arises as to why you didn't walk away from the fight and/or why you haven't formally complained about his behaviour...

2) How possible is this in general?

I've heard of UG's being 'asked to leave' due to bullying and/or involvement in a drunken brawls, but never a postgrad. As H.E. is very litigious now, they'd need witnesses etc. to throw you out on such a basis. On the other hand, many universities have a zero-tolerance approach on such matters. If this was to happen, you'd probably know about it by now.

3) Has this ruined his impression of me and therefore the phd even if i dont get thrown out?

In all honesty, it doesn't look good. Take heed of your supervisors suggestions and keep a low profile. It might be fruitful to tell your sup your side of the story in full (and in writing) and also attend a psychobabble course on conflict resolution.

My supervisor said that nothing is official and that he is not interested in my side of the story otherwise it will have to be in writing from both sides and this means formal. No it wasnt me doing the pushing but there are also I am sure no witnesses. How about possible allegations of receiving help from him on the program?

could someone please tell me their views on this? should i kiss the phd goodbye even if there is nothing formal due to possible attitude change of dept towards me

Hey Scared!!....ok this seems like a pretty complex and difficult situation, but the main thing now is to keep calm and proceed carefully...

Few more details, please might be easier then if I can help you I will try my best!!:
1-First of all, when you said this character 'helped' you with your work, how much did that involve?
2-What exactly did this fight involve, so there was no physical contact from your side? Was it the other person totally? Was either of you involved in verbally abusing the other?were there any other events leading up to this either in person or via email etc or was it totally out of the blue??
3-Not that it is totally relevant, but out of curosity, you said the other person was male, are you also male or a girl?
4-Does this boy also share the same supervisor as you, or are they just friendly with them? and are they a phd student also, or postdoc/member of staff? Did you have a good relationship with your supervisor prior to this?

Hi Maggie

Thanks for your reply. This person may claim he may have written the whole code but thats not true it was help serious help perhaps over a period of a week to a fortnight. No there was no physical contact from my part. We are both males. Our supervisors are friends.

Please advise

Aside from your responses, if this person phsically touched you in any way, no matter how slight, then it is a serious criminal matter...If I were you I would have gone straight to the authorities...

That said, at this point (again assuming the violence was tottaly on the other persons side), you need to SPEAK UP and DEFEND yourself ASAP...if this other character has assaulted you and then gone 'crying wolf' to the supervisor to cover his back, then you need to get the real facts out there NOW, write a very formal email to your supervisor and Head of school stating the events and urge that you want it dealt with immediately and investigated. If you don't speak up, the supervisor and probably the rest of the department will forever have this view and your chances of being kicked out are probably quite high (it doesnt take much to find a necessary justification on academic grounds to fail your next upgrade in May if they so wished)...

Maybe some verbal abuse too but no email for sure. He is a postdoc but leaving in march

Ok now that I have seen your response, like I said I really think you need to get the truth out there, because to be3 honest, I think the whole dept would surely know about this by now (not to scare you) but thats how things work...Go to your student union advice centre in the morning and seek further advice from them and like I said, set things straight with the head of school too. It seems they have clearly taken the side with this other boy, if your supervisor is saying things like stay away from him, so I think you need to set your supervisor straight on no uncertain terms and if you have already tried to do so, express dissatisfaction that they have not been more supportive to you, the 'victim' in all this...

maggie

he said that i have more to loose if this becomes official since his contract is ending in march. when i asked to find out exactly what he said he answered that he will tell me in march and not now. so he has basically just suggested that he is non-existent and that he will tell this to the other person too to avoid me.

[quote]Quote From scared:

My supervisor said that nothing is official and that he is not interested in my side of the story otherwise it will have to be in writing from both sides and this means formal. quote]

Sorry I have just seen this earlier post from you Scared, if it was me, the only option in my mind would be 'Make it formal'.

I think you have no option but to do this, not least for the moral implications i.e. if you don't this character will be seen to be getting away with it without due process. But actually, even more important for you now, is to set the record straight to clear your own name, since its obvious from your supervisor's words that your career will be affected by this in terms of negative slant on your reputation...

I think its a situation that I cant win. I mean even through a formal process my supervisor can get me at the next report cant he? Also I forgot to mention I am on university scholarship. What words do u mean have suggested that this will affect my reputation negatively? Is my next report in Sept?

Hi Scared!! Well..you have two options you can either keep quiet and sweep this under the carpet for the sake of pleasing your supervisor (who prefers a cover up) and in which case I think you should really make sure that at least your supervisor knows the REAL truth if you dont want to pursue the formal complaint process-so at least if your supervisor knows the truth it wont affect you too much, in terms of a career reference, recommendations to progress etc... the problem with this is, though, that you cannot control what others think of you in the department, so if they have heard about the incident now and believe you are the one doing the assaulting, then you will not be able to control what is being said about you behind your back or what this post doc is going around telling others.

Or you can initiate the formal process, to set the record straight, so that you will not suffer any future negative repurcussions of this incident at any time in the future.

I think its your decision depending on what you feel comfortable doing, if your happy to let it go in the hope that it wont come back to haunt you, then so be it! be maybe its still a good idea to tell the student union advice centre so at least your side is documented by them on record, in case the situation could get worse, as these type of things often do i.e. the boy could do something again in the next few weeks...

Also what do you think of the software programming that has been started again even if the results were kind of wrong? If my last academic report was last September does this mean my next one is in September?

Can you offer your 'friend' a co-author on the paper you are going to publish - maybe this is what he wants as he thinks he helped you so much. And you could still retain lead author??