Hello Rewt

I'm enrolled at a university in the UK, and the reasons why they failed me are... ludicrous, and unacceptable on a academic point of view. Of course, being that the academic point of view is unassailable, what I am about to write could not be part of my appeal.

As I have said, my university has two exams (end of the first and of the second year).
The first exam was solely concerned with my analytical theory for historical analysis, and I was passed without any issue.
In the second exam, with different examiners (against the regulations) they say they are failing me because of the analytical theory. They accept and praise the data and my command of them. They accept and laud how "interesting" the patterns that my data reveal are. They do not discuss my conclusions, based on the data and the pattern, and analyzed with the theory passed in the first exam.
They fail me, officially, because they do not like the theory passed in the first examination.

When they failed me the first time, they pointed out a series of issues with my work. I have taken their suggestions and run with them, re-shaping my dissertation entirely. But I now know - it was written in their emails - that the points they raised were just so I would sink quickly, and that they had no intention of guiding me to a better dissertation. And the analytical theory was not part of these corrections.

But this is secondary. When I say that the reason they failed me are ludicrous, I do so because the reasons written in the report are simply the justification of an already taken decision.
There is a trail of emails 18 months long, in which the main examiner states time and time again that I will never pass.There is even an email in which the faculty asks the University if I must have a second examination, since "it will certainly be wasted".

The decision was taken in 2018. They only needed to find a way to justify it.

My university has two examination before the submission of a PhD, and a couple of months ago I was failed at the second one. I have decided to first get a new supervisor (a god-sent professor from a different University whom I met at a conference immediately after the failure, and who got really into my work) and then to appeal the decision.

Since then, I have asked and obtained emails and documents on my examination process, and A LOT of things turned out:

One of my examiners, long before the examination, appears to have gone around saying I was "ugly. fat. and stupid" and I would have certainly failed. And my supervisor put him on the board against my wishes.

He wrote that he was certain I would have failed after receiving (illegaly, and without my knowledge) a draft of my exam submission months before my examination. And my supervisor put him on the board against my wishes.

He wrote so to the department several months before the examination. And the department put him on the board.

My secondary supervisor tried to remove him from the board. The department did not listen to him, since he had already resigned my supervision to move to Germany.

They failed me, they say, on what had emerged in the oral examination, but three days before my supervisor was enquiring on my chances of appeal when (not if) I would have been failed.

today I have appealed the decision of failing me to the internal board. According to my lawyer chances are that all of this does not matter, since historically my university drags these decision until the OIA, where they inevitably lose.

And I am here, wasting time, wasting money in a Kafkaesque process that crushes me.

I have received the document right before leaving to present at the most important conference in my field for the second year in a roll. which is befuddling.
I have been failed, the examiner did not even proposed the third submission.

The report is simply appalling and incredible: not only they state that I would have conceded that my dissertation could hold itself without the theoretical model - I did not, and it could not - but I am being failed because the examiners did not approve the theoretical model, the one subject I was told I could not be failed on: as i said, I needed to pass two exams before the end of the disseration, and the theoretical model was the subject of the first exam, which I passed. even if I wanted to cut it off, I could not. the examiners are setting themselves against the examiners of the first exam.

Iam looking for legal aid, but it is terrible.

I am not finished, but I have been struggling with mental health since the first year.
I am depressed, overstressed, and I suffer from anxiety attack. I stress-eat, so in 4 years I have gained 40 kilos. Last year things were going fine and I lost 17 of them in a handful of months, but now I am back where I started.

I'm a fourth year trying to finish his PhD.

In my university, each PhD students needs to pass through 2 exams meant to provide a different opinion on his work work throughout the process.

I failed my first attempt, and and the examiners suggested that I got demoted to a Master's status. Following this, I have taken every suggestion from the examiners, I have changed and developed my dissertation in the directions they suggested, I have written a completely different submission, one that I found positive and that even my supervisor liked (the other one resigned a month before the deadline).

At the end of the Viva I have asked one of the examiners to let me know the result as soon as possible, because the first time they let me suffer for a month. He called me in, sat me down, and said they were sticking to the Master proposition. Apparently, there is nothing wrong with my submission (which was called "perfect", and "marvellous"), and I am the issue, and my ability of carrying the argument home in the Viva.

We have discussed for 4 hours, during which I understood what kind of answer they expected (i thought my work was under examination, and so I offered data in support of my statement, whereas they were looking for evidence of critical thinking and argumentation), and at the end of our discussion, the examiner was convinced I was owed a new possibility. he has since been trying to obtain a third submission, which would be uncommon but not unheard of.

I am still waiting on the report, and I know a lot is going on behind the curtains, but it still kills me that I might be failed right now. The research is basically done, the writing process is at an advanced status, and they are stopping me because I was unable to understand the subject of scrutiny at the viva. I am setting my mind to an appeal, in case I was not given the third submission, but I am at the end of my rope.