Thanks Tey61 - couldn't agree more - you make some excellent points which I totally agree with. Not sure how I'm going to solve this though... The fact that I was warned by people who did their undergraduate degrees here about having this guy as a supervisor again makes me feel that I have been severely let down.

Thanks for your comments and advice which have been very useful. However -

Slizor - sounds like you're doing a PhD? If that's the case then the support you get from your supervisor should be very different to that I get from an MSc. Indeed, if things go wrong then you will have time to correct them and try something new as you have over three years to do your research. In my case I have 9 weeks - which as I pointed out is not long enough to learn a programming language and be able to write something which somebody with 20 years experience could not. Furthermore, I am well aware of the level of support that I should expect from my supervisor which should be comparable to that of my fellow students and it has clearly not been! In addition, it sounds like you're getting a lot more support from your supervisor(s!) than I have ever had...

Caro - thanks again - very useful. However, at the end of the day as the project was suggested by my supervisor then I'd like to think he saw it as something which was achievable given the time period. This therefore meant that I was duty bound to follow the suggestions that he made in order to get the best mark possible. In my mind the fact that the things he suggested were clearly wrong or impractical reflects more on him than me.

Appreciate you both taking the time to try and help me though - it's probably too complex to understand without first hand knowledge!

Cheers

Sorry - my post has been truncated but I'm sure you get the gist! At the moment I'm thinking of not handing anything in and feel this is mostly due to my supervisor being completely useless. This will be a major blow after achieving distinction for my PgDip.

Does anyone think it would be worthwhile raising a formal complaint or should i just accept what has happened and try to move on. And would I get another chnace to do a dissertation if my complaint was upheld?

Thanks for reading and appreciate any advice offered!

Cheers

Hi

Just looking for some advice (and a bit of a rant if that's okay!) about my supervisor for my MSc dissertation which has been nothing but trouble for the past 3 1/2 months. I really feel that I have been let down and am interested to see if others agree. To summarise what has happened:

1. Accepted topic that was recommended to me by supervisor due to not doing certain modules on my course which would have allowed me to do other (do-able!) topics

2. Hand in literature review at end of June expecting it to be returned fairly quickly allowing me to proceed with main body of work. Severe lack of articles on topic meant it was a major struggle to write good review. Supervisor tells me he is off for three weeks on field work. Finally returns review in mid August after persistent questioning and notes on feedback that I have put in something which I have not. Has he actually read the review? Other students reviews returned within 1-2 weeks of hand in.

3. Express lack of understanding of topic to supervisor and consequent failure to start. Also had to wait for data which only he had. Wasted three weeks due to him not being here...

4. Supervisor back for two weeks but then away again for further three weeks. Email contact only informing him that there doesn't seem to be much behind dissertataion idea and that I am likely to quit. Supervisor deletes email and does not respond for two weeks.

5. Idea put forward by supervisor for main body of work found to be not possible despite my repeated attempts. Told to "give up on it and say it didn't work". Does not suggest any other avenues to go down.

6. Supervisor then writes program code which may be used in dissertation. Program does not work and language is arcane and very out of date meaning there is no information on how to write it. Tells me he will not give me any more help on it and I am on my own. Goes on holiday for three weeks. I have no experience of writing code in this language so surprised he expects me to do something which he can't do with 20 years experience. 

Essentially I am now at the stage where I have just over two weeks to hand in a dissertation and I have very little output. There are very few (i.e. no additional) references to put in my dissertation and I have no working analysis or code. As I said I feel I've been let down for a number of reasons which are

1. Supervisor did not warn me that he would only be availble for three weeks out of 9 weeks timepsan for dissertation

2. He gave incorrect feedback in my literature review suggesting that he had not read it and requested more when there was no relevant literature to use

3. He suggested a technique to analyse the data which was not suitable for the data used and then ofered no constructive way to continue. Shouldn't he be almost certain that the technique should work if he suggested it in the first place?

4. He used a programming language that was very out of date and left me to pick up the pieces when it went wrong.

Hi Guys

I'm currently doing a MSc at Leeds Uni  to with river management and have progressed to the dissertation stage - which is due the first week of September. I've done pretty well in the course so far and have managed to achieve a grade of distinction currently.

My problem is that the course was entirely modular and I've now realised that I probably didn't select one or two modules that I should have - essentially I chose the courses I thought were interesting and didn't focus them on a specific dissertation topic. However, when the list of potential topics came out I realised that it was going to be very difficult to proceed with any of them due to severe gaps in my knowledge resulting from not doing some modules. Having been away from uni life for over a decade I also didn't feel I had enough knowledge to come up with my own topic.

As it was the only option available to me I went with a topic on "the development of a wild land quality index for the scottish river system" with a supervisor who I thought would be very helpful. However, people who had done their undergraduate course tried to warn me against this saying that he would be very difficult to work with.

First stage of the diss was to write up a literature review on the subject and I found this almost impossible as there was a distinct lack of literature. I managed to hand something in but in my opinion it wasn't good and I had to get an extension on health grounds as I started to have severe panic attacks. Certainly the review gave me no help in developing any methodology or knowledge of the subject area. Furthermore, going to see my supervisor wasn't much help as every time we discussed the diss he started going, changing the purpose of the diss and pretty much confusing me!

Next stage was to get data from my supervisor but this resulted in a weeks delay as he was away on a field trip. When he came back he informed me that at the end of that week he was off to Australia for two weeks. At our meeting to discuss the diss I told him i was stuck and had no idea how to proceed and he tried to explain the topic to me but i still didn't understand either the methodology or even the need for the study. I had told him I would come and see him at the end of the week but when I turned up on the Friday he had left for Australia and had not marked my lit review which he had promised to do. In effect he has only been there for four days the month.

I am now stuck waiting until he returns in a weeks time with nothing to do as I have no idea how to proceed. Time is also running out and there will only be about 5 weeks for me to do the whole diss when he returns. basically - not long enough.

Now trying to decide on my next step - should I carry on with the dissertation although I have major doubts about completing it on time or should I see my course supervisor and tell him that I'm pretty disappointed but will have to quit. Maybe there will be an option of doing it next year?

Pretty