In my case, as I had already published several articles, my aim was to publish my PhD thesis as a book. I was looking for a reputable publisher, expecting my thesis to be peer reviewed and I did not want to pay a penny. I approached four publishers: the first, refused to send it for a peer review and wanted me to pay for compiling an Index and would only publish in a soft cover and I rejected. The second publisher sent it for peer review and it was rejected but I did not get any feedback as to why. The third publisher, two reviewers rejected it and the third approved of it based on me submitting a book proposal, but the publisher rejected. In case of a third publisher, two reviewers wanted by thesis to be published but the third rejected based on a paragraph comment that there was nothing new in my thesis.. From those who were in favour of publication, one of them was an expert in the subject and I received a valuable comments for improvements and which I did. I am now writing a second book based on a different subject.

In my case, after submission, it took the university two months to approve the examiners and the examiners need 3+ months to read before a VIVA can he held.

I am waiting for my VIVA and I approached an external examiner from my university for suggestion. He told me that while conducting a VIVA, a PhD student was adamant that he (the external examiner) should only ask questions relating to his thesis and not general questions. This might prevent the examiners asking a PhD student to add the general verbal discussion in his/her thesis. This is something for everyone to ponder about and keep in mind.

The other options are to move to another university or change a supervisor..

At the university where I am doing my PhD, I met a student who was going his third PhD based on History. I would imagine that doing a second or third PhD would not take much time as the first PhD. The advantage I see is getting academic articles published, or a book chapter or even an academic book. I would imagine that a second of third PhD would be based on part-time and not full-time studies. Personally I find my first PhD degree very tough and I cannot imagine doing a second PhD even on a scholarship.

It all depends on whether a PhD student should publish his/her thesis as a book of a series of articles. If a student takes an initial broad approach then a book will be fine, otherwise he/she should resort to articles, bearing in mind that if these articles are based on thesis chapters then it needs to be rewritten to ensure that each article is self contained and can be read and understood on its own. It is also better to identify potential book/article publishers because articles have to be submitted based on the publishers in house style. In my case what I did is to send my revised chapters for publication to get a valuable feedback on how they can be improved and it has helped me a lot. As my thesis is broadly based, I have decided to publish it as a book next year and I have a publisher already lined up.

Hi Matt123

What does you university regulation say about copyright as it is prudent to follow it. If the regulation is silent then may be you can resort to comparable universities in the UK to see what their regulations are with regard to copyrights and adopt it.

Hi ckc

Have thought of taking a private course of action and sue the university for damages? Any lawyer will be able to help you.

Hi

My problem is how to create a new discussion forum.

This second supervisor was not based in the same country where I am doing my PhD, and we used to communicate by emails: I used to send him my chapters as attachments and he would read them.

My uni allows three years for a PhD and the fourth year as a writing up. It is also possible to change full-time studies to part-time and vice-versa and so those who are struggling may wish to change to part-time route, but this may be possible for local and not oversees students. Before enrolling a student has to have done a research and decided on a narrow area of research which can be accomplished within the three year period. It is the duty of a supervisor(s) to ensure that this is the case.

Hi Dan

This supervisor knew that I was going to publish papers and a monograph based on my thesis. I made an official complaint and threaten the university that I will withdraw from the course and sue the university unless the supervisor was replaced and an appropriate disciplinary action is taken against him. It seems the university is not keen to take disciplinary action as they want me to prove plagiarism.

Hi

It depends on the contribution made by a supervisor to claim a joint author. In my case I have taken my own initiative to present conference papers. The worst scenario was when my second supervisor repackaged my PhD thesis, changed the references, and has published an article based on my thesis and he is also going to publish a book. He has been replaced but the problem with me is with regard to my claim about the original contribution of my thesis.