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Help. Financial worries. Not passed PhD 1st year and really worried.
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Use the 'Turn To Us' calculator here: http://www.turn2us.org.uk/
They will give you a good indication of any entitlement to benefits.
Sorry you've found yourself in this position. The guy on the DFW board (debt-free wannabe) will also be able to help you in cutting down on things - no matter how good you think you are at cutting down, they'll find something to make it easier...!! You don't need to be in debt to ask the question on that board.
Consider your MPhil option, though - it would seem a shame to do all that and get nothing from it. Having said that, people are a product of what they've been through and done in life, and no doubt you'll have learnt and become the person you are in some way through this, even if it hasn't given you what you expected.
Best of luck.
KiKi' <-- See that? It's called an apostrophe. It does not mean "hey, look out, here comes an S".0 -
It can depend on the Research Council, but some will allow you to keep your funding whilst you submit for an MPhil rather than a PhD.0
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I'm applying for loads of jobs, 1 last week, 2 next week, just all a shock really
Sorry about your PHD. But applying for 1 job a week so far is not applying for loads of jobs! If you are seriously job hunting you should be applying for one a day at least, and in any field. I'm not job-hunting now but have applied for 4 jobs in the past week alone.
Maybe post a SOA so people can help you find cutbacks in your expenses.
Good luck* Rainbow baby boy born 9th August 2016 *
* Slimming World follower (I breastfeed so get 6 hex's!) *
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As another person said, which research council? Some of them are fairly helpful when stuff like this happens.
I may be biased (being a PhD student myself) but funded places are so difficult to find, and you must have been into the topic when you started?
If your supervisor has been absolutely dire then you have grounds for appeal, the fact that you didn't pass the progression review in itself shows lack of support more than a lack of ability, after all they took you on as a funded student in the first place...
Is there another member of staff who may be able to supervise you?0 -
flutterbyuk25 wrote: »Maybe post a SOA so people can help you find cutbacks in your expenses.
I agree that if you were having weekly meetings with your supervisor, you're not going to get anywhere with an appeal: she'll say she was making it clear enough what you needed to do, you'll say she didn't so you thought you were doing OK, or similar. marybelle and others are right, it is a huge jump to PhD, and you do absolutely have to work most of it out for yourself.
One other possibility is to find out whether you could write up for an MPhil at a later date, and if so how much later. I know there are limits, I didn't know what the attrition rates were like, but I do know that Universities started limiting the number of years part-time students could remain registered for without actually submitting.
For now, the priority has to be job hunting, IMO.Signature removed for peace of mind0 -
The OP really needs to talk to other people in his chosen field as far as I can see.
It is a difficult situation as no academic will want to comment on the opinion of the OP's supervisor, so he might have to discuss the PhD with people outside academia. Are there any employer's who regularily employ PhD qualified people in the OP's field that he can have a word with? They also might help your case if you were doing work for your PhD that is really valuable in your field.0 -
As another person said, which research council? Some of them are fairly helpful when stuff like this happens.
I may be biased (being a PhD student myself) but funded places are so difficult to find, and you must have been into the topic when you started?
If your supervisor has been absolutely dire then you have grounds for appeal, the fact that you didn't pass the progression review in itself shows lack of support more than a lack of ability, after all they took you on as a funded student in the first place...
Is there another member of staff who may be able to supervise you?
Everyone always blames their supervisor but if there's been weekly meetings then it's hard to argue inadequate supervision. I'm an academic and it's genuinely quite hard to know who will or will not be able to cope with a PhD. Some students who have performed well on taught courses just can't take the step up to succeed with independent research or just aren't commited enough to put sufficient work into it. It's not for everyone. I'm afraid if the panel has made the decision to terminate the PhD, the OP is out of the university as far as this PhD is concerned, and can't just ask someone else to supervise. The decision to fail the OP will have been checked and approved at faculty level. It's not taken lightly.
OP I'm assuming the decision to end your PhD registration is based on the academic quality of your upgrade report rather than you failing to attend training courses etc? If that's the case, then you might want to try to talk to a member of the panel or your department's director of research students to get a sense of whether they think there's enough there for an MPhil. There is no point dedicating more work to writing that up, if there's not enough results for it to pass. And do make sure if you go for the MPhil that you are clear about the expectations for the thesis and deadlines.
I would also suggest making an appointment with your university careers service to work out the best way to present this last year to future employers. You won't be the first to need that advice and there are ways of making it look OK, even if you don't go for the MPhil.0 -
As far as tax credits etc go, it looks as though you may have put in your own income only to the calculator, you need to include your partner's income also for a true picture as you will not be treated as two separate people. Also, if you're not currently paying maintenance to your ex due to being a student, bear in mind that if you start working you may need to start paying a percentage of your income, if your ex decides to make a claim for maintenance.0
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Thanks for the replies everyone, food for thought.
My other supervisor has agreed to supervise me to write what I do have as an MPhil, the deadlines are 12 months from now (although I'd realistically want to get it done and submitted in under 6 months). It's like an MSc dissertation in that it is checked and viva's are not that common. I'm due to meet with my primary supervisor next week, going to discuss whether there's enough there (there should be IMHO).
I'll be going along to the careers service for a analysis of this, it is a worry how I'll present this to future employers.0 -
missbunbury wrote: »As far as tax credits etc go, it looks as though you may have put in your own income only to the calculator, you need to include your partner's income also for a true picture as you will not be treated as two separate people. Also, if you're not currently paying maintenance to your ex due to being a student, bear in mind that if you start working you may need to start paying a percentage of your income, if your ex decides to make a claim for maintenance.
I put my partner's income too ... seems to make no sense, I get different answers from different sites. Some say no extra dosh others say I would get some.
Maintenance is not a problem, when I was working that was all handled via CSA and I don't have a problem with that.0
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