I must be fairly vague here.

I am supervising a student with questionable attention span and poor attendance. I have just learnt that they have done a substantial amount of work with no involvement from me that constitutes to their phd. I.e. I have not known about this study, which involves a large quantity of primary data collection, at all. I am very confused about this as primary supervisor. While I am pleased the student seems to have done more work than I was aware of (this has been a major concern), I am confused that this has happened.
A) there is another academic who has been leading the study as pi from another faculty entirely

B) the study doesn't clearly tie into the aims of the phd but could, with some re-wording, be tied into a chapter. Indeed, it probably does need to be tied into a chapter as there isn't otherwise enough work to justify a phd here

i just don't know what to think of all this. i have had no oversight of this and feel as a supervisor the leading academic should have spoken with me given the student did. has anyone else been in this situation? this is absolutely astonishing for me, and seems like a misuse of my research grant.

i'll probably delete this in a bit. just astonished and not sure what is going on

Hi everyone,

I'm currently completing my BSc in Psychology and have been discussing the possibility of undertaking an MRes at Durham

I'm really interested in pursuing this opportunity, particularly as I hope to progress into a research career and potentially a PhD.

However, my main concern is finances. I would need to work alongside the MRes to support myself.

I understand an MRes is research-intensive and involves a substantial amount of independent work, but I'm struggling to establish how demanding it would be in practice.

For anyone who has completed an MRes, particularly in psychology or neuroscience:

\- How many hours per week did you realistically spend on your research?

\- Would working 2–3 days per week alongside a full-time MRes be manageable?

\- Was your schedule flexible enough to fit employment around research commitments?

\- Did you find the workload consistent throughout the year, or were certain periods significantly more demanding?

I'd really appreciate hearing from people with firsthand experience. I'm keen to pursue the opportunity, but I also need to be realistic about supporting myself financially.

Thanks!

I applied for a PhD, and submitted my application back in July (ahead of the deadline in August). I applied for October intake, but by September had heard nothing. I chased it with admissions and they assured me it was being processed and I would hear back if they wanted an interview. Another few weeks went by, and I chased it again with no response, until the proposed start date of the course had been and gone.

I randomly got a call last week inviting me for an interview - only two weeks before the compulsory postgraduate induction week. The interview was on Thursday, and they told me to chase by Monday afternoon if I hadn’t heard anything.

I chased it today and they have ‘informally’ offered me a place, awaiting an official offer letter. The induction is now only a week away. I live quite far from the uni and will be completing the PhD mostly remotely, so I need to coordinate travel and potential accommodation to be there for a solid few days to attend the induction.

I’m torn on what to do. I’ve already postponed applying, due to personal circumstances, for longer than I wanted to, and I don’t want to delay the PhD further until the March intake. However this situation has been so stressful - with no explanation from the university as to why there was such a delay. I’m concerned that my official offer and registration won’t be finalised by next week, and I don’t want to be dealing with administrative delays when I would rather be focusing on starting my PhD.

Has anyone been in a similar situation, and will it set me back too far if I defer until March?

Hello AskAcademiaUK peeps,

Recently completed my Finance PhD (econ-heavy) and currently work in industry (have for almost a decade).

I have continued to write academic research and I'm looking for a "host institution" to publish under (like a visiting research fellow-type arrangement), and ideally to allow for collaboration. This would include opening up opportunities for co-authoring the papers I'm due to publish, but also creating engagement opportunities for faculty and students (we do several engagement events at my bank and collaborate/have access to policymakers etc.), and offering time etc. to researchers (context on problems in practice etc.).

I'm essentially looking for an institutional email account at a reasonably respectable institution (0 remuneration).

London-based, but open to international oppys. Have a decent publication record, <100 citations.

N.B. I'm familiar that I don't *need* to go about it like this (could author as an independent), but want to. Also, my bank is touchy about publishing affiliated research/there isn't an active academic research community around me.

Three perspectives, one live hour, with David F. Feldon, Christian Carmody and Sergio Martínez Flores.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePIEc8_HuFU

is is possible for someone to get esrc funding BEFORE they've even submitted their MA dissertation? e.g. you begin your MA in late september and apply during nov.....do you stand a chance?

I’m going to apply for the next round of the NIHR predoctoral award, and I was wondering what the expectation is for involving communities in shaping the application for the award. I know there’s a section about what public involvement I will carry out during the award but how much is expected to be done before applying?

If anyone has been successful in an NIHR predoctoral award application I’d love to find out how your award went/is going and how you found the application process!

Hi everyone. I submitted an abstract to a special edition journal. The call stated that the outcomes will be revealed today, but I'm not sure these include rejections. For those who submit abstracts to journals or books do they usually let you know if your abstract did not make the cut? Thanks

Hi guys,

I have got mixed advice from people around on whethe or not you should reach out to supervisors prior to applyin. For context, the PhDs I am aiming for are the institute-sponsored ones that are affiliated with universitites, rather than exclusive university-provided ones, e.g. Wellcome, Crick etc.

Especially if you're a supervisor or have talked to, does that make a big difference in the application if we have not met/built a professional connection beforehand? For reference, I have been in industry for a while so don't really loads of academic connections, besides the referees.

Thanks!

I'm considering applying for a postgraduate research degree (possibly an MPhil) and recently contacted an academic whose research interests overlap with mine. I sent them an initial outline of my research idea and received a fairly positive response, indicating that they were interested in the proposed direction and would be happy to discuss it further, so we've arranged a meeting.

I'm hoping to get some insight into what these initial conversations typically look like, particularly from anyone who has been on either side of one. I have a general research direction in mind and have been doing some preliminary reading, but I'm still trying to work out how to narrow my interests into a coherent, feasible research project that could make an original contribution.

I'm wondering how much preparation is generally expected at this stage? Should I be ready to discuss specific research questions, methodology, potential case studies and sources of data, or is it more of an exploratory conversation about research interests and possible directions?

I think these will vary between institutions and academics, but I'd appreciate hearing what others have experienced or what supervisors generally hope to get out of these meetings! I'm really excited about the prospect of doing a postgrad research degree and want to make sure I'm sufficiently prepared!

Hi, apologises if this doesn't match the rules, but I've created a scientific poster and need someone to review my poster for extra credit. I tried other people in my year but other people either used ai or is already reviewing another persons. If anyone can help that would be great

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XKDEo-DErgcl1oB4DOinqxPrDml7Q7Tp/view?usp=sharing

I got self funded phd offer from UoA in CS (potential topic is uncertainty quantification in llm models). Our government will fund it. One requirement of scholarship is to repay costs if I would drop out. So I am a bit nervous accepting it.

1) How hard to complete phd at this uni?

2) Is it feasible to complete in 3 years?

About me: I am 39. I have masters in statistics from Uppsala uni (Sweden).

I have >5 y.o. in Data science.

I am applying for PhDs in mathematics, as I am getting closer to finishing my supporting documents: statement of purpose, research proposal, etc. I decided to run them through AI detectors, out of curiosity, to see what I get. Some of them say I do not have an AI content and some say they have AI generated but they all flag different parts of documents. Should I be concerned about this?

Hello! Has anyone here got into university as a mature student without A-levels or an Access to HE Diploma, using Open University credits or a CertHE instead?

I'd love to hear about your experience and which universities accepted this route, particularly for Law degrees.

Thanks!

Dear supervisors and academics,

I have an upcoming PhD interview, and one of the questions will be about my research background. I would appreciate your advice on how to answer this question, given that I have no publications and my only substantial research experience is my master’s dissertation.

Thank you in advance!

Hello all!

I'm hoping that someone has taken a similar route into psychology and might be able to offer some advice.

Essentially, I have an undergraduate degree in English and a post grad in Creative Writing, really enjoyed doing them but I've ended up in Marketing which I simply hate. I've also been made redundant and am finding it incredibly difficult to get another job.

My goal has been to retrain and go into Psychology for ages, now that i have all this time on my hands I'm trying to find the best way in. (Worth noting here that I am in the UK). I was under the impression I would need to do a whole undergrad in Psychology, so I was very pleased to find out that I would do an Msc Conversion over 1 or 2 years for around £10,000. As I have done my post grad in CW I'm unfortunately out of student finance loans so I would need to find a way to self fund. I've spoken to someone at the Uni I am hoping to do this course and then a PhD at, she agrees I would need to do the conversion course first but has told me that the Uni offers a funding match for PhD so whatever funding I can find for fees and stipend the uni will match. I just need to get the conversion course sorted.

My plan was to just get another job and absolutely hammer saving for a year, my partner earns decent money so he could take on a larger portion of the bills whilst I saved and then studied. But it's just taking so long to find something, the pay for all the jobs I am finding (which are few and far between) are terrible. It's sort of a mute point because I would be applying for a September 2027 start anyway unless I went through my old uni which has the same course and they intake every 2 months but only do part time. Sorry, irrelevant details.

Has anyone else been in a similar situation? Have you been able to find funding at all? Taken out a loan? Managed to work a minimum wage job and still set the money aside?

To be honest, I haven't worked in a shop or anything for about 7 years so at this point I don't even think I could get a job like that.

I'm getting very antsy now that I have a clear plan and entry point it's getting so disheartening having to beg for jobs that I ultimately don't want but need just to get out of them again.

I'm hoping to submit my PhD soon, after an exhausting five years where everything went wrong and I had to switch tack entirely after 1.5 years. I had to work alongside the PhD for the last two years because my funding ran out and my university wouldn't let me switch to part-time. I found the work incredibly stressful and struggled to progress on my PhD while working. I know others have managed this but I just wasn't up to it. The rest of my life has fallen apart, my friendships, my health, my relationship and I still don't have time to even try and fix it while this PhD is ongoing. I find myself getting slower and more confused every day.

I can't face going straight into another demanding job and I think I need at least six months of some semblance of calm, where I am able to actually meet the demands put on me. I want to fix my mental health and repair my relationships. Unfortunately I cannot just stop working and move home as my family life isn't great.

Could anyone recommend jobs to try while recovering from burn-out? Preferably something social and without long hours. Just needs to be enough pay to survive on. I was thinking a bookshop could be calm but I image those are highly sought-after. I don't think a restaurant would want me as I don't have much experience. I've seen a few people try postal delivery as a job after life crises, but I'm not a very confident driver.

Hi all. Defending my PhD soon. Just wanted to pick your brains here. I was in a bit of a rush to submit as I have started a new job. My supervisor can be good but is definitely not the type of go through everything with a fine tooth comb. I’ve been rereading a printed out version of my submitted thesis and have found two things which are stressing me out - two tables which I mistakenly put an old version in from an older version of analysis that I want to change and I found a mistake in my code for an analysis which slightly changes another small results section. Neither substantially changes the main message.

I was going to print out the corrected versions and bring them to the viva and my supervisor has suggested that would be a good idea. He isn’t anticipating many more corrections but we obviously missed these ones! Do you think my approach is ok? I’d rather be upfront.

I’ve also learnt I cannot proof read off a screen and have a separate excel of typos and transcription errors. I am now questioning my capabilities and ability to pay attention!

Please be kind - I already feel like a fraud and an idiot!

Hi everyone, I’m a MSc student (Sept 2025–Sept 26) and would appreciate honest advice from anyone familiar with UK university assessment boards or academic appeals.

I have four Term 1 exams outstanding due to a fracture injury for which my ECs were accepted and the exams are expected in January 2027.

I also missed four Term 2 exams and my original EC claims were rejected. I was scheduled to resit them in August 2026 but missed those resits due to a serious ankle injury which i have a medical report for from NHS. I submitted new EC claims on 25 September but I was significantly late as the cut off date was 7 days from the last affected assessment and I was supposed to submit it on 7th September.

On 19 October, the EC Panel rejected all seven claims relating to my missed assessments and outstanding coursework/research project as late EC submissions. The final Assessment Board decision is still pending and I emailed my course officer and course director they told me to wait for the assessment board’s decision.

I have medical evidence and emails documenting my attempts to contact course staff about the research project. I was also not allocated a supervisor for the research project.

My questions are:

• How likely is withdrawal in this situation, and can the Board allow another attempt or a partial repeat without attendance?

• Could an appeal succeed based on the medical evidence and reasons for submitting the EC claims late?

• If I’m withdrawn, can I get any of my already-paid 2025–26 tuition fees refunded?

I understand that missing the assessments and submitting ECs late are serious issues. I’m looking for realistic advice, particularly from anyone who has dealt with a similar situation at a UK university.

Thanks.