PhD supervision- how would you handle this?

[BellaHadidHere]

I inherited a challenging PhD student who I was supervising with a Prof.

I'm an SL but very little supervision experience (two to completion, eight currently working on projects).

Prof then left so I was supervising alone. I don't work in the area of this PhD at all. I feel confident supporting methods but absolutely not the empirical/theoretical focus. I'm humanities.

A new colleague joined our Dept who works in the empirical/theoretical area of this PhD. She's an L with no supervision experience.

After she'd been around for a few months, I asked her to co-supervise with me. She agreed so I informed the student, our PhD director and the relevant admin teams that she was doing it.

Meanwhile, she changed her mind and decided she didn't want to supervise this student because it's too challenging for her first one. I get the sentiment but we're massively short staffed and everyone is taking on extra admin, teaching and PhD supervision to keep the Dept. ticking along.

A Prof (who also doesn't work in the area of the PhD) has tentatively put himself forward to supervise with me instead of this new L colleague.

However, this new colleague is really well-placed to supervise given her expertise and I feel that to support our PhD students the best we need to match students with the necessary experts. So it's concerning me that this PhD student will end up being supervised by me and this other Prof, neither of us having knowledge of the research area while our new colleague who has relevant knowledge and could support the student, isn't involved.

The other issue is that because we are so short staffed, we all need to chip in where/how we can and, unfortunately, none of us are able to be picky on some issues. We've been short staffed for some time and when we had a flurry of people leave, I (and many of my colleagues) took on a number of PhDs that weren't in our areas or were quite challenging to help out and be collegiate. The same needs to happen now and I feel frustrated that this new colleague isn't showing the same collegiate-ness that others have/is needed.

So, now that I've told everyone this new colleague will be supervising with me. She's agreed to come to a meeting with me and the student to offer some guidance but will then, apparently, step back from the project leaving me at square one and the student with a piss-poor supervision team.

How would you handle this situation, please?

What I want out of this is for the new colleague to supervise with me because of her expertise and for her to kind of recognise that we're massively stretched and need all hands to the pump.

I think you are right not to speak directly with your colleague. It is not your job to allocate students in your department, all you should do is document your concerns that the student is not adequately supervised.

She sounds like she is struggling for reasons outside of your control. It is extremely important this is documented in writing in the review so that she knows she is doing poorly, why she is doing poorly and what plan is in place to help her. Does your Uni have a support unit for students who need help with general writing skills? It might be worth pointing her in their direction and then she can choose whether she makes use of their help or not.

Thanks booboos

Glad I've got my plan sorted in my head and it looks reasonable to you all.

Yes, there is writing support available but I'm not sure the student would be inclined to make use of it TBH. I don't think she sees that there's actually a problem.

All of these issues are linked of course. The writing issue, for me, comes from her not having an academic background so she just hasn't been/isn't immersed in the world of academic writing and reading. It's not that there are easily identifiable issues that you can pinpoint with her writing- it's just that it's overall just not very academic. Again, if the old DoGS would've been a bit more savvy, this student wouldn't have been admitted at all.

I'm doing the dance. It's like the dance on Ricki Lake, but cooler.

This is why I disagree with those saying that academics should just be allocated these PhD students without any power of veto. A PhD student is very different than an undergrad whose degree is decided by committee. It's a long-term three/four year working relationship where you have to be able to work together, and in which you personally sign off to say the work is of the required quality- essentially you are putting your reputation on the line for this one student (crap PhDs reflect on their supervisors however much the student is at fault). I think it's fine for us to veto, I would say no to this student, and leave it to the dep't/college to sort out who supervises them. I wouldn't take 7/8 PhD students either unless this was a significant amount of my workload on paper. That's beyond collegiality.

Most academics want PhD students, and PhD supervision is part of our expected targets, so a lecturer without any would be very exposed. But I don't think they should be allocated against the supervisor's consent given the nature of the working relationship.

A PhD student is very different than an undergrad whose degree is decided by committee. It's a long-term three/four year working relationship where you have to be able to work together, and in which you personally sign off to say the work is of the required quality- essentially you are putting your reputation on the line for this one student (crap PhDs reflect on their supervisors however much the student is at fault)

I don't agree with that to be honest. I think there are some real clangers that get let through (esp. international students with money behind them) and everyone knows that's nothing to do with the supervisor.

I think it's fine for us to veto, I would say no to this student, and leave it to the dep't/college to sort out who supervises them

I agree with your first point but my issue is that my new colleague initially said "yes" which meant I got the ball rolling administratively (and told the student she'd have someone else on the team). She then came to me the next day and said "no". If she'd just said "no" in the first place, half this mess wouldn't have happened.

Having said that, you say just leave it to the department to sort out but, ultimately, someone has to supervise this student. Her original supervisors have both left so someone has to "inherit" her. Why not the new colleague?

I wouldn't take 7/8 PhD students either unless this was a significant amount of my workload on paper. That's beyond collegiality

We're incredibly short staffed. Sadly having this many PhD students is just necessary for some of us.

Most academics want PhD students, and PhD supervision is part of our expected targets, so a lecturer without any would be very exposed

Yep, she's also kicking up a fuss about her admin role and refusing to teach on one of our programmes. She's making herself very exposed particularly as the course she was recruited to teach on is moving to another university. I don't think she realises how imperative it is for her to actually take on some stuff even though she might not want to.

It sounds like your institution is the problem. We don't accept PhD students without two supervisors agreeing to take them, full stop. So, if no-one will supervise them, then they don't come, even if they have funding. Most people want a few PhD students anyway, so it seems to work out and the very poor ones or ones who are off topic are just not taken on, with a few exceptions who slip through the net. We are able to say no, but always saying no wouldn't be a good idea although no-one really monitors this. I wouldn't go about 4/5 students unless I really had to (as in forced by management) as it would be unmanageable for me, time-wise, as there's always one or two who need more intensive supervision. We all co-supervise on teams now, so having a couple who you are their main supervisor and a couple who you are less important works well.

Your new colleague sounds like a rather uncollegial diva.

I concur with household. Sounds really tricky Bella and that you are being massively under supported.

Thetrees The issue is that this student did have two supervisors who agreed to supervise her.
But, yes, I agree the institution isn't being very supportive. There's lots of other stuff going on in the department at the minute so senior management attention seems to be fully focused on that. Plus, our HoD doesn't want to get her hands dirty.

Assuming your new colleague isn't through her probationary period... will this be tackled by senior management using that process? It's exactly the kind of behaviour that should lead to sanctions. It's very common for people straight out of a PhD and indeed many established member of staff to be utterly clueless about the way universities actually work, but they must at least show willingness to shift gear. Otherwise, you're just storing up a major staffing problem, really.