PhD Resubmit re-viva advice

[PhDWoe]

So I’ve been doing an endless part time mixed methods PhD in a STEM subject area

whilst progressing through the project (employed by the uni but no time allocation for study given) I became increasingly aware that my supervisors were actually clueless about qualitative methods (and a few other aspects of the study design they had suggested)

prior to submission the thesis was read by 4 separate supervisors (2 mine and 2 colleagues) all thought it had some issues but was essentially fine.

the examiners ripped it to shreds because of significant methodological errors based on my supervisors advice. They wanted to award me an MPhil but I think swayed towards R&R mostly cos it’s embarrassing for the uni to fail a staff member.

Since then, I’ve re-analysed two major data sets using different methodology and done an additional study and resubmitted. I’ve also published 3 papers (with a 4th accepted).
Viva is soon

i’ve noticed having gone through it again that there are a few errors, mostly typographical and not major but one is the insertion of a table from the previous iteration of the thesis and it just shouldn’t be there. It’s a pretty major thing to overlook (thesis was reread twice by my two useless supervisors) and obviously my fault (I have ADD so found the whole thesis-writing process unbearable especially part time).

not sure if it helps but the most recently accepted paper is a condensed version of this data chapter (without the random table insertion) so in a sense I’ve already corrected it.

I can only pass the re-viva if they make a minor errors recommendation.

there are a few other things worrying me about the thesis - it’s not perfect (also I now work for a different institution so I don’t think they’ll mind failing me now!)

I guess what I’m asking is where is the line between major and minor errors in a thesis?
Also is there anything I can do in the viva to nudge the examiners towards minor corrections (eg reassurance, an action plan for corrections etc)?

TL:DR
noted thesis errors and it’s a proper pass/fail situation - how can I constructively reassure examiners?

As someone doing a PT PhD while in a teaching role your post has made my blood run cold

Posting to offer tea and sympathy and a bump in the hopes someone knowledgeable shows up.

Surely the fact that you've published will get you over the line?

Have you already submitted? I assume you have? Is there any chance you could be in touch with whoever is managing the external examiners (often an admin person) with apologies and say that you realised you submitted the incorrect version in error and ask if you could re-submitted the correct final version? Then note where chances are made in case examiners have already started to read it.

Honestly, I wouldn't be too bothered by that if someone contacted me for that reason as long as the student was apologetic and accepted they'd made an error. In terms of your methods, did you get feedback from someone with expertise in qualitative methods for the latest version? I'm a qualitative researcher and honestly, most non-qual people have absolutely no idea how to do qual research, so would be useless in advising you. But I often get asked to have a minor role in co-supervising students when their own supervisors have no flipping idea what they're doing.

Thanks both @JenniferBarkley I’m sure you’ll be fine - my advice is really to carve out as much time as you can and to choose supervisors and examiners carefully! It’s definitely a marathon!

@mindutopia thanks for posting. The viva is coming up soon (thesis was submitted a few months ago) so it will have been reviewed. I can’t correct this. I did get a qualitative scientist to support me and she was great - we’ve produced 3 publications in decent journals so I’m now pretty comfortable with this aspect.

I’m just frustrated that I’m now in a pass:fail situation (can’t pass with anything more than minor corrections) because of the appalling guidance my supervisors gave me on data analysis the first time round.

I guess I’d really appreciate any insight from examiners as to where they draw the line in terms of minor versus major corrections if possible.

Do you mean that a data table is present and it shouldn’t be? Like a pasting error? I wouldn’t even count that as a minor error tbh. I’d just tell the candidate to delete it before final submission

Something similar happened to me, but with a number of pages that appeared in my thesis twice. Once in the correct place and once in an incorrect part. It was just a copy & paste error. I brought it up right at the start of the viva, the examiner told me to delete the erroneous pages and that was it, no big deal. I passed with minor corrections.

Thank you @bge and @Alaimo that’s reassuring - I just have no idea what is normal!

my external examiner is VERY quantitative and extremely detail-oriented. I don’t think she ’gets’ a mixed methods approach at all and I don’t think she’ll be very sympathetic to any errors

I think the key point is to go into your viva being able to confidently talk about why it is how it is (not excuses about last time as that is water under the bridge - is it the same examiners? - but about why you chose whatever methodology you did), that the publication has been peer reviewed and accepted on the basis of that, why you now think there might be better or additional ways of analysing and interpreting your data and what they are, etc. Be able to refer to recent papers, and if relevant, perhaps show that previously people were doing this work this way at the time you were doing yours and it's mostly more recent studies that have moved to different methodologies. Or whatever is appropriate.

Also know what the latest developments since publication are in your field and how they relate to your work. Ie you need to do another pass of the relevant literature since you wrote up or since you last looked, especially something really significant. They need to see that you are capable of being called Doctor, which is mostly about the thesis but not entirely.

You COULD even reanalyse the data and have it in your back pocket to whip out (on paper and in talking about it) - although this is a rather avant garde and possible dangerous approach if judged badly. But at the same time, don't bring anything up if it seems to be going well or if not sure just test the waters as you don't want to draw more attention to flaws when you don't need to! It'd be unusual for them not to if they perceive there is a problem that would lead to major corrections. And if they don't and then they fail you, then you could appeal on that ground.

It's fine to take copies of your papers (annotated eg with post-it tabs), your thesis (likewise), and some other notes into your viva. Not too many but enough. Although you also need to come across as knowing your stuff. Does you uni do mock vivas? If so try to avail yourself of one.

The night before my viva I realised I’d made what seemed to be quite a big error. I was so worried but explained to the examiners and they were fine. There will inevitably be errors with a thesis but best to flag proactively I think. I hope it goes ok!

Thanks so much all

@LadyMarmaladeAtkins I’ve re-analysed both data sets in light of the previous viva recommendations and that’s within the resubmitted thesis and three of the papers are included in the appendix. I sent the draft 4th recently as I don’t think it will be accepted before the viva (very slow turnaround!)

it will be a remote viva on Teams so it’s tricky to ‘show’ anything. Though I have my notes and error log.

I’m up to date with literature as I work in this field though my research area is very niche/novel so there’s not a lot to compare it to out there. It’s essentially an exploratory study of a population who have never been studied in relation to this phenomena (and who are generally understudied). But I’m familiar with similar literature/methods in other study populations

I realise now that my supervisors and the externals appointed by my supervisors are entirely unsuitable for this subject area and ironically through doing this research have connected with other researchers who are much more knowledgeable in this area. But I can’t do much about that now.

thanks so much for the comments. It’s helpful just to type out my thoughts. I’ve been so embarrassed by the whole process that I’ve only told one friend that the viva is coming up (she actually works in mental health and was incredible after my last viva where I actually think I had some ptsd symptoms in the aftermath) so talking about this is cathartic as no one knows it’s happening.

I’ve not even heard from my supervisors since submission (including sending them the draft paper!)

It sounds to me that (whatever happens) you have strong grounds for appeal and if the outcome is not good you should be sent details of how to appeal (and if you don't you can add this to your list of grounds).
But most PhDs are awarded on the basis of the work being potentially publishable - you have done this so my guess it that you will be ok.

Ok so full transparency the viva was today!

it mostly went ok I think though there were two areas where the external asked me questions about aspects of the work that were covered in other chapters and my ADD brain got ‘stuck’ and panicked as my notes were out of sync with the questions and I spiralled into waffle without my notes 😞

one of the examiners referred to the pages in the text each time they asked a question and this was super helpful for me - if anyone reading this works in student support then please suggest that as a reasonable adjustment for oral exams. My disability office didn’t and it’s only now that I realise how much the ‘jumping’ of the questions from the other examiner affected my focus as I tried to understand what they were referring to

my reasonable adjustments included taking breaks except they told me at the start that they were limited on time and if we overran they wouldn’t be able to get back to me today and so I didn’t really want to ask (though we did have some v short ones which helped)

anyhow regardless of that they weren’t able to make a decision today so they’re going to reconvene tomorrow morning then call me on my lunch break at work right before I go into a very important external meeting.

So that’s great.

honestly I’m expecting the worst. This whole thing has been a nightmare from start to finish

Thanks for posting @drwitch supervisory support is one of the key areas exempted from appeal so I doubt it.

I want to say congratulations for getting as far as you have, especially by part-time study with a clueless supervisor. I have ADHD and dyslexia and have just finished my Masters. My study was difficult enough but at least it was only 1 year not several like you had to do. Give yourself a pat on the back, OP. You deserve it.

Can you appeal about any other missing reasonable adjustments that could have made a difference, especially if other universities offer the same?

Thanks@mangomary I appreciate it
honestly the thought that this has all been for nothing is heartbreaking. I’m in bits and the idea of being in limbo til tomorrow then having to pull myself together after a likely fail outcome to ‘get back to work’ is so stressful

I don’t understand why they didn’t just schedule the viva an hour earlier. It’s taken them almost 9 months since my submission to schedule it and then they couldn’t actually find a slot where they could all be available for the length of time needed.

I think with the reasonable adjustments element, the challenge us that I don’t know specifically what would help so the disability office just gave me the standard ones. Regardless of the outcome I’ll definitely be suggesting that they encourage examiners not to jump around chapters and to try and use page number referencing to the sections that they’re asking about.

I know it's hard but try not to think the worst. We have rejection sensitivity which makes it all the harder.

Post tomorrow and let us know how you got on.

My Masters neurodiversity coach was really good. If it's bad news, I could check with my coach to see if she's able to give you any suggestions on how you should have been supported but weren't.

I was just coming on to say that a day before my viva the most critical equation in my PhD thesis (all the work I had done was condensed into this one equation) was incorrect! My blood ran cold. It was a 'reformulation'/substitution error where I analysed data with the equation in one form but presented in an easier to use form for the thesis (so all the data analysis using it was correct) - think when I moved parameters from one side of the equation to another I subtracted rather than set it as division. The examiners didn't even flinch when I mentioned it and just said that they trust me to correct it when I submit the final version.

So that's some good news for you I hope, though I see that your viva was today. Congrats! (even if that is some evil examiners leaving you hanging for an extra day! I never heard of that before).

I hope it goes well for you. It sounds like you've worked incredibly hard.

I have never heard of NOT giving the result the same day - this seems a very weird (and cruel) way of going about it. Fingers crossed for tomorrow! (I somehow managed to print the key to my graphs so small you couldn't actually read it. They just told me to enlarge it during revisions).

Well done on getting this far and I will have my fingers crossed for you.

@JenniferBarkley another p/t PhD / teacher here - solidarity, we will get through this!

Gosh OP, I agree with the PP, it’s appalling that they’re making you wait overnight. However, this reflects on the institution/examiners, not you. Do try not to worry, vivas and theses are not perfect so examiners expect errors. Have a drink and a good night’s sleep if you can. Wishing you the best of luck!!

Yes. It’s incredibly stressful.
interesting to hear that others haven’t heard of this happening before

I’m actually now less worried about the thesis - it felt like they were really that interested in it to be honest but more interested in testing my understanding of the literature and concepts. I managed to answer this all pretty comfortably apart from the two questions that were asked out of context which I totally fumbled and now I’m worried that they don’t think I have a proper understanding/depth of knowledge

god I hate my brain!

They should have given you the outcome today. That's plain cruel.

As an examiner that point about indicating pages is useful to know. The last thing I'd want is to cause unnecessary stress.

Anyway, I hope to read good news tomorrow.

Good luck for tomorrow

I'm autistic and in the final year of mine and absolutely dreading the viva, so thank you for your tips.

All the best for today, I know how stressful this process is and it’s shocking how much they’re keeping you waiting, both for the viva post submission and the result. Everything crossed that they come back to you early.