I can't comment on Swedish unis, but as far as whether to keep an MPH general or specialized, I'd say keep it general because you never what is going to happen in the future and it might be easier to switch fields if you have a wide background knowledge.

Seems like a tough decision to make - if it was me I'd go with my gut because what looks good on paper isn't always right.

Good luck!

I'm currently in the US as part of my PhD so I've got a pretty good idea of the system here too. I can see the merits and disadvantages of both systems, but I have still found that US students I have met have more in depth knowledge of their general research area than some of the UK students that I know. Obviously I'm dealing with small subsets of very large populations so maybe this is an inaccurate view.

On the other hand, US students also tend to be more confident and outgoing, and sometimes I wonder if it's just that UK students are more willing to admit what they don't know and therefore appear less knowledgeable than their US counterparts.

I agree 5 to 6 years is too long, but then again, if someone gave me funding for that long I'd be more than happy to continue living the student life!

I don't think they are playing catch up to be honest. In order to be accepted on to a graduate programme, they have to have taken certain modules relevant to the programme and these are the same sort of modules that we will be taking.

When they start a PhD, they then have to do 2 years of classes alongside their research. Some of these are second or third year undergraduate classes and some are specific graduate classes. This means that they have got a very broad biological background, then a narrow section of more relevant classes to their research area and then a highly specialised knowledge of their subject area.

Compare this to some UK biologists, who may have transferred in from chemistry or physics, and you get a picture of very little broad background knowledge with highly specific knowledge of their own personal subject area. Such students have to do a lot more reading around the subject as a consequence.

Add the fact that the US students attend more conferences, speak at more seminars and generally have more things to put on their CVs than we do, you may find that they actually fare better in the scientific community.

Ae7, yes that's true, but from what I have seen, their dissertations are nothing like the ones in the UK, at least not in Biology anyway. Many of them have a short introduction, little or no methodology and then the papers they have had published, or at least submitted for publication.

Additionally, the viva system is different and they often just give an exit seminar followed by an hour or so's discussion with their thesis committee, where it's practically unheard of to fail and they are very unlikely to have to correct anything in their thesis other than a few typos.

So 'all but dissertation' seems like a lot of work in the UK, but it's not so much in the US.

But yes, this is just my view from people in one Biology department in the University of California system, so yes, more opinions on the subject are probably beneficial!

I think this is fairly normal for most senior jobs outside of academia too, and even some basic ones. But I agree, it's not helpful or encouraging.

Yes you can apply, you just to make it clear on your CV/application that your PhD hasn't been awarded yet.

I'd use ABD if it's an option, since, although it's practically a pass by the time you are at that stage in the US and not necessarily a pass in the UK, it's the closest to it. If there's a place to write a covering note / letter in the application then mention it in that.

Congratulations! Having to make this decision must be a a nice position to be in!

I'd choose France, mainly because it's closer to home.

US/Canada is too far away for me, personally.

Some of those open vivas are just for show though - they have that concept in Italy for example, and I've been told it's unheard of to fail when you get to the viva stage... in fact, the graduation ceremony is directly after the viva, so that kind of says it all really!

My friend has just done that. He picked a random topic (but within his research area) and wrote a review paper on it with some other colleagues (topic was random for them too). It just got accepted.

I think he would do it again because he is very happy to increase his publication list!

I think it did take time away from his studies though because our supervisors aren't happy with the amount of progress in his work... He used to work on it mostly on the weekends and during evenings. He hasn't mentioned it to our supervisors...

I have had this problem recently too. I usually write like you are describing: if it's not good I would delete and start again. I found I couldn't write anything and was just staring at a blank screen for ages.

I tried free writing, where you just write continuously for at least 5 minutes without stopping. It felt weird at first but at the end of the day it felt good because I had something down on paper, and I could then revise it the next day so at least I felt I had done something.

It's taken me about 4 months to write 2500 on one particular subject because I found this one subject so difficult to understand and write about. It's finally at a stage for me to send to my supervisor this week - but I don't think I would have been able to do without the free writing. So give it a go and see if it works for you!

This can really vary for me, depending on how busy my supervisors are. My PhD is in Biology.

Sometimes we meet every 2 weeks for 2 months, other times I have gone for 3 months without an official meeting (although they are around if I need to ask them a quick question).

I think your supervisor should take more of an interest and you are right to expect him to. It's a shame if supervisors don't engage as they should (the conference stuff you mentioned etc) but I don't think you are going to be able to change that too much. You should, however, be able to negotiate better supervision with more frequent meetings.

I think you are going to have to be more assertive with your supervisor and tell him what you want and that it's important for you to get it in order to be able to finish your PhD. Just be honest and tell him how you feel. If he doesn't know the answers, he should be able to point you in the direction of someone who does, or at least suggest some sort of resource.

Good luck and I hope the situation improves for you.

I expect they just use this form for all PhD applications, whether applying for a particular project or submitting an independent proposal.

It says: "In up to 1,000 words, please provide a statement of your proposed area of research, and a short description of the study with details of the
aims and proposed methodology. Please indicate any relevant prior knowledge of the area and what you can bring to this piece of work. Tell
us why you believe you are the ideal candidate. Attach additional sheets as necessary."

If it was me, I would state what I'm applying for and confirm that the PhD already says should use xxx methods to achieve xxx goals. I would then just use the rest of the word limit to talk about prior knowledge and why I'm the best candidate. If you know/have experience with other methods then you could mention this too.

Good luck!

Make sure you read up about different research areas in the dept, as well as the things your potential supervisors work on. They like to see that you have done your homework.

A bit of enthusiasm goes a long way too.

If they ask you questions that you can't answer, which they probably will, just say you are not quite sure but based on xxx you think yyy. If you really can't come up with something, just say you don't know. As long as you have only say you don't know to a few questions, that's ok.

Treat it like a normal interview and be prepared for scenario-based questions like 'tell us about a time when you were stressed, how did you cope?' etc.

Me too!

My supervisors are there to advise me, not to do the work for me. If I come to them and say 'I don't know what to do about this', they don't tell me the answer, even if they know. They tell me to go away and think about it for a few days and come to them with suggestions.

I'm at the stage now where they don't know the next steps of my research anyway, because I've already tried every avenue that should work and doesn't, and I have to come up with alternative solutions to my problems myself now. So no, I wouldn't say science students are less independent than in social sciences.

Well I must say supervisors in social sciences can't have much involvement in the PhD at all then!

For my Biology PhD I can definitely say my supervisors have "made a substantial direct academic contribution" to A) Conception or design (The initial ideas were theirs and many of the subsequent steps) and C) Analysis and interpretation of the data (if only in the form of looking at the data and saying whether I am analysing it correctly, the next steps I need to take etc). They will probably end up (re)writing a lot of any papers I produce too in the course of "critically reviewing successive drafts of the paper and approving the final version".

What are social sciences supervisors doing then?