Hi all,

I am a current PhD student in Australia. I am in my 3rd year and my project is in engineering/material research. I entered into my current program straight after finishing my undergrad. I guessed I start doing my PhD without realising how difficult it could be. Recently I feel very down. My previous supervisor retired at the start of the year and I am now with my current supervisor for around 6/7 months. It is only until around a month ago, I realised that my current supervisor doesn’t understand what I was doing (even though he was suggesting me about what I should do to improve my analysis). He basically criticise about all the work that I have done. I tried to get help from my previous supervisor, but that didn’t help. And I think now I understand the problem about my project from my current supervisor perspective, but I really don’t know how to redirect my project to get it back on track. My current supervisor can’t help much either, as he don’t know too much about the research field that I am working in (yet he is the most suitable person in my school to supervise me…) He gave me a suggestion on how I can go on with my project, but I feels that it will completely change my project. All the work that I have done in the last 2.5 years would probably be either wasted or minimised to around 20% of the overall project. So I really don’t know what to do now. I am currently think to give my project 1 last try by testing 1 possible ideas, if the result are bad, then I am think to downgrade to master. What I wanted to know is what is the possible impact of downgrading to a master? Is it actually worthwhile downgrading to master or should I switch project at this point? (In Australia, PhD is usually around 3-4 years, so some of the people started with me are finishing. This make me feel very bad as well, feel like I am a complete failure). If I finished with MPhil, would people think that I am a PhD failure and marking that as a disadvantage for career?

Many thanks in advance

I think in this situation you have to do what's best for you. I had to change my project 18 months into PhD and I'm frantically trying to get things finished. I think it would be a better idea to write up for MPhil than to waste what you've done. But give the PhD another chance. It's such a shame you're not getting the support.