Hey everyone,

I applied for a funded PhD studentship earlier this year, but was unsuccessful. However, even though I wanted that studentship so desperately, I messed up my interview due to being a nervous wreck... Hence, their reason for rejecting me was that my approach for the project wasn't analytic enough and they advised me to get a RA job before applying for a PhD.

Now, a PhD has been advertised at the same department again (albeit in a slightly different area, but I would still love to do it). However, even though I'd love to apply, the project would be co-supervised by the same person who already rejected me once. Hence, do you think it would be wise to apply again, given that I was rejected by that supervisor before? Also, since being rejected I wasn't able to get the RA job they advised me to get. Rather, I had to stay in my old job and the only research I was able to get involved in there since my rejection was a nationwide service piece of research looking at service utilisation and delivery. However, I was only responsible for collecting data, data input and the maintenance of the database, which I feel isn’t really a lot given that research can involve more…

Given this, do you think it would be wise to apply there again or just leave it? I'd be really grateful for any advice :-)

Miu

The way I see it you've absolutely nothing to lose by applying, except for the time it takes to complete the application, go for it!

It might be that they don't remember you - so I wouldn't worry about it. It's a different project so you'll either have a clean slate again or if they do recognise your name, they might see it as tenacity! Which surely is a good thing! There's no harm in trying if thats what you want to do.