Hello,

Probably mainstream topic for this forum; however, I have some different conditions which I would like to share with you. I'll try to keep anonymous due to the popularity of my supervisor in my field. The situation is the following:
I am a non-Eu student, finished BSc in one south-eastern European country. Was ranked top 3 in my class, received Honors, and later on a DAAD scholarship for German master. I chose a not good ranked university in Germany (don't know why), however famous in Germany due to its history, and finished an international program (MSc) as the top (ranked no.1) of my program and all of the other programs on my faculty. Received some other scholarships on the way and some awards of my thesis. My thesis supervisor is very famous in the field, academia and companies (High ranked UK PhD, many honors, all sparkly CV). After the thesis he offered me a position, for which I spent a lot of time thinking and finally accepted it 5 months ago. During this process, I contacted some other university, and I received a positive feedback from a supervisor on very highly ranked UK uni; and I applied for a scholarship, even though the deadline was past, as he encouraged me to do so. Later was rejected for the deadline reason; however, he was keen to try the next term, but I have accepted the other position already.

Now I am working here, and I can't seem to shake of this feeling that I should have tried again, and go on different university, for the sake of the prestige and to try myself elsewhere. I do know many would say this does not matter, but somehow from what I see is that many people get accredited just for going there ( I am not arguing the quality of the dissertation). It keeps affecting my concentration and work, and although I got a conference paper accepted, I am seriously thinking to go to my supervisor and tell him that I would like to quit and then apply for different schools and funding. Generally hes a man of his word, and I do respect him very much, although his expertise in my topic are somehow shallow, and IMO hes using me somehow to advance in my field.

Any thoughts or comments are welcome.

There is only one way of finding out: stop and think what you really want to do. Is your urge to become an academic / get a PhD strong enough for you to carry on? If not, don't waste your time. It's as simple as that. If you really want to get certain things in life, you will find a way. If not, you will find an excuse.