I just failed my PhD progression assessment for the third time!! I was ill when I did the first two; I thought the third one was really going to be it. I'm really disappointed, I was wondering if anyone had similar experiences? My university is going to help me put together an appeal so that I can try again, it feels really hopeless. Has anyone had similar problems but been successful in the end?

What are the reasons for the failure in your third attempt? And what are the implications for failing the assessment? I think we need more details to be able to offer any advice.

Don't give up. Use everything you can to get back on track.

I failed the first two progression assessments because I was unwell - I then had a lot of time off. I returned to try my progression assessment again and really thought I'd get through this time.

The reasons for failure were that I had made insufficient progress and that I didn't know enough background information about my field and that I had insufficient data for publication in a journal. The last point is not correct because we are submitting an article to a journal.

One of the examiners, I've had for each of my 3 assessments and we don't get on, her pre-viva report was critical but the other examiner, actually said the work was acceptable in his pre-viva report. The viva let me down quite a lot though - my examiners don't work in my field and they asked a lot of fringe questions which I was unsure about. I'm going for an appeal and it seems likely I'll be able to redo the assessment but I'm really struggling to see how I can learn enough to ever get through. I'm torn between going over hundreds of journal articles or just continuing with my research as normal.