Thank Crunchie it's Friday...
post graduate study hoohah.
On Monday I thought I knew what I was doing. I took the course application form to lecturer H to check over, who said it was fine, and commiserated with me that it wasn't eligible for funding. Dissertation adviser A then tried to find a way to make it eligible for funding, which involved me sitting in her office for an hour while she ran around the department trying to find someone who would tell her that it is eligible. Unsuccessfully.
On Tuesday I had an email from A, who said that the alternative course (Course B) we had considered and then dismissed because it wasn't happening is in fact happening, and is eligible for funding, according to lecturer C. I spent about three hours downloading and printing the ream of paper that is funding application forms and guidance notes. Then had a meeting with A at which we dismissed Course B as being not quite researchy enough for my preliminary-to-a-PhD needs.
On Wednesday I had an exchange of confused emails with C, who is the postgraduate research degrees guru, in which she said that Course B is not as unsuitable as I think and I should reconsider it, and I said but it is because these modules aren't in it, look, and they're quite important, and she said you just have to read it carefully and I refrained from saying Hello? Qualified proofreader here, if there's one thing I am able to do, it is read carefully and those modules aren't there.
But then I started to complete the funding application for Course B anyway, just in case. And funding applications make tax returns look like... something very simple. Because they seem simple, but they have stupid guidelines like "word process this and then sign it and then pass it to your referees to word process and sign it and it must be a real signature and not a reproduction" and Oh. My. God I pity people who are going from one institution to another because that must be eight different types of nightmare, with the word processing and the signing...
On Thursday I went to see one of the module co-ordinators to try to sort out the confusion with C and the missing modules, and found C talking to her about it. So I finally discovered the problem - we'd been looking at next year's study scheme instead of this year's study scheme, and next year's is wrong but this year's is right, except that it's going to be altered so that it's made more suitable as a preparation-for-a-PhD masters. So at least my extreme confusion has led to a useful conclusion all round. So the problems A and I had with the content of the course are now sorted. Hurrah.
Then I went to see H again, who is the Funding Guru (or one of them anyway) and he looked through the form and read my personal statement which I had sweated blood over, I kid you not, and suggested some changes (for which read deletions), at which points I had to point out that the sections in question were things that the guidelines asked for and he made "Oh - shows how long it's been since I read the guidelines!" noises and I refrained from saying But it's the thing you do and you're supposed to be the The Go-To Guy for the funding stuff and What Do You Mean you haven't read the guidelines lately you should know them off by heart you ... WASSOCK and instead changed the subject because, hey, if this all works out I'm going to be sharing a common room with these people for the next four years and it's best not to be making them Do Their Damn Jobs Properly when I can more or less manage by myself. Oh, and also I thought I'd better take into account the fact that he's on the panel that decides whether or not my funding application goes to the Research Council...
(Meanwhile, on Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday I'd been to see my personal tutor, M, who is one of my referees for getting onto the course, and each time she said "I'll have it done tomorrow - promise" and of course it never was ready tomorrow, and she's very nice and a useful person to talk to when I'm stressed and her heart is huge and in the right place and everything, but Jesus Christ on a bicycle she is totally hopeless at deadlines unless you nag her constantly.)
Sooooo.... on Friday (today) I went to see M and IT STILL WASN'T DONE but today was the deadline for the funding application so I sat with her and watched her do it and we discussed the wording etc and it was therefore pretty much the reference I'd have written for myself (except I'd have done it ten days ago when I was asked).
And so my application for Course B and my application for funding (Please God Let Me Get The Funding) are in and are no longer my responsibility and it feels like a weight has been lifted from my shoulders, except that now I have to do the assignment which is due on Monday which I'd forgotten all about, what with the to-ing and fro-ing for the Masters, but which luckily is only a 500 word proposal so I should be able to bang it out in a couple of hours.
::exhales sharply::
I'm sure you didn't want to know all that, but ... tuff.
On Monday I thought I knew what I was doing. I took the course application form to lecturer H to check over, who said it was fine, and commiserated with me that it wasn't eligible for funding. Dissertation adviser A then tried to find a way to make it eligible for funding, which involved me sitting in her office for an hour while she ran around the department trying to find someone who would tell her that it is eligible. Unsuccessfully.
On Tuesday I had an email from A, who said that the alternative course (Course B) we had considered and then dismissed because it wasn't happening is in fact happening, and is eligible for funding, according to lecturer C. I spent about three hours downloading and printing the ream of paper that is funding application forms and guidance notes. Then had a meeting with A at which we dismissed Course B as being not quite researchy enough for my preliminary-to-a-PhD needs.
On Wednesday I had an exchange of confused emails with C, who is the postgraduate research degrees guru, in which she said that Course B is not as unsuitable as I think and I should reconsider it, and I said but it is because these modules aren't in it, look, and they're quite important, and she said you just have to read it carefully and I refrained from saying Hello? Qualified proofreader here, if there's one thing I am able to do, it is read carefully and those modules aren't there.
But then I started to complete the funding application for Course B anyway, just in case. And funding applications make tax returns look like... something very simple. Because they seem simple, but they have stupid guidelines like "word process this and then sign it and then pass it to your referees to word process and sign it and it must be a real signature and not a reproduction" and Oh. My. God I pity people who are going from one institution to another because that must be eight different types of nightmare, with the word processing and the signing...
On Thursday I went to see one of the module co-ordinators to try to sort out the confusion with C and the missing modules, and found C talking to her about it. So I finally discovered the problem - we'd been looking at next year's study scheme instead of this year's study scheme, and next year's is wrong but this year's is right, except that it's going to be altered so that it's made more suitable as a preparation-for-a-PhD masters. So at least my extreme confusion has led to a useful conclusion all round. So the problems A and I had with the content of the course are now sorted. Hurrah.
Then I went to see H again, who is the Funding Guru (or one of them anyway) and he looked through the form and read my personal statement which I had sweated blood over, I kid you not, and suggested some changes (for which read deletions), at which points I had to point out that the sections in question were things that the guidelines asked for and he made "Oh - shows how long it's been since I read the guidelines!" noises and I refrained from saying But it's the thing you do and you're supposed to be the The Go-To Guy for the funding stuff and What Do You Mean you haven't read the guidelines lately you should know them off by heart you ... WASSOCK and instead changed the subject because, hey, if this all works out I'm going to be sharing a common room with these people for the next four years and it's best not to be making them Do Their Damn Jobs Properly when I can more or less manage by myself. Oh, and also I thought I'd better take into account the fact that he's on the panel that decides whether or not my funding application goes to the Research Council...
(Meanwhile, on Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday I'd been to see my personal tutor, M, who is one of my referees for getting onto the course, and each time she said "I'll have it done tomorrow - promise" and of course it never was ready tomorrow, and she's very nice and a useful person to talk to when I'm stressed and her heart is huge and in the right place and everything, but Jesus Christ on a bicycle she is totally hopeless at deadlines unless you nag her constantly.)
Sooooo.... on Friday (today) I went to see M and IT STILL WASN'T DONE but today was the deadline for the funding application so I sat with her and watched her do it and we discussed the wording etc and it was therefore pretty much the reference I'd have written for myself (except I'd have done it ten days ago when I was asked).
And so my application for Course B and my application for funding (Please God Let Me Get The Funding) are in and are no longer my responsibility and it feels like a weight has been lifted from my shoulders, except that now I have to do the assignment which is due on Monday which I'd forgotten all about, what with the to-ing and fro-ing for the Masters, but which luckily is only a 500 word proposal so I should be able to bang it out in a couple of hours.
::exhales sharply::
I'm sure you didn't want to know all that, but ... tuff.