3. Other Discipline and Programme Specific Requirements

Your PGR support team will provide guidance on the requirements for your programme. 

The assessment is 6 months after initial registration for full time students and 12 months for part time students. MyPGR will send you two automated reminders, but it is your responsibility to meet the deadline.

You will need to submit a progress report (maximum 1,000 words) which reviews your progress towards achieving the targets which you identified in your Supervision (learning) agreement. This report will be evaluated by your primary supervisor and the department’s Director of Postgraduate Research (or deputy).

You will also need to prepare a short talk and a list of bullet points summarising progress against the targets set out in your Supervision (learning) agreement. You will be asked to attend a meeting to assess your progress. A decision on your progress will be made and communicated to you verbally and in writing

Students who have missed the deadline to submit their progress report and failed to request an extension to this deadline by contacting the appropriate PGR Support Office will receive an initial warning, under the TQA Manual ‘Unsatisfactory Progress Procedures’

If sufficient progress has not been made you will receive an initial warning, under the TQA Manual ‘Unsatisfactory Progress Procedures’ and new target dates would then be set. If progress remains unsatisfactory, you would receive a Final Warning, which could lead to withdrawal from the programme.

i. PhD Biological Sciences

An 18-month mid-PhD review.

• Students should give a 15-minute presentation to their panel outlining progress to that point, followed by 45 minutes of discussion with the panel.
• In the presentation, students should explain what data has been collected, what analyses have been conducted, what results have been found, and what has been written up.
• Changes to the original aims and chapter structure set out in the upgrade report should be noted and explained.
• The panel will provide feedback to the student on their progress, and in exceptional cases may recommend Health Wellbeing and Support for Study Procedures or initiate Unsatisfactory Progress.

ii. PhD Complex Living Systems

There will be a yearly review with the solely purpose of supporting the students' progress. 

iii. PhD Psychology

PGRs will be required to present to their research group at 18 months from the programme start (pro-rata PT) on progress since the upgrade, with the external member of the upgrade committee present, and feedback provided informally.

iv. PhD Sport & Health Sciences

The following review guidelines will apply for all new students registering from Sep 2019. The timelines will be adjusted pro rata for part-time students.

Presentation at the annual PGR Conference.

• The timing will be 15 months (year 2) in cases where funding covers 3-years of FT registration, and 27 months (year 3) for those students whose funding covers a 4-year studentship.
• The presentation will be attended by the department’s Director of Postgraduate Research (or deputy) and the same examiner who assessed the upgrade viva as a checkpoint of progress of experimental work towards completion.