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[voxprincipalis]

Actually, we give incompletes at this stage of the game (though personally I think it should be an F that wouldn't sit well with the more senior faculty). With an F, you are automatically kicked out of the program. Incompletes turn to F's within a year and then you are kicked out.

If you give her an incomplete, she will automatically have a clock ticking down to the time she is automatically kicked out of the program. What's nice about this is that it becomes clear that it's HER ticking clock, not yours. So lay out the timeline for her: "In order to have that incomplete not turn into an F, automatically dropping you from the program, you need to have X done by Z date. In order to get X done by Z date, you will need to have done R, S, and Q by Y date." ... etc.

It makes it clear that doing that work is her responsibility, not yours, and that she needs to take matters into her own hands.

I had to have a few conversations like this with doctoral students. They weren't pleasant, but they were necessary.

VP

[seventhyear]

In this discipline, is her defense committee formed yet (in some, you set that up as soon as you are a Ph.D. candidate).  If so, maybe set up a meeting with the entire committee.  Then you've got backup-both from a perspective of having 3 or 4 people telling her that she isn't working up to par, and your tushie is covered against all sorts of things (her reprisals, tenure committee wondering why your student finish etc).

[lettuceleaf]

Tamina, You have my sympathy!!!

I too had a difficult student, who I inherited after his adviser left the institution. It took the full 7 years + one semester extension for hu to finally finish the Ph.D. Hu graduated and has a 5-year PDF contract, so it all worked out in the end.

In this case, the problem was that hu was a perfectionist and also hu was involved in waaaay too many small research projects, extraneous to hu's own research, that were distracting.

We could not have committee meetings because one of the committee members was so angry with hu for the slow turtle-like progress that it was extremely unpleasant (personal attacks). The committee member had a personal stake in getting publications from the research, so it was understandable to be angry, but the negativity didn't make the student work any faster.

What worked was to meet with the Graduate Program Director in my department. We explained what amount of work was needed for satisfactory progress; two unsatisfactory reports result in automatic dismissal from the program. It was the wake-up call that was needed, but I wish I had done it earlier, instead of letting hu drift for about 1.5 years with very little progress.

 

[ttguy]

 Students have seven years to finish or they are kicked out.

wow...thats really long. Which field you are in? I thought 3-4 years is maximum.

[zharkov]

 Students have seven years to finish or they are kicked out.

wow...thats really long. Which field you are in? I thought 3-4 years is maximum.

Most students take 4 or 5 years to complete a PhD, depending on field. Seven years is common for a time limit.  The place I got my PhD hadn't even worried about it until they realized a student had been around something like 8 or 10 years.  Then they put the time limit in and leaned on the slow poke to wrap things up.

[pink_]

In MLA fields, at least at places I've been or known people, it takes 6-7 years.  this is in part because most of us are teaching while taking course, studtying for qualifying exams and writing the dissertation, and since we usually don't get to teach our dissertation or anything remotely related to our research, it slows things down considerably.

[jonas_salk]

Social sciences often take 6-7 years as well.  Natural sciences seem to be a bit quicker, in my experience because students integrate into already-ongoing projects and then make an offshoot of that larger project into their own project instead of coming up with completely new projects that are often only tangentially related to their advisor's research, as often happens in the social sciences.

[licaone]

In my field (mathematics) four years seems to be the norm, five is  long but still acceptable, more than that is too long.

You don't seem to feel that the department is going to hold it against you if she does not finish (sounds insane, but I know of places where this would happen). I agree with LarryC, Fiona (of course!) and the others who suggest you should be blunt. Obviously she knows there is a problem, you are doing her no favor procrastinating the inevitable.

And I agree that posing the question in terms of "we" is not right. It's not your problem if she does not do what she's supposed to do. I must say that I have been living in this country for a long time, but I still have a hard time getting used to the very indirect and convoluted style of communication that is prevalent here (you know, "this is interesting" to mean "this is crap", or "we have problem" to mean "you have a problem").

I have had a few graduate students with an attitude similar the OP describes. I have always been very direct. All of them have flunked out, with one exception, a young woman who loafed for a long time, until I gave her an ultimatum. To my amazement she came through, wrote a fine dissertation and has done well since then.

So, my point is this. Probably she can't finish, but in any case you are doing her no service if you keep tolerating her attitude.

And keep repeating "this is not my problem, this is not my problem . . ."