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[drspouse]

I am going to have to try and be a bit obscure here and I'm not sure how relevant this is to many forumites, but I have two graduate students (one current, one potential) who are presenting a bit of a problem.

One of them is not doing too badly, and is off collecting fieldwork in Outer Tropicland, hu's home country.  I find that hu's personal circumstances mean that hu is unlikely to be doing any personal data collection in the next few months (or doing any writing - though hu has an assistant who will be continuing).  If hu continues to be registered for the PhD at some point the allowed time will run out, hu will get in trouble, I will get in trouble, and if I have another student who does this it is possible I will not be allowed to supervise grad students again (as per the regulations in my locality). I am planning to forcefully advise hu to take an official break from hu's studies.

However actually supervising this student is somewhat of a feather in my cap, as it leads to collaborations with academics in hu's home country, and makes me attractive to other overseas students, a bit of a golden egg in our circles.

And to make matters worse, I have been asked to "advise" another student also in Outer Tropicland who does not wish to be registered at my university (as hu has got a better deal in hu's home country, Small Europeland, but where there are no specialists in my/hu's field).

So - I have a feeling I am going to be asked to continue to unofficially advise student no 1 during this break (especially as I am the one who will be insisting she take a break) - as well as the request to unofficially advise student no 2.  I have no idea what to make of this. On the one hand, being friendly to students and colleagues gets one collaborations and good students. On the other hand, it causes one to be exploited.

[cranefly]

I frequently have similar problems due to working a very unique area.
With student that you doubt is doing personal data collection: Set strict deadlines, and give them the consequences of missing those deadlines.Then enforce.
With student and unofficial supervision: Ask for offical co-supervisory status at their university (sort of like an adjunct advisor). Even if it's just on paper, your name should be on that student's thesis if you are advising them. Who asked you to advise them unofficially? This has implications, as well.

It's up to you--lately I've been saying "no" to anything I don't directly profit from (profit in the non-monetary sense). It's a matter of keeping sanity, to avoid exploitation, and of course it depends on your time and how you are willing to spend it.

[dellaroux]

Given that I know of a situation somewhat like this, in which an overseas, locale-specific grad student's father was dying and she still went out collecting materials, analyzing them, and writing up some data every day, and--although it was on a slower basis--got her work done with an extra semester's extension after he did, in fact, die, I'd be uninclined to be very lenient, either.

[offthemarket]

Most people would not expect you to do something which isn't in your interest.  That won't stop people from asking, though.

It sounds to me like this is in your interest.  As long as you define the terms of your supervision, so that it's not unfair to you, then continue.  It builds collaborations, maybe will bring money, and should bring authorship, right?  As long as the students are not high maintenance, why not?

If the cost is greater than the benefits, then politely back out.

[larryc]

The part where you don't get to direct grad students anymore if a couple fail to complete is scary. Talk to your chair or the graduate director first, then kick the first student's ass. "Either complete X and Y by next month or withdraw from the program for a year" sort of thing.

As to the other student, agree only to give "occasional advice" but emphasize "I am not your graduate advisor and cannot serve in that function." Be helpful, but throw all work requests back at the student ("What should you read? Excellent! Please put together an annotated bibliography on the topic and I will tell you which articles are most important.")

[drspouse]

Thanks all.

It's not actually a problem that the first student is not going to be collecting their own data - they have to collect so much that we don't expect all of it to be collected in person.  I have put my foot down and told them that they will be suspending their studies, and I will look at their work after the suspension, they can carry on collecting (or supervising) data but they don't need much from me to do that. If they suspend now, all is hunky dory (for me). If not, but they then need an extension, it is not...

Sadly the realities of UK academic life are indeed scary, they have a four year time limit and we have to keep a very tight rein on them or woe betide us!

I am very grateful for those tips from larryc - how to provide a bit of advice without actually doing much work!

[patio_chair]

I think this is a common problem of graduate supervision.  I work with a lot of grad students in my current position (mostly doctoral, some MA) and while I'm a fairly doting supervisor, different students proceed at different paces.  Eventually the university kicks them out if they don't finish.  My own feeling is that it depends on my relationship with the student.  I've seen the 11-year track before, and though it's not pretty, some of those people go on to use their doctorate for one or another productive thing, so if the "cost" is low to me (a meeting here or there), I don't really worry about it.  If I was in the UK system and held to the stupid standard that I can actually control how fast my students get their writing done, maybe I would feel differently.

[sciencephd]

For the second student, despite the fact that the advising would be informal at your home institution,  you should be an official committee member at their home institution, thus making it a formal arrangement, and something that you can also add to your own CV.

[ucprof]

All good points here.  I think the bottom line is what do you get out of it.  If you are getting publications out of it with free (to you) labor from these students, it sounds like a deal to me whether they are at your university or not.  If you get no publications and you are just doing work `for free' so to speak then no I would not bother so much with it.  If you get valuable connections but no papers then it is somewhere in between - which means you may not really need to do that much work "supervising" said student.  I suggest, if they are good students, then you work it out so you at least get publications from this and if not then try to minimize the impact on your time as best as possible.

I had a situation in which an overseas colleague "sent" me a graduate student - I was not sure what to make of this at first but since they did not want anything financially from me up front I said OK.  We put hu on a project and hu turned out to be a fantastic student and we have two papers now.  I ended up providing some financial support for hu in the end but it was well deserved.  In this case I did not mind being an unofficial adviser for the student. I think this sort of thing is very situation dependent.  It may also differ quite alot between physical sci, soc sci, humanities etc.

[drspouse]

For the second student, despite the fact that the advising would be informal at your home institution,  you should be an official committee member at their home institution, thus making it a formal arrangement, and something that you can also add to your own CV.

We don't have an equivalent to that in the UK; perhaps there is in Small Europeland, as I happen to know that Neighbouring Small Europeland does have a committee equivalent.  In the UK we have two examiners who are not the supervisor, and one is from another institution, typically. This is a CV point position but only quite marginal. If student no 2 does go with the Small Europeland U hu's topic will be quite distant from mine, I suspect, and I wouldn't be inclined to accept an invitation to sit on the committee, especially as this role isn't well understood in the UK so it would be hard to convince CV-readers.