. . . AND SO ON AND ON IT GOES

I stepped out of the barrister’s office feeling less queasy than before the meeting. I glanced over my right shoulder, beyond to the other side of the park on Symonds Street, and sighted a lone, park bench perched atop the grassy knoll. I sauntered over and sat down on the wooden slabs. I could see the apple core I had tossed, mostly eaten, lying on the leafy mulch carpet beneath the maple tree, a disheveled layer of dead leaves that had piled up as the autumn season dwindled slowly into an indecisive winter.

Unlike New England, the seasons on the North Island aren’t separated by harsh differences in temperature, in which summers can reach as high as 90 degrees Fahrenheit and winters plunge to sub-zero. Rather, the North Island seasons are gentler, each easing into the next, barely noticed until one steps into the outside air and senses the chill that suddenly seeps into one’s pores.

I checked the time on my cell phone and could see that more than an hour had passed. Although the meeting was brief, the length of time it took to clarify my questions was long enough to get the information I needed. My head felt much clearer, less confused, and there was a pleasant lightness in my step. The dark, foreboding shadow, which had begun to represent my doctorate future, gave way to slits of rays of light, bringing optimism. The barrister reassured me that the policies regarding academic conduct, which I had culled from various pages of the University of Auckland website, were accurate and not dated, as one person had said. About four weeks ago, the Graduate Centre sent me three packets of information regarding academic standards and integrity to which doctorate students and academic staff are to adhere. 

The barrister’s reassurances informed me that my interpretation of the statutes were correct. The document clearly outlining the guidelines for completing and grading the PhD thesis, Statute and Guidelines for the Degree of Doctorate of Philosophy (PhD), now contain numerous yellow highlighted lines, bringing attention to the statues, which prove that I had followed the rules. The university is obviously interested in producing qualified academics, and their guidelines on the quality of the doctorate thesis are clear testaments to the institution’s goals. However, these policies also reinforced to me that the conduct and guidance of my committee was incorrect, that is, in violation of the statutes. My meeting with the barrister simultaneously convinced me that the conduct of the School of Architecture and Planning regarding my provisional year is truly baffling.

Back at the house now, in the room I am renting, at my desk, where I placed the sheaths of pages containing e-mail communications between my supervisors and I dating back to June 2013, I now read through the contents of various e-mails. My eyes skim the communications, which refer to the contents of my research proposal, my fingers slowly leafing through the printed pages containing the most incriminating messages. I sight where I had submitted all the drafts of my doctorate thesis, where I had submitted various drafts of my research proposal, where I had explained having already included the information my committee thought should be in the research proposal, and read through the research proposal yet again in its different draft stages. From my readings, I could see that the same questions had been reconciled over and over in my proposal, albeit worded and reworded differently in order to make it easier for the reader to understand. I could also see where their comments contradicted earlier ones. For instance, in a February e-mail, my supervisor acknowledged reading the pertinent definitions requested by them for clarity, but soon after in a separate e-mail, claimed that I needed to include these same definitions in the proposal. I had never taken out these definitions since his acknowledgement and, moreover, have been included in the proposal since September or October last year (2013). This communication typifies the nature of my committee’s feedback on my research proposal over the last ten months. Keeping in mind that I wrote this proposal using the teaching sample guidelines as well as that of the School of Architecture and Planning, it is truly interesting to me, if not peculiar, that despite having followed these guidelines my committee still found shortcomings in the proposal. And yet, their feedback has not in fact improved it considerably, either. Furthermore, from having again reviewed these comments for the umpteenth time, I could see that these “issues” could have been resolved in early October 2013.      

In a most recent comment, my supervisor sent readings to me to help me write the methodology - more than a year after I had completed the draft of the methodology chapter. I had even revised this chapter in September 2013 and got it to a point where I was able to condense the chapter to the most relevant, if not informative, contents. I pointed out that the methodology I selected were most appropriate for this study (consisting of two case studies), communities that had never been researched before on the topic of resilient food systems (and, therefore, exploratory case study is most appropriate), and will use a combination of research tools to obtain my data. Verification of data is a necessary part of the analysis, but it is not necessary to enter into a lengthy discussion in the research proposal about the points that I will be verifying. And yet, despite the work that I had put into discussing the methodology and my application of readings, which justify the methodology I selected to design my study, my committee decides to now send me readings that do not really improve the methodology.

One committee member even asked me in a recent e-mail that he does not know how I am going to operationalise my study, although this information has been present in the research proposal from the very beginning. Because I had first sent the draft chapter to them on 28 June, 2013, why they are giving these readings to me now – towards the end of my provisional year – and enquiring how I will operationalise the field collection is baffling to me. After all, they had all of July, August, and September 2013 to advise me on the contents of the methodology chapter, and then again in the months, thereafter.

Over the months of my provisional year, I noticed that this committee appeared to be intent on having me use certain methods or theories, and even dictating the direction of my research (in spite of the fact that neither of my committee members have published on resilience theory or food systems), but have failed to answer my questions of “why?” when the theory I selected and methodology I designed were more appropriate for the purpose of understanding learning and adaptive capacities in the food system community. Although I had explained more than once my reason for using the learning-adaptive capacity dimension of resilience theory and why I am using the exploratory case study to do my research, they in turn failed to exposit their reasons to me for why they thought I should pursue action network theory (ANT) or why I should discuss at length triangulation (i.e. verification). They do not seem to be satisfied with the rationales I have given, but the University of Auckland statutes support the fact that doctorate students engage in their research independently. This aspect of the doctorate program, after all, is part of the training to becoming a career academic capable of independently designing and conducting research. The nature of the feedback from my committee demonstrates to me an unwillingness to move my provisional year forward, despite testaments to the contrary.

Since I began openly discussing these breaches of university statutes, I began to see the light regarding the comments made to me from other international students. Back in August 2013, one international student told me that “they” would give me problems, while another informed that they give many students problems. In January, after meeting with an academic staff not connected to my department or committee to get another perspective on the contents and organization of my research proposal, a doctorate student from Germany told me that he has been enrolled in his provisional year almost two years and still has not received permission to leave for his fieldwork. And then, last month, a person at the Botany library informed me about a man from Chile, who was invited to do his PhD at Auckland University. After completing components of his research, following his return from his fieldwork, he was suddenly told that his funding ended, which eliminated the possibility of completing his doctorate program and obtaining the qualification to teach. How convenient. Such obstacles created for doctorate students, I now understand, are the “problems” to which the other students referred.

Such occurrences make me suspicious about the university’s true intentions behind accepting international students. Because of these issues, my mind reverts back to the student from India, who had begun his doctorate studies at Massey University only to find that his research had been hijacked at the end of his program, possibly by someone at the university. That this goes on at all at respectable institutions is ironic, as some senior staff have earned degrees in international universities (as highly regarded as Princeton, Yale, and Harvard), indicating that they were probably treated with dignity. I wonder how these academics would feel if they had been treated in the same way that I and other international doctorate students have been treated here at Auckland and Massey.

Save for the brief euphoria elicited by my pleasant visit with the barrister – a reprieve from the melancholy moods that had settled into my days - I silently wondered what good would come out of the meeting. If the university cannot even enforce its own policies on its academic staff, who would be able to do so? Dare I say that my academic experience with the university, especially when weighed along with those of other international students, exhibit signs of taking advantage of international students? 

HOMELESS

You’re always alone, I notice,

said the beggar from in the alleyway.

I see you in this alley weekly,

carrying that same dumb notebook.

What’s the matter, you dumb or something?

He asked of her, searching for an explanation,

from the tepid smile that lingered,

loosely on her closed, brown lips.

Listen. . . .

I need a cigarette,

That merchant no sell me,

I crave it; it’s so cold here,

In this dumb city,

And I ain’t got no money.

Reaching into her back pocket,

For some change and crumpled dollar bills,

Willing to indulge him,

In his addiction to the smoke – she,

A ladybug that was flung into the gutters

after the rainfall. 

Gracias, gracias, senorita, he mumbled,

Humbled by her split-second generosity.

The smile that played on her lips,

Quickly disappeared, transforming into

The hazy self-pity, that grew

Like a sour pomelo, dangling precariously

on the tip of a tree bough. 

When he took the camel lights from her fingers,

Bowed, and walked briskly away,

Into the Mission District throng,

She lingered alone on the sidewalk,

Gazing quietly after his departing figure.

© Copyright Camille Tuason Mata (2008)San Francisco, California

HOWICK HISTORICAL VILLAGE

           Just after the New Year, after planning for weeks to take a walk to the Howick Historical Village, I finally did it. The village structure is situated not far from the Burswood neighbourhood, where I live. A short walk through the neighbourhood, up a hilly path, through a children’s playground and onto Golfland Drive I went. From this point, I followed the road signs through busy traffic, complete with honking cars, until a got to the dirt road closed off from cars by a chain link. This appeared to be the back entrance to the village.

            Howick Historical Village is a reincarnation of the European settlers, who lived in this defence outpost and presents life as it was from 1840 to 1880. The historical buildings and landmarks, distinguishing this settlement, have been preserved by the Howick Historical Society, and give visitors the feeling of having walked back in time. If you have ever been to the Old Sturbridge Village in western Massachusetts, then you can imagine what this one is like.

            I was not able to go in, as I was afraid still at the time to randomly pay for entry fees to museums, but I was still able to get inside the yard and onto the porch of the Bell house, which sits astride the edge of the village quarters. From my vantage point, I could see people in costume milling about, pretending to have (I presume) conversations regarding matters in their lives as they were important to them then.

            I did a bit of reading on the history of this village and the surrounding areas. The village is located in the historical city of Howick, renamed as such by Earl George Grey, a former Governor Captain, from the name given to the area of Owairoa (flat waters). When the Europeans arrived, the Maoris (the Ngaitai Tainui) had already inhabited the area since more than 1,000 years ago. When the Europeans arrived, the Maoris perceived them as a threat, but Chief Wiremu of Ngati-noho, curbed a potentially volatile relationship by using diplomacy and sharing of goods.

Earl Grey had converted Howick into a strategic buffer to protect Auckland from invaders from the south. From walking around and reading little historical tidbits here and there from signposts marking physical landmarks, I deduced that this area, Howick, Mangere, Panmure, and Pakuranga were former defencible (soldier settler) areas set up to create a military buffer around Auckland. It seems the in-migration of Europeans, despite efforts to welcome them peacefully, ultimately resulted in land wars that displaced Maori maraes from lands considered to be invaluable to cultural survival – not unlike the land displacement histories of Native Americans and other indigenous peoples.

One name, in particular, kept popping up as I visited places and read placards: Robert Massey. He owned large tracts of lands that were eventually parcelled out and bequeathed to government and possibly returned to some Maori tribes. Two homesteads, in Howick and Mangere, commemorate his contribution to New Zealand history.

The recognition of Maori presence in the Howick Historical Village barely shows up. I looked at photographs from a book on the village’s history (An Introduction to the Howick Historical Village by Alan La Roche), and apart from a raupo cottage, which looks very much like a bontoc  (of the Philippines) house on stilts, there was very little to speak of in the make-up of Howick’s first settlers in the Howick Historical Village. 

Entry path leading into the Howick Historical Village cafe

School

Cottages on the property

Lazy Saturday just after the New Year

On the property of Howick Historical Village

Bell House

Walking path cutting through a conservation area

A loft on the hillside at the edge of the conservation area

River  below the loft

Old bridge connecting the Robert Massey property to another property

At one of the Massey Homesteads in Botany (Pukeko in the background)

Robert Massey homestead in Botany

Bell House from another angle at the Howick Historical Village

CORRUPTING HIGHER EDUCATION

In the Pocket Oxford English Dictionary, corruption is defined as “dishonest or illegal behaviour”. To be corrupt means “willing to act dishonestly in return for money or personal gain”. Willingness means to act in defence of dishonest behaviour. The desire for personal gain can be fed by jealousies or animosity towards another, which is in and of itself wrong, but corrupt behaviour would be considered to be a character flaw.

A normal assumption to make, when a student is accepted into a doctoral program, is that the school is committed to training students to become career academics. Naturally, the training would involve directing the PhD thesis at each stage of the program towards meeting the standards of the university so that the student advances towards candidacy. The incentive for universities to ensure students succeed through the PhD program is to prove their training capacities, which is evidenced by students’ publications once they have achieved the status of academic.

The assumption that the academic training institutions will respect and create a positive and productive learning environment is normal if not mandated. The Auckland University student charter makes known that it has “a special responsibility to foster and preserve scholarly values; support the search for truth and curiosity-led investigation; maintain intellectual integrity; encourage critical appraisal; and to nurture these values in their students” (1.1). The Charter further acknowledges that it holds the university accountable for “providing (sic) an academic environment in which students can be stimulated to reach a high level of intellectual attainment” (2.5) These standards have not been fulfilled with respect to my case. Rather, the feedback on my written work has ranged from suggesting that I write to the level of a 12 year old in light of the complexity of resilience theory to adding extraneous information to the research proposal that is better left expounded in the literature review chapter, to failing to understand the manageability of my research. Doing field observations of the food systems to two composite cities (small ones), coupled with collecting survey and interview data, over a period of six to eight months is more than manageable, and is certainly do-able. In addition, I have been discouraged from using resilience theory in my study rather than being encouraged and supporting my research interest in resilient food systems even after I had explained the importance of this study and the need to it in Bukidnon Province, an agricultural centre of the Philippines.

The lack of encouragement has been made worse by the veiled threats of failure in my provisional year despite the progress I have made in my thesis. As I told one supervisor, I have exceeded the minimal requirements (the literature review and a full research proposal) in the provisional year. My achievements have included these two milestones as well as the background and methodology chapters, and survey and interview questions. I have also developed my itinerary for my fieldwork as well as the table of contents, complete with summaries about the content of the remaining chapters. Essentially, I have completed almost fifty percent of my PhD thesis; the remaining chapters can be written only after I complete the fieldwork. This second stage of my thesis, primary data collection, meets the originality requirement expected of all PhD theses. As so, the fieldwork becomes inevitable and cannot be avoided. My doctorate work (under "Camille Tuason Mata's Projects") speaks for itself.

In a phone call, upon learning about my situation, one European professor opined that “they (my committee, possibly the university) are taking advantage of you”. Another professor, from Canada, upon hearing my concerns regarding the conduct of key university personnel, expressed the view that they were bullying me. I concur with him. One committee member displayed a lack of confidence in my ability to do the fieldwork, who expressed in August (2013) that he will not release me for the fieldwork if I was not clear on the methodology and research objective. Since he made that statement to me, I have made both clear and have elucidated both in the research proposal, but I still have not been cleared for the fieldwork. Yet, the Student Charter makes explicit the importance of “providing (sic) an environment free from harassment and discrimination, consistent with the Human Rights Act 1993 and University’s Harassment Policy” (2.10).

As anyone interested in succeeding in the provisional year would do, especially in light of the expensive costs of studying, I approached the student advocacy office. Apart from the e-mail from one advocate informing me of the breaches in policy of one supervisor’s attitude, I have not been aided adequately. I have requested new supervisors, but the graduate centre has ignored these requests. I have also sought help from entities outside of the university, such as the different Citizens Advice Bureaus, and contacted attorney offices that can refer me to lawyers, who can advise me properly. I have spent time seeking out legal advice because the entities at Auckland responsible for ensuring that student rights are respected and “endeavour to act in the best interests of students through wide consultation” (3.1), but with little help in referring me to anyone who may know education law. I have not had a lot of success either from the Head of School, who has not acted in the interest of my academic success.

What is the incentive to create obstacles for me? Returning to the Oxford Dictionary, corrupt conduct for personal gain can also be fuelled by racist sentiments towards a group or individual perceived as not belonging, and can manifest in the misuse or abuse of power. One legal advisor at one of the Citizens Advice Bureaus even informed me that retaliation may be part of the system. Failing to hold systems accountable for corrupt behaviour can acculturate corruption into social systems, making it a normal feature of everyday operations. This appears to be the situation at Auckland, evidenced in the circuitousness and sluggishness of the pace of feedback, and the failure to give me the proper representation and advocacy I need.

AN AFTERNOON IN MANGERE

               Today, I digress from my disclosures about the problems at Massey and Auckland Uni, thoughts which have troubled and preoccupied my mind all throughout the 16 months of my doctorate life in New Zealand, to focus on more pleasant experiences. This technique, one I have perfected throughout my life, allows me to dissociate from those individuals obsessed with creating problems in my endeavours so that I can gain some perspective. It is also a technique that recharges my batteries after battling with ineffective systems, accurately characterized by sluggish, do-nothing bureaucracies that have failed to respond to breaches of academic policies.

            This week, as I have done every week since arriving in New Zealand in 2012, I consciously took a detour to be in the company of someone who calms me. I spent an afternoon in a Mangere neighborhood, where I became acquainted with my new-found friend’s guard dogs, nibbled on pastries purchased at a bakery in my neighbourhood, and sipped Turkish coffee made with a press. I learned that the right equipment is absolutely essential to brewing Turkish coffee just to get the right rich flavour out of it. In between, we chatted amiably about odds and ends, his family history, land troubles, New Zealand settler history, took a brief walk to the Massey homestead, a massive Victorian house bequeathed to the Auckland Council, and about being rooted in the North Island. He, an aspiring writer, is attempting to chronicle the burdens of protecting lands owned by his Maori half in order to reveal the betrayals bestowed on his kin by the Pakeha government. That afternoon, though, we barely talked about his book project, preferring instead to putter around in his yard, pulling out weeds from his garden patches. He pointed out edibles and ornamentals to me, and encouraged me to taste the leaves of plants for identification. His face, stern, was deep in concentration as he flicked unwanted weeds to the side.

            Mangere, as with Otara and Otahuhu, are Auckland’s Pacific Island communities. Like the neighborhood patterns of segregation in the US, these three districts are inhabited by a population of low-income families. Violence and vagrancy also partially define these neighbourhoods, but are not as obvious as in America’s inner cities. In comparison, Mangere, Otara, and Otahuhu are relatively clean and maintained, hiding the poverty of the families there.

            In between exuberant bursts of energy I devote to revising and re-writing my thesis (which is all I’m doing on it, these days), I like to search for inspirations in books and around the community made accessible to me. This day was no different. After I departed my friend’s home, I trekked the long walk to Burswood through now-familiar streets. After four days of making appointments at the public library, the smells of feijoa and Chilean guava trees have become familiar. On this day, I was eager to view the Highbrook Reservation Park, a nice respite before the landscape merges with the industrial, commercial section of this district. I stopped at the bridge, which crosses the lagoon, where locals seem to like to fish. If I’m lucky, I catch glimpses of the lagoon’s inhabitants when they fly into the air, their precise form veiled by sprays of water as they leap into the air and reenter. A barely audible splat and concentric ringlets signify their submergence into the lagoon’s depths.

            In the later afternoon, still hours before my evening run, I finish off Amanda Knox’s memoir and then slide into John Zilkiowski’s story about creating educational opportunities for youth in inner-city America and in developing countries. I find strength in the courage and tenacity of both protagonists. These digressions, with which I consciously pepper lazy hours in between those spent on my thesis, maintain my sanity and keep my chakra balanced.

            The slight chill in my bedroom reminds me that autumn is just around the corner. I interrupt my reading to brew another cup of coffee. Easy motions allow me to reminisce about another place representing serenity. Although I can’t see these views of another lagoon along the Pakuranga-Panmure from the kitchen patio door, they are attainable on foot from my neighborhood. No one can ever deny that the New Zealand landscape is quite plausibly unmatched by any other place.

An inlet separating Pakuranga from Panmure

The beginning of the path which winds along the edge of this lagoon

Lots of sailboats moored

Wooden bridge allowing pedestrians to cross the sandbars

A view of the lagoon from the bridge

More sailboats

This path has these tiny houses facing the lagoon

A shady spot along this winding path

Low tide

Nearing Tamaki Bay Road, this view shows the distance of this walking path

Another beach bather's house

LESSONS LEARNED FROM THE NEW ZEALAND EDUCATION (PART 2)

Once I was re-accepted as a transfer student at the University of Auckland, I thought I could leave all the problems I encountered at Massey where they belonged (at Massey) and resume my studies seamlessly without more interruptions. There were two reasons for this thinking. My application went forward smoothly after confirmation by the Graduate Centre that I had completed draft chapters while studying at Massey for seven months and intended to bring my research with me. As I was self-funded, there was no question over who owned the copyright of my PhD thesis chapters. After signing a legal declaration in front of a lawyer (my witness) confirming that I had indeed written and completed the chapters I claimed to have written and submitting this legal document to the Graduate Centre, I was asked to send the admissions committee another set of official transcripts (which cost another USD $90.00 or so) directly from my alma maters. Massey was among these institutions, although I had not graduated from there. Some weeks later, Auckland accepted me, again. In the process of moving my records to Auckland, I saw no signs of problems to come.

Another reason for feeling that the transition would be smooth and uncluttered is because of Auckland’s high international ranking. The university rates itself as being globally competitive in terms of educational quality and says as much in the billboard ads they put up around the city and in the marketing language on their Facebook page. My understanding of world ranked universities are shaped by schools like UC Berkeley, U of Hawaii, and the Ivy leagues, whose professors publish prolifically, present papers regularly at conferences, and receive positive ratings from students for their teaching abilities. The University of Wollongong would also belong in this ranking for the same reasons. I assumed the quality of education and the academic staff at Auckland would be of the same high quality. At the doctorate level, the knowledge of professors is extremely critical to advancing and honing the knowledge of students in research development and analytical thinking. The schools mentioned have demonstrated through the academic work and commitment of the staff and therefore the universities to advancing disciplinary knowledge and to training doctorate students. I thought Auckland professors and academic staff were similarly committed to providing quality education to doctorate students.

Only after I had fully committed to Auckland, which was signified by the transfer of my federal loan records to the financial aid representative to Auckland and the submission of a formal declaration, signed by me, of my intention to enrol on 1 July 2013, did I begin to see red flags. The first sprung up when the graduate advisor assigned to me declared “there’s no such thing as a transfer student at Auckland” (26^th June, 2013). I knew this to be untrue as I knew that transfer students were accepted at the discretion of the Board of Graduate Studies as per the University of Auckland statutes. At the Board’s discretion, I was accepted. Moreover, the Graduate Centre had sought confirmation of my academic work (in progress) completed at Massey, which they included as part of my application.

Another red flag surfaced at the first meeting with my committee with respect to a comment that sounded like a “conflict of interest”. This committee member wanted to know what had transpired at Massey, a question I found to be inappropriate considering I did not transfer to Auckland to discuss my experiences at Massey. If anything, we (the committee and I) should have discussed my goals for the upcoming year. Starting this meeting with this more pertinent discussion would have been productive, especially since I had already made considerable progress in my PhD program in the seven months I was at Massey. It occurred to me then that this committee member was the person to whom my former Massey supervisor referred when she declared to me that “she knew him” at the final meeting with her on (roughly) 15 May, 2013. At the time, I didn’t realize that this former supervisor had a wide professional network or that she may have a group of allies, who were prepared to defend her conduct regardless of how wrong they were (although another doctorate student at Massey HAD informed me before I left that this woman – my former supervisor - knew a lot of people). A more professional individual would have made it known to this former supervisor that he couldn’t have any conversations with her about me, as he is on my PhD committee and is considered by the University of Auckland statutes to be a compromising situation for me if he allowed her to influence him in any way. Objective assessment is honoured by Auckland as disclosed in, again, the statutes governing academic conduct with respect to students.

My concern about conflict of interest forced me to turn, as I had done at Massey, to the Head of School of the School of Architecture and Planning in October 2013. I explained that I wanted my final years to go smoothly, as my only reason for applying to New Zealand universities was to complete the requirements for the PhD to the standard expected by the university. Unfortunately, instead of receiving support and agreement from this Head of Schhol that my goals and focus were consistent with the expectations of Auckland University, she instead accused me of not having completed any of the requirements of my provisional year (e.g. DELNA English test, academic integrity modules, the research proposal). Clearly, these accusations were untrue – I had completed all within three months (by October 1, 2013) of enrolling (on 1 July, 2013) at Auckland. Moreover, she claimed that I didn’t have all the qualifications I claimed to have. She then presented me with a form that demonstrated an incomplete list of university of qualifications. Only one of four university qualifications was listed on the form. Her comments led me to suspect that this person was more than acquainted with my former supervisor at Massey, and had chosen to align herself with her professional connection rather than enforcing the university policies assuring objectivity.

I began to feel as if I was being shoved into a power game, with my PhD committee and the Head of School at the helm. This power play was also beginning to characterize my relationship with the academic and administrative staff. This former supervisor seemed to have the power to influence not just my committee member and the Head of School, but other academic staff at Auckland, evidenced by the false claims about my qualifications, the delays in the progress of my research proposal, but also in the failure to correctly interpret and enforce university policies. For instance, I had been informed that I had to be at Auckland unequivocally for another three years, forcing me to reaffirm the policies regarding the provisional year of the PhD program. In November 2013, I was able to confirm with a managerial employee at the international students office, it IS possible to not only apply my graduate work started at Massey towards my current, provisional year at Auckland, but it is also possible to leave for my fieldwork in the provisional year, make changes to the provisional year in light of my transfer status, and apply to submit my PhD thesis in two years time, all of which would allow me to still complete my PhD in three years. This is preferred by me, as any doctorate student borrowing money to complete their program would understand. Obvious to anyone, another year would force me to borrow money unnecessarily for another year, increasing my debt to another USD $20,500, a personal hardship.

When the feedback on my research proposal began to also stymie my PhD progress, I felt that familiar sinking feeling in my stomach and the need to vomit. The nature of the feedback to contents of my research proposal was simply peculiar. The comments pertained to explanations in the methodology, the literature review, and the background chapters, which I had been accused of not including, but upon reading were obviously scribed in the relevant sections of the research proposal. Then, even after reviewing the proposal contents, and informing my PhD committee member of the presence of these missing elements, he would return it to me with the same requests. This unproductive communication back and forth went on for five months, and had caused considerable delay in my provisional year. Keep in mind that Auckland only requires that provisional year students submit a formal research proposal and a completed literature review chapter draft. In my case, I had done more, having completed both of these documents as well as the methodology and the background chapters. These finished draft chapters exceed the expectations from doctorate students, so the delay is perplexing.

There were other consequences to me, but not to the academic staff. Delays forced me to miss the deadline for the AAUW scholarship awarded to American doctorate students matriculated at international universities in the final writing year of the PhD. If I had been able to apply, receiving the scholarship would have offset the cost of financing the final year. With my publications and my expedient progress, I felt I had a good chance. Delays have also pushed my departure back by more than two months  and could result in additional financial burdens. 

The demonstrated lack of understanding of the policies at the University of Auckland by academic and administrative staff, coupled with what I have begun to perceive as a power game being played by these same people at my expense, forces questions about the job descriptions of university staff and the mission statement of the university. What is the purpose of Auckland with respect to accepting and agreeing to train research students? What is a reasonable expectation from doctorate students regarding the integrity of the conduct of academic and professional staff at the university with respect to students’ academic progress? If students are expected to test and obtain a score of 100% on the required academic integrity modules, shouldn’t academic and professional staff do the same? Shouldn’t this outcome, then, be demonstrated in their performance on the job in the way that doctorate students are expected to perform at an acceptable level in their doctorate program? Shouldn’t there also be reasonable protection for doctorate students from being targeted by professors, who are violating integrity standards?

So far, I have yet to see a person in authority create a buffer around me (a tuition-paying student) to protect me against the personal attacks from this former Massey supervisor and those whom I have perceived to be her allies. (In a future blog, I’ll describe just how criminal her conduct had become). How can a mere lecturer (senior or otherwise) have such absolute power in an educational system, where the people are expected to ensure that student progress is made? Aren’t universities solely in the business of education and research? Shouldn’t politics be left to the politicians?

Unfortunately, I have not seen Auckland conduct itself as a world-ranked university, contrary to the way it markets its image. Is it a learning institution or one established to simply employ people?

LESSONS LEARNED FROM THE NEW ZEALAND EDUCATION EXPERIENCE (PART I)

          The decision to embark on a PhD program requires some thought, in which the pros and cons of taking on yet another higher education qualification are weighed. Foremost among these considerations is the cost of doing so. Certainly, the competition for these funds is high because there are more qualified students than there are funds available. Moreover, many of the scholarships are restricted to studying particular subjects, a fact that merely increases the competition for any one scholarship. As in my case, my publications were not considered by the universities and the New Zealand International Doctoral Research Scholarship to be strong enough reasons to warrant being given a scholarship. Therefore, I relied again on the US Federal Loans to finance my first year, after which I had anticipated continuing to look for other scholarships.

            Regardless of how one finances the PhD education, it is an investment in terms of time and effort, which can be draining - if not discouraging - if the supervisors involved in the student’s progress do not have the requisite qualifications or, more importantly, the educational philosophy to do the job well. This deficiency in qualification at Massey, I discovered rather quickly created obstacles to my progress; I am also discovering that competencies at the Auckland may be also a factor in my timely progress.

            It did not take long after arriving at Massey in late September for me to realize that I might have walked into a system that might not be aligned with the standards assumed and expected of academic institutions. Besides the false scholarship notification issued to me by the International Program Office (IPO), a point I raised in an earlier blog, I soon began to suspect that my primary supervisor did not have the thinking skills, nor the doctorate qualification, to be able to supervise a doctorate student. This suspicion was magnified when her guidance on the content of the literature review chapter was erroneous. There were other comments from her, which I interpreted as having been of a sexual nature, such as showing me provocative photos of an older woman and declaring they were of the Head of School of People, Environment, and Planning after going to the photo image printed on the bottom of one of my publications, and asking me how old I was in that photo. What was she implying exactly?  Perhaps I was misreading the situation, but that conversation on my fifth day in New Zealand (in 2012) made me uncomfortable. I, thus, interpreted these allusions to be inappropriate.

Moreover, all within my first week of studying in New Zealand, in meetings with her, she repeatedly brought up the desire to co-author, alluding also to my then to-be-published book as the target of her desired co-authorship. I refused her offer. However, this decision seemed to have triggered her subsequent abusive behaviour, which ranged from slapping me on the head, following me around campus and Palmerston North and periodically hitting me, going into my desk drawers and taking important medical documents, bills, and letters I needed to send to my creditors, tampering with my completed draft chapters to delay the pace of my academic progress, letting herself into our (doctorate students’) office and logging into her account on the computer assigned to me, and eventually entering my living quarters. I presumed the people holding the master keys were influenced or possible pressured into letting her in or giving her the key combination to enter my personal life, as I have sometimes heard her use her university lecturer position as leverage. 

         I became enlightened about the alliance between this senior lecturer and other influential staff at Massey in the late summer of 2013. An unprovoked encounter with her, in which she approached and whacked me on the side of my head while depressing coffee grinds in a coffee press in the third flour lounge of the Geography building evoked snickering from the vicinity of the couches. As I had never been treated so violently by a supervisor or academic staff at previous universities where I had completed degrees, this senior lecturer’s behaviour, in combination with her unhelpful instructions on the contents of the literature review, led me to start investigating her credentials.

Although she was listed as having earned a PhD thesis on the Massey library website, my requests for the hard copy of her dissertation failed to produce hard proof of this document. I also typed in the titles of her articles on Google.com and found the authentic publications, which did not have her name printed alongside the authentic author. In other words, she did not in fact co-author the articles. I verified this fact by going to the online journal, typed in the volume and issue numbers, only to learn that she was indeed not the author of these articles.

As I slowly worked my way through my PhD thesis, organizing readings, taking notes, I realized my situation would not improve if I did not get administrative and legal help. I approached the Head of School twice to ask for a different supervisor. I also clandestinely stepped into a law office of barristers and solicitors to ask for advice about obtaining a restraining order against this woman. Neither attempts resulted in an outcome favourable to me; rather, in both cases, they seemed to favour this senior lecturer. The Head of School wavered on pairing me up with a different supervisor, informing me that she would have to speak with this senior lecturer (as if this would resolve the abusive situation I had unsuspectingly walked into), and the barrister informed me that because my accusations were of a criminal nature, I would need to get legal representation, which could be very expensive. On my doctoral student loan budget for living expenses, I could not afford to pay for a decent, knowledgeable, and skilled lawyer. Otherwise, I would have been willing to get witnesses to come forward.

Such financial constraints, and the apparent alliance with this senior lecturer demonstrated by the top administrative staff, forced me to apply to transfer to another school. Because the University of Auckland had accepted me for the same year (late in 2012) as Massey had, I re-lodged my application with them. My acceptance there, I quickly learned soon thereafter, seemed to have incensed her because her violent behaviour escalated, culminating in her pulling out a lock of my hair with silver pliers. In another incident, again in the third floor lounge, she descended on me with a knife obtained from the utensils drawer and jabbed me in the back with the sharp point. It was clear this woman is unpredictable and possibly dangerous. (As I will explain in a subsequent blog, within a few days after transferring to Auckland Uni, it dawned on me that this senior lecturer too had professional relationships with the people in the School of Architecture and Planning, and had possibly contacted them ahead of time to plot to perhaps derail my academic progress.)

As a result of these happenstances, debilitating enough to seek out the assistance of a therapist, several questions have come to mind. Why would the School of Graduate Studies at Massey approve the pairing of this woman with me, a student who clearly demonstrates an earnest desire to publish, push the boundaries of her discipline, and carry out independent research? Why would Massey keep a woman like this employed for twenty two years? Are there not more qualified and more ethical individuals more committed to teaching, research, and possessed a stronger academic philosophy than this woman, who could replace her? I believe Massey University has long understood her state of mind. I also do not think my experience with her was isolated, as both she and another senior lecturer hinted at the possible abuse of another student in the PEP (presumably at the hands of this senior lecturer). A final question is was all this abuse simply an effort to get me to drop my PhD program after working through my research design and objective in order to help “get” either her or one of her colleagues a PhD thesis?   

What is the minimum doctorate students can expect from supervisors? What about from educational institutions? Academic staffs at other universities are required to include their degree, the institution from where the degree was earned, and the year earned on the staff page of the departments. Most of the time, they will include a link to their CV, which includes the two or three people who had supervised them on their PhD thesis. Universities should be obliged to post all this information in the interest of applicants, but at Massey and Auckland this is not common, an indication that the lecturers may not have the adequate qualification. I fail to understand why any university would retain the employment of individuals, who are only interested in punching the clock and making an appearance to work for posterity. Trust me when I say that getting through the PhD program entails lecturers with critical thinking and knowledge management skills, but not those who have no interest in teaching or supervising.

The university should also ensure that academic staffs exercise fairness in assessments and in other dealings with the students to ensure timely progress. On the occasion that these requirements are undermined, appropriate accountability measures should be in place with the intention of supporting the student’s continuation, rather than demoralizing the student. A PhD thesis is stressful enough without worrying about unfair treatment.

The lesson learned from this experience is to thoroughly investigate the lecturers in your intended department, and research testimonies of previous and current students’ experiences with the university. Do not take anything for granted. Although not all students are treated in such a heinous manner, the fact that one has been is a good enough reason to do your research. The next student could be you, after all.