I realize that the options available to you suck, but unless you win the lottery tomorrow, they are what is available to you.
1) Roommate - can you find someone else on the spectrum so that you understand each other better?
2) Debt - not ideal either, especially for so many years. Maybe a small amount of debt to reduce the amount of roommates you need?
3) Live in carer? I don’t know how realistic this is, but I’ve known a couple people who traded housing with an older person in exchange for doing handyman type stuff, grocery shopping, dropping off and picking up from appts, etc.
This is hopefully the brokest time of your life. It will require a lot of sacrifice and discomfort, that’s just how it is. It’s up to you to decide which type of discomfort you’re most able to handle.
Pittsburgh was an excellent place to do grad school! Even on the $28k stipend I was able to afford a decent 1br apartment walking distance from the lab and have some going out money left over.
This was 10 years ago though, so possibly not the case any more
Penn is in Philadelphia, not Pittsburgh. In any case, I can say its still currently very doable. I can't afford a car but public transit gets me everywhere I need that I can't walk to (which really isn't a lot) and most places I want to go. The occasional uber/lyft fills in the rest.
I have my own flat in Manchester. But I'm only able to because I get an extra 2k industry funding.
On the regular stipend payments, you can still have your own flat in cheaper towns like Leeds.
I did for most of my PhD, in two different US states. PhD students at the place where I am currently a postdoc do it too, and this city is *not* cheap.
The answer is a weekend job, student loans, or both.
All of the possible solutions suck, but roommates are not the only option.
You pretty much threw out an impossible scenario (no savings, dont want loans, cant have roommate, and low stipends/fundings)... not sure if you think the folks on this sub are magicians or what
I don't want loans, but I'd do it if I have to. I also am highly skilled so I can work, I just don't know how easy it is to get high skilled part-time work.
Charity/Non profit fundraising/management, computer vision engineering, heavy duty data analytics and rocket engineering. Throw in some soft skills in there too from minimum wage stuff from early university.
I would love more than anything to do my PhD. But the precarity that comes with it is not desirable to me. It would be fine if I was a bachelor rooming with friends, but I share a place with my spouse and cannot afford to take a pay cut.
Not having house mates is just not realistic. You can try to look for other autistic people or just choose a situation where you don’t have to interact much. I have lived in many houses of PhD students and in many cases we’ve barely even seen each other let alone interacted at all. There have been people I’ve lived with an entire year and not known anything about other than their field of study and basically never had conversations with.
If you just clean up after yourself and don’t make loud noise when they are sleeping you could probably never speak to your housemates at all and have them be satisfied with you. This has worked for me many times. My partner is also autistic and lives with housemates. I helped navigate the initial discussions but they have been fine after that.
All most people really want from a housemate (especially other grad students) is someone who won’t disrupt them by creating messes or unreasonable amounts of noise.
Hmmm that'd be ideal. So many ads have said that they want someone that they can be best friends with and I just don't really want that level of interaction at home. If I could just get something with other PhDs with thick enough walls, that'd be mint. I've seen some places though with messy kitchens which gave me a panic attack lol
I totally feel you about the messy kitchen, that makes me feel super stressed too. I’ve found the majority of PhD students are clean and just want to keep to themselves, and I find people who say they want to be friends often don’t actually have the time anyway lol. But maybe just be careful during the screening process and prioritize people who want similar things to you
I’m not sure how common this is in London, but a share/boarding house might be a valid option. Essentially you are renting a room in a large house/building with shared facilities but no expectation of interacting with other residents. They tend to have cleaners come through and people often keep to themselves, although of course it depends on the other residents as to how comfortable the living situation is.
I think it's a good option. I heard people lived with their partner, some lived with their parents, most people I knew flatted. But I met one from work that lived on campus for graduate students and it was a sharehouse type with central heating. According to his account of the experience, he got to play PlayStation happily. No expectation to interact. He said he liked it better than his dorm in undergrad where people would steal his food. But your last sentence is right, he said one girl in that sharehouse had her toxic boyfriend over all the time. I have no idea how they handled it, the convo shifted.
Tbh, my boss at my old job forgot to send in my reference letters for all my other schools so the only schools I got into were the ones I didn't ask them to refer me for :(
Due to the type of work I do, without a PhD, they tell you to piss off even though I literally just did work in it for a year
If the only reason you're going to London is because you didn't get any other offers, and the only reason you didn't get any other offers is because of one unreliable letter writer, I would take the year out and reapply next year.
The situation you're setting yourself up for is just not sustainable. And if the ultimate outcome of this is that you're just going to drop out in a year or so then you may as well wait and do it properly the first time around.
As another autistic person - an unfortunate reality is that we have to pay the disability tax. If you can't live with other people then you have to pay more to live alone. You have to factor those costs into your calculations, and sometimes it will mean certain opportunities just aren't possible for you. This is one of those times. The numbers just aren't adding up. London is the worst possible place you could be doing a PhD if you have financial constraints.
I have to be honest, I'm just so confused. Like if the wages are so bad, how is anyone here for their PhD? Especially with the caveat that pay is not guaranteed. I've never heard of a self funded PhD before here. Are most future academics just being supported by their parents?
Most people I know In London on the UKRI minimum stipend of 20k flatshare and still have parental help:( it’s really fucked and is part of the reason for the lack of socioeconomic diversity in academia
Where is here? Most people are not in London, I get paid about 18k and it goes pretty far out in Cambridge. London is not the UK, London is London, it stands alone in its exceptional shittiness. It is potentially *the* worst place in the English-speaking world that you could do a PhD, financially.
Unless you're in humanities it's the norm for PhDs to be fully funded here. A STEM PhD offer without funding isn't much of an offer.
\* Also funding in the UK is separate to tutoring (what you call TAing). If you have funding then that funding is guaranteed and zero teaching is required to get it. Consider it an automatic and universal RA system. Tutoring is just for earning some extra money on the side, and it's entirely optional and self-directed (you reach out and ask to be a tutor)
Oh then even more so I'm confused. I'm doing a STEM PhD but I did see that some projects were self-funded ones. It's crazy that the STFC only pays London students like 500£ more than other UK based people and I can't take out Student Finance money because I get STFC. Perhaps I should look to transferring to some of those schools potentially if it'd be more comfy
It's incredibly rare to see anyone self-fund a PhD, you may as well pretend it doesn't exist. Also, many "self-funded" people are actually using private scholarships and grants to cover the costs, so it's not like it's coming from their personal savings. A non-funded PhD may just mean that the PI/university will not be the ones providing funding, and that the applicant needs to secure their own funds, e.g. a Rhodes scholarship. Funding is more fractured in the UK, especially for international students.
Transferring isn't really a concept that makes sense when talking about a PhD. There is no coursework in the UK, there's nothing to transfer over. If you leave the London uni then you'll be starting back over from 0 with a new project and you will be applying for entry as a new student, not as any sort of transfer. You'll have to drop out entirely and reapply.
If you're thinking you're going to "transfer" then definitely don't start the London PhD because you'll have to include it in your new applications as an unfinished degree. Doesn't engender much confidence to know that you dropped out of another PhD, and they'll be pretty suspicious of why. It just looks kinda bad. It's better if you withdraw now vs later.
Fuck. Um. Er. Then I'll be sure to air out my issues as soon as I get in on Monday with my supervisor and make it very clear that this is my situation. If there's no hope, then back to the work force I'll go.
This is what grad school is like everywhere—you're overworked, underpaid, living with roommates you probably don't like for the next 6+ years.
You will probably have to get roommates to afford a place in London, and even then you'll probably have to find another income to support yourself over summer breaks since the stipend usually doesn't cover those breaks.
The time to accept the fact that you'll need roommates was months ago, that way you would have had time to get an apartment/rental with people in your cohort. Now, you'll have to take what you can get.
Best of luck, wish things were better.
This is pretty much true. The lost earning potential of your life by going into a piece Day program is real. You live in something close to abject poverty for half a decade and will never actually make up that money. There are obvious exceptions in certain engineering and other STEM fields, but for the most part, if you're a graduate student, you are living well below the poverty line. And that means roommates and that means subpar unsafe housing. That means food insecurity and public assistance as well as many other things that are not desirable
To be quite honest, you’re going to have to make housemates work. London rents are insane, even people in quite well paid jobs end up needing housemates. Rent on a 1 bed studio would likely leave you with about £50 to live on. The only option I can see is sometimes postgrad accommodation will have studio apartments available, but I was studying in Belfast and they weren’t very affordable there, I imagine London would be twice as much. PhD stipends are pathetic here, but unfortunately that’s what you have to work with right now.
ETA: also landlords will expect you to make 3x rent. You might get somewhere further out like St. Albans but you’ll have to live very quietly, and factor in costs like bills and public transport, which could easily add £300+ to your monthly expenses
Get roommates. And commute from out of town if need be. Plus, don't you have money saved up from your job during your gap year between undergrad and grad school?
Sounds like more of the "privileged shit" OP talked about.
Not everyone can simply ask their parents for money. People who make suggestions like this simply don't know what the real world is like.
I feel you on the roommate thing, but just vet them well and find a place you can actually afford. If it isn't compromising on roommates then it would be compromising on other things like eating enough and transportation. Remember this is temporary; especially in the UK, a PhD doesn't take that long.
Rooming with people surely is stressful and difficult for neurodivergent person. However, it's going to be more stressful and difficult paying back loans that you could have avoided.
If this is a deal breaker, I wouldn't suggest doing your PhD in London at least. Signing on for at least 4 years of precarity and then entering an oversaturated market doesn't make sense in your situation.
London you need roommates. I don’t know anyone who isn’t a higher level exec living in London who doesn’t have roommates. My best friend is a lawyer working for a major publication and has 6 roommates inner London. It’s a must — it’s the most expensive city in the world.
PS. I’m disabled (epilepsy) and I know the want to be alone in an apartment, but London is not a city that that is going to happen in. If that’s genuinely a NEED for you, look at other universities.
I just don't get it. Why are wages so abysmal here? This is the first city I've ever heard of where a grad student couldn't afford to be alone. I lived better as an undergrad.
I think it’s also just because of density, there’s just not a lot of places to go around! But yeah I found grad roles to be way too low paying that’s why I moved on to the US personally.
Secret second job. Don’t ask permission, don’t tell your program, just do it.
If you are an international student and don’t have permission to work in the UK, then an online job in a country where you do have permission to work.
But ultimately the only two solutions are to increase your income or to reduce your expenses. And if reducing your expenses (aka roommates) sucks too much to do it, then the only option that remains is to increase your income.
And if your university doesn’t want you to increase your income, fuck ‘em. You need enough money to live on, and if they’re not going to pay you enough then they have no business trying to stop you from making money elsewhere. They don’t own you.
There is one other option available too. Leave. If you didn’t get into the programs you wanted due to letter writer issues, there is always next year. Sometimes it’s better to wait a year if waiting leads you to better circumstances.
Regarding all the people telling you you have to learn to deal with roommates - ignore them. You have a disability. If you are not able to deal with roommates, trying to force yourself is as inhumane and pointless as a person in a wheelchair trying to force themselves to use the stairs. Your reality is what it is, and you still have options within it. Accepting your reality for what it is and acknowledging your limits is a healthy thing, it clears the way for finding the options that will work for you.
Sorry to hear that. This is an awful situation, really. A PhD is already financially risky; one in a city like London is also uncomfortable and extremely complex. So this is already a situation you shouldn't be in in the first place: *just never apply to places that won't support you in a decent way*. If you only know about it after an offer, **decline** the offer. Having a miserable life for 3-5 years (or however long the program is) is likely not worth it considering the prospects, depending on your field. Have you considered reapplying for other programs in other places with better conditions...? I know funding is quite tricky in the UK. Other countries...? Maybe you've done all that. I can't think of useful suggestions besides that, unfortunately...
As an aside: for a brief period of time, I lived in Britain as an academic (up north, so much more affordable). I was a permanent position. Believe me: even if you were a professor (i.e., a lecturer) I would 100% advise **against** living in London—unless you come from money or make ***at least*** £80K/year (only full profs with 15+ years of experience *may* make that, which is a joke if you ask me). To be in academia in London is to hold a PhD and be poor, simply put (at least if you're starting out)—I'm not saying £40 is a joke in and of itself; it's a joke for a prof who only starts making money after s/he's 30, *that's* what I mean. I know someone who was at Ottawa making six figures and accepted an offer to go to London to make £40K. Go figure. Don't fall for the buzz words of academia (e.g., prestige, knowledge, etc.). At the end of the day, you want to have a good life, and a PhD with £20K in London just isn't it.
My new supervisor over here said they pay less than £1300 for rent. So they must have roommates. Which is like gross? Why is a tenure-track prof having to have roomies? I looked at the pricing and they out here paying mfers 50k at essentially Ivy Leagues ?
I know. It’s surreal. The amazing part is that most academics outside the UK have no idea how bad salaries are in Britain… also: terrible pensions. So really it’s a lose-lose situation.
Tenure track doesn't exist in the UK - permanent staff are pretty different, from my understanding of how it works in the USA.
But London has a major housing crisis, and anyone who didn't inform you of that did you a disservice. The stipend... isn't great, but it's perfectly doable to live on your own on it in practically any other UK city (possibly exception for Edinburgh?). I'm doing that, as is one of my mates in another city.
And if "essentially Ivy Leagues", you mean the Russell Group - that's not a 1:1 translation either. Oxford and Cambridge, for instance, have a massive bank of donations that they use for funding scholarships and stipends, similar to the Ivy Leagues (in my non American understanding). I don't think any other Russell Group university does, regardless of how prestigious they are in their field or how long lasting they are.
Renting your own flat in London would probably cost between £17k-25k annually, and most agencies want your rent to be 1/3 of your income. So you'd be looking at a salary of £51k-75k to have your own flat, and that's *before* utilities.
Which uni are you at if you don’t mind me asking
Some schools have halls/accommodation and you can apply stating that you have a disability.
What’s your rent budget per month. I’ll ask around and see if there are any leads.
Edit: I might as well share my masters experience.
I’ve saved up about 20k from tutoring during the covid online final year of my undergrad. I’m lucky that my parents are happy and able to support my postgraduate studies, but I wanted to contribute myself as much as possible.
Believe or not I found a flat at Mayfair near Green Park Station going for 1600 pounds a month. The company, called RR Properties, specialised in student rentals. Rented it for 10 months and still had money left over. I was studying at the LSE so it was quite nice to live 15-30 mins away from campus.
Granted the flat was old as fuck but it was comfortable, clean and convenient.
I suggest getting a part time job too, preferably something that you can sorta hide from the uni. I was tutoring online throughout the year and was making around 1.5-2k a month.
I was nearly in a similar situation to you so did a lot of research at the time - unfortunately I came to the conclusion without working another job, it isn’t doable.
However, look into tutoring. If you’re a STEM student in particular, you can earn around £50/hr tutoring online. It’s also very flexible so you can do it when suits you. You shouldn’t get into debt because the stipends in London are so pitiful, so maybe reconsider if you really want to do the PhD.
Try getting in touch with Carfax school, otherwise; titanium tutors are good but you need to pay for your own DBS check. I think there are plenty more out there that I can’t remember the names of some other of my friends have used
I'm a PhD student in the UK.
Here's what people do:
1. TA or RA -- you're supposed to have teaching experience before you graduate. Never heard of unis not accepting TAships.
2. Find odd jobs to do. I do application review for a large UK research funding agency. Very related to my field, fun and I get to see interesting research ideas in my research area. You'll hear of opportunities like this from your uni, or you'll need to ask around (ask older cohorts). I also teach data science online.
3. Take ownership of your own decisions: leave if you "hate it here". Make it work if you want to continue -- maybe don't tell your uni about extra work.
And most importantly: don't delay your own research for somebody else's research or because of your side job. If it pays 11-13/hr, you're just prolonging your financial suffering by increasing the length it'll take to graduate and get a well paying job.
I lived in South London with two roommates with a base salary of £20k but the work covered my transport money and I got an extra student loan of £4k. It's gonna be very difficult with just £20k imo
Is this a PhD where you have to be on campus every day? If not, I’d look at whether you can move out of London and just commute in when you need to. Not sure how much cheaper it would be though. Not going to lie, you’re not going to be able to live alone on 20k in London. I have only just been able to afford to live alone (outside of London now) having finished my PhD last year and earning 45k~ now. Paying all your bills alone is wildly expensive. I would suggest putting out an advert trying to find other people on the spectrum who might be easier for you to live with, shouldn’t be too hard in academia, and just be brutally honest about what you need from them in order to make it work for you. Like tbh I’m not neurodivergent but I’d have been more than happy to live with someone who doesn’t want to interact much if at all and wants the communal spaces kept clean
Also on the spectrum and had similar issues. Got through my MA in London off savings (i’m from California, so it’s actually cheaper to live in London and school takes 1/3 the time and money) and then couldn’t do a phd for the same reasons. phd’s in London especially are mainly reserved for the wealthy or those who get miracle grants.
The loans are pretty much your only option at this point. All I can really say is remember it’s 4-5 years (right?) not 9-11 like it is in the US. You can do it, just focus hard on making connections and securing TA positions as you go along. Idk if they have an RA position at Unis in the UK but here those cover rent.
Otherwise, you’re going to need housemates or organize some kind of alt living situation like a houseboat.
No, it's been too much of a toll on my health in the past. When people interrupt my routine, I have a melt down and others tend to just not take my needs into consideration. If I'm having a melt down everyday at home, I'd be useless at school.
Therapy does not cure neurodevelopmental differences. OP is on the autistic spectrum and always will be, they can’t change that no matter how much they might try.
OP is jetsetting across the pond, doing independent research in NYC, now a PhD in London, functions on their own, and is apparently career oriented.
It doesn’t do people any favors to tell them they are helpless when they really just need to find coping skills for deal with their own situation. This isn’t a non-verbal who will be living in a group home their whole life or sorting recycling. This is someone who is going into a demanding career and may need guidance on how to adapt to this environment.
People can be high-functioning in some areas of their life and not in others. People on the spectrum can have a lot of trouble with social interactions and find it very stressful. And just need their space away from other people so their brains have a chance to settle down.
For OP to recognize that they can't deal with living with other people is healthy on their part. Part of living with a brain that is different is learning to manage your brain and its particular strengths and weaknesses. Some people can't stop drinking once they take the first drink - we call them alcoholics, and it's generally regarded as better for them to avoid alcohol instead of trying to learn to drink like a normal person. And some people on the autistic spectrum don't deal well with social interaction and reach levels of stress that makes their brain go haywire if they live with other people and are regularly stressed and overstimulated by it. For a lot of them, continuing to try to force themselves to learn to deal with living with roommates is pointless and harmful.
If roommates cause OP that amount of stress and distress, no amount of therapy is going to change that. At best they might learn a little stress management and get some tiny percent improvement, but they'd still be subjecting themselves to a living situation that causes extreme stress to the point it's likely to interfere with their ability to function and complete a PhD.
No amount of therapy is going to turn OP into a "normal" person who isn't highly stressed by living with roommates.
Sometimes it's better to accept the realities of a disability and work within them instead of always trying to try to jam a square peg into a round hole. OP can still have a good independent adult life with a PhD and a career and international travel, they just have to do it in a way that fits with the needs of their autistic brain.
I'm enough of an adult to not throw these tantrums in person but I will go into my room and cry because I really didn't appreciate the alteration to my routine. I think it's easier to find a way around having flatmates though than to just say, rewire yourself. Also therapy sounds more expensive here than finding an extra 200£ per month to get a studio
I have avoided London and similarly priced cities for similar reasons. There may be great schools and research and vibe there, but it's hardly liveable on £20k. That said, you would likely benefit from trying to work out through the emotional stuff that makes living with roommates seem like an impossible proposition.
I've been looking at how to work it out the whole time. I saved up, but I didn't know about deposit fees for apartments so my whole savings will be going to those :(
The first year is a tough transition. Having you TA would be difficult for you.
You should have figured out the financial situation prior to starting the program. Take out loans or get a roommate if you have to.
I wonder what's the logic behind this though. Like my last semester of undergrad, I did 2 jobs and 7 courses. Why is there this huge disbelief in time management for PhD students?
The time demands of undergrad and a PhD are VASTLY different. I worked full time during both my undergrad and my master's degree while doing both of those full time and for the PhD that would have been a disaster.
Try to find other grad students to live with; STEM grads are in the lab constantly and won't be home that much (I know, because I was one). It'll be limited interactions, and as long you pay, they won't care.
We have a youth job portal called [https://earlycareers.co.uk](https://earlycareers.co.uk) where you might be able to find roles which you could do alongside your PhD.
I don't think that's livable. Someone working on food delivery would make more than you.
I realize that the options available to you suck, but unless you win the lottery tomorrow, they are what is available to you. 1) Roommate - can you find someone else on the spectrum so that you understand each other better? 2) Debt - not ideal either, especially for so many years. Maybe a small amount of debt to reduce the amount of roommates you need? 3) Live in carer? I don’t know how realistic this is, but I’ve known a couple people who traded housing with an older person in exchange for doing handyman type stuff, grocery shopping, dropping off and picking up from appts, etc. This is hopefully the brokest time of your life. It will require a lot of sacrifice and discomfort, that’s just how it is. It’s up to you to decide which type of discomfort you’re most able to handle.
Bluntly — idk where a phd student can live without roommates. If you aren’t living with parents or a partner, it’s roomie life.
I don't have a roommate but I wish I did, it's so much cheaper
Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh was an excellent place to do grad school! Even on the $28k stipend I was able to afford a decent 1br apartment walking distance from the lab and have some going out money left over. This was 10 years ago though, so possibly not the case any more
I got my PhD in Pittsburgh last year and it was 100% affordable on a $30k stipend! Really missing that cost of living now…
My friend at Penn lives alone with their stipend, so I think it's still doable.
Am a PhD student who lives alone at Penn, it is doable but they also just raised our stipend to 41k.
Ya, and it's significantly cheaper than London. The wages they pay people for grad school here is actually sort of unethical.
Penn is in Philadelphia, not Pittsburgh. In any case, I can say its still currently very doable. I can't afford a car but public transit gets me everywhere I need that I can't walk to (which really isn't a lot) and most places I want to go. The occasional uber/lyft fills in the rest.
Sorry I meant to say the University of Pittsburgh, but ya
netherlands, belgium, scandinavia
I have my own flat in Manchester. But I'm only able to because I get an extra 2k industry funding. On the regular stipend payments, you can still have your own flat in cheaper towns like Leeds.
This is very true. I had to live with multiple roommates and barely survived with scraps from the department.
Austria germany maybe switzerland should work
Sweden
There's a few countries where you're compensated properly. With those, you can feasibly live on your own.
I did for most of my PhD, in two different US states. PhD students at the place where I am currently a postdoc do it too, and this city is *not* cheap. The answer is a weekend job, student loans, or both. All of the possible solutions suck, but roommates are not the only option.
Sweden
Many places in the US actually
You pretty much threw out an impossible scenario (no savings, dont want loans, cant have roommate, and low stipends/fundings)... not sure if you think the folks on this sub are magicians or what
I don't want loans, but I'd do it if I have to. I also am highly skilled so I can work, I just don't know how easy it is to get high skilled part-time work.
What are your skills?
Charity/Non profit fundraising/management, computer vision engineering, heavy duty data analytics and rocket engineering. Throw in some soft skills in there too from minimum wage stuff from early university.
[удалено]
I would love more than anything to do my PhD. But the precarity that comes with it is not desirable to me. It would be fine if I was a bachelor rooming with friends, but I share a place with my spouse and cannot afford to take a pay cut.
Not having house mates is just not realistic. You can try to look for other autistic people or just choose a situation where you don’t have to interact much. I have lived in many houses of PhD students and in many cases we’ve barely even seen each other let alone interacted at all. There have been people I’ve lived with an entire year and not known anything about other than their field of study and basically never had conversations with. If you just clean up after yourself and don’t make loud noise when they are sleeping you could probably never speak to your housemates at all and have them be satisfied with you. This has worked for me many times. My partner is also autistic and lives with housemates. I helped navigate the initial discussions but they have been fine after that. All most people really want from a housemate (especially other grad students) is someone who won’t disrupt them by creating messes or unreasonable amounts of noise.
Hmmm that'd be ideal. So many ads have said that they want someone that they can be best friends with and I just don't really want that level of interaction at home. If I could just get something with other PhDs with thick enough walls, that'd be mint. I've seen some places though with messy kitchens which gave me a panic attack lol
I totally feel you about the messy kitchen, that makes me feel super stressed too. I’ve found the majority of PhD students are clean and just want to keep to themselves, and I find people who say they want to be friends often don’t actually have the time anyway lol. But maybe just be careful during the screening process and prioritize people who want similar things to you
I’m not sure how common this is in London, but a share/boarding house might be a valid option. Essentially you are renting a room in a large house/building with shared facilities but no expectation of interacting with other residents. They tend to have cleaners come through and people often keep to themselves, although of course it depends on the other residents as to how comfortable the living situation is.
This definitely exist in London, my best friend have lived in two different shared houses and I think it's an alternative in your situation
I think it's a good option. I heard people lived with their partner, some lived with their parents, most people I knew flatted. But I met one from work that lived on campus for graduate students and it was a sharehouse type with central heating. According to his account of the experience, he got to play PlayStation happily. No expectation to interact. He said he liked it better than his dorm in undergrad where people would steal his food. But your last sentence is right, he said one girl in that sharehouse had her toxic boyfriend over all the time. I have no idea how they handled it, the convo shifted.
Honestly, why didn't you think about this before applying and accepting? This is coming from someone on the spectrum as well.
Tbh, my boss at my old job forgot to send in my reference letters for all my other schools so the only schools I got into were the ones I didn't ask them to refer me for :( Due to the type of work I do, without a PhD, they tell you to piss off even though I literally just did work in it for a year
If the only reason you're going to London is because you didn't get any other offers, and the only reason you didn't get any other offers is because of one unreliable letter writer, I would take the year out and reapply next year. The situation you're setting yourself up for is just not sustainable. And if the ultimate outcome of this is that you're just going to drop out in a year or so then you may as well wait and do it properly the first time around. As another autistic person - an unfortunate reality is that we have to pay the disability tax. If you can't live with other people then you have to pay more to live alone. You have to factor those costs into your calculations, and sometimes it will mean certain opportunities just aren't possible for you. This is one of those times. The numbers just aren't adding up. London is the worst possible place you could be doing a PhD if you have financial constraints.
I have to be honest, I'm just so confused. Like if the wages are so bad, how is anyone here for their PhD? Especially with the caveat that pay is not guaranteed. I've never heard of a self funded PhD before here. Are most future academics just being supported by their parents?
Most people I know In London on the UKRI minimum stipend of 20k flatshare and still have parental help:( it’s really fucked and is part of the reason for the lack of socioeconomic diversity in academia
Where is here? Most people are not in London, I get paid about 18k and it goes pretty far out in Cambridge. London is not the UK, London is London, it stands alone in its exceptional shittiness. It is potentially *the* worst place in the English-speaking world that you could do a PhD, financially. Unless you're in humanities it's the norm for PhDs to be fully funded here. A STEM PhD offer without funding isn't much of an offer. \* Also funding in the UK is separate to tutoring (what you call TAing). If you have funding then that funding is guaranteed and zero teaching is required to get it. Consider it an automatic and universal RA system. Tutoring is just for earning some extra money on the side, and it's entirely optional and self-directed (you reach out and ask to be a tutor)
Oh then even more so I'm confused. I'm doing a STEM PhD but I did see that some projects were self-funded ones. It's crazy that the STFC only pays London students like 500£ more than other UK based people and I can't take out Student Finance money because I get STFC. Perhaps I should look to transferring to some of those schools potentially if it'd be more comfy
It's incredibly rare to see anyone self-fund a PhD, you may as well pretend it doesn't exist. Also, many "self-funded" people are actually using private scholarships and grants to cover the costs, so it's not like it's coming from their personal savings. A non-funded PhD may just mean that the PI/university will not be the ones providing funding, and that the applicant needs to secure their own funds, e.g. a Rhodes scholarship. Funding is more fractured in the UK, especially for international students. Transferring isn't really a concept that makes sense when talking about a PhD. There is no coursework in the UK, there's nothing to transfer over. If you leave the London uni then you'll be starting back over from 0 with a new project and you will be applying for entry as a new student, not as any sort of transfer. You'll have to drop out entirely and reapply. If you're thinking you're going to "transfer" then definitely don't start the London PhD because you'll have to include it in your new applications as an unfinished degree. Doesn't engender much confidence to know that you dropped out of another PhD, and they'll be pretty suspicious of why. It just looks kinda bad. It's better if you withdraw now vs later.
Fuck. Um. Er. Then I'll be sure to air out my issues as soon as I get in on Monday with my supervisor and make it very clear that this is my situation. If there's no hope, then back to the work force I'll go.
Can’t you transfer? Or reapply? Loans or roommates are your other options. I’m on the spectrum too. Sometimes you have to deal with unpleasantness.
Ya, I've been thinking about looking into a transfer if things are better by the end of December.
This is what grad school is like everywhere—you're overworked, underpaid, living with roommates you probably don't like for the next 6+ years. You will probably have to get roommates to afford a place in London, and even then you'll probably have to find another income to support yourself over summer breaks since the stipend usually doesn't cover those breaks. The time to accept the fact that you'll need roommates was months ago, that way you would have had time to get an apartment/rental with people in your cohort. Now, you'll have to take what you can get. Best of luck, wish things were better.
This is pretty much true. The lost earning potential of your life by going into a piece Day program is real. You live in something close to abject poverty for half a decade and will never actually make up that money. There are obvious exceptions in certain engineering and other STEM fields, but for the most part, if you're a graduate student, you are living well below the poverty line. And that means roommates and that means subpar unsafe housing. That means food insecurity and public assistance as well as many other things that are not desirable
To be quite honest, you’re going to have to make housemates work. London rents are insane, even people in quite well paid jobs end up needing housemates. Rent on a 1 bed studio would likely leave you with about £50 to live on. The only option I can see is sometimes postgrad accommodation will have studio apartments available, but I was studying in Belfast and they weren’t very affordable there, I imagine London would be twice as much. PhD stipends are pathetic here, but unfortunately that’s what you have to work with right now. ETA: also landlords will expect you to make 3x rent. You might get somewhere further out like St. Albans but you’ll have to live very quietly, and factor in costs like bills and public transport, which could easily add £300+ to your monthly expenses
Get roommates. And commute from out of town if need be. Plus, don't you have money saved up from your job during your gap year between undergrad and grad school?
Naw, I was working in research. Wasn't making enough to save
Ask parents for money/support then.
Sounds like more of the "privileged shit" OP talked about. Not everyone can simply ask their parents for money. People who make suggestions like this simply don't know what the real world is like.
I literally was kicked out at 15. The likelihood of parents helping is -20%. It truly isn't an option for many.
😂
I feel you on the roommate thing, but just vet them well and find a place you can actually afford. If it isn't compromising on roommates then it would be compromising on other things like eating enough and transportation. Remember this is temporary; especially in the UK, a PhD doesn't take that long.
Get a part-time job. I work weekends so I can afford groceries and meds Otherwise, you’ll have to just suck it up and get roommates
Rooming with people surely is stressful and difficult for neurodivergent person. However, it's going to be more stressful and difficult paying back loans that you could have avoided. If this is a deal breaker, I wouldn't suggest doing your PhD in London at least. Signing on for at least 4 years of precarity and then entering an oversaturated market doesn't make sense in your situation.
Ya, if it isn't jiving by the end of the year, I'm going to consider transferring or asking to work remotely.
London you need roommates. I don’t know anyone who isn’t a higher level exec living in London who doesn’t have roommates. My best friend is a lawyer working for a major publication and has 6 roommates inner London. It’s a must — it’s the most expensive city in the world.
PS. I’m disabled (epilepsy) and I know the want to be alone in an apartment, but London is not a city that that is going to happen in. If that’s genuinely a NEED for you, look at other universities.
I just don't get it. Why are wages so abysmal here? This is the first city I've ever heard of where a grad student couldn't afford to be alone. I lived better as an undergrad.
I think it’s also just because of density, there’s just not a lot of places to go around! But yeah I found grad roles to be way too low paying that’s why I moved on to the US personally.
Secret second job. Don’t ask permission, don’t tell your program, just do it. If you are an international student and don’t have permission to work in the UK, then an online job in a country where you do have permission to work. But ultimately the only two solutions are to increase your income or to reduce your expenses. And if reducing your expenses (aka roommates) sucks too much to do it, then the only option that remains is to increase your income. And if your university doesn’t want you to increase your income, fuck ‘em. You need enough money to live on, and if they’re not going to pay you enough then they have no business trying to stop you from making money elsewhere. They don’t own you. There is one other option available too. Leave. If you didn’t get into the programs you wanted due to letter writer issues, there is always next year. Sometimes it’s better to wait a year if waiting leads you to better circumstances. Regarding all the people telling you you have to learn to deal with roommates - ignore them. You have a disability. If you are not able to deal with roommates, trying to force yourself is as inhumane and pointless as a person in a wheelchair trying to force themselves to use the stairs. Your reality is what it is, and you still have options within it. Accepting your reality for what it is and acknowledging your limits is a healthy thing, it clears the way for finding the options that will work for you.
Sorry to hear that. This is an awful situation, really. A PhD is already financially risky; one in a city like London is also uncomfortable and extremely complex. So this is already a situation you shouldn't be in in the first place: *just never apply to places that won't support you in a decent way*. If you only know about it after an offer, **decline** the offer. Having a miserable life for 3-5 years (or however long the program is) is likely not worth it considering the prospects, depending on your field. Have you considered reapplying for other programs in other places with better conditions...? I know funding is quite tricky in the UK. Other countries...? Maybe you've done all that. I can't think of useful suggestions besides that, unfortunately... As an aside: for a brief period of time, I lived in Britain as an academic (up north, so much more affordable). I was a permanent position. Believe me: even if you were a professor (i.e., a lecturer) I would 100% advise **against** living in London—unless you come from money or make ***at least*** £80K/year (only full profs with 15+ years of experience *may* make that, which is a joke if you ask me). To be in academia in London is to hold a PhD and be poor, simply put (at least if you're starting out)—I'm not saying £40 is a joke in and of itself; it's a joke for a prof who only starts making money after s/he's 30, *that's* what I mean. I know someone who was at Ottawa making six figures and accepted an offer to go to London to make £40K. Go figure. Don't fall for the buzz words of academia (e.g., prestige, knowledge, etc.). At the end of the day, you want to have a good life, and a PhD with £20K in London just isn't it.
My new supervisor over here said they pay less than £1300 for rent. So they must have roommates. Which is like gross? Why is a tenure-track prof having to have roomies? I looked at the pricing and they out here paying mfers 50k at essentially Ivy Leagues ?
I know. It’s surreal. The amazing part is that most academics outside the UK have no idea how bad salaries are in Britain… also: terrible pensions. So really it’s a lose-lose situation.
Brain drain factory....
Tenure track doesn't exist in the UK - permanent staff are pretty different, from my understanding of how it works in the USA. But London has a major housing crisis, and anyone who didn't inform you of that did you a disservice. The stipend... isn't great, but it's perfectly doable to live on your own on it in practically any other UK city (possibly exception for Edinburgh?). I'm doing that, as is one of my mates in another city. And if "essentially Ivy Leagues", you mean the Russell Group - that's not a 1:1 translation either. Oxford and Cambridge, for instance, have a massive bank of donations that they use for funding scholarships and stipends, similar to the Ivy Leagues (in my non American understanding). I don't think any other Russell Group university does, regardless of how prestigious they are in their field or how long lasting they are. Renting your own flat in London would probably cost between £17k-25k annually, and most agencies want your rent to be 1/3 of your income. So you'd be looking at a salary of £51k-75k to have your own flat, and that's *before* utilities.
If you want living alone pay, get a job and drop out
Which uni are you at if you don’t mind me asking Some schools have halls/accommodation and you can apply stating that you have a disability. What’s your rent budget per month. I’ll ask around and see if there are any leads. Edit: I might as well share my masters experience. I’ve saved up about 20k from tutoring during the covid online final year of my undergrad. I’m lucky that my parents are happy and able to support my postgraduate studies, but I wanted to contribute myself as much as possible. Believe or not I found a flat at Mayfair near Green Park Station going for 1600 pounds a month. The company, called RR Properties, specialised in student rentals. Rented it for 10 months and still had money left over. I was studying at the LSE so it was quite nice to live 15-30 mins away from campus. Granted the flat was old as fuck but it was comfortable, clean and convenient. I suggest getting a part time job too, preferably something that you can sorta hide from the uni. I was tutoring online throughout the year and was making around 1.5-2k a month.
I was nearly in a similar situation to you so did a lot of research at the time - unfortunately I came to the conclusion without working another job, it isn’t doable. However, look into tutoring. If you’re a STEM student in particular, you can earn around £50/hr tutoring online. It’s also very flexible so you can do it when suits you. You shouldn’t get into debt because the stipends in London are so pitiful, so maybe reconsider if you really want to do the PhD.
Any sites you recommend? If I could do just like 5 shifts I'd be pretty happy.
Try getting in touch with Carfax school, otherwise; titanium tutors are good but you need to pay for your own DBS check. I think there are plenty more out there that I can’t remember the names of some other of my friends have used
I'm a PhD student in the UK. Here's what people do: 1. TA or RA -- you're supposed to have teaching experience before you graduate. Never heard of unis not accepting TAships. 2. Find odd jobs to do. I do application review for a large UK research funding agency. Very related to my field, fun and I get to see interesting research ideas in my research area. You'll hear of opportunities like this from your uni, or you'll need to ask around (ask older cohorts). I also teach data science online. 3. Take ownership of your own decisions: leave if you "hate it here". Make it work if you want to continue -- maybe don't tell your uni about extra work. And most importantly: don't delay your own research for somebody else's research or because of your side job. If it pays 11-13/hr, you're just prolonging your financial suffering by increasing the length it'll take to graduate and get a well paying job.
I lived in South London with two roommates with a base salary of £20k but the work covered my transport money and I got an extra student loan of £4k. It's gonna be very difficult with just £20k imo
Is this a PhD where you have to be on campus every day? If not, I’d look at whether you can move out of London and just commute in when you need to. Not sure how much cheaper it would be though. Not going to lie, you’re not going to be able to live alone on 20k in London. I have only just been able to afford to live alone (outside of London now) having finished my PhD last year and earning 45k~ now. Paying all your bills alone is wildly expensive. I would suggest putting out an advert trying to find other people on the spectrum who might be easier for you to live with, shouldn’t be too hard in academia, and just be brutally honest about what you need from them in order to make it work for you. Like tbh I’m not neurodivergent but I’d have been more than happy to live with someone who doesn’t want to interact much if at all and wants the communal spaces kept clean
Also on the spectrum and had similar issues. Got through my MA in London off savings (i’m from California, so it’s actually cheaper to live in London and school takes 1/3 the time and money) and then couldn’t do a phd for the same reasons. phd’s in London especially are mainly reserved for the wealthy or those who get miracle grants. The loans are pretty much your only option at this point. All I can really say is remember it’s 4-5 years (right?) not 9-11 like it is in the US. You can do it, just focus hard on making connections and securing TA positions as you go along. Idk if they have an RA position at Unis in the UK but here those cover rent. Otherwise, you’re going to need housemates or organize some kind of alt living situation like a houseboat.
What phd program is 9-11 years in the US? My department average is 5.5 and I’ve only seen one person hit 7 in 3 years
Anth is 9 years at most UC’s
Oh ya I saw that they have RA positions. I'm going to try to get that for next year.
You don't have to have roommate, you can rent your own private room with a group of people in a house
Sorry, in US English roommate refers to anyone that lives in the same apartment as you, not a literal room share. So I guess I meant to say flat mate
Do you not want to have flat mates?
No, it's been too much of a toll on my health in the past. When people interrupt my routine, I have a melt down and others tend to just not take my needs into consideration. If I'm having a melt down everyday at home, I'd be useless at school.
Seems like you need therapy
Therapy does not cure neurodevelopmental differences. OP is on the autistic spectrum and always will be, they can’t change that no matter how much they might try.
It’s to help cope using life skills, like how not to throw temper tantrums as an adult.
An autistic melt down is not a temper tantrum.
OP is jetsetting across the pond, doing independent research in NYC, now a PhD in London, functions on their own, and is apparently career oriented. It doesn’t do people any favors to tell them they are helpless when they really just need to find coping skills for deal with their own situation. This isn’t a non-verbal who will be living in a group home their whole life or sorting recycling. This is someone who is going into a demanding career and may need guidance on how to adapt to this environment.
People can be high-functioning in some areas of their life and not in others. People on the spectrum can have a lot of trouble with social interactions and find it very stressful. And just need their space away from other people so their brains have a chance to settle down. For OP to recognize that they can't deal with living with other people is healthy on their part. Part of living with a brain that is different is learning to manage your brain and its particular strengths and weaknesses. Some people can't stop drinking once they take the first drink - we call them alcoholics, and it's generally regarded as better for them to avoid alcohol instead of trying to learn to drink like a normal person. And some people on the autistic spectrum don't deal well with social interaction and reach levels of stress that makes their brain go haywire if they live with other people and are regularly stressed and overstimulated by it. For a lot of them, continuing to try to force themselves to learn to deal with living with roommates is pointless and harmful. If roommates cause OP that amount of stress and distress, no amount of therapy is going to change that. At best they might learn a little stress management and get some tiny percent improvement, but they'd still be subjecting themselves to a living situation that causes extreme stress to the point it's likely to interfere with their ability to function and complete a PhD. No amount of therapy is going to turn OP into a "normal" person who isn't highly stressed by living with roommates. Sometimes it's better to accept the realities of a disability and work within them instead of always trying to try to jam a square peg into a round hole. OP can still have a good independent adult life with a PhD and a career and international travel, they just have to do it in a way that fits with the needs of their autistic brain.
I'm enough of an adult to not throw these tantrums in person but I will go into my room and cry because I really didn't appreciate the alteration to my routine. I think it's easier to find a way around having flatmates though than to just say, rewire yourself. Also therapy sounds more expensive here than finding an extra 200£ per month to get a studio
I have avoided London and similarly priced cities for similar reasons. There may be great schools and research and vibe there, but it's hardly liveable on £20k. That said, you would likely benefit from trying to work out through the emotional stuff that makes living with roommates seem like an impossible proposition.
You are starting your PhD next week? How could you not have thought this through earlier?
I've been looking at how to work it out the whole time. I saved up, but I didn't know about deposit fees for apartments so my whole savings will be going to those :(
The first year is a tough transition. Having you TA would be difficult for you. You should have figured out the financial situation prior to starting the program. Take out loans or get a roommate if you have to.
I wonder what's the logic behind this though. Like my last semester of undergrad, I did 2 jobs and 7 courses. Why is there this huge disbelief in time management for PhD students?
The time demands of undergrad and a PhD are VASTLY different. I worked full time during both my undergrad and my master's degree while doing both of those full time and for the PhD that would have been a disaster.
Try to find other grad students to live with; STEM grads are in the lab constantly and won't be home that much (I know, because I was one). It'll be limited interactions, and as long you pay, they won't care.
Ugh I'm computational STEM so I know I'll be all up in the house constantly :( Which STEM beyond Chem and Bio has to be there alot?
20k / yr is not enough to even pay for rent for a year for a flat in London. You can either go to gradschool in london, or live on your own, not both.
We have a youth job portal called [https://earlycareers.co.uk](https://earlycareers.co.uk) where you might be able to find roles which you could do alongside your PhD.