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First-time teaching PhD students make course assignment way too demanding for a new lecture
I'm attending a graduate lecture at a university in Europe. Two lecturers, both PhD students, are giving their first lecture. One of the PhD students is senior and another just recently enrolled in the PhD program. Technically, I'm not so sure if it is legal or acceptable (within EU education system) that having PhD students organize the whole course when the professor never show up.
The lecture is a completely new lecture not given before at this university. As the lecture is new and domain wise narrow, there isn't any remotely related lectures I can find in other universities, thus hardly any reference material is available through the internet. So practically, the only references are their slides.
Personally for me, the material/slides given by them are insufficient to solve the assignment. According to university regulations, the course requires theoretically not more than 6 hours per week on it, but practically, I have spent more than 20 hours every week re-watching the lecture video and re-reading the slides, yet still struggling for the assignment. I asked for help or hints from the lectures when stuck in an assignment, but got always rejected with "NO, given materials are good enough, fill the gap yourself." Other conversations are like: "function X is not mentioned anywhere else other than slide Y, it looks critical to our assignment, but no other references or examples can be borrowed. Could you provide some hints on what is it actually?", the lecturers response with "It can be easily inferred from the name, we don't give any more information other than the slides." Such questions are never answered, let alone getting "hints" from them.
As much as I don't enjoy the way they teach, they are not bad people to me. Perhaps their expectation to students is largely biases as their research topic are pretty narrow and unpopular. They simply don't have a good image of how students (statistically wise) like for those who are not doing research in their direction , and expect every audience is like them 5/10 years younger. Of course none of this was mentioned on course website or prerequisites.
The difficulties are not about understanding a brilliant paper, or improve some obscure algorithms, but to implement programs in a certainly constrained way they propose. An analogy to the coursework requirement would be, to implement heap sorting or ray tracing in CMake script. You would understand how weird this is if you study computer science. Thus for sure, there is no reference or any other material we could use.
I tend to believe as they lack formal teaching experience, they set an unrealistically high standard for students.
More than half of the students dropped out half way through the course already, now there are only less than 10 students left. After talking to these students, most of them agree with my impression that it is too demanding as a non-major course and also struggle a lot with the deadlines.
I don't want to fail the course, and I will stay and suck it up anyway. But other than "sucking it up", what are other (diplomatic) actions I can do at the same time to secure my chance of passing this lecture?
Updates:

The professor in charge of this course replied to my email that he won't discuss with an anonymous email address, and that he could perhaps set up a meeting including these two lecturers if I resend the email with my university account. I'm afraid exposing my identity would fail me for the course (I am just not comfortable with this after my previous attempts to discuss this with the lecturers were rebuffed).
I contacted the student union with an anonymous email. They are willing to investigate the matter, and collect students' opinion on it, then possibly talk to the lecturers as a student group.

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Student union activity on this matter will likely fizzle out, or at best, take a long while. I wouldn't put much stock in that progressing unless a large number of people complained, which probably can't happen anyway. Really, you need to talk to the course teachers and/or the senior staff member in charge.

The professor in charge of this course replies my email that he won't
discuss with an anonymous email address, and could perhaps set up a
meeting including these 2 lectures if I send it with university email.
I'm afraid exposing my identity would fail me for the course.

You absolutely need to get over this latter concern, as it's simply not rational. You must have a frank, open discussion with your professor at this time. Being "known" to your professors in graduate school is both a base-level expectation and a completely positive situation. You won't be able to advance in your discipline without a professor lobbying for you, guiding your research, helping through rough spots, writing recommendation letters, etc.
It sounds like you may be operating under some level of John Henryism syndrome:

John Henryism (JH) is a strategy for coping with prolonged exposure to
stresses such as social discrimination by expending high levels of
effort which results in accumulating physiological costs...
The term was conceived in the 1970s by African-American epidemiologist
and public health researcher Sherman James while he was investigating
racial health disparities between blacks and others in North
Carolina...
James' hypothesis was that African Americans sometimes attempted to
control their environment through similar attempts at superhuman
performance. The expression of this superhuman performance may not
necessarily involve a steel hammer. It may involve working harder at
the office or working long to prove one’s worth. The end results,
however, may still involve the same negative consequences that befell
John Henry...

As noted, the JH theory was developed in reference specifically to African-American experiences in academia. Personal note: although I'm a white man in the U.S., I come from a rural "pick yourself up by your bootstraps" culture, and the first time I read about JH I was stunned at how much it illustrated my own experiences in grad school (Master's level). Did I ever go to my professors' office hours (or reach out to other students) for assistance? No, I did not. Did I go on to achieve the PhD? No, I did not, and I think that oversight at the time is largely to blame.
(Parenthetically, it's common in some institutions to have a requirement that student inquiries only get replies if sent via in-system email. Your professor may not have any choice about that limitation. I am in a department with a similar mandate.)

"it's common in some institutions to have a non-negotiable requirement that only in-system emails get responses." Confused student here: I understand it being strange and not likely to be productive to send a professor course-related emails from an intentionally anonymous account, but that rule seems much broader and wild to me. Don't professors often need to work and communicate with people outside of the institution? How can that be realistic if they aren't able to email them?

@ElizaWilson: The context is student communications. I think the motivation is in assuming that any contact with students (e.g., in the U.S.) entails FERPA-protected information for which the identity of the student needs to be authenticated. Personally, I don't think that argument is generally persuasive -- but I've now been at multiple institutions that dictate such. Edited my answer to clarify.

OP's apprehension is probably unjustified given we don't know that their professor will vindictively fail them for speaking up, but this depends on the culture at the institution and even the individual professor. At my undergraduate institution in India, some professors would hold grudges against you over multiple semesters for criticizing their teaching style or otherwise rubbing them the wrong way. Administrators would just brush aside complaints about these professors. I have personally experienced professors getting away with bad behavior that would never fly in a US university.

@DanielR.Collins Thank you. This answer is excellent. Never heard of JH before either, but applies to so many "pioneer"/minority cases.

@ElizaWilson as someone working at an elite university for a long time: part of the point is to teach professionalism and discipline, so a student communicating with their educators NOT using their university email address would be a huge red flag. Further professors get tons of student emails, parsing them is a nightmare. Also we don't want emails from students' friends and parents making excuses on their behalf (yes this happens). Of course we interact with people outside uni but not for strictly academic teaching matters.

You seem to have set the parameters here such that your only options are to drop the course or to do your best on the assignments. You've closed off communication, insisting it be anonymous.
I'll note that in some situations, saying something intelligent on an assignment is worth something, maybe a lot, even if you don't come to a full solution. Leaving things blank is never a good strategy. I once won a lot of "points" on an oral exam by explaining to the questioners what my block was and where my analysis was going wrong. The actual solution was very simple, but I just wasn't seeing it.
I (and the rest of us here) can't judge if you are making an accurate assessment of the difficulty and lack of help, but, even in the most generous analysis, the situation you describe might be intentional - a goad to get you to learn to learn on your own.
A less generous interpretation might suggest that you want things to be easy with mostly pro-forma assignments that simply give back the presented material in a different form. For unimportant courses in fields about which you care little, that may be enough. But gaining insight requires hard work.
I didn't start to gain insight into mathematics until I started to do things beyond what the instructor demanded.

I would stay anyway and won't submit an empty solution. But as there isn't really much I can do on the assignment itself, I am at the same time actively seeking diplomatic solution to improve the situation.

A few suggestions:
Gather some allies
This is a problem that is unlikely to be solved by anonymous complaints. But in particular, if you are afraid to be singled out for repercussions, try to convince some of the other students to talk to the supervising professor together. This also helps to convince them that you are not a lone complainer, but that there might be an actual problem.
Similarly there might be some student organisation in your faculty or elsewhere, part of whose job description is being the students advocate in such cases. Even if you do not officially want to involve them, it would be good to inform them and to get some of their advice. In particular they may be able to tell you how the professor will react, based on previous experiences.
Seek conciliation not confrontation
Since you are starting the discussion, you have the chance to set the tone, so use this to your advantage. If you immediately demand that the class should be made easier, then you will immediately be dismissed as someone who instead of doing his classwork rather spends all his time complaining about it, maybe even rightfully so.
Instead try to pose it as a common problem to be solved together. E.g. tell them that you appreciate their work and understand that the classes are demanding, because the topic is demanding and that while you are not opposed to doing more work than the regulations say, there are other classes as well and simply only so many hours in a week. Don't ask them to dumb the class down, instead ask for more office hours or additional repetition classes.
And in regards to these two, if you get them, use them. First of all, not doing so will make you complaints look bad and secondly, these also help them to gauge how the class is going. Personally I've taught more than one class, which I thought went well, until I've had to answer the students questions one office hour later and noticed that I completely failed to get the point across and had to change my approach for the next class.

I contacted the students union with an anonymous email. They are willing to investigate the matter, and collect students' opinion on it, then possibly talk to the lecturers as a student group.

Most probably, the teachers are overzealous and overambitious in how much they want to teach you.
In practical terms, you have two options: either to find motivation to soldier on, or to reveal your identity and have a meeting with the teachers and the professor. I will go through them one by one.
Motivation to soldier on. Think about it that way: inexperienced and overzealous teachers tend to choose assignments they find interesting, instructive and challenging. They take you to higher levels of the Bloom's taxonomy. So, if you do them, you will learn a lot. If you are not motivated to learn a lot about this particular subject, note that you will also enhance your problem-solving skills. If you end up in an intellectually demanding job (academia or not), the problems you'll need to solve will be nothing like spoon-fed exercises at the end of a polished textbook chapter. More often, you'll need to summon all your knowledge to look for the right approach, search through scattered, incomplete and poorly written sources without any idea what you are looking for. The assignments you get might be a good training in exactly that.
Reveal your identity. This may be over-idealistic, but I don't think that the risk of retaliation is as high as it appears. Most people are enthusiastic about teaching their first course. At this stage, they are ambitious about being good teachers, and probably have some notion that they need to accommodate feedback. If they have self-esteem, they will also try not to retaliate - they will realize that your only fault is that you are too weak compared to their dream student, but ambitious to finish the course and assertive. No-one reasonable will hold you at fault for that. That said, you want to be careful not to hurt their egos. This is non-trivial, since you've come to their boss over their heads to complain. So, if you go to the meeting, don't in any circumstances mention their lack of experience. Say what good you can say (e. g., lectures are interesting etc.). Be factual - state how much time you spend on their course, how it compares to previous courses you have taken, etc. You may humbly bring up your previous grades and prerequisites. Believe in yourself - you are a good, motivated student, but you are struggling. Be non-confrontational, solution-oriented: it's nobody's fault, there's just a mismatch between the audience present and the course level, that has to be addressed. Of course, it will be much better if you convince one or two of your peers to come out with you. Of course, if everyone comes out, there's less even risk individually, but it may force the teachers on the defensive.
This is a generic advice, you may want to take into account the culture in your country, and whatever you know about personalities involved.

When studying CS with a side-dish of maths, I heard a course about Abelian Groups; this was for senior students, i.e. in the later semesters. It started out simple enough, you know, plenty of definitions, theorems etc.; it had no prerequisites except "the usual" (familiarity with mathematic principles, basics from Linear Algebra etc.); all mathematical structures were laid out from first principles, clear and plain, with complete derivations written on the whiteboard.
Before I knew it, I was way over my head. I could follow along with the lectures just fine, I remembered most of the theorems and definitions, but had not a single clue of how to tackle any of the assignments.
Turns out this lecture was based around the principle that students are supposed to study the topic. In contrast to me, the other students would spend hours and hours sitting at home or in a library, reading books on the topic, repeating the proofs for the theorems, tackling them from other angles, discussing them in small groups maybe. That was before the bachelor/master system was introduced in my country, and at my uni there was no measure of how many hours of additional study was required. Needless to say, I let go of that particular lecture and found a more interesting (to me) one which for some reason I "groked" without any particular effort.
It could well be that this is what's going here. It seems to me that the courses are designed to spark self-study. University is not school, some profs see it as their job to give students a kind of guidance into a field, with the students doing the main work. Your teachers saying that the "name of the topic implies the solution" looks to me like they think you'll either read books, do online searches, discuss it with your fellow students, etc...

I'm afraid exposing my identity would fail me for the course.

It might be helpful if you think about this anonymous email issue from the professor’s point of view. Professors are used to students complaining that the material is too hard: this literally happens to them all the time (even when the course is at a perfectly reasonable level), since practically every course will have some weak students who will struggle, or even decent students who just like to complain. Knowing the identity of the person complaining is the minimal mechanism a professor has to even begin to evaluate the credibility of such a complaint — even with that knowledge it can still sometimes be quite difficult to know how seriously to take it. Now, by using an anonymous email, you take away even that relatively weak mechanism. This undermines the professor’s ability to make decisions to support effective teaching. You also send a signal that you are ashamed or embarrassed of struggling in the class, which suggests that you potentially know or believe your own complaint to be frivolous. Considering all of this, I cannot say I find it surprising that the professor is being dismissive — I might very well do the same in their position.
Now, I don’t mean to suggest that your fear of exposing your identity is not rational. I can imagine situations in which it would be rational. However, at the end of the day, this is a fear you simply need to get over. Graduate school is a professional environment in which people are expected to behave professionally and maturely, and to work with others around them to achieve a shared goal. Hiding your identity is not compatible with those expectations.
Finally, none of this is to indicate that your complaint itself is unsound or invalid. My suggestion is to try to enter a good faith dialogue with the professor and share your concerns, taking my feedback above into account. Hopefully he will be reasonable, listen to what you have to say, and instruct the lecturers to be more helpful and/or make some other adaptations to make the class more survivable. Good luck!

"this literally happens to them all the time" - this assumes that the OP is in the "default country", while they explicitly stated that they are in Europe. Cultures are different.

@Kostya_I yes, I heard that even Europe has at least 2-3 cultures. Who knows, maybe what I said is true in some of them as well. For what it’s worth, it is definitely true in the two countries where I have experience teaching, so it didn’t seem like such a dangerous generalization to make.

@Kostya_I In my limited experience in Europe (Italy, France, Germany), yeah that happens every time. Not every student, of course, but for a sufficiently big class it's basically impossible not to find a complainer.

Spending 20 hours a week on a graduate level course is not necessarily excessive. This is basically the upper limit of what I would consider reasonable in graduate school. If the subject is useful to you (even tangentially) in the future, your future self will be grateful that you took a more rigorous course that gave you a better foundation.
It's not necessarily unusual for more than half of the initial enrollment to drop. Probably many people thought the course is too hard and aren't interested in the subject, they would rather take something easier for an equivalent amount of credits.
It is a red flag that the instructors don't want to help you. If you are going to office hours, and showing the instructors where you are stuck, they should be able to give you hints or point you in the right direction. Are you asking questions in the office hours or just asking over email? Because you should not expect responses over email. If the student teachers aren't holding office hours, or aren't answering questions in office hours, those are legitimate grievances you should discuss with the professor in charge of the course.
It is a red flag that phd students are teaching the course. This is doubly true if it's the first time the course is being offered. Both situations are conducive to less effective teaching.
It's unlikely that anything you do will change the difficulty of the course. The homeworks and lesson plans are probably already planned out and will be unlikely to change when the course is already underway. Depending on the current course progress, it may actually be impossible to change the course content based on time constraints.

Your best strategy here is to work together with the other students in the class. You say you have already talked with some of them, if you all agree the homework is difficult and time consuming you should all be pooling together to solve the homework together.
As other responses have already pointed out, don't try to communicate anonymously.

I asked through an online channel, they response, but refuse to answer my question. Conversation examples are in the description. 4. It was not taught before, not in this university, and similar topics are not found in other universities.

Assuming the exchange you give are true quotes, this is a very bad and unprofessional response from the instructor.
However, "I have no idea what this function is" is a bad way to ask a question because it can be easily interpreted as rude/dismissive and is overly vague. A better question could be something like "What is the difference between this function and function X" or "how to calculate X in this function/does this function have property X".

my original question was "function X is not mentioned anywhere else other than slide Y, it looks critical to our assignment, but no other references or examples can be borrowed. Could you provide some hints on what is it actually?" Then I got reply from them as written.

As the others have already said before: Do not fear to reveal your name and get in touch with the prof asap.
I have been working on a European university for many years now, and I have never encountered a situation where a student failed because the teachers did not like them and wanted to punish them. (On the contrary, sometimes a teacher really wants a student to pass just because they do not want to see this student in their course again next semester!)
Of course, if you have to encounter the prof and the two PhD students in a meeting, this is a scary situation. If possible, try to find other students that are not happy with the course either so that you are not alone. But in any case, get an appointment with the prof.
In this appointment, try to be as neutral as possible. If you accuse the PhD students of being incompetent and rude, the prof will defend them. Of course you are angry and disappointed, but do not show these feelings. Do not be aggressive or whiny, this does not help.
Instead, try to concentrate on you and your problems with the course. You want to pass this course, but you have severe problems to understand what they teach you. You need help, and so far nobody has helped you, that is why you are here.
Profs are usually interested in students passing their exams, so if you concentrate on the help you need, you will most likely get it.

Your second point describes exactly my concern on revealing my identity. Currently student union accepts my anonymous complaint and are investigating. I would talk to the professor with my university email if this doesn't work out.


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Masters student used part of PhD student's work
I am a PhD student doing research in a university. I was working on a research project which would be part of my thesis and upon completion of some parts of it I submitted the draft manuscript to my supervisor. However, almost 1 year after I started the project, one Masters student joined our lab and started working with me.
As I was also helping him to write his Master's thesis, his thesis contained parts of my research manuscript with many exact texts and data written and obtained by me. I didn't/couldn't object to that at that time, neither did I approve him to submit that thesis with those data/texts. But, when he sent me the manuscript of the thesis (which contained texts/data written by me), I mailed him: "Nice, I will make some more corrections here and there". In the  thesis, he also  acknowledged me for my "support" in his research work, although he didn't specify.
The thing is, now I noticed that in his thesis it is declared that "This work is done by the Masters student independently and the results contained in the thesis has not been submitted for the award of any other degree elsewhere", which is also approved by my supervisor. The declaration made here is entirely wrong as he did not do the work independently (bulk of it was actually done by me) and the work was intended to be part of my phd thesis.
Now, I added many additional data and new research ideas to that research work and want to add it as my thesis chapter. My question is, should I seek permission from the Masters student to incorporate the parts of the data that were already incoporated in his thesis? There is clear evidence that the data and texts that he used in his thesis were not obtained or written by him originally, but were parts of a manuscript submitted by me to my supervisor almost 1 year before his joining. But still,  can he refuse or stop me from using that data? Also, will it be considred plagiarism if I use those data without his permission? Or plagiarism  is considered to be committed by him as his thesis contained parts of my manuscript?
Edit.
Also, can it be accused for helping someone to do plagiarism? All I did, was following my superviser's instructions-which I can't prove this way may be. But he did a similar thing before, where he used another student's research work into someone elses thesis, and the student complained about him to the higher authority. But the situation was handled internally, with no punishment for my superviser
I don't know how to manage this situation. I have to  include this work in my thesis as I have already published a paper based on this. But I can't alter or remove the parts of data that were included into the Masters' student's thesis

@Roland Thank you for your suggestion. But can I be accused of plagiarism? The Master's thesis contains text and data written and obtained by me originally. There is clear evidence that I wrote those parts as I submitted a manuscript containing those texts and data to my supervisor almost 1 year before the student's joining. So, isn't technically the Masters student plagiarizing?

@Roland Thanks. Actually I can have the evidence even if my supervisor isn't available anymore, as I sent the manuscript to my supervisor by email at that time , The date of the email predates the student's joining. I still have the email  with me. I also didn't approve (or disapprove) the Master's thesis, as there was no such option for that in his dissertation. Only my  supervisor approved it. So yes,  may be any actions taken by me might make my supervisor look bad.

O, I didn't know that.

@Roland  O, I didn't know that. Lets see..... There can be other evidences, e.g. the doctoral committee report. Also, many  parts of the work were done by me in a foreign country as part of collaborative project, where the master's student didn't go. Those had to be added in his thesis as certain parts of thesis (e.g. characterization and machine designing data) cannot be ommitted. But he clearly can't prove that he did those characterizations as he was not in that foreign lab.

@Roland Thatz true. Anyway thanks for your advice and suggestions. It helped a lot :)

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Is it unprofessional to forward email discussions to doctoral supervisor?
I was having an email discussion regarding my postdoctoral application with my potential host supervisor. At one point, he asked for recommendation letter from my PhD supervisor.
When I contacted my PhD supervisor, he asked me to forward the above-mentioned email correspondence to him. So, I forwarded my email discussions with postdoc host to my PhD supervisor. The mail didn't contain anything related to postdoctoral project, but only on official matters like interview timings etc. My supervisor has sent his recommendations to the postdoc host in the same email track. I wanted to know is it unprofessional from my part?
Recent Update: I came to know that my PhD supervisor wrote a simple email instead of a formal letter with his signature and stamp. Moreover, he mentioned only my first name with wrong spelling (e.g. 'Dr. Jahn', instead of Dr. John Smith). He also asked the postdoc host if he could collaborate with him in the same email. The email doesn't contain anything bad about me but the structure of it looked naive to me. Can anyone suggest anything regarding that?

It seems unlikely to me that there was anything confidential in what you sent and therefore little reason to worry.
It may have given your advisor some context in which to write a better letter, actually.
I suggest relaxation.

Thank you for your suggestion

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I am missing deadlines for coping with anxiety. What should I do?
Ever since I knew about anxiety five months ago, I started going easy with life, started to distract myself from all the stressors. I used to be very alert before deadlines previously and hence it used to interfere with my life severely. Now that I try to relax and use stress handling techniques, I feel better but I am missing deadlines. Today I got the rejection letter for a paper I submitted, which I know happened because of going easy on the deadline. Now what should I do to balance both sides?

I think the title is wrong - you are not missing deadlines "due to anxiety", but rather because you decided not to give in to your anxiety. I think that's quite different.

The first, and most important, step should be to find a good therapist to work with you on your anxiety if you don't already have one. If you already have one, talk with them about how you are feeling about this rejection. They will be in a much better position to talk you through your options than we random people on the Internet.
Keep in mind that this isn't an academic question per se (even though it often comes up in academic contexts), and professors and fellow students are not necessarily the best people to help you. Speaking from a little personal experience and seeing the same process in others, getting help with anxiety, burnout, and stress-related symptoms is not about finding a magic bean strategy that will allow you to put in the same hours as before, but somehow don't mind it anymore - it's about guiding you towards acceptance that you cannot and should not work quite as hard as you used to, along with the consequence that you may produce less output than before (but in exchange get a much better life, as you yourself said).

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I recently realized how bad my mental health (anxiety or insomnia) condition is. Should I apply to US universities for grad school this year?
I wish I could see a therapist and talk about these instead of writing about them here but, in my country, there are no reliable therapists and people do not emphasize higher study at all. People do not deal with anxiety here, some ignore the symptoms and others who know keep it a secret because it is seen as a weakness. So there are no help or support groups here. Two years ago, when the mild anxiety started because of stress at my first job, I sought medical help but I think I was wrongly treated with medicine and I think this contributed to insomnia or worsen the anxiety, whatever it is. This experience has gotten me fearful of seeking professional help too.
I have been struggling with anxiety for more than two years since I first started my job but did not know that it was anxiety. Recently I got to know about it and made lifestyle changes like leaving my job and moving back home. The anxiety is less now because of having no job stress. But the application time for the fall 2018 semester in the US is approaching and I really need to make a decision right now. I feel like I do not know much about this illness or how to cope with it. I don't know if it is insomnia or anxiety, but because of it, my performance was suffering in the job and my manager was unhappy with my performance before I left. For these reasons, my confidence level is zero, I feel like I won't be able to keep up with a Ph.D. program and also work as an RA or TA since I do not know how to deal with the boss. Also, my anxiety reaches its extreme when I start working seriously and can't sleep enough for days. The condition at home is very poor, all of my family members are suffering from illnesses and since I do not have any friends right now, seeing them suffer breaks my heart. I feel like running away from home so that I do not have to see them suffer. If I could help them financially it would be very useful for them and so it is a source of pressure too.
So right now, I am fearful of my potential adviser (if he turns out to be unsympathetic to students), seeing a therapist here in my country, getting fired from my Ph.D. program when I get into one or staying at home with the risk of worsening my anxiety for not having any help.
I have options like going for the Ph.D. program in the US and see a therapist over there. It's a benefit that they have enough data about people like me. But I do not know how to work with a therapist and if I'll be able to help myself and also keep up with the grueling schedule of a graduate program. There will be other challenges like a new culture, not having anyone to talk to, etc., and I'm not good at making friends. So I don't know if it will be the proper step. I have been trying to get into a Ph.D. program for four and a half years now, so if I get fired it will emotionally crush me and take a huge toll on my confidence.
So what should be a rational step in this situation? I am willing to do anything to improve my mental health condition to get a Ph.D.
Thank you for being patient with this long post.

Do not give up on professional help just because the first attempt did not work for you. From experience of people I know, the technology does not yet exist to reliably know what prescriptions will work for a given individual. You should go back to the doctor, report the effects, and let them try something else.

Note that the problem of knowing what will work for a given patient applies even to simple physical problems. I'm on my third medication for atrial fibrillation, and my second blood pressure medication.

I do not have issues for the medicine not working out. I am terrified because he didn't explain what I had and that it was just stress that I needed to handle. It looked as if he didn't know much about this illness and prescribed the medicines just to get rid of me. He told me to give up preparing for PhD which was the most important thing for me that time. Now if I go to a professional, I will probably have to stay here a year and it is quite possible that he will advise me to give up PhD, which I can't do. I feel like there is no proper guidance here.

I've voted to close on the grounds that an answer to the question depends very much on the exact details of your situation in a way that won't generalize to other prospective students.  I will comment that access to mental health care is often quite limited on university campuses in the US and you may be overly optimistic about what would be available to you.

Unfortunately, mental health is not generally paid as much attention as it should worldwide. This said, looking at what some friends have gone through (small sample, though), the situation here in Sweden is much better than that in the US and the UK. Do your research before choosing a place, and consider your health, you only have one.

I voted to close because this is highly individual; however, I have something to contribute that will fit better into this box than the comment box.
If preparing your application makes you feel worse, don't do it.
If preparing your application makes you feel the same or better, then go for it.
You don't need to attend just because you are accepted.
Anxiety and insomnia are often related to each other like the chicken and the egg.  When one is anxious, one is more likely to lose sleep; when one is chronically short on sleep, one has a harder time dealing with difficult situations and is more likely to feel anxiety at an impairing level.
There are some conditions, such as obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), that tend not to go away unless a very specific treatment protocol is followed (exposure and response prevention).  However, many other types of anxiety do get better with more ad-hoc treatment approaches.  Even OCD does sometimes improve by itself, or through self-treatment, or through a less-than-ideal therapeutic approach.  And sometimes, finding someone who is a great listener is all that's needed.  So, why not look for someone you feel comfortable talking to?  Even if the therapist's formal studies haven't been hugely impressive, you still might find that it clicks, and talking with the person you found is helpful for you.
I'm not sure why you are concerned about the medications you were given.  I'm guessing maybe you're concerned about getting habituated and/or addicted.
The internet is a great place to find out about a particular medication's potential risks and side effects.
I have no idea what is at the root of your problems, and I don't even know what your symptoms and patterns of symptoms are.  Even a doctor wouldn't be able to match up medications with your needs after reading your post.  But what I can do is to share a list of medications that are sometimes helpful for anxiety and/or insomnia, tend to have a relatively low profile of side effects, and are relatively mild.  I'll include a tiny bit of information about each one.
Melatonin: over the counter (no prescription needed).  It's best to use the smallest dose that is helpful -- some people start with 1 mg and increase gently only if needed.  I have heard recommendations that the starting dosis be tiny, tiny -- by counting drops of the liquid form of the medication.
Zaleplon: 5 mg is the smallest dose (in the U.S).  This helps one relax and drop off and takes on the order of 20 minutes.  This is a relatively mild sleep aid and has a short half-life.  Some people are able to take it if insomina strikes at 5 am and still get up alert and ready for the day two hours later.
SSRI: sometimes helps for other conditions besides classic depression.  It can take up to six weeks to see an improvement after beginning to take it.  To be effective it has to be taken every day, religiously.  Dosages that are helpful for OCD are much higher than the standard dose for depression.  One has to ramp up slowly, with careful medical supervision.
Ativan or Xanax: these are in the Valium family and in small doses can help an anxious person stay on a more even keel.  Watch out, this is a medication that might be incompatible with operating machinery such as a car.  Note, one can cut the tablets up into pieces with utility scissors.
Zaleplon, Ativan and Xanax can be habit forming, especially if they're taken every day.
Regardless of where you are living, a big part of self-care involves building a support network.  It is generally more difficult to do this in a strange country.  However, maybe you could use the next 11 months to get better at building a support network, as practice.
Another good general coping mechanism is exercise.  You might find it helpful to start getting into good exercise habits now, if you don't already have them.  There are lots of ways of getting exercise and each person just has to find what's fun for them.
Now, about graduate studies: sometimes a person is able to feel better about him or herself when involved in a major endeavor, such as graduate studies.
It really is incredibly individual.
Note.  Just because the culture where you are is to hide anxiety, that doesn't necessarily mean you have to hide yours.

A little more:
Any therapist that tries to send you to grad school or prevent you from going to grad school is the wrong kind of therapist.
I want to share one possible non-medication intervention for insomnia: listen to a book on tape or a podcast that you have already listened to at least once before so that it won't be too exciting.  Set the timer feature on the mp3 player so it will turn itself off after 20-30 minutes.
There are also meditation or mindfulness tapes out there for insomnia but if you don't like them you might have better luck with what I described.

It is the most informative and helpful response I have found regarding my problem so far, I can't thank you enough. My sleep quality was way better before I took the medicines, so I might've developed insomnia after taking the medicines or I may be habituated/addicted. If it helps, I am off them for 10 months. Or it could be other events in my life which have caused this, but I'm not really sure. You know it's very hard to be sure about anything if you have anxiety.

I do zumba dance, it is the only thing that makes me happy these days, also writing :). And I feel good about myself if I'm involved in a major endeavor like graduate studies or working on writing a paper, but the problem is there is authority involved in this and I'm not sure if I'll be able to meet their expectations with my very poor communication skills and the impairing health problems.

@alu - Yes, anxiety can make a lot of things difficult.  Very true.  I thought of one more thing that can help you prepare for grad school: developing a positive identity by focusing on the flip side of disability/difference, e.g. the classic example of the blind person having extra acuity for hearing.  Another example might be a person with OCD having a great deal of patience with some technical aspect of their work. // It sounds like you've got some positive strengths to build on, including self-awareness.

I have been meaning to ask, do you think my symptoms suggest that I have OCD? Or you are saying that in case I have OCD then these should be done?

Take a look at the OCD checklist at https://www.tourettesyndrome.ca/forum/symptoms-diagnosis-and-treatment-of-tourette-syndrome/diagnosis-and-treatment-of-tourette-syndrome/4893-tourette-symptom-checklist?7737-Tourette-Symptom-Checklist= // you can fill it out and deliver it when you se a medical provider.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


text:
My supervisor wants me to sign an acknowledgement that I will not be listed as an author after I graduate. Can authorship be signed away like this?
I will be completing my PhD soon, and my supervisor is asking me to sign an IPR declaration where I have to mention the research works where I had direct or indirect contribution. However, it also states that I will not get any authorship in the resulting publication.
Here is the text of the declaration:

I will disclose any research result during PhD that may lead to intellectual property. I also completely understand that my name shall not be included as inventor/ author of the IP filing/publication.

This is not a university policy; only the students in my lab are signing this. I do not know where this document originated; my supervisor may have drafted it themself. I am not concerned about the IP part of this, but I do want authorship in any papers based on my work.
I have not yet asked my supervisor whether I have to sign this or whether I'm allowed to revise it before signing. However, my understanding is that he will want new students to pick up the ongoing work, but he figures (correctly) that new students will not be motivated to continue with mostly-finished lines of inquiry unless they are promised first authorship. So, this is his way of doing just that.
My question is, can authorship of someone's own research work be denied in this manner? I may have to sign it now under indirect pressure (to get a PhD without hassle with my supervisor), but can I challenge the declaration in future if papers are published based on my work that do not list me as an author?
Recent Update: I talked to my supervisor. He told me that he is not interested anymore in the particular work that I am concerned about and therefore he is probably not going to publish it. So according to him my authorship in that work is out of question. I am still clueless as he had shown interest in that work previously. Later he sent an email to me and other graduating students, requesting us to submit the IP declaration again. In the email he mentioned that "your contributions will be duly acknowledged", but he didn't ammend the declaration itself. Many of my colleagues (who are going to graduate) have submitted the declaration already and are not interested in arguing with him.

Some clarifications have been edited into the post and comments have been moved to chat; please everyone, post advice as answers (or in the chat), not the comments.

An explanatory heads-up here, not a chat element -- To understand the answers and comments, and why they've been offered, please notice that the content of the question has been considerably changed by the various edits made to it.

A famous example that came to my mind. The oil drop experiment that earned Millikan a Nobel price,: "[...] This remains controversial since papers found after Fletcher's death describe events in which Millikan coerced Fletcher into relinquishing authorship as a condition for receiving his PhD.[10][11] In return, Millikan used his influence in support of Fletcher's career at Bell Labs. [...] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_drop_experiment

Are you sure that you correctly understand the meaning and scope of the document that has been proposed to you?
It is generally hard to try, after you have signed something, to undo the effect of a written statement you have signed, and much better and often easier not to sign it at all.
If you are under some kind of pressure to provide a document of the kind proposed, then it would be advisable first to try to have a dialogue with your supervisor or other person proposing it, to try to understand better just what s/he thinks it should suitably cover or contain.  If you have taken part in an ancillary way in work that is mainly being done by others, and the circumstances are that you would not yourself think it fair for you to claim co-authorship in their publication, then in principle I see no harm in making a statement of the kind requested, so long as it is limited to that kind of involvement and that particular activity.
If on the other hand the supervisor turns out to be expecting you to make a disclaimer for work in which you have taken a part important enough for you to claim authorship or co-authorship, then you need to consider saying so, and claiming that authorship or co-authorship. There you have a potential dispute on your hands and you need to take advice beyond what is available in this forum.
If in addition the supervisor is really expecting you to make that kind of a disclaimer for work on which your part is really that of an innventor or coinventor, then the supervisor would be  making a proposal which is actually illegal in India as in practically all other countries, and the people who wrongfully apply for a patent as a result of it would be at risk, if discovered, of losing the rights and of subjecting themselves to other legal risks also.
But in my experience there can indeed be situations in which a person P has had a (definite but slight) degree of involvement with a piece of work and its investigators A, B, &c, but not so much that a co-authorship is warranted for P in the resulting publication by A, B... . P's part may be worth a collegial acknowledgement but no more.  Examples of such involvement can be those that go no further than generally useful conversation, or routine ancillary assistance.
If your department has a policy of clarifying the non-authorship of people in that ancillary position, and is not just aiming something specially at you, then I see no injustice or harm in your agreeing to take part in that precaution, just so long as you think carefully and take care about the breadth of any statement to which you may consider putting your name.
It may be useful for you to think through (1) which parts of your activities are those for which you definitely feel entitled to be an author or co-author in a resulting publication, and whether there are (2) activities that you have been involved with in an ancillary way, or parts you have taken in the work of others, for which you would not justly make such a claim.
If there is anything in category (2), then it seems to me that it would be reasonable and harmless for you to acknowledge it, as well as reasonable for the main investigators to ask for such an acknowledgement, to prevent disputes arising later. If there is anything in category (2) on which you feel prepared to give such an acknowledgement, then naturally the relevant description of the work of others to which your acknowledgement applies should be written in carefully limited terms, so that there is no risk of its effect 'spilling over' onto some activity or topic more important to you.
If you feel that you have not taken part in anything in category (2), i.e. that you have had no ancillary involvements that are too slight for you to claim to be a co-author, then your reply to your supervisor can simply be, that there is no work or activity in that category to which his proposed document would properly apply.
For your activities in category (1), the boot is entirely on the other foot. You should be prepared to state what your activities have been, and make positive claim of your activities and entitlement to be an author or co-author of any resulting publication, and you ought to be prepared to describe what those topics or activities have been. If, as it might seem, it is a policy in your department for ancillary helpers to be asked to disclaim being a co-author, then you should also consider making just that same kind of request in respect of any others who you are aware to have had an ancillary involvement in your own work that is so peripheral that they should not in justice seek to be named as author or co-author on the strength of it.

Your question asks "can" authorship be denied? That's probably a legal question, best suited for another forum. But you might also be interested in the ethical question, "should" you be denied authorship?
I'm sure that every field and country has its own norms. You live in India and study chemistry; I live in the US and study medicine. However, I believe the ethics of authorship are relatively generalizable.
The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors has provided recommendations for "Defining the Role of Authors and Contributors":

Who Is an Author?
The ICMJE recommends that authorship be based on the following 4 criteria:

Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND
Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND
Final approval of the version to be published; AND
Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are
appropriately investigated and resolved.
...

All those designated as authors should meet all four criteria for authorship, and all who meet the four criteria should be identified as authors. ... The criteria are not intended for use as a means to disqualify colleagues from authorship who otherwise meet authorship criteria by denying them the opportunity to meet criterion #s 2 or 3. Therefore, all individuals who meet the first criterion should have the opportunity to participate in the review, drafting, and final approval of the manuscript. [Emphasis added]

Thus, we can see that authorship should be an inherent quality of an individual based upon their contributions to the research endeavor, not a right or privilege merely to be optionally asserted.
Just because you sign a piece of paper, that doesn't somehow change your "substantial contributions" to the work.
Thus, I hold that ethically, you cannot and should not have your authorship discharged by contract.

So, what should you actually do?
I would recommend having a discussion with your advisor asking for clarification. I hope that most researchers would share the opinion that research team members that make "substantial contributions" to a work should be authors.
Perhaps you could have the wording of the document amended to something along the lines of:

I also completely understand that my name shall not be included as inventor of any IP filing. Moreover, I will not be listed as an author on any publication to which I have not made substantial contributions.

You neglect that contract  law may enter into the situation. Ethically, I agree. But what "should be" and what "is" often differ. And, of course, you can be bound by contract.

Say I email a journal and tell them I collected data, ran the analysis and wrote half the paper. Are they going to care whether there is allegedly some contract provision? That doesn't change the ethics. The journal isn't a party to the contract. Can you personally be sued for breach of contract? Probably. I'm not an Indian lawyer, but you can enter into contracts to do all sorts of unethical things in the US. That, however, is a question for Law.SE.

Now you seem to be giving bad advice. Should the OP publish independent of the institution? Yes, it could result in a suit. If the research is sensitive to the government in any way it could result in much worse.

I won't disagree with you that it could potentially lead to legal liability (I edited to clarify). But the question author hasn't signed anything yet. So I'm arguing they shouldn't agree to anything that is ethically dubious.

The four criteria of authorship you quote look unsatisfactory. If there is a coworker A who fulfils the first item about substantial contribution, and the fellow workers B, C, ... for no really good reason freeze him/her out of the rest of the drafting process, I don't at all see how that can nullify  A's claim to be named as a coauthor (and still less, if a patent is in question, nullify A's claim as a coinventor).

@Buffy  this question was on Ask Patents and it was suggested that the OP ask here also. If this was in the US one could contract to not have ownership interests in a patent they are an inventor of but a contract can’t change who is and isn’t an inventor and must therefore be listed.

@terry-s You certainly aren't the first to offer a critique of the ICMJE guidelines (For example this paper). Personally, I like the NIH OIR chart. But the ICMJE guidelines are relatively reasonable, have been around for a while, and they are a good starting place.

@george white : I quite agree with your point, and as I'm sure you would add or agree, it has legal force as well. Ian, I don't know what sort of legal status the ICMJE guidelines claim to have. Although as George implies they could be incorporated by ageement into a contract, that does not enable them to supersede features of legal relations that are not susceptible to nullification by agreement. The status and naming of inventors is indeed one of those things that by law are not optional.

@Ian I suggest you modify or withdraw your proposal to modify the OP's document. If his position is in truth that of a coinventor, your current proposal would have him colluding in an illegal act.

@terry-s the agreement the OP is faced with does not say he agrees to a falsified patent application. There may be no application or it could be carefully tailored to avoid claiming anything the OP made a conceptual contribution to.

Hello everyone and thanks for your comments. I didn't ask the reason for the agreement to my supervisor yet.But as I have known from seniors, the remaining works of the graduating research scholars (which have not been added or have been partly added to their thesis) are often given to new PhD students to complete. The new students are often interested in first author papers and often neglect to complete the unfinished works of their seniors. Therefore, this contract may be a way of letting the senior researchers sign off from their first  authorship claims so that the new students can get it

In the work I am concerned about, the work was partly added to my thesis and I did the remaining parts after thesis submission. Initially, we had plans for both patent and research paper based on that work

@george white : But if the OP in an IP disclaimer names activities in which he has actually (co)invented something, and the others do go on to claim patent rights without him, then he will have enabled that by his document. To the extent that he is aware, it doesn't have to say expressly 'I agree to a falsified patent application' to amount to collusion.

I agree with you in that hypothetical. In the actual case he has no idea what will be filed , if anything, and specifically doesn’t know what aspects of any potential invention might be claimed.

Based on your update, you are confused about what is being asked.
Your supervisor is not asking you to sign away authorship; he is asking you to sign away any patent rights you might have.
Doing so looks a little sketchy. However, without knowing how you are funded, what your lab does, or what agreements you have already made, it's very hard to say that it's actually bad, and I would tend to think the intent is innocent.
Here is a quick example of how this might be entirely legitimate:
You are working in a group doing research on blood clotting. You finish up your work and move on. Five years later, your lab patents a cool new band-aid that instantly stops bleeding, and spins off a startup to start marketing them.
To make this work, they need clear ownership of that patent. It's actually fine if you have partial ownership of the patent (they can plan for it and negotiate with you), but it is very bad if you might have ownership. So to fix that, your lab demands that you claim any IP you might have before you leave, and waive claims to anything that you don't claim now. The language you posted looks consistent with that.

Of course, they could also be strong-arming you into giving up IP that you rightfully own because they are bad people. It just wouldn't be my first guess.

For comparison here are the University of London regulations  - see para 46 "In general, where a student creates intellectual property in the course of their studies which is capable of protection under registered or unregistered design right, patent or database right, those rights will vest in the University rather than the student."

@Stuart F : Well that looks like a selective quotation, elsewhere the Univ of London document appears to concede that students keep at least some of their rights. But generally it also looks like an attempt to create contract terms by unilateral fiat rather than by agreement, and in some respects it appears to respond to the law as it was about 50 years ago.  But I won't suppose that the defects of the document will matter much in practice, since financial muscle (here, of the university) so often trumps individual legal rights.

I'd argue that a) many university contracts contain broad terms like this, and b) they're not infrequently challenged as being overly broad - simply because a contract tries to claim rights over your work doesn't necessarily make it so, but it does make it expensive to dispute.

If you are an inventor, and the patent goes in without your name, the patent can be attacked and voided.  Inventorship should always be correct.  Inventors can assign royalties, though.

@terry-s Such terms are fairly normal for UK university rules for postgraduate research students. The university of Sheffield says "It will be a condition of registration for Higher Degrees by research that the student will agree to assign the Student Intellectual
Property to the University." However, they do agree to pay the student a share of patent revenue. https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/media/33590/download?attachment

Its also policy (if not regulations), that the position of the research office is that students do as they are told by their supervisors, and so by default, students are unlikely to be inventors.

You should not sign the document. It is common for PhD contracts (in the UK and USA) to have a clause stating that any IP generated in the university's facilities belongs to the university and not the student. If that is the case, then there is no need to sign the document. However, if it is not the case then there is no reason you should be pressured into signing away any rights of authorship or ownership that you may have.
Your supervisor claims that he is uninterested in the work and will not publish it. If that is true, then there is no benefit for them if you sign it anyway, which would make me even more suspect of their motivations. They may want to make their life easier in the future in case they realise some of your work has commercial/IP value - but you should not lose out for the sake of their convenience. Don't be afraid to push back on unreasonable requests.
Practically, you still have to deal with your supervisor and get your PhD. If I were you, I would first check what my signed PhD contract (including any official departmental policies you agreed to at the time) says. If the situation is still unclear then I would say I'm not comfortable signing something without getting independent advice (e.g. a lawyer) given how broad the scope is, and make sure that any communication with your PI regarding this issue (e.g. if they hint that not signing will delay your graduation) is in writing. You can see from the other comments here that it is very unclear what you would actually be agreeing to, and that is reason enough to not sign something.

I am going to try to answer this from a legal perspective. You should really consult an IP lawyer if you have concerns over this.
Yes, you can waive your right to be named as an author. The most obvious cases of this happening are where there is a “ghost” writer. But quite often an employer will ask that you waive these rights too. In the EU/UK this would be called waiving your Moral Rights.
However, when that is done the document/contract that states this will be quite detailed, not three lines.
I am not a lawyer, but if I were I would seriously doubt the validity of this document, or at least what it purports to achieve. The first reason for this is that you evidently believe that you are being coerced into this position, and contracts formed via coercion cannot be legally enforced.
The more elaborate arguments against it involve the terms stated "shall not be included as author/inventor". This is an odd turn of phrase. Great, you are not named as author/inventor, but can you still claim to be the author/inventor? Are you entitled in equity to the benefits of authorship/inventorship? If the answers to those questions are “yes”, then for practical purposes you would be the author/inventor. That is to say that you get to claim authorship/inventorship and you get all the financial rewards of such…
The main purpose of contract is to attempt to remove doubt from any agreement between parties. The agreement you have posted does not appear to achieve that in any realistic way.

The declaration is rather sweeping, and while it may be meant to facilitate transfer of projects, it could be made oppressive.
Since you are close to finishing your PhD, most of your primary/'first author' manuscripts would presumably be in some partially prepared state. Your interest is to secure those. The best move would be to send those manuscripts to your professor over email before signing the declaration.
This may not be practically feasible, so you could mail the professor a list of manuscripts that you have planned, and ask if these could be exempted from the declaration.
The point of having it on mail is that you have tangible support for your case, should there be any future difficulties.
Personally, I don't read any bad faith into the declaration, but it is certainly unusual. There may be mitigating factors though; one is that the continued research (across batches of students) is funded by the same grant/funder, and continuity of work is essential. This would also explain why it is lab policy, rather than university policy. Still, you must take reasonable measures to protect yourself.

yes. The work is part of a funded project and a part of the declaration also mentions that we will not continue the same work in some other laboratory after graduation. But I still don't understand the authorship part.

The intention may be that you can't claim authorship for any future publications that come out through the work of your successors.


text:
Job applications and explaining the reasons for low research output in my application. Looking for feedback and if it could be seen as an excuse?
I'm back again with what should be my final post as I truly figure out the damage caused by my horrendous Ph.D experience (the D in my Ph.D could stand for diminishing returns at this point). It is also probably somewhat of a sequel to this post I made 5 months ago: Conference, poster, and publication gaps due to COVID and poor advising. How to explain for the future?
There's no need to read the above post, but it can help give some context for this one (if you want to see the recent ones go ahead and review my recent posts).
I am currently writing a research statement for a tenure track position I am applying to near my hometown. My odds of getting it are probably next to none, but I want to do so anyway since I was told by peers and faculty that research statements are expected for post doc and certain industry positions. I have not come across any that interest me yet. However, I feel like if I write this Research Statement now, I will at least have a template should I want to go back to it for different positions. What I am doing now, like most things these past 6 months, is preparing myself for future job positions and ruling out what my options are right now.
I wrote a paragraph that explains my low research output. No mentions of the drama that happened between me and my first advisor or anything like that. If I am also being upfront, when I write this it feels unfair to me almost. First two years it was nothing but doing requisite stuff in my program that may have lead to publications and I was not allowed to work on extra projects whatsoever that could have prevented me from being in my present situation. Even then, I don't know if my present situation is all that bad (visiting full time position at a SLAC, fellowship requirements I will fulfill by teaching this year). Now, after an advisor switch, I was expected to propose (which I did in 7 months) and casually go back to working on research with new health issues (e.g., PTSD, borderline cognitive functioning)? Good news is that I recently found out one of the sources of my problem and treated it.
Here's the paragraph:

My current research work output at the Ph.D level is reflective of the
limited research output I could possibly generate given when I started
my doctorate studies (Fall 2020) and budget crisis at [Ph.D program
name] one academic year after I matriculated into the Ph.D program.
After matriculation into my Ph.D program, I had not yet graduated from
my Master’s program until December 2020 due to passing with revisions
at the last possible defense date for my Master’s program.
Furthermore, my main task my first year of my Ph.D program was
finishing electives via approved coursework on top of ensuring I
graduated from my Master’s program that Fall 2020 semester or I could
not continue the Ph.D program. It was not until my second year of my
Ph.D program and I was finished with coursework that I could pursue
additional research projects. However, I was only permitted to pursue
my doctoral candidacy qualifier project and data collection for a
follow up project as far as research activity goes. Additional
projects I had planned on continuing with my first advisor were
abandoned due to my first advisor leaving the program. I am currently
in the beginning stages of planning future studies with my current
advisor ([advisor name]) that I am willing to continue at
[college/university], but it is unlikely that a postdoc will be funded
to continue those studies right now.

Far too lengthy and too negative.
All you need is a simple statement: My research output at the onset of my Ph.D. was hampered by the Covid-19 pandemic, and further compounded by my advisor leaving the program.
That's it. People will get it.
If the rest of your CV is strong enough to warrant looking at you further, people will understand and just focus on what you have done since. They don't want someone who is going to dwell on all the wrongdoings done to them. Save the explanation of how it all went down when you go for drinks off the record (we all have some stories about stuff that went wrong). If the rest of the CV is mediocre, a lengthy statement of what could have/should have been likely wont make any difference.
Stay upbeat and focus on the positives. Leaves search committees with a better feeling about you as a candidate.

Absolutely. The magic wording for describing hardship in an application goes something like this "Despite challenging circumstances A and B, I was able to achieve X and Y".

Great advice. I imagine most readers will tune out of OP's paragraph before even noticing the key point of "advisor leaving the program".

@r1nano This is good overall. One thing I'm wondering is whether I should save the paragraph for the beginning or end of the statement. I've also considered bringing that up in my cover letters for other jobs but I'm not sure yet.

The most important thing to remember about your cover letter and CV is that they are advertisements. That's why the last paragraph is so important here.

@zzmondo1 - I would suggest adding this wherever it is relevant in terms of flow. If you have enough interesting new results to discuss in your research statement, then this could just be a line in your cover letter. Just draw attention to what you have done, and be enthusiastic about it, don't worry so much about what you couldn't or didn't do.

@zzmondo1 - additionally, the reason I emphasize enthusiasm, especially if you are thinking about academia is that someone who can be positive and enthusiastic is going to engage students much better, both in terms of supervision and teaching. You want to show them that you can be successful and that people will want to work with you. I understand your position though, and you just want to feel like people understand that you are capable of so much more, if only things were fair.

Delete the paragraph entirely. Burn any paper copies and smash any hard drives that contain it. To be brutally honest it makes you come off as a whiner with zero agency that blames everyone else for their problems. I know that sounds mean; I phrased it that way for the shock value to drive the point home.
First off, no committee or hiring manager anywhere cares all about statements that involve could, should, would, might, etc. The care about what you did and accomplished.
"But bad things happened to me!" you say. I agree. But faculty members lead groups. You're responsible for your not only your own research and success, but the budding careers of your postdocs and students too. You must be a problem solver and tough and resilient in the face of adversity because many people depend on you. The committee wants to see evidence of resilience and resourcefulness, not that you have a tendency to play the blame game.
Second, as a general rule, never draw attention to your weaknesses. Faculty applications are extremely competitive. Actively advertising you have a sub-par (in your opinion) publication record harms your application with no upside. If your record isn't strong enough you won't get hired - no number of statements and paragraphs trying to explain it away will save you. And you don't even know for sure if your publication record is considered weak anyway, maybe the committee thinks it's fine.
Third, another general rule is never air your grievances. Similar to the above, it draws attention to your complaints instead of your successes. It unfortunately doesn't matter how justified you are - the committee doesn't have the facts. They'll think "seems reasonable, but there's always two sides to this story." They know you're biased in your favor so they'll naturally consider how things look from the other side. They'll wonder things like "why didn't they move with their advisor?" and "why did they halt data collection, are they not self sufficient?"

... I don't know if my present situation is all that bad ...

Now this is the right attitude! Advertise your accomplishments as best you can, highlight your strengths and ambitions, and hope for the best!

I might edit this into my original post, but part of the reason I'm likely going to go with the light one sentence mention that @r1nano suggested is because my current advisor's letters of recommendation always mention my advisor leaving the program. As for why I couldn't go with her, it was because she's at her new university's department of education rather than psychology. I later learned (after I told my grievances to the director of graduate studies) that she couldn't have been my primary advisor even if she wanted to because she was at another institution and department.

I find this statement too wordy and difficult to follow.  It reads like an excuse, rather than an explanation.  I understand the compulsion to explain (I faced this same issue for different reasons), but it can end up reading like a complaint, or knocking yourself too much.
Where I am we have the concept of "relative to opportunity". It is important to separate what were limitations on opportunity, and what was a result of your choices/achievements.  Eg the fact that you were doing your Masters during your PhD is a consequence of not doing well at your Masters - not a lack of opportunity.
Importantly, including such a statement in a job application needs to increase your chances of getting the job - and preferably the entire application should show why you would succeed if the lack of opportunity were removed.  As @R1NaNo pointed out, a simple statement of limitations is best.  Elsewhere you want to highlight your successes to show that given opportunity you will be able to produce the outputs.

Good points. I should note that the delay during my Master's was not due to me not doing well in this case (even though that's true of coursework in my Master's). The delay was because I wrote my thesis proposal for my original idea. When COVID hit, I was told to just defend a pilot study I did my first year in the program as my Master's thesis.


text:
Is it worth resubmitting updated application materials a second time over poor sentence flow?
I am a fourth year doctoral candidate in Experimental Psychology who should be graduating this summer with my Ph.D.
I recently resubmitted application materials for a visiting position one month after the deadline for one position and a few days after a deadline for another because I had noticed an institution's specific name from my previous application was on there by accident.
However, I noticed two sentences had extremely bad flow. Here they are: "Finally, I am interested in advising students if there is ever the opportunity to do so. I
would also like to start and advise an Autism Spectrum Club branch if there is ever a chance to do so as well." For the applications that are due tomorrow (March 1st), this is how I edited it, "Finally, I am interested in advising students if there is ever the opportunity to do so. I would also like to start and advise an Autism Spectrum Club branch."
Is it worth emailing the chair and giving another resubmission that they can forward to the committee (they already did so for my first one)?

It's not bad flow. It's repeating a phrase almost word for word, and using more words than you needed.

CrimsonDark's answer from your other question is still very apposite here: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/208054/is-it-possible-that-my-previous-milestone-projects-masters-thesis-quals-pro You spend an inordinate amount of time worrying about, frankly, utter non-sense and your quality of life would improve substantially if you learned how to handle this appropriately with the help of a professional instead of trying to outsource this task to Academia SE.

No, don't do that. You already resubmitted once, and something trivial like this would just make you stand out in a bad way. Save resubmitting for like "I got a huge grant."

You worry too much. Individual sentences do not make or break applications. You did your job in submitting your file, now move on mentally and be productive with things that help you build a future career.


text:
Reviewing papers for MDPI: general feeling as a reviewer
So simple question for those that already reviewed for MDPI: how did you feel about the quality of the other reviewers (in general)?
I have reviewed a handful of papers now as I feel it is necessary (in the end others review my papers too), but I am starting to have serious doubts about the "level" at MDPI.
Maybe it depends on the journal/paper etc, but for most of the papers I reviewed it ended in me feeling rather idiotic to even bother.
(on a side note: I avoid MDPI to publish in, it is really my last resort to publish something in, if I have no other option, but this does not really happen).
To summarize:
One paper was a copy paste of another paper, they just changed the molecule they used. Now I can get this, but there is a difference between bluntly copy pasting (even certain mistakes from this previously published paper in MDPI) were kept(!!). I was the only reviewer to actually review this paper. The other 3 pretty much just gave it a go to be published. Which made no sense, the language was awful, there were critical errors in the paper. On top of that, after review round 1, all of a sudden there were extra authors on the paper (and the editor never said anything about this even though I mentioned this in my review report).
Another paper: 2 reviewers, I had some minor remarks, but still some issues and the paper also had several issues language wise. The second reviewer just accepted the paper as it was and congratulated the authors on the splendid work. The paper was mediocre. Nothing special and it contained some errors.
A third paper: I wrote a long list of errors, small things, some bigger ones. In general the paper was again mediocre but ok. It could be published if they removed these issues. The 2 other reviewers barely mentioned anything. They just had a few points (like 3-5) that were really minor things. It seemed they never really bothered to read the paper.
Now I know this happens in other journals as well. I even reveiced "reviews" from reviewers while it was obvious they hardly bothered to read my paper, but MDPI seems to top the cake to be honest.
The duality I am facing now is: should I bother to review for MDPI again (and at least try to improve the manuscripts) or not bother anymore and only review for other, more reputable, journals?
I might be a bit naive as I know other (reputable) journals might also have shitty reviewers.
I specifically ask about the experience of reviewing for MDPI, not about their reputation MPDI in general.

Should I accept review requests from dubious journals? seems more relevant than the duplicate target used for the question's closure.

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.

I voted to reopen because the question is about the reviewing experience, not whether MDPI is reputable. I will write also an answer one day, but not yet - hopefully in another 2 weeks to a month.

Does this answer your question? Is MDPI a reputable Academic Publisher?

This seems like an answer to https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/5466/is-mdpi-a-reputable-academic-publisher and not a new question.

Reviewing experience is the best way to judge if MDPI is reputable, so this is about whether MDPI is reputable.

Why focus the question on a specific publisher? the question is very interesting and of general scope, when formulated as
"should I bother to only review for reputable, journals?"

@Allure I disagree with the reopening, because OP asks "should I bother to review for MDPI again (and at least try to improve the manuscripts) or not bother anymore and only review for other, more reputable, journals?" which is very close to asking if MDPI is enough reputable since there are other journals more reputable.

@EarlGrey Hmm Anyon's linked question might be the more appropriate target, then.

Their business model is set up to collect $ from academics as efficiently as possible.
To this end, MDPI's modus operandi is simply to obtain the minimal peer review evidence that makes them sufficiently reputable in order to collect $.  This means they are not interested in quality review.  They just want to use a reviewer's name to validate their process.

Just a personal remark (that to some extent answers the question, for me personally). I usually have many things to do and am asked to review regularly, by several journals. I will strictly do reviews on a first come first serve basis. I will not be hassled by tight deadlines, and for sure a tighter deadline will not make me prioritise a review. Furthermore I decline as a matter of principle all requests that give me three weeks or less time, as this will not normally work according to the first come first serve rule.
More radically, as people know how busy everyone is, I think that if somebody sets a review deadline at less than three weeks, they implicitly communicate that they don't want a thorough high quality review, and consequently I won't review for them. This rules out reviewing for MDPI as far as I know them, but note that this is not exclusive to MDPI, and their reputation is not the issue here. However I'm not surprised in the least that they get crappy reviews given the time frame in which they're working.
I do know that high publication and reviewing speed is seen as desirable by many, and if somebody else is able to produce a good quality review in 10 days, fine by me. Still I value quality over speed, and quality takes time in my world.
Later addition: Once more not exclusive to MDPI, but... the problem with commercial publishers who use the model that the author and not the reader pays is that they have an economical incentive to accept papers. This will often play out as accepting papers more easily, and being generally more positive than critical reviewers, including potentially ignoring reject recommendations, although this will depend on the individual editor and journal. Some may be concerned enough about the scientific reputation of their journal to not accept all too bad stuff, others may accept far more than a competent and critical reviewer thinks they should.

Great sum-up of the issue I have with publishers. I wonder why the publishers take forever to post-process / edit the manuscripts, often with horrible results, while they almost exclusively try to save time on the peer-review process.
Additionally, I wonder why I still have to spend a huge amount of time preparing the figures: the publishers could have/provide great tools (something like "I provide you a dummy but representative dataset, you prepare many figures, I pick the one I like").
So many questions to the publishers, but they don't care, they still get 40% profit margin.

I both reviewed for and published with MDPI multiple times.
My experience is in line with what is often written here: MDPI will simply look for other reviewers if they dislike your peer review report. A few months ago, I reviewed a seriously flawed paper in my field (nutrition). The authors completely misinterpreted their data. Reviewer #1 asked for minor revisions while I could not recommend the paper for publication (based on the flawed methodology). They asked for a third reviewer who finally approved the paper. It is now published - review reports did no not appear because the authors did not select open peer review.
In 2022, I submitted 3 papers to MDPI. One to Nutrients, which is one of their flagship journals. Two (well-known reviewers) asked for minor revisions which made me skeptical... In this case, peer review was open. In another instance, the same happened. A paper that has been rejected by other Q1 journals underwent minor revisions and was published in 21 days with MDPI. Finally, I had a paper with 3 reviewers that asked for major revisions. After 3 rounds, all reviewers were satisfied and indicated that the paper is suitable for publication. MDPI rejected it and invited me to re-submit it to another MDPI journal.
For me, MDPI is gambling. It is not transparent and I would only submit papers to MDPI that you may not publish elsewhere. I am honest about that.
As for peer reviewing, I only review articles for MDPI from people I know. The constant pressuring for deadlines makes me uncomfortable. 5 days for a major revision is simply not enough in my opinion.

MDPI will simply look for other reviewers if they dislike your peer review report. I have to downvote this is incorrect: it's simply implausible that MDPI can do this and still keep up their blazing-fast review times. Consider, if each reviewer invitation asks for a review in 10 days, and the first reviewer takes 10 days to return a report that MDPI dislikes, then the earliest they can get another reviewer report is 20 days after submission. This is simply too late even by MDPI's timeline.

As far as I can tell, MDPI solicits three reviewer reports as the standard operating procedure. Chances are the other two reviewers simply did not read the paper in as much detail as you did (or did read the paper in detail but didn't have more recommendations), which seems to mesh with your case 2 - the reviewers are well-known and still recommended only minor revisions.

Finally, about this: After 3 rounds, all reviewers were satisfied and indicated that the paper is suitable for publication. MDPI rejected it and invited me to re-submit it to another MDPI journal. Do you have any indication that it was MDPI that rejected it and not the editorial board member handling your paper?

It depends on the journal but some invite "only" 2 reviewers. I had manuscripts accepted based on 2 review reports. 3 reports are not always required. For the last point, you are right. I cannot tell whether it was MDPI or the editorial board to reject our paper.

I think the target is 3 reports, but sometimes it's not possible and the journal has to make do with 2. Examples are if a reviewer agrees to review but does not submit a review, or if one simply cannot find three reviewers, to the point where the first reviews are already submitted but there is still a third missing. MDPI certainly does not invite only two reviewers - they invite many, many more.

For the last point, does the decision email say who the handling editor is? I know there's an email that names the assistant editor assigned to the paper (who is an MDPI employee), but does the decision email name someone else? If so, could that someone else be an editorial board member?

Disclaimer, I worked at MDPI at the time most of this answer was written.* I also have had extensive experience in academic publishing, albeit for other publishers.
The question of whether reviews at MDPI are worse than at other publishers is difficult to answer, because to write a full answer one needs access to every journal's & every article's reviews. I don't have that kind of birds-eye view of the operations. Individual editors see only a subset of their journal's articles. More senior editors can see all the journal's articles, but there are a lot of them, so they are not likely to check every article's reviews. I'll still write an answer based on the reviews I've seen firsthand. The following numbers are for the journals I work with. Because different editors do things differently, what I see might not apply to the journals you see.
For the reviews I have seen firsthand (most of these papers are still under review, hence the relatively low number of reviews per paper):

Number of papers: 11
Number of reviews: 15 (all written by different reviewers)
Number of reviews that include detailed comments: 10
Number of reviews that do not include detailed comments: 5

Definition of "detailed" I'm using is if the review is >2 paragraphs in length, after excluding requests to cite X paper or simple English fixes. This definition is not ideal, but it's simple, and does not require subjective judgment.
Several of the reviews with detailed comments are extremely detailed reviews, spanning several pages, with two reviewers running their own calculations and including those calculations in the review (!). Among the reviews that do not include detailed comments, there was one review that basically asked for some citations without saying much else. The other reviewers still clearly read the paper, but didn't have much to say.
Compared to the reviews I saw at other publishers, broadly speaking, these reviews are excellent.
However, I have several comments about these numbers:

Peer review is a rather stochastic process, and some reviewers will just write poor reviews. We can see this in the Who's Afraid of Peer Review? sting from 2013. Briefly, a Science correspondent submitted a fake paper to several open access journals, and:

Of the 255 papers that underwent the entire peer review process to acceptance or rejection, about 60% of the final decisions occurred with no sign of actual peer review. ... Only 36 submissions generated review comments recognizing any of the paper's scientific problems.

So about 40% of 255 papers (=102) were peer reviewed, of those 36 of 102 (~35%) noticed the paper's scientific problems. In other words, about 65% of peer reviews did not notice the issues. Even if some of these reviews are themselves faked, the numbers are large enough that it seems likely that some reviewers simply didn't notice or care enough about the problems. This would mesh closely with my own experience. I clearly remember one Distinguished Professor at a major R1 university in the US writing a review that said nothing except "I recommend revision, and you should cite the following papers all written by me", so seniority & publishing record doesn't preclude a reviewer from writing poor reviews.

It should be obvious that if the editor reaches a reviewer who is very familiar with the topic of the paper, then it's more probable that the review will be good. Conversely, if the reviewer is not really familiar with the topic, they more likely to either write a poor review, unless they "get familiar" with the topic (which is a time-consuming process).

Since the MDPI standard operating procedure is to have MDPI staff identifying and inviting reviewers, and since the processes at MDPI are so accelerated (we request reviews in <2 weeks), I think it is relatively likely that MDPI reaches reviewers who aren't the best-qualified to review. In theory, these reviewers should decline to review the article, but some number surely accept anyway and then write a poor review. That could explain what you're seeing. If this is indeed the explanation, it'd indicate the editor(s) you interacted with aren't very good (whose name is on the emails inviting you to review?).

As I wrote above, compared to the reviews I saw at other publishers, these reviews are excellent. However, this could also be explained by me becoming a better editor (which definitely happened - my current journals are closer to my expertise, and I have been putting in a lot more effort than I used to when selecting reviewers).

For the record of the 15 reviews above, 3 of them were by reviewers not invited by me. Of those three reviews, one is very detailed (this review is one of the two where the reviewers did their own calculations); the other two are not.

MDPI allows reviewers to volunteer. One of these papers had three volunteer reviewers, but all three were plainly unsuited to reviewing it (no relevant expertise), so they would likely have written poor reviews too. I don't know why they volunteered. I declined all of them, but another editor might not have, which would probably lead to what you saw.

Finally: for the question "should you bother?" I think this linked question is highly relevant. Ultimately it's up to you, and you should not feel pressured to review. There is one thing that I do wonder about though: if you are the only reviewer for a manuscript, would you feel troubled? If yes, then that seems problematic for a lot of journals (I've written some papers that received had only one reviewer myself). If not, then what the other reviewers do doesn't seem like a major concern, and certainly a less important one than whether the authors take your comments seriously.
Update: I've since had the chance to look at more papers handled by other editors. Roughly 50% of the reviewers for the papers I saw had no relevant expertise in the topic (here I count, e.g., Stephen Hawking as having no relevant expertise for a surface science paper, even though surface science is a branch of physics and Hawking was definitely a physicist). Interpret as you will.
*I am no longer affiliated with MDPI.

I am a young researcher in the field of Solid Earth (geology and seismology). I have reviewed 6 papers and so far, I have a good impression of the journals I review for, namely Applied Sciences, Earth, Sustainability, and Remote Sensing.
Among them, I rejected 2, suggested major revisions 4. All of the manuscripts followed my suggestions with 2 rejected and the rest improved a lot after major revisions. None of them has been published and is still in revision (maybe from another review) with the time from submission ranging from 1 months to 6 months.
So I think in my field, MDPI journals are pretty fine. It seems the quality heavily depends on each journal, and I hope MDPI is improving its reputation.