ethics - Should I report a PhD student’s incompetence to their supervisor?

I had a short exchange of mails with a PhD student who wished to ask some questions about a paper of mine, which was troublesome in many respects:

• 
  

  The student had a blatant lack of basic knowledge and techniques of their field. (Imagine a computer scientist not knowing what object-oriented programming is, a mathematician not knowing what fields are, etc. They did not change fields for the PhD.)

  
  


• 
  

  The student should be able to answer some of the questions with very little work.

  
  


• 
  

  Initially, the student did not give me even remotely the information I needed to answer their question in a useful manner.

  
  



• 
  

  The student seemed utterly overwhelmed with their project.

  
  


• 
  

  There were strong hints of a “do my work for me” attitude.

  
  

For the purpose of this question, assume that I am very likely correct in my assessment. Going into details about why I arrived at this conclusion would be beyond the scope of this question and be disclosing too much. I also wish to make clear that I am not annoyed by the questions or similar, I am just worried about the situation.

I am now wondering whether I should write a mail to their supervisor (whom I don’t know and who is not at my institution) informing them about this incident. My considerations so far are:

• 
  

  I am pretty confident that this student will not finish their degree (by honest means). As long as they continue with this, they waste time and resources: their own, their supervisor’s, and other researchers’ whom they are emailing.

  
  


• 
  

  If I were this student’s supervisor, this is something I would like to know since it can prevent me from wasting my time and resources on them. On the other hand, I hope that I would quickly notice these qualities in a PhD student.

  
  


• 
  

  This problem will likely escalate soon anyway.

  
  


• 
  
  

  It’s the supervisor’s job to talk to the student and give them the possibility to clarify in case I misjudged them. However, if I am wrong, my information may wrongfully harm the student if the supervisor overreacts or the student’s image is tainted subconsciously.

  
  


• 
  

  Depending on the situation, such a communication as mine may allow the supervisor to smoothly get rid of the student – which is good if I am right and the student is incompetent, but bad if I am wrong.

  
  

My question is this: Is there anything else I should take into account when making this decision? (I know that, at the end of the day, I have to weigh the arguments myself.) Note that I already sent a mail to the student but am skeptical whether they got the message.

Answer

Reporting your concerns to the student directly is probably your best option, for reasons beyond those already mentioned.

1. 
   

   Contacting the supervisor escalates the situation dramatically. Dealing with any ensuing situation might take away time and energy you need for your job. Do not borrow trouble.

   
   


2. 
   

   The student asked for your help and will likely benefit from your feedback.

   
   
   
   
   • 
     

     From the question, we do not know whether the student has already reached candidacy.

     
     
     
     
     • If not, they would benefit from hearing directly that they need to improve their skills.
     
     
     
     • If so, they may need to review the material, be less lazy, or have a reality check about their path. They can recognize which option is relevant for them, more than you can, or even than their supervisor can.
     
     
     • Either way, an appropriate response might include: "The questions you're asking can be answered by applying core knowledge from [key subfield--especially if this is a subfield that usually has its own qualifying or comprehensive exam]. Please check with your supervisor about these points, and she can contact me with further technical questions."
     
     
     
     
   
   
   • 
     

     A central problem seems to be professional communication, and you could address that directly with the student.

     
     
     
   
   
   
   



3. 
   

   The question did not specify that the student and supervisor are at the author's institution.

   
   
   
   
   • If they are not co-located, this would complicate the idea of informally chatting with the supervisor and would likely force the conversation to be through email.
     
     
     
     • Under U.S. law, this email becomes an "education record" for the student, which would be turned up in the (hopefully unlikely) event that the student is acrimoniously parted from the program and has a competent lawyer.
     
     
     • Other jurisdictions may not have the same law, but emails can be forwarded and may still drag you into a mess or reflect poorly on you out of context.
     
     
     
     
   
   
   • Feedback from an outsider may have a larger impact on the supervisor's judgment of the student than the author anticipates.
     
     
     
     
     • More prominent academics are often more distant supervisors, and this supervisor may have had very little contact with the student to compare this with. By Bayesian updating, your assessment would loom large in the supervisor's mind.
     
     
     • If the author and supervisor are in different countries or at institutions of different status, the supervisor may feel ashamed that the student attracted your negative attention.
     
     
     
     
   
   
   
   


4. 
   

   Finally, if you communicate about this with anyone, do not say anything remotely like: "I am pretty confident that this student will not finish their degree (by honest means)." (You stated this as an assumption, but it is not clear to me whether this would be part of your intended message.)

   
   
   
   
   
   • If I received a message saying this about a student I supervised, it would sound like you suspect academic dishonesty, an extremely serious charge.
     
     
     
     • If you have such a suspicion, it is worth approaching an ethical advisor (an ombudsperson?) at your institution and/or the student's institution, beginning with hypothetical questions.
     
     
     • If you are merely worried about the student's competence, do not appear to impugn their ethics.
     
     
     
     
   
   
   • Whether a student will finish is a very difficult judgment to make accurately.
     
     
     
     • Since your contact with the student appears to be limited to this unflattering correspondence, you may not see the student's countervailing strengths.
     
     
     • There are many different doctoral student trajectories. Traits like taking initiative (as demonstrated by cold-emailing the author of a paper) and perseverance help students who are behind academically make up their deficits and finish.
     
     
     
     • Let's assume you could accurately peg the student's odds of graduating at 25%. Stating your conclusion that the student is unlikely to graduate and is a poor target for resources (even if phrased as a "worry" or otherwise softened) will draw everyone's attention far more than the specific details you have to offer. Whomever you communicate with about this, recognize that the base of your evidence is limited and refrain from extrapolating.