Fact sheet · Primary sources
Did Sahra-Josephine Hjorth claim to have a completed PhD?
NOT SUPPORTED BY REVIEWED PRIMARY SOURCES
Claim reported
Media reporting questioned whether Sahra-Josephine Hjorth had represented herself as holding a completed PhD when her doctorate had not been awarded.
What I actually stated
The reviewed primary sources repeatedly distinguish my doctoral research from a completed doctorate.
A contemporaneous CV states:
Ph.D student
and immediately underneath:
Thesis submitted (defense pending)
The same document separately lists completed degrees, including my MA from Aalborg University.
The biographical material prepared for my Singularity University faculty profile likewise identified me as:
PhD fellow Sahra-Josephine Hjorth
The final version of the biography continued to use "PhD fellow."
Primary-source record
The reviewed record includes CVs, institutional biographies, faculty correspondence and formal funding materials.
Across those sources, the terminology used about my doctoral status includes "PhD student," "PhD fellow," "PhD researcher" and "awaiting defense."
Assessment
Not supported by the reviewed primary sources.
No reviewed primary source shows me personally representing that I had been awarded a completed PhD.
Third parties did at times use inconsistent terminology. That is a separate factual question from whether I supplied or authorized that terminology.
Primary sources
Contemporaneous CV, Sahra-Josephine Hjorth
Sahra-Josephine Hjorth · CV
"Ph.D student" / "Thesis submitted (defense pending)"
Establishes the doctoral status stated at the time and identifies Singularity University as the affiliation for workshops "at the NASA Ames Research Centre". Home address and personal phone number redacted; all other text unaltered.
Unrelated personal information has been redacted.
UnFoLD Grand Solutions application, Appendix C and attached CV
2020 · Innovation Fund Denmark · Application appendix
"PhD Fellow" / "awaiting defense"
Establishes how doctoral status was formally presented, and distinguishes ongoing doctoral status from completed doctorates. Third-party email addresses, phone numbers, private addresses and dates of birth redacted; all substantive text unaltered.
Unrelated personal information has been redacted.