Talk to an employment attorney. This sounds like potential "bait and switch" practices that have strung you along for less pay/accumulated earnings. I'm sorry

Talk to an employment attorney. This sounds like potential "bait and switch" practices that have strung you along for less pay/accumulated earnings. I'm sorry you got such a mixed signal from your engineering tree and the promotion committee. Need to do more research on that promotion committee. This sounds like the committee nightmare that many PhD candidates face.