Professor will not write a letter of recommendation because I have restricted access to my records under FERPA, is this legitimate? I am preparing my tenure-track faculty application materials for the current hiring cycle, and I'm thinking of replacing one of my reference writers with one of my PhD committee members (I'll call him Dr. Z). In addition to serving on my committee (I successfully defended my dissertation earlier this year), Dr. Z was a co-author on several journal/conference papers and a former instructor for several classes in which I did very well.

I sent an email to Dr. Z asking him if he would be willing to provide a letter of recommendation for me. His reply:

  I have been informed that you have FERPA restrictions on your academic
   records.  I cannot provide reference letters for you or speak on your behalf to any potential employers with FERPA restrictions in place.

When I first enrolled at my PhD-granting institution, I placed FERPA restrictions on my academic records. Specifically, I chose to have my directory information removed from my school's online directory. I'm not a control freak, but I do tend to take advantage of mechanisms which help to prevent any of my personal information (such as home address, etc.) falling into unknown hands.

I have no reason not to remove the FERPA restrictions, but I hate the thought of removing them under these circumstances. However, I also understand, and appreciate, anyone's right to provide (or not) a reference for whatever reason(s) they choose.

I am left wondering, though:

Is there a legitimate reason that someone in Dr. Z's position would have for wanting to see my academic records prior to providing a reference?

Edit — For what it's worth, I am seeking out reference writers, such as Dr. Z, who can speak to my research capabilities, not about how well I did in their class.

David Z's comment is dead on: it is an unpleasant technicality that under FERPA regulations, one should not discuss the student's performance in any quantitatively specific way.  E.g., one should not say "Mr. X got an A in all my courses" or even "Mr. X was the top student in the course".  The exact rules are confusing to many faculty members, to the point where one feels like if one took FERPA too seriously one might not be able to write a suitable letter.

In my university there is, in theory, a form that a student can fill out to waive the FERPA regulations on a letter-by-letter basis.  In theory this means that if the letter is getting mailed to N institutions, one should fill out N forms.

(The above considerations apply to all students, not just those who have asked for special protection.  However, a student who places further restrictions on their records is precisely going on the record as being especially concerned about their privacy, so in practice it makes a lot of sense to take the FERPA restrictions much more seriously for these students.)

It may or may not be the case that Dr. Z is himself trying to access or view any of your academic records.  (I guess he must have done something to find out that your records are FERPA-restricted though.)  Whether someone would look up a student's grades in courses taken by other faculty members must depend on the people and the institution.  For instance, at my institution I have access to the grades of all undergraduate students -- and I have been informed of the FERPA requirement that I access them only for legitimate, educational purposes -- but I do not have access to the grades of any graduate students, even my own advisees.  So in practice when I write letters for students I speak only about their performance in my courses -- but again, if they were FERPA-restricted and I was being suitably conscientious then I would even then have to be extremely careful about what I could say and likely be forbidden from including a certain amount of positive information about the student.

Also:

  I have no reason not to remove the FERPA restrictions, but I hate the thought of removing them under these circumstances; this tastes a little too much like blackmail to me.

Even assuming that Dr. Z wants permission to access your records and not just to talk about them, I think you are not viewing this in the right way.  "Blackmail" seems ridiculous to me: one of the conditions for that is that the blackmailer must have something to gain!  What does Dr. Z gain if you waive or even entirely remove your FERPA restrictions?  The pleasure of viewing some of your academic records??

For my part, I am curious as to why you chose to place restrictions on your academic records at all: what are you protecting yourself from, really?  It sounds like you may not completely understand what FERPA restrictions mean and may have just taken them on as a sort of free insurance.  If I were you I would learn more about this.  In my opinion, one could argue that "I have FERPA restricted my records" and "Please write me a strong recommendation letter" is already a bit of a mixed message.


Teaching Citation: Are there any Journals which Fully Apply APA, MLA or Chicago Citation Rules I'm interested in doing a little casual survey.  As many of us have been through undergraduate training where citation rules are expected to be applied exactly, and sometimes even marked as if they were mathematical equations, I'm wondering if all that learning is even worth it.  Does anybody know of any major or middle-level journals which actually demand any of the major citation systems to be applied, or do all such journals have in-house systems?

If most journals do demand strict adherence to any of the style manuals then it follows that there is good reason to teach such systems, but if none or few do, then these systems should not be taught as they are but adapted to what is actually practiced.

I believe all the journals published by the APA request strict adherence to the APA style manual. Similiary, PMLA, one of the two journals published by the MLA, asks for submissions in MLA style. University of Chicago Press publishes a lot of journals, but the first one I found asks for submissions in Chicago Style.

My experience with APA journals is that they allow for fair amount of flexibility in the submission format. I doubt any journal will reject submissions that use italics instead of bold or a comma instead of a period. They will likely fix these issues during copy editing,

As for the comments on the questions that just use Endnote or BibTeX/Biblatex to handle it, the problem is that most of these style guides are not designed to be programmatically implemented. It took a lot of work to get biblatex to fully implement APA 6 and there is no BibTeX version that is fully compatible.


Does the International Math Olympiad help research mathematics? I was reading a note of Hojoo Lee on inequality which is written for International Math Olympiad (IMO) participants. Although he writes that “target readers are challenging high schools students and undergraduate students“, it appears to be quite advanced.

It occurred to me to ask, do these IMO problems contribute towards research work in math? Do these math notes/books give good overview for research work?

I am not interested in examples of Fields Medal winners who had previously participated in the IMO.

I think of Olympiad problems more as "parlour tricks". They're really difficult, and it's super-impressive if someone's good at them, but the skills are very different to the skills you need in research. As a big example of a difference: the Olympiad rewards quick accurate leaps of reasoning, because you're under such time pressure. Research rewards long-term grit and persistence through blind alleys and repeated failure.


Expected issues upon graduating with a second Masters in Electrical Engineering after first Masters in Computer Science I obtained MS degree in Computer Science degree some 7 year ago from a decent German state university. Since then I majorly worked in system software roles and occasionally embedded software and hardware. Over this time I have also developed keen interest in designing circuits for signal processing but my skills are very limited.

I am therefore thinking of going for further higher education in area of Integrated Circuits. However I donot want to go for PhD as its 5 year investment. I also looked at continuing education programs, but I couldn't find anything interesting. I am therefore thinking of doing second Masters degree in Electrical Engineering.  I would be applying to schools in US and Europe which are either equal or better established than my alma matter.

The question is what issues can I expect to face when looking for work after graduating with two MS degrees: one in Computer Science and recent one in Electrical Engineering

It isn't that uncommon to have two master's degrees. Several people I know did it as a way to switch fields or they did a BS/MS program and then got a second MS en route to their PhD at a different university.

I can't imagine how this would cause any issues for you at all. You just have to consider whether it is worth the time, effort, and opportunity cost required to get another degree. General advice seems to be that you should consider getting the degree if (1) you need it for the job you want or (2) you are just very interested in the subject matter.


How to make group work work? Occasionally I have some material to cover that is best presented in the form of take-home group projects.

Some student groups manage to find a way to coordinate their work well and to complete the projects successfully, with every team member benefiting from the collaboration. Other groups do not do so well:

Some groups evenly divide the work, but still work in isolation, losing the benefits of working with peers.
Some groups push the work to one or two students, while the remaining students merely contribute their name.

I wonder if there are strategies or tools instructors use that can encourage more groups to operate successfully while they are working outside of class?

I think first it may be worthwhile to accept that in any group work situation there is the possibility that people will worked siloed (or isolated from one another) or one or two people will push the work forward while others are relegated or chose to remain in a passive state.

There are some good reasons for this. I recall being a student with a pretty solid GPA, group projects were a horror for me. If the project grade is based on the overall project and does not take into account individual contributions this meant that students who were less focused on their GPA would be willing to turn in something that was not up to my standards. This led both to situations where other students refused to do work on the project (knowing that the stronger students would carry them in order to avoid dings to their GPA) and to situations where stronger students would freeze out other students (ie the stronger students would choose to take all the work and not let other be involved) in order to maintain control over the project.

Group projects are often used as an analogy for working in the 'real world' where working in groups is the norm. The fundamental difference is that in most cases if a peer is completely slacking or sending in subpar work there is a concrete structure to monitor and handle that issue (which doesn't always work of course but there's almost always more accountability than in academic group projects). You can mimic this behavior in an academic setting by splitting up the grades for the project. Don't give one 'group grade' to everyone, instead have students report on who did what (this is particularly effective if you can have them set this early in the project instead of during turn-in) and correlate the students grade to both their work and their work in the context of the project. Having this set up early can be a great way of preventing aggressive or strong students from freezing out what are perceived as the 'weak links'.

Additionally consider regular checkpoints on the project. This will let you get a feel for the interactions in the group and the content being produced while also minimizing the opportunity for a student to jeopardize the group by waiting until the last minute to work on their part (this will still happen to some extent).

In short - add more structure to the group project. This increases the workload on your end but it mitigates the most common issues you'll see in groups during group projects.


As a grad student how to approach a possible breakthrough research? I am in this peculiar position whereby I started off my grad school in subject X and got very boring projects in it and eventually around my 3rd year I started studying a new subject Y  (partly because I met some inspiring profs in Y who motivated me)

Now in some sense it was just lucky that after about 6-7 months of working in this new field I along with another co-grad student hit upon a breakthrough research idea possibly solving a famous long-standing open question in this field Y! It was sheer luck that we hit upon an idea which seems to work! (though we are struggling hard to prove the theorem)

Now when I am trying to officially shift departments/institutes to pursue Y, I am explaining in my statements this new possible breakthrough that we hit upon. But I am a bit worried as to how senior established profs in Y will react seeing such a thing in my statement.

I think all answers till now are completely missing the point of this question and what I am worried about. So let me break-up the context in parts.

(1) In mathematical stuff no one wants to put on arxiv a "possible" method unless one has a rigorous proof for it to work. If we had a proof then I wouldn't be asking this question!

(2) In my SOP if I don't write about this progress then what else do I write about!? This is the main stuff that I have been working on ever since I decided to shift fields. So I don't see a choice but to write about this idea!

(3)  The professors who have seen the idea seem to have no opinion at all. They take the view that unless there is a rigorous proof how do we know whether this is right or not. At this point all evidence is numerical simulations. (and the prof who originally inspired me to start Y remarked that he had himself independently also tried one of the ideas we came up with)

(4) I have anyway linked from my SOP a draft which explains the idea.

As a good researcher always be cautious with "breakthroughs". I would explain that you think it is a good idea worth pursuing. Coming off too strong may put new professors off. Unfortunately I have witnessed many times people believe they have come across breakthroughs when they are nothing of the sort. I think partly because unlike how science is portrayed in the media, "most" excellent science is a long grind, through years of experiments, thought, collaboration and trial and error. The road is often long and winding, and to approach someone well versed in the field with a "breakthrough" may be hubris. But, if it is a strong idea and worth pursuing with good reasoning/logic/science behind it, I cant see a problem convincing anybody in your field the importance of what you propose! Good luck!


What will help a master student more a Research or One extra subject? Obviously a master student with some beneficial research efforts instead of an extra subject will boost up his/her confidence in future, but students sometimes want to do masters with extra subject due some reasons specific to them.
I'm asking for some motivating and appealing answers so that a master student should give extra respect to their research tasks, which will route some new directions for the humanity around the globe.

I would choose extra research over an extra course. The experience you will get out of a research can be invaluable as in analysis, logic, critical thinking, writing and submitting a paper and so on. For me, if you like a course and can't get enroll in it, you can always buy a book or get some notes and read it on your own time. It is much harder to do research in your own as an MS student. Of course the aforementioned points can vary based on your field. From a civil engineering PhD student point of view, research weighs more than courses. PS, you can always attend courses as a listener (for no credits) or take it if you do a PhD.


Why do some academic journals requires a separate "summary" paragraph in addition to an abstract? At least in the field of biology, some academic journals have added a separate summary paragraph (for example: "Significance Statement" (in Journal of Neuroscience), or "Significance" (in PNAS), or "In Brief" (in Current Biology)) in recent years. Why do the publishers think an abstract is not enough?

They serve slightly different purposes.

Specifically, the abstract is what you'd tell your coworkers; the significance statement is more like something you'd tell your mom.

The abstract is meant to quickly summarize this particular paper. A good abstract will provide a little bit of context or background, lest readers wonder why you're studying gene X or brain area Y, but the bulk of the abstract is approach and results. "Here, we show...." The significance statement is meant to put your work in a broader context and explain/justify why your article is worth publishing. (I suspect these are also helpful in attracting media attention, if that is of interest).

For example, suppose your paper investigates an antibiotic resistance gene. The abstract might look somethng like this one from MacMahon et al. (2009):

  The ardA gene, found in many prokaryotes including important
  pathogenic species, allows associated mobile genetic elements to evade
  the ubiquitous Type I DNA restriction systems and thereby assist the
  spread of resistance genes in bacterial populations. As such, ardA
  contributes to a major healthcare problem. We have solved the
  structure of the ArdA protein from the conjugative transposon Tn916
  and find that it has a novel extremely elongated curved cylindrical
  structure with defined helical grooves....

This briefly hits on the context, but doesn't really delve into it. A significance statement would talk more about this healthcare problem (e.g., X patients have multidrug resistant infections) and how this paper helps solve it (target for co-treatments or whatever?).

Edit: take a look at the PLoS Computational Biology guidelines and examples (linked therein) that @cheersmate found for some more direct comparisons.


Funding problem - salary scale - CNRS I am here to discuss about a funding problem I am having and I heard a lot of post-docs had before, but I couldn't find any testimony or tips.

My problem is the following and it is very simple. I got lucky to obtain my own funding from a funding agency, the name of which I can't reveal at this time. Of course I was thrilled and few days after the beginning of my contract the funding agency told me the money has been transfer to my institute. Then, I got my first pay check and I had the unpleasant surprise to notice a difference of ~2000euros (before taxes) between what the funding agency was supposed to give me and what the institute was giving me.

Obviously I was surprised and when I asked for reasons it seems the institute has some salary scale and they put me on those scale instead of giving me the money from the funding agency. And obviously they are keeping the rest for themselves.

However, this isn't true for all post-doctoral fellowships. Another post-doc in the same institute with a Marie-Curie fellowship isn't on those salary scale. Right now my PI (which support me 100%) and I are still in the middle of the discussion and I am looking for person that have a similar problem to help me find my way out of this trap.

The institute I am fighting with is the French institute: CNRS. I have nothing against them, but I think our work is hard enough to do research, get funding without also needing to fight for the money we are owed.

Edit posted as answer:

I haven't discuss yet with the funding agency because I am still hoping that the institue will re-evaluate the situation.

What I have understood is that a agreement has been signed between the funding agency and the CNRS that allow the CNRS to pay me based on the salary scale. However I'd never been aware of such agreement. And obviously such agreement will only benefit the CNRS that will keep 48,000€ (24month x 2,000€) in the transaction.

In addition, as I said this agreement only include some fellowship but not all of them such as the Marie-Curie fellowship. But I have no idea why.

You find yourself in a tricky situation.  Universities often try to establish equity among grantees, regardless of whether a funding source could in theory pay higher or lower salary.  The way I've seen others deal with this is through a preemptive negotiation with the university. The scales tip in their favor, because you'll probably apply anyway, but I've seen some wiggle room on salary.  But after the fact would seem unlikely. Worth a shot. But, if the granting agency in good faith believes you are making X compensation but you get Y, they might not be happy about it. If you ask your granting coordinator whether you should inform the agency if the discrepancy, it might get some attention.


Switching labs, need advice on how to communicate with old PI regarding project I’m currently a master’s student (rising second year) wanting to applying for PhD, in the US. I completely switched field with the M.S. program so when I chose a lab, it was not an entirely educated choice. Now, after the first year, I knew what I’m passionate about and I am switching to a new lab once the fall semester starts.
I already told my current PI that I’ll be moving and he is supportive. However, he wants to push me to finish my current project, which he says won’t take too long. From my experience working on the project, I know that is not true. I also want to apply to a PhD program with the research interest of my new lab, so work in the new lab will be my priority.
Usually, I wouldn’t mind work the old lab project on the side to finish it up. But I’m taking 60 credits at a prestige private university that’s well known for its stress and heavy course load.
I told my PI that I don’t want to bite off more than I can chew and it’s in the lab’s best interest to find someone who can focus and prioritize his lab work. I would be actively in contact with my successor to help them familiarize with the data. However, he keeps saying this isn’t much work, and I should be able to finish it.
What should I do? I want a good letter of recommendation from him for the PhD application too.

I can generally see two motivations for your old PI to have you finish the project:

He benefits from a finished project and does not want to pay the price (time, risk, money) of training a successor.

He thinks that finishing the project is a good career move for you as you gain experience in wrapping up a project (and he can write that in his recommendation letter) or possibly a publication.

Something that is very important to consider here and in my experience often underestimated by students is this: It takes quite a while to familiarise yourself with a project so you can efficiently work on it. You never hit the ground running. The details strongly depend on the field and individual project, of course, but just to give an example, my rule of thumb for four-month projects is that the student has to be up to speed after three months and then most of the valuable work is done in the last month.
To estimate this for yourself, think about how much time and energy it would take you to re-do the work you already did on the project with your current knowledge  (i.e., minus familiarising yourself).
Compare this to how much time you actually spent on the project.
Now, there may be some tedious experimental chores involved that simply cannot be made more efficient, but maybe you do not need to do any further of those or these can indeed be done by somebody else.
It may also be worth considering how much energy the remaining work will cost.
It may be very stressful for you, but it may also be some rather enjoyable, relaxing, and satisfying activity compared to everything else you are doing.
Finally, it may be worth noting that one thing your PI may have experienced and wants to avoid the following:
A valuable project that is nearly finished gets abandoned because the student quit or finished and was unwilling to do the few final pieces of work that can be easily done by them and only by them.
The reason for this is that the student does not recognise how much they could have benefited from finishing the project.
And training somebody else to finish the job is not worth the effort.
With all that in mind, I suggest to talk with the PI with all that mind.
I suggest to ensure to address the following points:

What work does still need to be done?
This is both about what he wants from you and what you think this requires.
What of this work needs to be done by you and what can be done by somebody else?

What’s the amount of time and energy you estimate to spend on this work?

How do you benefit from this?
Does this yield valuable experience, a better recommendation letter, a publication, etc.?

Mind that how direct you can be with all of this depends on your old PI and cultural factors.


Why is it unethical to share the contents of an exam with students who haven't taken it yet? Ever since I have known the term academic integrity, I have known that it is bad to breach it––I have known that it is in my best interest to maintain academic integrity and in the best interest of all others. However, recently, I have been wondering why it is so detrimental to break academic integrity though only in the context of assessments. For example, consider the following hypothetical:

Background
Roger is a student in university in History class 1. Jacky is in history class 2. Both classes are of the same curriculum. Roger has a history exam on Monday. He studied hard and took the test. There was one question that he did not know the answer to.
Situation:
During lunch, Roger told Jacky about the test, that it was easy for him but that there was one question that he did not know the answer to. He tells Jacky the question. After lunch, Jacky found the answer to the question that Roger told her about in her notes. On the exam, she got the question right.

Roger's grade was not harmed by Jacky's success. Grades were not determined through a stanine, percentile, etc. In the end, Jacky knew the material needed for the test, even though she was told what to study.
Why is it extremely unethical and considered a breach of academic integrity in almost all cases to share test material with others? What detrimental effects does it have on the person receiving the information/hints?

Why do you think that cheating, or more generally any breach of academic integrity, has to be of direct and immediate detriment to each involved person? The basic idea, to my understanding, of academic integrity is that by violating it, the system as a whole suffers, which is clearly not the same as there are direct negative consequences for each involved individual.

In your example, cheating on a test* can easily be very positive for the individual that is cheating (assuming (s)he is not caught, and also ignoring that (s)he probably did not learn what (s)he was supposed to learn, which may lead to trouble down the road). Of course, for the academic system in total, cheating students are pretty bad, as they severely undermine the value of examinations.

Similar arguments can also be made for other cases of academic honesty - as a young researcher, it may be quite positive for me to build a great career on manipulated data and forged experiments, but for science as a whole this would clearly be terrible.

This of course leads to the question what incentives rational individuals have to not act against academic honesty. Those fall into two basic categories: fear of repercussion and ethics. Both categories are easy to understand. Clearly, it may work out great for me to cheat on tests and forge my data, but it may also easily be discovered and backfire on me - and if it happens, the consequences are typically dire enough that overall it is not worth the risk for most. Further, as academics we are nurtured in the thought that academic honesty is the foundation of science. Hence, many (most?) academics would not want to violate academic honesty for personal advantage even if they knew for sure that they would not get caught. It is simply our understanding that the entire system is based on academic honesty.

*By the way, your scenario would not ubiquitously be considered cheating. For instance, in my old alma mater in central Europe, sharing test questions with the next year of students is completely normal and a widely accepted practice among faculty and students. Goes to show that what is considered ethical also differs among regions and institutions.


Self-endowed chair in the US and Europe Endowed professorship is very common, but the financial endowment normally comes from external sources. Is it also common that a professor/research endow his/her position to establish a research group in the target university?

It should be an excellent approach for mid-level professors/researchers who can establish a research group in a top university (where it is normally hard to get that position) and get research fund from external sources such as industry and funding agencies.

This is of mutual benefit for both the university and professor, but I have not heard about such positions. Is it uncommon or just through private contracts?

UPDATE: Apparently, I confused endowed and named chair with research professor. I asked the question about research professor here. However, I still do not see a contradiction between research professor and self-endowed professor. Does a endowed chair must be necessary result of a huge donation to university? or a foundation can merely fund a professor position. If it is the latter case, one should be able to fund his own endowed position too.

Endowed professorship typically are the result of a large donation of money to the university that allows them to fully fund a position in perpetuity based on the earnings on the initial donation. This is generally much larger than what an individual can bring in from external sources. If you manage to bring in that type of income, you will likely have little problem obtaining a permanent position.

I am aware of one independently wealthy individual who made a large enough donation to establish his own professorship. Basically he spent a small fraction of his wealth (which would be a large fraction of the wealth of most academics) to become a full professor with minimal teaching and service duties. His research was funded from his charitable foundation and I believe the foundation paid the standard overhead rates. He was reasonably productive throughout his entire career and probably could have obtained a professorship without using his personal wealth, but given the competitive nature of the job market and limited availability of positions, probably not at the institution of his choosing.


Can one earn money from a product developed during research? I have recently shared a video on LinkedIn about a project I was involved in while working as a part-time Research Assistant. Besides this project, I have a number of other robots that might be commercialized.

Having shared this video, I received several messages asking whether this robot will be soon on the market or whether we have an early adopter program.

This is something we have not even remotely considered. Can a product that has been developed in University be conceptualized or made commercially available by the University or the Research laboratory?

I know some people that started a company and turned their PhD research into a startup. But this is not something I am considering. In this case, the University is the owner of the product that has been developed and we are not allowed to take anything outside the campus.

If I invent something while I am working in the domain of the University, can revenue be created by selling this product?

The answer - at least in the US - is pretty well always "yes", it just depends on who has to sign off on the legal agreements and what they want in exchange for doing so.

The most common path is that institutions will have some equivalent of an intellectual property office, which handles legal agreements, licenses, royalties, etc. Most big institutions now have a requirement that staff must report any potentially valuable IP to them so they can protect and/or sell it and/or disavow it as it pleases them.

In R1 institutions, this isn't a rare thing - it's big business, with many regularly bringing in tens of millions or more in yearly revenue agreements.

However, in general Universities won't directly sell products. Instead, they will license out the tech to whoever wants to do business. It is common even for institutions to offer exclusive licenses to their own students/faculty to develop companies, provide seed funding grants, offer placement in incubators, and provide the licenses in such a way that there are no up-front costs and money is only owed back to the institute once revenue has gone beyond some threshold (often a few hundred thousand USD, but YMMV).

The big complexity is generally in how the project was funded and what the IP agreements everyone almost inevitably signed somehow indicates. Contracts where the government was involved in granting can get a bit more complicated, but generally the whole system has grown to be very accommodating in favor of people finding a way to bring more money into the system. Go figure.

Of course, a University rarely if ever sell the products in any kind of direct relationship. Instead there is a system of licensing and so on that moves that over to private companies, with the institution getting a piece of the action.

Some systems are more generous than others (and others more aggressive in claiming ownership over as much as possible), so you'll need to check with your local intellectual property office if you are interested in knowing more precisely how things work in your neck of the woods.


How did researchers find articles before the Internet and the computer era? I find it hard to write a literature review, even though I have Google, the Internet, and all free, very easy to search for information tools.
I have to search for days to find a piece of information that is related to my research.
I really would not be able to do that without the help of the  internet and the technology.

This really makes me wonder how people in the past did that:

Did they have to read the entire book to find a piece of information?
I know they might have used the index, but still this wouldn’t have given them the details of what they were looking for.
Does that mean people in the past (before the Internet) worked harder to achieve their degrees?
Does that mean that research before relied less on references?

We depended on libraries and librarians. Grad students would spend hours in, say, the math section of a good academic library, going from book to book and taking copious notes (on paper, of course).

But, often enough, the next paper we needed to look at wasn't in that library at all, so you would go to the librarian and ask for a loan of the resource from another library.

But it was also an important technique to use the librarian as a 'knowledge expert' who could, and would, suggest things for you to look at and places to look. I don't know if librarians still get the training to do that.

And, of course, you could ask your colleagues for hints about which rocks to uncover to find the gems.


How should one interpret a requirement that a proposal in pure math be "jargon-free?" I'm applying for a fellowship wherein they ask for a long proposal about what I'm working on (a PhD thesis in pure math).  Then they advise me that some of those evaluating me will be from non-math departments, so the proposal "should be jargon-free."

Right off the bat I guess [PSL2(Od):Γ] < ∞ is out of the question...  I could explain what a manifold is to a mixed audience, but I think they'd need to do some homework before they followed what it might have to do with finite index subgroups of Bianchi groups (or whatever topic you might be studying).  Without the "jargon" I feel like my whole language for it is gone. Afterall the reason we have so many definitions is because each one refers to a distinctly defined thing that we previously had no name for!

I can see that I could take a more historical, conceptual perspective, but I'd still be dancing around what I'm actually doing.  It's especially hard to summarize something that is not even fully developed.  I think that for people who don't study math, the only reference point is science applications, but those don't really exist here because then it would be applied math and not pure math.

I'm coming up short looking for anyone addressing this online.  There are multidisciplinary tips about writing proposals, but I think the accessibility problem is at its biggest with pure math.

I think that the key idea here is that they want to know why you are doing what you are doing more than what you are doing.

Let's say you're diligently working towards establishing an isomorphism between soliton elves and the christmas-tree singularity.  That's all well and good, but:

There are lots of properties in the world.  Why is isomorphism between soliton elves and the christmas-tree singularity an interesting property to try to establish?
Is there a higher-level strategy to your approach than "just do lots of math until the problem is solved"?
Why is the approach that you are taking a good one?
If you establish this property, what are the consequences, and what comes next?

A really good and clearly written proposal should be able to have its logic grasped by pretty much any scientist, whether or not they are capable of judging its originality, plausibility, and significance in detail.


How to engage in discussion after a presentation on an unfamiliar topic? Sometimes I am in a conference presentation or seminar which there are only a handful of audiences, and after the presentation the atmosphere simply urges the audiences to ask questions or the presenter will be embarrassed. I do want to contribute to a meaningful discussion, but the problem is that I am unfamiliar with the topic, and after listening to the presentation, I can only understand the background briefly. I cannot formulate a good question after the presentation.

You may wonder why I attend a presentation which the topic I am unfamiliar with, and sometimes it is driven by curiosity, and sometimes it is compulsory (like invited speakers from my supervisor etc). I know it may be possible to formulate a good question by reading the publication of the speaker beforehand, I have tried it actually but the efforts to understand an unfamiliar topic seems too much, and it may not worth it especially I cannot come up with a good question afterwards.

I don't want to be looking stupid after a presentation, but also don't want to start a discussion which is not quite meaningful just because nobody raises a question. Is there any way to help one to start a good discussion for a topic which I am unfamiliar with after a presentation?

In general I agree to what @user46345 and the others said: If you do not have a good question (and no good reason to ask one anyway) it is better to be quiet.

However, sometimes it is important to ask a question. Two examples that come to my mind are:

You are the discussant of the talk (and you had no opportunity to read the paper before the talk or the speaker already answered all your questions in his talk).
You have a very shy audience that whats to ask questions but no one wants to be the first one to ask.

But there are probably others.

The best thing to do would be to read the paper first and think about a question related to it. If that is not possible there are still some other options to use:

If you haven't understood something during the talk: ask about that.
It is not your field of expertise, so no one expects you to know
everything about it.
In most fields a very common type of question is about applications. In economics this could be "What are the policy implications
of your results?". @JeffE has the following examples for (theoretical) computer science "Does your algorithm work well in practice?" and for non-theoretical computer scientists "Does your technique have any theoretical guarantees?".
"Sensitivity analysis type questions": Is the assumption A crucial?
How would your result change if you change assumption B? They still
require some knowledge of the subject but not as much.

These questions can be used as backup as long as you still have some knowledge about the topic of the talk and you have paid attention (asking something the speaker explained 10 minutes earlier makes you look really stupid). However, it is usually better to avoid asking questions than forcing you to ask one.


How to anonymize submissions and ensure each student gets exactly one chance to submit? I am teaching a subject for a group of students I have not met before, and the exam coming up. It is a 14-day take-home exam. My previous experience with examining similar students indicates that there is a somewhat widespread problem of failing to answer in sufficient detail or sufficient rigor. (My subject is rather "mathematical", but the students are rather "not mathematical", so they are not used to mathematically rigorous thinking.) When reading their answers, I feel I would like to ask about the omitted details*, and I suspect quite many of the students would answer my additional questions correctly. If only I could provide them this chance...
I thought of allowing the students to submit their drafts early. Then I would glance over the answers and comment on those who should be expanded or detailed, without indicating whether the content of the current answer is correct or not. I think this would achieve the goal.
However, there is the problem of anonymity. Normally, the students submit their answers to an online system which anonymizes them and only then do I get to evaluate them. The system cannot be used for early draft submission, though. Another way would be for the students to send me e-mails with their drafts, but that would breach anonymity. Question: Could you recommend a solution of how to anonymize the draft submission? I also would like to ensure that each student is only given one chance to submit the draft (which seems like an additional difficulty in designing an anonymized system).
*You could suggest to formulate the questions absolutely precisely so that there is no way a thoughtful student would miss what the answer should be and how detailed it should be. I am trying this to an extent (taken to the extreme, it would make the questions awkward), but this does not always work as well as I would like. Also, what I am trying to evaluate is primarily not the mathematical rigor but the general understanding and some other things. As long as a student can answer correctly and in sufficient detail (regardless of whether this is right away or after additional questions/comments from me), I feel the student deserves a good grade.

In an online file sharing system (e.g. dropbox, google drive, onedrive...) create as many folders as you have students. Create a share link for each folder with write access.
Send the share links and the list of student emails to a trusted third party, and ask them to randomly assign a share link to each student.
Tell the student to upload (anonymously) their submission to the shared folder they were assigned to.
Upload your own feedback in the same folder.

It's a bit of a hassle but it works. There is a trusted third party involved, but you cannot get around that (just like for your exams proper, there is a trusted third party involved, namely, the online system).

Federico Poloni asks why a third party is strictly necessary. As this is a rather trivial question, I do not expect to be able to find a citation in the literature, but here is a mathematical proof. For simplicity, assume that there are two students, A and B. The instructor must give some information to A and B such that

the instructor can verify that no student submits the same work twice;
a student cannot impersonate another student to get around this restriction;
the instructor must be able to provide feedback regarding some submission and ensuring it arrives to the correct student.

Because of 2, the instructor must give some different piece of information to A and B to "sign" (in a cryptographical way, for example), their submission. A different key must provide a different signature because of 3, but the same key must always yield the same signature because of 1. Without a third party, the instructor must know what key is given to each student. It is then trivial to reuse that information to know what key yielded what signature, which can be use to breach anonymity.


Is it ethical to post (part of) my research question on the internet? I do research in math. A lot of times, I get stuck. I wonder if it's considered ethical to post questions on which I get stuck on internet sites, for example Math Overflow or Math Stackexchange.

If the question is just a small step or something already well-known, it is probably a waste of time to reinvent the wheel myself (and I don't get credit for doing so.) On the other hand, if it turns out to be a crucial step, then I could potentially be dishonest if someone on the internet solves it and I claim it's my own work. Sometimes it's not easy to tell beforehand which case the question will fall into.

Posting questions is ethical, the issue is with appropriate credit and potential collaboration. I would say that  most answers will be directions to published work that covers your question, if the question is about problems already solved. In this case, you just have to reference the books or papers that you used.

If it turns out to be an open question, it probably won't be answered in a simple post on internet sites. In this case, in the best scenario, you could find people that will collaborate with you in a more permanent way, till you both solve the issue and, eventually, publish a paper.


My advisor shared my unpublished/ongoing work with another student without notice My work has been rejected from a conference. I am working on it to get accepted. As the conference is annually occurred, I think at least 6 or more months will be required to make another submission.
However, I just noticed that my advisor shared my work with another student without notice. The other PhD student asked me how to apply my method into his project, which I was pondering for one of my next action items.

I am upset about my advisor, because he barely provided feedback on how to improve the outcomes. He does not copy his discussion with another student.
I felt like he just tried to share my ideas to have more publication.

I understood that students should discuss and collaborate each other to improve research. According to another student's email, he does not seem to have any intention for collaboration. He just mentioned that he read my draft of paper and considered applicable to his research, so he just wants to know the implementation details.

I understand the value of collaboration. However, I am not sure if another student and I are supposed to work together, since my advisor did not inform anything about discussion with this student. The other student does not seem to have any intention of collaboration.

Should I just talk to my advisor not to share my undergoing work without any notice and inquire if I am supposed to collaborate or not?

There are two things that you need to address here: your advisor sharing your work with the other student, and the other student's request.

Regarding your advisor sharing your work, you should talk to your advisor about this but do NOT express anger. S/he was probably doing what they thought was best and did not realize it would upset you, and it is VERY important to keep a good relationship with your advisor, so I wouldn't start a fight over this. Just a simple "I appreciate this opportunity to help them with my methods, but I would appreciate it if in the future you would check with me first before showing my drafts to someone." or something similar. Keep it low-key, do not go in angry or expecting an apology, just express your preference for how situations like this should be handled in the future.

Regarding the second situation with the other student -- ask them if they'd like you as a collaborator on their paper! It's never too early to start working collaboratively!


Alternate university course allocation mechanisms When it comes to course enrollment/registration in a limited-enrollment course, most institutions use a sequential system where students pick their course schedules sequentially (often ordered by seniority, then first-come-first-served or randomly within groups with the same seniority). Some institutions, particularly business schools, use "bidding mechanisms," where students bid (in bidding points, not real money) on the opportunity to take over-demanded courses.

These have their advantages and disadvantages, but it seems like there ought to be other ways to handle course allocation. For example, a university might use a system like a sports draft, in which people pick just one course at a time.  Are such draft systems actually used and are there other interesting non-standard ways of handling registration for restricted-enrollment graduate or undergraduate courses?

A clarification: By sequential mechanisms, I mean mechanisms in which students one-by-one select their full course schedule for the upcoming term. Obviously some systems allow a group of students to register within a given window. I still count this as sequential as it is processed sequentially: the order within that window is determined by the order in which the students in that registration window submit their requests. In economics and mechanism design, this is typically referred to as a sequential dictatorship (or a serial dictatorship, which is slightly different only in that the order is predetermined and not dependent on previous selections).

The following institutions have (or had) non-standard course allocation mechanisms. Please add to this list if you know of others, or add additional links if you can find more detailed information on the various systems.

New York University Law School (cannot find a link describing the system)
Wharton (Course Match, a bidding mechanism)
MIT Sloan (Sloan Course Bidding, a bidding mechanism)
Harvard Business School (Cross-registration, lottery based)
Harvard Kennedy School (Course registration, a bidding mechanism)

Other resources on course allocation mechanisms:

A blog post by Michael Law


Is my work a good research work? I am a master student in computer science and am working on a static program analysis project as my thesis. I used existing platforms and frameworks along with existing approaches for static analysis of a program.

However my work would solve a problem in the area I am working in. In better words, for Android OS there is not yet a good work on static analysis of native binaries. This is what I am working on.

I think my work is not a good research work, because my work is all about implementation and dealing with existing tools. As far as I know, a good research work should not engage itself in implementation complexities and should be as abstract as it can be with a great degree of novelty.

In my opinion my work is novel, but it is not an abstract solution as it is mostly about technological stuff. So, I am in doubt if I am thinking right or not.

PS: By "good research work", I mean it can be published as a good research paper.

Good scientific research is anything that increases the knowledge of humanity.  Sometimes that involves creation of new things, sometimes that involves putting together existing things in a way that creates a new capability.

What you have described might or might not be scientific research, depending on the particulars of the work.

If there is an interesting reason why Android static analysis hasn't been done yet (e.g., something incompatible between Android's organization and typical static analysis approaches), then explaining that reason and how you overcame it can be the core of a good scientific paper.
If, on the other hand, it's just technical drudge work (e.g., like rewriting an application from C to Java), then even if it is difficult and valuable it will not be particularly scientifically interesting.

Even if the application itself turns out not to be scientifically interesting, however, what you learn once you start applying static analysis to Android programs might well be...


How do I address a colleague in an 3-way email with a student? In my department, professors go by their first names with students and each other. My colleagues in some other departments go by their title and last name. To convey their preference, when referring to such a colleague in conversation with a student, I will use the professor's name and title (e.g., "You should ask Prof. Walker.").

If I am on a 3-way email involving such a professor and a student we are jointly advising, do I address the professor by their first name, title, or not at all?

This answer is a bit meta, I guess. I would probably use a form of address that would seem comfortable to the student, since you are jointly teaching him/her. It would seem to make things like reply-all in an email more comfortable for the student. I'm sure your colleague will understand. If you are being a bit formal with the colleague you can echo that with the student. Ms. James and Prof. Smythe.

However, some places are first name only and always. Then it would be different.

One option, of course, is just to ask each person how they would like to be addressed and go with that. You will want to give your own preference as well when you ask.

Just note that whatever you do, you will be either emphasizing or de-emphasizing the authority structure. Either could be appropriate depending on other factors.


Is it appropriate to ask for letters of recommendation from professor on maternity leave? A professor who knows me very well is currently on maternity leave (her baby arrived in late April).

This professor has known me for 4 years (since first semester of undergraduate career) and also advised my undergraduate thesis (2 semesters).  In addition I also did an independent study course with her, and she has provided me funding from her own grant money in the past in order to pay for me attending academic conferences.

I am planning to apply to several master's programs, possibly PhD, in addition to other things that require such letters (Teach for America, Summer School, etc.).  All of these things require letters of recommendation.

Is it appropriate to ask her for letters of recommendation on her maternity leave, and if so, how should the request be phrased in email?

Yes

I think It would be different if say, you took one or two of her classes. But it sounds like she advised you a great deal, and thus she should have some investment in your educational success. Especially if you have talked about graduate school before. What is important is you give her notice as soon as possible so she can find some time to do it: Having a newborn is no easy job.

I would phrase it as follows:

  Dear X (unless you call her professor, then Professor X, but my
  advisors I call by their first name)

  How is your newborn?

  I realize you are very busy with your maternity leave, but I was
  hoping you might have some time to write me a strong letter of
  recommendation for graduate school. As you might know I am interested
  in ZQR, and your mentorship over my senior thesis has been essential
  to my education.

  Thank you for your time,

  user

I'd also like to add that while I was applying to PhD programs, the professor who eventually became my advisor was on maternity leave while I was asking her questions about the lab. In confidence, she enjoyed my emails because having newborns, while a joy most of the time, often lacks the intellectual rigor that most people are accustomed to in their day to day conversations.

My guess is she will be very happy to do this, and somewhat expects you to ask.


Post-doc position/fellowship application - PhD limited results due to no supervisor support and small research group - explain in positive way This is not to blame the supervisor for obtaining few results, but clearly phd students working in large groups or under good guidance can exploit more their potential. Also phd students working in large groups often publish as a co-author just because there is a lot of collaboration within the group. So at the end of the phd students from small groups have had less chances of publishing more.

When applying to post doc positions or fellowship, the applicant must explain what results were obtained during the PhD, the skills that were developed (management, research, etc). Say that during the phd the student did not receive any guidance or support from the supervisor and that the lab only had 1-2 phds and no chance of collaboration within the lab, how can this be explained in a good light and also to show that
1) the student truly acted as an independent and mature researcher without complaining about the lack of supervision
2) to convey the message that the few results achieved during the phd should be evaluated in light of this lack of supervision, and that not being in a large lab did not allow to get those 'extra' papers that phd students in large labs might have chances of publishing.

Don't make excuses because you weren't in a big lab. Tell what you did and what you learned, be honest about it.
Important skills that you have acquired might include

the ability to plan, organize and conduct research mostly on your own. Make sure to point out how this will help you in the position you are applying for, e.g. you will be able to plan projects,...
the ability to network with foreign researchers (if you had almost no one in your lab to work with, you maybe exchanged emails with other labs, worked with them,...?).

These are only two examples of something you might learn in a small lab that you often don't learn in a big group. Depending on your situation, there might be other things of course, but try to figure them out. Then, there shouldn't be a reason to feel any worse than guys from a big lab, who might have one or two publications more than you.


Should I ask for permission to write an expository post about someone else's research? I am a math PhD student in North America about to enter my second year. Last week I attended a conference and was interested in a research presentation by a professor at another school. The presentation was about some of his current (unpublished) methods and results to attack a problem in combinatorics. I am thinking of writing an expository post about his talk in my personal blog.

Question: Should I contact the professor to ask for permission to write about his research? My concern is that he hasn't published the results and so might not want to put them in public yet. I have seen people writing expository posts about talks or papers that they read or hear about (for example here), but I'm not sure if they need permission from the original author(s) to do so.

I don't think you strictly need permission, but I would recommend asking the speaker anyway, out of simple courtesy.  People are aware when they give a talk that they are making the information public, and that the audience members may share what they have learned, but putting it on the Internet may speed up that process more than the speaker is expecting.  Posting about the talk without the author's consent, or at least notifying them, isn't unethical, but it is sort of "bad manners".

If the speaker asks you to wait, I would suggest you honor that request: partly out of  general professional courtesy, and partly because it isn't good politics as a PhD student to get on the bad side of senior people, especially if you work in this area.  You may be applying for a postdoc with this person someday.  I would guess that at most, they might say something like "We plan to post a preprint in a few weeks; could you hold off until then?"

As a possible side benefit, when you contact the speaker to ask if it's okay with them, they might also volunteer some other information for you to use in your  writeup: copies of their slides, further details, a preprint, etc.

If they say it's okay, then as a further courtesy, you may want to send them a copy of your writeup before you post it, to see if they have any comments or notice any errors.  Or at least send them a link when you post it, and be ready to respond to any feedback they may have.


Why would a journal force me to register on ORCID? I recently got a paper accepted as a co-author in a relatively good journal. Now that we are at the finalizing phase, I got an email prompting me to give my ORCID identifier and to create one if I don't already have one.
Here is an excerpt from the email (emphasis mine):

Note that unless we have ORCIDs of all coauthors on file we will not be able to publish the manuscript, in case of acceptance. To avoid a delay in processing this paper, please take care of this at your earliest convenience.
You will receive this reminder on a weekly basis until you have authenticated your ORCID

I find this to be very annoying. It doesn't seem like I have suffered from not having an ID until today, why does that journal absolutely needs me to register on that thing?

Not only publishers start to collect/request/demand ORCIDs more and more but also institutions.

What is it all about?

It's about bibliometrics and author profiles. Being able to identify an author and its publications is useful for the institution and its authors. Authors benfit by having an accurate and complete publication list, even if they change the institution. Authors and institutions benefit because bibliometrics become more accurate, e.g. the author's h-index or the list of publications affiliated to authors of an institution.

Why are publishers taking action?

  We hope that our action inspires the community, including researchers, research funders, and research institutions, to join us in adopting ORCID and making it easy for researchers to connect their iD to their contributions and affiliations. source

Publishers want to enhance their services for authors by including ORCIDs in the publishing workflow.

Why are publishers making ORCIDs a requirement?

One reason I can think of is that they want ORCIDs because bibliometrics, especially impact factors, are important for them and the enterprise(s) providing the impact factor(s) are also interested in author specific factors like the h-index. Additionally, I assume, publishers also want to know and present who publishes in their journals. Think about a publisher stating that a nobel prize winner published most in their journals.

Overall, ORCIDs solve a lot of the problems regarding author identification, which benefits authors (named Smith or Wang or ...) and institutions. ORCID itself is a nonprofit organisation. So far, I haven't thought so much about the benefits for the publishers to make ORCIDs a requirement. Maybe there are different/more reasons.


Are religious invocations in academic presentations appropriate? One thing that I have noted come up a few times in presentations in the US in the last few years has been that some speakers—usually graduate students and postdocs, rather than more established career professionals—have included religious invocations at the end of presentations in entirely secular venues. One presenter went so far as to have an entire slide devoted to it, complete with quotations to spiritual texts and illustration.

Is there any sort of protocol about when such sorts of invocations are considered appropriate? (For instance, at a student's doctoral defense, but not at a public seminar?)

I think this is a good question.

Let me propose some guidelines:

1) A religious invocation should occur at the beginning of the talk or the end of the talk, but not in the middle of the talk.

People often begin talks with material that is unrelated to the topic of the talk itself, e.g. thanks to various organizers; comments about the weather, the venue or the town; jokes; and so forth.  It seems to be clearly asking too much for someone to speak only about their scientific field during the entirety of their talk.  However, at a certain point you get down to business and the "talk itself" in the narrower sense begins.  One should not (of course this is an opinion, but a strongly held and easily defensible one) mix religion with the material of the talk itself.

2) A scientific talk is not an occasion for proselytization.

To me whether religious material is appropriate depends a lot on the purpose one has in bringing it up.  If you include religious material as an attempt to convert audience members to your religion, I think that is really problematic and unethical.  If you include religious material for other promotional reasons, then I still have a problem with it, just as I would be with someone promoting their not wholly scientific company or product.  (Even wholly scientific promotion might not be so great, but that's a different answer.)

On the other hand, it is a totally standard thing to have the last slide of a talk give thanks to various people and institutions.  If you feel deeply grateful or thankful in the religious sense, then it seems natural to want to express those feelings, given that other speakers are thanking people and things (e.g. the US government) that, in your sincere opinion, have not helped you out as deeply or fundamentally.  At any rate, it does not bother me if someone ends a talk by thanking some theological entity.

3) One should not express religious sentiments in a scientific talk in a way that encroaches on anyone else's religious sentiments or lack thereof, nor which implicitly or explicitly invites or requires participation or complicity from the audience.

Thus "Alhamdulillah" is probably okay; "Now Thank We All Our God" is probably not.

In general, in (e.g.!) an academic context, one should be respectful of others' beliefs and views, and one should not be controversial or exclusionary in anything without a specific intellectual purpose for doing so.  One should also be respectful of others' time and realize that speaking in front of a group is a privilege.  On the other hand, academics are human beings and can choose to say things which are not strictly necessary.  In my calculus class last week, I had students identify a quote about mathematics being someone's worst subject followed by a careful and insightful consideration of the reasons for this.  The quote turned out to be from Malcolm X.  What calculus reason could I possibly have to quote Malcolm X?  None.  But I thought it was interesting and perhaps important in its own way.  I enjoy my freedom to do that, so it is not a hard sell for me to give leeway to those who want to make some kinds of religious statements, so long as they are in line with the above guidelines.


Should I be worried about low undergraduate grades during the COVID-19 crisis affecting grad school admission chances? I'm currently in my undergraduate junior year studying Mechanical Engineering at the University of Waterloo in Canada. I'm hoping to apply for Top 10 US grad schools in mechanical engineering in about 18 months. In response to the worldwide COVID-19 health crisis, our institution has (as have most academic institutions) switched to online teaching and made many changes to the structure of our courses to accommodate the situation.

As part of these changes, the university has offered students the option to selectively change the grade reporting on their transcripts to CR/NCR (Credit/No Credit) at the end of this semester. Normally, my grades would be pretty good (hovering around ~3.9 GPA) and I wouldn't bother to report my grades as a CR instead of as a percentage, but this crisis has completely disoriented me and made it difficult to focus on my studies.

Furthermore, the university has allowed instructors to retroactively adjust the course breakdown/weighting away from the original syllabus--this means that tests/projects that were originally worth 15% of the grade might have been increased to upwards of 40% weighting. This has had a negative impact on my course grades as well, as I was hoping to make up for poor showings on some of these lower-weight deliverables with strong final exam performances. Instead, these final exams are going to be worth much less now.

In the aftermath of these changes, I'm contemplating using the CR/NCR option on some of my course grades, particular with any grade that ends up lower than my current GPA. However, I'm worried about how this will be interpreted in my grad school admissions in a couple years. In normal circumstances, I think changing a percentage grade into a CR/Pass grade would be a red flag that a student's performance in the class was less-than-stellar.

Given the COVID-19 crisis and its effects on academia as a whole, are admissions committees two years down the road likely to be understanding if I decide to take advantage of the CR option now? Should I make use of it and explain that this was "the coronavirus semester" in my application package, or am I dooming myself by converting my grades from percentage into CRs?

The situation is chaotic and it is difficult to make a prediction or give firm advice. Either path could be better than the other, depending on the judgments of others.

However, one prediction that I can make with confidence is that universities sending out grades will also be sending out explanations that extraordinary measures were taken in extraordinary times. Furthermore those receiving grades and such will understand that the situation was chaotic and that the ordinary procedures need to be modified.

If it were me, I'd probably opt for the grades rather than pass/fail. If necessary, I'd just explain that the general chaos affected my performance somewhat and the grades may not accurately reflect my potential. I'd suspect that letter writers would back that up. But that is partly because I'd have a history of excellent performance generally and not one that would be questioned in the absence of the current situation. (This is the hypothetical me speaking, not the real me.)

But the pass fail option can also be explained fairly easily that the risks were higher due to general disruption and you considered it the safer option as the rules were changing, making earlier assumptions invalid.

I expect that there will be more emphasis put on interviews and on letters of recommendation for a while until things settle down again. But that is just a guess.


Got Ph.D Degree from India on the basis of Ph.D Comprehensive Exam + Ph.D Thesis now thinking of doing Course Work in another university I applied for a teaching job. I was told by the selection committee that I didn't do coursework in my Ph.D program.
I replied that the university Ph.D program requires two years of Independent Study on the courses specified by the course Advisor and then a comprehensive Exam and then Thesis Adjuducation.

What can I do if the university has no provision for registration of formal courses ?

I have asked them to consider the Credits of Courses that I have in two Masters Degrees ( 42 Credit Hours from Master of Engineering + 41 Credit Hours from MS )

When I had checked the qualifications of one of the Selection Committee members, he did one MS (with 24 Credits Course Work + 30 Credits Course work in Ph.D with thesis in both the programs)

I am thinking of Joining again Ph.D PROGRAM in a university where there is coursework, and complete 30 Credit Hours of Course Work.

Please advise how can I do this ?

If you are planning to take a big step of re-doing a PhD just based on this one interview you had, then I'd recommend reconsidering the thought. Have you received similar responses in the past? If yes, then may be the university that awarded you a PhD, doesn't has a good reputation. In that case too, a second PhD is not the best option. You can think of some Post doctoral certification or Post-doc research work. That would enhance your profile and would not count as a repetition.


Explaining poor grades in application? I am applying to a Masters Program at a top university. I already have a Bachelors and a Masters degree, in addition to work experience. I have strong letters of recommendation and my Masters degree grades (both quant and social sciences) are excellent (all A's). Unfortunately,  during my bachelors degree I had some serious personal issues with a parents health, which resulted in me not being able to handle the course load for a couple of semesters, resulting in some poor grades (few Cs and a D).  My overall GPA still ended being well above average and majority of my grades were still A's.

Should I explain this in my application or simply focus on the strengths of my application? I will not be including this in my personal statement but there is an option to provide additional info. On the one hand, I feel like these poor grades are a blot on my record (some poor grades sprinkled among As) and not a good reflection of my potential. I basically went through a tough time where my life was so uncertain that I couldn't properly plan my course load or withdraw from courses on time. These courses were quantitative, which is relevant to the program I am applying to. At the same time, I feel like adding this info in my application might draw attention to the negatives or make it seem like I'm shirking responsibility.

You should explain.

Unlike (say) mental health problems, there is no stigma attached to having a parent in ill health. If you don't explain, people will be wondering what the reason for the bad grades was, and whether it was mental health problems or some other cause that reflects poorly on you. If you explain, they they will know what caused them and will see these bad grades in a much less negative light.


Who owns the research data at US research institutions? When a graduate student, or PI does government funded (NSF/NIH/etc) research at a US R1 institution who owns the data?

What portion of the copyright for the research data does the graduate student have and what portion does the PI have? My understanding is that graduate students are supposed to be listed as co-inventors on resulting patents meaning that they should own some portion of the copyright? Can a graduate student deny a PI access on copyright grounds?

My interest comes from a debate we recently had between two PIs where one refused his copyright for our collaborative research results (some anonymized medical outcomes data). Apparently, PIs can refuse to their copyrights to each other, but can graduate students?

No one.

The short answer is that “data” as the term is understood by US law is not covered by copyright, thus in popular parlance it is not “owned” by anyone. If you google “can data be copyrighted” you will find various articles explaining this in more detail. Here is one.

The longer answer is that, as seems to often be the case in matters of law, the legal meaning of “data” seems to differ slightly from how people use this word in normal speech. What academics might refer to as “research data” may also include aspects of what is referred to in some sources as “presentation” or “compilation” of data, and to the extent that this is the case, copyright might apply to it after all. In that case, the copyright would be owned by some combination of the PI, graduate students, the institution that employs them, and any funding agencies who might have funded some of the research, depending on the policies of the institution and funding agencies. For example, at my own university, researchers own the copyright to the work products they create.

I also notice you are mixing up copyright and patent rights by mentioning them together as if they were the same thing. They are not. Data is not a form of invention so I don’t see how patent rights would apply to it. But more generally, if a graduate student and PI come up with any patentable inventions, those would be subject to quite different rules and policies than those covering copyright. For example, at my own university, patent rights for researchers’ inventions will generally belong to the university, though the inventors can receive a share of any royalties generated from their inventions. As far as I know this applies equally to graduate students and regular faculty. But you should check the policy at your own institution.

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer.


Can I mention my undergrad ranking in CV, when there is no official document about it? Our university doesn't announce any rank and it is not present in our transcripts but I know that my rank is 7 out of 60 in my department. Can I mention this rank? Since I dont have any proof of my rank I am not sure if I can mention it or not.

If you can't prove it, I wouldn't put it in your C.V.

For one, anyone reviewing your application will have no way of knowing if you're lying or telling the truth. That's never a feeling you want a reviewer to have.

Even more importantly: what if you were actually wrong? What if you were 8 out of 60? Or 6 out of 60? I trust that when you say you're 7 out of 60, you have a pretty good idea of that, but you can't be sure if your school doesn't issue an official rank.

For what it's worth, if your GPA is high enough, I doubt rank will matter much. #7 is great, but #7 out of 60 students is different than #7 out of 600 students or 6000 students. For that reason, the rank itself is less valuable than your actual GPA.


Post-Baccalaureate Online BS Programs? I am going into the field of computer science after getting my original bachelor's and masters (in city planning) a few years ago and finding out I like the technology much more than the actual field I studied before. I took GIS courses and started tinkering around with code and figured out CS was my calling. I am currently taking classes at my local community college to get an AS in CS that I am hoping to transfer to somewhere that offers a BS. I have no regrets because I am in a job I love and take class half-time while I work.
I think that I will be done with it in about 1.5 to 2 years as it is about 27 credit hours and I am taking about 7-8 a semester (fall, spring, and summer). It may take me closer to the 2 because I want to retake calculus and physics (as the college requires) since I took them 10 years ago as an 18-year old and barely skated by. Most BS requirements in CS require 2 calc classes and one physics class. It looks like my local universities can accept them being taken from community college as long as the AS was earned. I just would rather be safe than sorry.

Here is the catch though, I probably need to do it online since I also want to work while in school and will likely be moving out of my state when my SO finishes medical residency in 2017.

I like being in class, but I am 28 now and will likely have a lot more going on later. It seems like going somewhere locally would be more affordable, but then I risk not being done in time. That's why I am considering doing it online since I may have to perhaps have a marriage and hopefully an advanced career from what I am doing now at my current company. Are there any good schools that are non-profit that go fully online? To further make things complicated, I am hoping to go somewhere that isn't insanely expensive because I am already $35,000 in the hole from my past degrees. I have seen that there is OSU, UMUC, and U of Illinois. I have heard that UI and UMUC are expensive and hard to get into. I read somewhere that FSU and Nova may have something as well as some private catholic college. Trying to sort out fact from fiction on good schools and seeing the most up-to-date information. Those degree mills just are not appealing to me in that they are expensive and I would rather have my time be put into something that is on the up-and-up.  It seems like a few of you here may be able to tell me things from personal experiences.

I really am hoping you  can help me get a list of reputable non-profit schools to apply to sometime in 2015 that will accommodate me in that part of life.

There are many online programs from traditional universities that you could choose from. A significant question is your aim for the degree.

Will you pursue further education?
Are you planning to switch careers?
Do you intend a career in industry or academia?

It's important to understand what your goals are. Particularly in the software industry, if your goal is hobbyist, to build skills that will supplement your current job or to pick up as a developer, the education you already have may likely be enough. (Edit: And, if undergrad is your terminal goal, this probably isn't the forum.)

If the goal is to pursue graduate/advanced education or research, then the specific degree is obviously valuable. A problem may exist with finding the nexus between "good" and "easy to get into" (you indicate a concern with admissions rigor at UI and UM-UC). Plus, it's important in those cases to be developing relationships with faculty, a task that is hard to do through emails and online forums.

Programs through traditional universities have costs similar to their in-person programs. That's going to be hard to get around.

One exception that comes to mind is Harvard Extension School's programs. They offer a computer science focus, but do require at least 16 credits completed through in-person courses in Cambridge.

I unfortunately can't offer a comprehensive list of online bachelors degrees through traditional universities.

Something else to consider, though, is instead of pursuing a second bachelors, look for masters programs that function as career-change degrees. These will have a lower bar for entry and include some fundamental learning (though generally expect you to learn quicker).

Open University (Bachelors, Post-bachelors, Masters)
Oregon State (Bachelors CS)
Drexel (Bachelors Info Sys completion, Masters CS)
Harvard Extension School (Bachelors CS, Masters Software Eng)
Georgia Tech (Masters Computer Science)
Penn State's World Campus (Masters Software Engineering)

come immediately to mind as being accredited schools with these sorts of online programs. They're all easily found with a bit of Googling, however, and I'd suggest doing a little focused searching to see what you can turn up.

Many, many schools have programs today. Masters programs will probably be cheaper than Bachelors programs. Through a traditional school, though, all are going to cost. And ultimately, unless you're looking to get deep into theory, you're likely better off completing your Associates, learning a few modern languages and learning through application.


Is it too soon to leave TT position? I am an Asst Prof.  I started during COVID so I know things aren't normal. I love my colleagues but I have been having problems with my chair.  This week after a reasonable request regarding my career, the chair escalated to using disrespectful and abusive language (mainly because I asked if we could discuss the situation instead of just saying yes and thank you).  This has been a pattern with him and there is no reason to think things will get better. I wish I could but I'm not someone who works well when I don't like my boss (in terms of productivity and mental health). So far I have not been in love with the job. I love some parts (research and working with PhD students) but not others. I enjoy service (as I did a ton in my PhD and UG), but at my current institution it is often useless and poorly run (i.e. more performative than focusing on real viable solutions). Also the teaching load is higher than average (with lots of pushback to buy-out if you're not part of a preferred group).
I did well on the market last yr and have some places I could call to move to, but will probably move to a research institituion/org.  I am not sure if I should give the job more time before leaving.  Again, I do like my colleagues/collaborators and the resources of the university.  However, I have also heard that being at the whim of your dept chair is a systemic issue.

It is unclear to me 'why' you want to give the job more time. Do you expect your workload to decrease? Do you expect your chair to become more reasonable? For academia to change their approach to work/life balance? If the answer to all (or even most) of the questions like this are 'no', then there is no point in waiting. And from my personal experience, the longer you wait in transitioning from academia to industry, the more challenging it is going to be -- and less satisfying.


What is the most effective and efficient method of searching multiple journals for multiple keywords? My goal is to find articles related to invasive species management on a monthly basis. I have a list of species for my region (i.e keywords) and a list of journals. Although I enjoy combing through new issues of each journal, I'm wondering if there is a more automated, and less time consuming method.

I've tried using Boolean operators in Google Scholar, but this limits the search to 2019 (not monthly) and isn't journal specific. I have also explored some programs (e.g. Stork), with limited results.

Any insight is greatly appreciated. Thanks!

In case the journals are indexed by PubMed ( biomedical literature) and you're not afraid to do a bit of programming, you might want to explore the tools proposed here. You can even download the full Medline database (see here) and search through it locally, in case that's more convenient.


PhD interview - how to explain why I left a previous PhD? I previously quit a STEM PhD program after 1 year. The reasons were complex but included burnout, mental health, pressure from the industrial sponsor, lack of support and loss of interest in the project.

Following some time out of education, I decided to reapply for PhDs. I have been invited to interview for a very competitive PhD program. It is stated in my application that I started a PhD previously, and I expect to be asked about this in the interview.

The answer is messy and difficult to talk about - how can I explain it in the best light possible?

I'm not sure that explaining why you left is the most important thing. Questions might be phrased that way, but people really want to know what is different now so that they can predict that you will be a success this time. You can't avoid giving some direct response to the question, of course, but you also need to be able to point to things you have done since then that make your success more possible and more likely.

Perhaps "loss of interest" was a result of lack of support or burnout. Both of those are easier to account for than lack of interest, I think. You needn't give every reason you can think of, but reasons that are fairly common and that have obvious corrective actions are easier to account for than others.

Don't avoid the direct answer, but focus on what is now different.


Advice on rejecting job offer from recommender I worked for this professor last summer for free and am going to ask her to be recommender for PhD application. This year I asked to work with her again, however this time I need salary. So she offered me a job, however there is no salary. Furthermore, there is no other professor involved in this project so I cannot get another recommender as well. I am not really interested in this. What can I do so that I do not piss her off and she still writes me a letter of recommendation?
Thank you all

Say that you really wish you could accept her offer but, unfortunately, lack of money is becoming an issue for you. You need to start earning money (in order to live). With regret you will have to find a funded position even if it is not so desirable.


Teaching Fellow vs. Postdoc I would like to continue with my academic path but, the last year, I've been conducting mainly research activity with no teaching assignments. I would like to build up my portfolio to gain some teaching experience eventually thinking for a Lecturer/Assistant Professor position but, on the other hand, I would not like to hamper my outward mobility and compromise my research output. What would you suggest?

In part to forcefully disagree with @Buffy's remark that it's generally easier to move from research to teaching roles... my own and others' PhD students from my "R1" university in math in the U.S. have encountered disbelief about their sincere interest in teaching at an undergrad institution... Indeed, given the way computerized job applications often work (mathjobs.org), it's nearly effortless to apply to any place listed on mathjobs.org. In particular, making such an application is absolutely not a proof of sincere interest, beyond not wanting to be unemployed.

I suspect significantly for that reason, some (I don't know what fraction...) of non-research-fixated math depts in the U.S. simply do not list themselves in mathjobs.org, so that "the bar" to apply to them is set higher than clicking boxes.

So far as I can tell, "sincerity" (or its appearance, ack, ...) plays a significant role. I see this, and am not entirely opposed to it, in graduate admissions, postdoc applications, and tenure-track applications. So, if one intends to "game" the system (well, why not?) one needs to do so well enough to fool a certain number of people.

Depending on your personality, it might be less stressful to just follow the direction you want, rather than having your day-to-day life determined by some dubious long-term strategy.


How competitive is it to become a tenured history professor at a four year institution? I am a current history undergraduate student who would like to teach someday! I would really like to teach at the collegiate level but I hear that it's becoming very competitive to find a tenure track? How come?

My wife is a historian, and I can attest: it is extremely competitive.  The basic reason is that many more people are earning Ph.D.'s than are being hired to tenure track positions.


Some of the major corrections are already in the thesis I've passed my viva with major corrections at a UK university.

Upon receiving the corrections, I found some of them were already emphasised and discussed in several places in the thesis.

My supervisor said I should just accept these corrections and work on them.

What should I do? Should I just expand with few sentences/paragraphs? Is it too bad to respond that they are already there?

Consider that if your examiners have asked you to add things that were already there, then either (a) they didn't read the thesis very well, or (b) those things that were already there were not clear or obvious. In the case of (b), you want to improve that.

You could reply to "defend" things as they are - but be very sure of your ground before doing so, and expect that the examiners might respond "change it anyway". Unless there is a good scientific reason not to do the changes, I wouldn't bother - as your supervisor said, just swallow your pride, and do what they've asked. While annoying, it'll be less trouble for you, and also not risk annoying people you might want to work with in future.


How to cite a conference paper in an "extended" journal version? I recently presented a paper at a conference which was published in its proceedings.  Now it is time to submit an "extended" version with "30% new content".  The new content isn't a problem, I've added several figures, a couple of genuinely new findings and some helpful illustrations that I developed while preparing my talk.  However, the instructions from the publisher state:

In the extended paper clearly cite the conference paper and list it as one of the references.

In my opinion, this can be interpreted in one of two ways:

Write a new article that assumes knowledge of the proceedings.
This is kind of a scary option because it implies that it really has to be a new work.
Explain that an earlier version exists and what's new here. This is a comforting interpretation but seems kind of uncharacteristic for the style in most journal articles.

What's the best path to follow here?

I write something along the lines of:

  This paper is an extended version of work published in [1]. We extend our previous work by A, B and C.

Note that some new figures etc. will probably not really count as new content (this would probably be called new presentation rather than new content). New findings and new data, that's what people will really be interested in.

One common pattern that I often see in my field is that the conference paper has most of the ideas in place, but a rather cursory evaluation. The journal extension then has the ideas of the conf paper + whatever input came out of discussions at the conference + a more or less large-scale validation. The "nucleus" of the paper is reproduced more or less in verbatim. To be fair, I am not sure if this is even ok from a copyright point of view, but it certainly is common practice in my field FWIW.


Why would recommender not submit letter to some schools? My recommender received the list of schools I would be applying to months in advance. She submitted 7 out of 10 letters and then just disappeared: ignores emails and notifications from schools. Why would anyone agree to write a letter and then do that? I have months of research experience under her indirect supervision and took her class too. She does know I have more than 3 referees though...

You're right that there isn't any particular reason for a professor to intentionally and voluntarily refuse to send letters to certain institutions, especially not without telling you.

So I would consider unintentional and involuntary explanations.

The notification emails may not be reaching her (IT failures, spam filters, etc).  Try to contact her personally (email, phone, in person) and let her know that the letters are due.
Oversight is a possibility.  She might have forgotten about the letters and then gone on vacation where she doesn't see the emails.
She may be unable to work because of some sort of emergency (personal, family, medical, etc). Recommenders are people too, and sometimes things happen in their lives that take priority over your letter.  If you cannot contact her yourself, contact her institution or department and explain the situation.  It is possible that they will have access to a letter she's already written and can send it out, or that someone else there can write a letter.


Does a thesis have to have a "Discussion" chapter? I have written a thesis seeking to analyze the ideological thinking of a newspaper through its editorials in a political situation during a certain period of time (1985-1991). I couldn’t count on my advisor and I have written my thesis by myself. My advisor approved my thesis and I must defend it in three weeks.

I have been reading other similar theses. I have realized that most of them use a chapter for “Discussion”. My thesis does not have such a chapter. I wrote a chapter for “Methodology”, another for “Results” and after that one for “Conclusions”. I am afraid that in my defense someone will ask me why I did not write a chapter for “Discussion” and I don’t think I have a very convincing answer. How would you answer to that kind of question?

Do you discuss the results and their implications?  Do you present the insights and conclusions?  Do you make your argument and present your evidence in a logical, persuasive way?

I find that chapter/section headings are much less important than the overall document strength. If your thesis fits the following, the I'd defend it.  Worst case you may be asked to restructure; best case you make your point and it is accepted as is.

Key Points:
Thesis should
- be organized and logical
- clearly articulate the main points and supporting evidence
- discuss any conclusions and insights

I'm sure there are others.  Section/chapter headings are author's choice - use what you need to accomplish your purpose.


Is it helpful to tell a university that I have admission and scholarship from another university? I have got an admission letter with full scholarship (i.e. covering tuition fees, living expenses, etc.) from a top university X (ranking under 50) but I want to take care of my grandmother who is not from my birth-country so I want to continue my Master program at that country B; which I don't have its citizenship; so I will be a foreign student and the number of full scholarships (even partial ones for covering tuition fees) at country B are very limited for international students. Also, the university Y at country B has ranking between 2000-2500.

My question is : Is it rude to telling (and emailing) them my admission letter that I have from university X to university Y? And will it be helpful to enhance chance of getting scholarship or quite the reverse?

Thanks!

Yes, but with caution.

The basic premise is, if you're an outstanding applicant, it's conceivable the admissions people at the lower-ranked institute think it's pointless to accept you because you're going to decline the offer anyway. If you've been accepted at Harvard but rejected at Saint Mary's, chances are that happened. In that case you can send them your Harvard acceptance letter and tell them why you really would rather attend Saint Mary's. Similarly, if Saint Mary's accepts you but doesn't give you much funding, then sending them your Harvard acceptance letter with full scholarship is likely to make Saint Mary's add more dollars to your application as well.

Before Saint Mary's makes a decision however, I would not send in the Harvard acceptance letter, because it's irrelevant.