Is a professional doctorate beneficial for someone looking for a career as a programmer in industry? I am a software developer by profession and was wondering what a professional doctorate (PdEng) would add to my career if I plan to work in the industry.

EDIT: I am not talking about a Phd rather a Professional Doctorate program (PDEng).It is a 2 year program and used for getting a job in a very specific sub discipline of a field.

You might get different answers for different countries. This answer is for the US.

Speaking as a person who has hired many programmers (both for my own company and for other companies) I feel quite confident that having a doctorate of any kind will not help you land a job as a programmer. The simple fact is, people care about what you can produce. What frameworks, models, patterns, languages, etc. are you effective in? This is what people generally care about from a technical perspective. They will care about other things like how committed you are, how many hours you can work, etc. but what you would gain from a doctorate will not be of value to people who hire in industry.

That said, it can be useful for career mobility. For example, I have see people chose one person over another for an IT management position because one had a doctorate. That turned out to be a terrible choice for the company, but I don't think the problems were connected to his doctorate (he simply had no experience managing people). Some people might see the value in the doctorate but only at a higher level (not entry level).


How can I write a book about paper writing which contains real examples without violating copyright? I'm teaching a course on computer-science paper writing, and I aim to turn my notes into a book for publication.  It's designed specifically for Chinese postgraduate students who are writing their first paper.

In my course (and thus in the book), I use examples from real publications by Chinese authors.  Moreover, I use LaTeX's \includegraphics{...} so my quote is visually identical to what's in the paper.  I then critique the writing: explaining what I feel is poor, and how I would improve it.

My feeling is that doing this for a paragraph or two with attribution is unproblematic, but:

I'm using a large number of snippets, totaling maybe hundreds from different papers.
I'm aiming to include a section along the lines of "how to proofread and optimize writing", where I take a single (short) paper, and painstakingly revise a large portion of it.  I'm tempted to go through the entire paper, because it contains many examples of writing issues I see repeatedly, and because it's not possible to write one part of a paper in isolation from the other parts.

So...

Question: How can I write a book about paper writing which contains real examples without violating copyright?

I'm not sure what I need to know about this---it'd be my first book.

Update: Thanks for the responses!  Virtually all the papers come from the ACM, and each paper lists the copyright; maybe 90% have an ACM copyright.  The ACM's policies page says:

  Course Material - Permission granted without fee if the course material is produced without charge to the student. (See Commercially produced Course Packs below)

So I'm confident I haven't done anything wrong so far; there's no concerns about me handing out ACM-copyrighted papers.  And our university has institutional access, so the students have access anyway.

Also, at this point, I'm only just starting to put a book together, and I need to do this for the course whether or not a book eventualizes.  I can simply keep copyright in mind as the book develops.  Asking permission from the ACM seems to be a matter of sending an email; I don't know what they will say.  (The authors might not be happy about me criticizing their writing.)

The best solution would be to get permission from each copyright holder for each paper/snippet you use. This is often seen in books ie a list of figures and a statement of permission from each author X and Y and Z.

Using the material may be ok at the moment because it is for an educational purpose, but to put that into a book is probably going to be more a business/profit purpose which is different for copyright...

But I get the impression that you don’t want to do this as you mention “I have hundreds....”

You will need to check this properly with a copyright lawyer / legal team...


Is it possible to ask the professor to check assignment before submitting? I have got assignments related to programming. They are tough and my friends could not get results. I wanted to ask my professor to run them to see whether I did them right or not. (the deadline is rapidly coming.)
I am a graduate student. It is my first term.

Most instructors will refuse to check your homework for you before you turn it in.  You get it graded once and only once.  There are no do-overs where you get to turn it in the first time, they point out your mistakes, then you get to turn it in again after you've corrected it.

If you're confused, you can ask clarifying questions about what the homework asks (e.g., desired behavior in corner cases, output formatting, error handling, other constraints and anything else that seems ambiguous) and about the underlying material (e.g., an algorithm discussed in lecture that you need to apply) but not about the correct answer or whether your answer is okay.  Some instructors (e.g., me) will help a student with debug, but usually only to help you learn the skills involved.  They usually will not debug your program for you.


NSF Proposals: numerical citations or author-year? I'm preparing an NSF proposal.  I ordinarily like author-year citations because they seem more scholarly and give the reviewer instant information about who(m) I am citing.  However, multiple people have advised me that it makes the text hard to read, and I've heard that the most important thing for NSF proposals is that they are easy to read.

But still- I hate flipping back and forth between text and citations- it seems like that causes a readability problem of a different kind.  At the same time, numerical citations are much more concise and help me make my page limit.

So I am in a bind.  What do you people think?

In terms of reference formatting, this is the only paragraph I can find in the NSF guide:

  Reference information is required. Each reference must include the
  names of all authors (in the same sequence in which they appear in the
  publication), the article and journal title, book title, volume
  number, page numbers, and year of publication.

Thanks to @Suresh, I misunderstood the meaning of it and I agree that the instruction does not specify either numeric or author-year format.

However, the page limit is 15, all inclusive, numeric system would give you a few more lines at the end. And you don't need to hate flipping back and forth, because the reviewers will do the flipping. However, should you feel so strong against it, call and talk to the grant program manager or contact person and ask if you can use your preferred system.


Delaying grad school vs. going to lower-ranked school I'm currently a senior who wants to get a PhD in physics. However, I may only have the chance to go to a school which has a strong professor in a certain area, but the school itself is not highly ranked.

My other option is, one of the professors I'm working with at my current institution is favorably disposed towards me, and could support me for another year while I do more research. If I did this, I will push out publications (including at least one first author) before I apply.

Another professor I know has told me that he thinks I should not waste my time, and get started on the PhD, especially since I might be able to hit the ground running there. However, I am aware that getting a degree from a non-top 10 school will hurt my prospects for future positions. I'm also keeping in mind that I could also head to this school next year as well if everything goes sour again.

What do the members of the community think? I would really appreciate more viewpoints on this matter. Thanks for your time!

Edit: I understand that questions asked here should be of a general nature, and not just apply to an individual's unique situation. However, I don't think this situation is all too uncommon, and this question may be useful to those who are looking for information in the future.

I don't entirely disagree with the two previous answers: taking the offer you have now may be a fine choice.  However, I'd give serious consideration to strengthening your application and trying again.

One of the biggest differences between departments is the strength of the peer group.  You will ultimately spend much more time talking and working with your fellow students than with faculty, and being part of an amazing cohort is incredibly beneficial.  You'll spend countless hours in detailed discussions, going into far more depth than any faculty member is likely to have time for, and you'll organize student seminars and study groups.  Depending on your field, you may write papers with your fellow students with no faculty involvement.  In the end, you'll learn far more from them than from courses or meetings with faculty, and these relationships will last for the rest of your career.

If you don't have this opportunity, you can certainly still become an excellent researcher, but you are less likely to reach your full potential, and even if you do it will be harder.  To maximize the benefit, you need to be surrounded by lots of wonderful students, many of whom are just as talented, hard working, and ambitious as you are, and some of whom are destined for even greater things.

As a rule of thumb, as you move down the prestige scale the average level of the students drops off much faster than the level of the faculty, because there are many more students than faculty.  There can be exceptions, such as a department that attracts much stronger students in one subfield than overall, but you shouldn't count on it without concrete evidence.

Here are a few ways you can gauge the students in a department:

When you visit, do you have really interesting discussions with current students, which leave you feeling excited about further interactions?  (Don't take this too seriously, since if you're shy it may be difficult to connect quickly, but it's worth thinking about.)
Does the department regularly produce graduates whose careers you would be happy with?  (Take this one very seriously.  If you are aiming for a job at a major research university but few people from your Ph.D. program get such jobs, then either your goals are unrealistic or you'll really stand out compared with your peers.)

If the answer to both questions is yes, then that's a good sign, but otherwise you should be cautious.

Returning to the original question, this might help you judge the offer you have already.  For the option of spending another year where you are, I'd ask three questions:

How likely are you to get better offers next year?  Of course there's no way to be sure, but perhaps a mentor could help you make an informed guess.
Will you enjoy the next year?  It's not worth doing if you're going to be stressed out and miserable.  Besides, unhappy people rarely do their best work.
Will you look back on it as a valuable intellectual experience, regardless of its effects on your grad school applications?


Is publishing with SpringerBriefs vanity publication for a beginner researcher? I am a beginning researcher and am unsure as to the academic worth/usefulness for my career to publish with SpringerBriefs. Would it be seen as a vanity publication?

Think "short book", not "long paper". There's been several questions here about the value of publishing a book (e.g., Is there any value in self-publishing a book as an academic? or Pros and cons of (co-)authoring a reference book in early career?), and the answers apply here as well. In short, the fact of having published a book carries virtually no weight (at least in most fields), but a good book can have a long-term impact.

Original research should in general be published in a peer-reviewed journal (or conference), not a book. But if you've written a few papers on a topic that you think would benefit from a consistent notation, cleaned-up presentation, extended introduction and literature review; or if you have a set of lecture notes on a current hot topic you are particularly proud of and would like to see get wider attention (preferring to trust the power of Springers marketing department instead of the vagaries of Google), then publishing them as a SpringerBrief could make sense for you. Whether it'd be worth the effort to get them into shape (and it will cost effort) is something you have to decide for yourself.


How to reply a faculty to ask him to recommend you to another faculty who might be recruiting this year? I am a graduate school applicant for PhD in XXX engineering, fall 2021. I contacted a POI for the same and got the following reply:

Hi hashbrown,
sorry at the moment, the only graduate student position I have available is for YYYY research.
Thanks

Can I ask them to recommend my name to another faculty in the same field?

No - this professor doesn't know who you are or if you're any good. They saw your research interests, and they didn't align to what they're looking for right now. Somewhat doubtful they even read your CV.
If they didn't say "I recommend you contact Dr. Y," then there is nothing material you can get from them.


What would be the proper way to ask for reference letters So, during my bachelor years I was a bit of a hermit. I studied on my own, made little contact with my professors outside of the necessary academic/ social situations, and mostly passed on as that rather good student professors don't think much about.

Stupid, I know, but people skills is the worst of my worst developed skills. Also I was stubbornly independent and asking questions during office hours made me feel as if I was failing at being a decent student, so I never asked questions or help.

4 years after graduating, I am thinking of applying for a master degree. I have picked the professors to whom I will ask for reference letters .... and the first deadline is 31 jan. I have received BA and BB with one of the professors (professor X) and BA and AA with the other (professor Y).

I was thinking of emailing professor Y and asking if I could meet him (it is easier for me to ask for the letter face to face, and I think I can make a better case this way). He is a positive, decent person and I think he considered me a good student despite our minimal interactions due to the cold and introverted disposition we both have as people. Also, knowing how busy he usually is, I don't intend to take much of his time and I intend to clarify this in the email.

As for professor X, I will just email him. He is very indifferent towards all students, me included, so nothing I can say face to face will make a difference. The problem with him is that, he probably doesn't even remember me.

So I am not sure if I am going about it the right way. The reason I left this for the last moment is that whenever I opened my email, I felt there was no right way to do it. What would be the most appropriate way to ask for the two reference letters?

Dear Professor Smith:

My name is Freya ASE.  I was a student in your class on widget design at Enormous State University in 2014.  I am writing to request a letter of recommendation.

After 3 productive years in the workforce at Ballbearings Anonymous, I have decided to apply for the Ph.D. MechE program at CalTech and a few competing programs.  While BA has been great practical experience and good use of my ESU training, now I want to move into cutting edge fluid flow research.

Would you be able to write a positive letter for my applications?  If helpful, I can supply some bullets to refresh your memory on my class project, class performance and our interactions.

Sincerely,

Freya ASE


Central deposit for recommendation letters A while back, I remember seeing a service, and I believe more than one, that claimed that they would store letters of recommendation for you and send them on your behalf or the person writing the letter. That is, the letter writer would submit the letter to them, and then you could submit that same letter to different places requiring a similar letter through them, all without you ever seeing the letter. The idea is to avoid repeating work for the writer and avoiding constant asking for letters for the applicant.
The thing is, my Google-fu has completely failed me and I cannot find them again. Does anyone know what I'm talking about?

In mathematics, mathjobs.org fills this role.


Is it advisable to contact a professor if I fear failing a graduate-level course? I am an international master's student in the US. I am currently finishing my last semester of courses.

This semester has been very tough on my personal life because of some family issues. I also had major unexpected technical difficulties with one of the projects which made it practically impossible for me to finish it in time. As a result, my performance in one of the courses suffered in the second half of the semester (I was doing well in the first half). I just had the final exam and I feel that it went badly. I am now scared that I might fail the course and have to come back again in Fall,  especially because that means I have to move back to the city and spend more money on tuition.

I am confident that I would have done much better on the course had my circumstances been different. I am therefore considering contacting the professor to explain my situation in the hopes that he won't give me a failing grade.

So my question is this: is it advisable to contact my professor in this situation? If so, how can I approach the topic? What should I avoid discussing?

Perhaps I should mention, I don't feel very comfortable with him on a personal level, and he has been generally strict with grading guidelines.

When I read the headline, my immediate impulse was to say "yes, of course" - assuming, that the course is still running and you need advice on how to proceed and come to a good result.

After reading the full question, my answer is a clear "no". I'm located in Germany, but I assume the following thoughts are applicable to the US too:

If you explain your situation to the professor right now, it will feel like you want to influence his objective grading attitude. I would never accept such an attempt and I would in fact be angry because just because you told me, I will be influenced. I won't rate you better, but I might even be stricter in cases where I'm unsure whether I should give a point more or less, just to avoid beeing unfair towards the other students.
If the professor would react on your situation, it might even be illegal, it would be definitely unethical. In the worst case, he could be fired. #Everyone has to be treated equally.
Most (all?) universities have defined rules on how to treat sickness, bad personal circumstances, etc. You should check your local regulations and get advice from either other faculty members, students organizations or the responsible university staff. In many cases, there are options to re-do an exam.
You should check the regulations mentioned before, but I would not take any measures before the results are out. After they are published, you could ask the professor on advice on how to proceed and explain your situation afterwards. Maybe there are some options like a second attempt or otherwise.


Tips for supervising interns My advisor will be taking on a number of summer interns, some of whom have been assigned to my projects. The interns are a mix of sophomore and junior undergrads with varied levels of research experience. They will be present for 8 weeks (2 months).

What are some general tips for supervising interns ?

My biggest piece of advice is set expectations from day one and then work with them very very closely until you feel like they have "taken off" and are also on the same page.  It is such a short amount of time that you may have to have them do some shadowing to get them on board as soon as possible.

The worst thing you can do is tell them to do things, not get what you expect, then in week three you have gone no where, you are frustrated, they are frustrated, and then they are gone before you know it.


Differences between writing a report for a company and for an academic reader I have been hired for a small consulting gig and need to write a report. The people reading this report are not scientists, but rather process engineers and in general people with a more business-like mind set.

I have experience writing academic reports, but not reports for the corporate world. At the moment I am writing the report avoiding as much technicality as possible, and assuming the reader has a limited understanding of the very detailed methodological and theoretical aspects of the work. Besides this, are there any differences in writing style that I should observe? For instance, should I cut down on the use of references and so on?

Having written edited and supervised the writing of consultancy and similar reports to earn my living for many years, I am now getting used to writing for academics. The crucial point of difference is that a consultancy report demands decision and must be tailored to make it as easy as possible for the decision-maker, who may well not be an expert in the subject matter, to understand what you are saying he or she must do, and why. In contrast, an academic paper is intended to show other experts in your field how clever you are.

You need to find out if there is a house style with which you must comply. If not, I recommend the following approach.

In a consultancy report you must assume that the reader is very busy indeed and will not necessarily read all of it. You have to be very direct, right from the start. A busy reader will be asking these questions: What's the report about? What question does it address? What's the answer? Why is that the answer?

It's your job to answer them as soon as they occur to the reader. That means that you should avoid structures that postpone important material to the end, such as:

Introduction
Background
Terms of reference
what we did
Who we saw
Findings
Conclusions

Instead use a pyramid structure:

Situation: starting point, general area report is about. No more than a few sentences. Nothing new or surprising goes here. For example: Your present system is set up to make black automobiles.
Complication: What has triggered the consultancy study. Why you were hired. For example: Your sales are declining.
Question: That is the question that would come naturally into the reader's mind having read the situation and complication. For example: what can we do about it?
Answer: A few sentences that summarise your answer to the Question. For example: Start producing cars in a range of colours, for which the necesary technology can be acquired in six months.
Reasons. Why that is your answer, set out in a logical manner with increasing detail as the text proceeds.
All the stuff about terms of reference, who you saw etc. goes in appendices. References are most unlikely to be wanted.

Much more detail on this style of writing, that is widely used by leading international consultancies, can be found in various books by Barbara Minto.

Good luck.


Repeatedly citing same item of personal communication The APA style indicates that personal communication should be cited in the format "J. Doe (personal communication, M dd, yyyy)" in-text, without a bibliographic entry. I was wondering what the best solution to citing such an item repeatedly is?

Example:

  J. Doe (personal communication, August 21, 2017) proposes that concept
  X is inherently meaningless without mechanism Y.

  [...]

  Doe (2012, 2015, 2016) presents mechanism Y in terms a, b, c. We could therefore
  assume that this predicts concept X to exist independently of Y,
  nothwithstanding J. Doe's (personal communication, August 21, 2017)
  objection that doing so would lead to undesired behaviour Z---it is
  what strictly follows from the system proposed in Doe (2012, 2015,
  2016).

Is there a better way to refer to the same personal communication the second time? Options like J. Doe (op. cit.), J. Doe (ibid.) etc. seem to not really work semantically (given what kind of object op. cit. and ibid. refer to) and be potentially ambiguous with Doe (2012, 2015, 2016), although I suppose the initial of the first name here may disambiguate.

Are there any established ways of dealing with this elegantly?

[Edit:] I should add that I have to refer to a different instance of personal communication with Doe elsewhere, so simply citing "Doe (p.c.)" later on would be potentially ambiguous, unless it somehow only referred to the most recently cited instance of personal communication.

[Edit 2:] To provide some context, we're talking here about a situation where the papers by Doe (2012, 2015, 2016) outline a particular theory but leave some aspect of it poorly defined or ambiguous. The private communication entails asking Doe for clarification as to how he intended that ambiguous aspect of the theory to be understood/implemented. So this is not really about relying on data or sources that are unavailable, it is about giving fair shrift to Doe's theory, and making clear as a starting point both for my own work and others how the original point was intended. If this is not taken into account there's a real danger of just attacking a self-made straw man here, and neither Doe nor I nor others in the field would probably be happy with that. It seems inevitable to me that full disclosure here entails citing the personal communication on more than one occasion, namely whenever Doe's disambiguating communication comes into play.

Without knowing the context, what you are trying to do seems poor practice to me. "This is important because person X said so in private" is impossible for peer reviewers to verify, and hence not authorative when written in a paper.


How would we identify a better measure of academic productivity? Measures of academic productivity, like the h-index, m-index, i10-index are useful but imperfect. Their imperfections are more than an abstract concern. Hiring committees consider them in determining how the applicant stands in relation to his peers. The weight committees give to these numbers varies, especially with newer metrics.

How do we know which measurement of scientific productivity is the most accurate? This question suggests that no measure is accepted as generally accurate. The h-index has a retrospective validation for some fields. Have studies tracked a cohort of scientists over time to compare the ability of these measurements to predict who received a tenure-track appointment in the next five years? (I realize that is not everyone's goal. It is one that tenure committees care about.)

I don't know that anyone has done this on a broad scale for tenure. There is a fairly recent study that used a machine learning approach to figure out what metrics are predictive of success in achieving a faculty position.

van Dijk, D., Manor, O., & Carey, L. B. (2014). Publication metrics and success on the academic job market. Current Biology, 24(11), R516-R517.

For an overview and a simplied version of the application, see this Science Careers story.

From the paper's summary:

  The number of applicants vastly outnumbers the available academic
  faculty positions. What makes a successful academic job market
  candidate is the subject of much current discussion [1–4] . Yet, so
  far there has been no quantitative analysis of who becomes a principal
  investigator (PI). We here use a machine-learning approach to predict
  who becomes a PI, based on data from over 25,000 scientists in PubMed.
  We show that success in academia is predictable. It depends on the
  number of publications, the impact factor (IF) of the journals in
  which those papers are published, and the number of papers that
  receive more citations than average for the journal in which they were
  published (citations/IF). However, both the scientist’s gender and the
  rank of their university are also of importance, suggesting that
  non-publication features play a statistically significant role in the
  academic hiring process. Our model (www.pipredictor.com) allows anyone
  to calculate their likelihood of becoming a PI.

tl;dr Publish lots of papers that get lots of citations in good journals. But you knew that already.


Are papers on Research Gate publicly available? Do users need an account (on Research Gate) to view papers on the site? Or, are these papers available to anyone who finds the page for a paper (i.e., through Google Scholar)? Doing some investigating with different browsers and computers is a bit inconclusive to me.

In my experience, the papers are often not online, but RG let's you "request" a paper, meaning the website sends a canned email to the author, which they may or may not respond to. This is regardless of whether or not the user has an account. RG infamously listed authors with their publications who never registered, and these would thus receive all sorts of spam. I'm not sure if that is still the case.


Leaving postdoc after less than one year with no reference letter I've been in my first postdoc for a year and feel that I'm not progressing in my career. There has been communication issues with my PI, he's not very supportive of his senior postdocs, and it takes a long time to publish.

I am currently looking for new positions, however how do I address the issue of my one year postdoc, especially if I won't be receiving a reference letter from the PI?

Should I address this in the cover letter?

Also, he is quite big in the field, so are there any considerations I should be careful about, for instance applying to people he has worked with?

Would it be worthwhile to ask other PIs in the department that I have not worked with but I have been on good terms with for a reference letter?

I would apply to new postdocs using the professors at your former doctoral program as references. If there's someone at the postdoc school that you worked with and can speak positively, you could use one of them instead of one of your former profs, but I'd keep the ratio 2:1 or 3:1 in favor of your former professors.

The good thing is that you're in your first year of the postdoc. Sometimes there are just fit issues -- in terms of personalities or research topics or both. Everyone in academia is aware of this and we're aware it's not always the fault of the applicant -- especially when it comes to "big names" (== big egos). I think you could apply to new post docs referring very briefly and obliquely to fit -- and using the materials and references from your doctoral program.


Is meeting the entry requirements enough to justify applying for an MSc? This summer, I will be graduating from the University of Leeds (BSc Mathematics) with an expected 2:1 grade. I am now looking at finance-related MSc courses.

Going to a top tier London university (Imperial, UCL, etc) would be a dream come true for me, but I can't afford to throw away the cost of making applications (approx. £70 each) if I don't stand a chance of being made an offer.

I expect to meet all of the entry requirements for these courses, but still feel that I would be (academically) a weak candidate for such courses (having achieved only ABBB at A-level, for example).

So given that I meet the entry requirements for these courses, would it be worth making an application - or would I not stand up to the competition?

Edit (additional information): I also have no relevant work experience. However, on the positive side I have good knowledge of a variety of programming languages, take on a fair number of personal projects which demonstrate a genuine interest in finance, and have done a lot of financial mathematics as part of my degree.

Additionally, I may be able to put in a plea on the grounds of extenuating circumstances on the basis of a mental-health diagnosis which had a significant effect on my grades in earlier years. Since these issues have been treated (i.e. in my third year) I have averaged a strong first (however, poor past performance means that I only expect to graduate with a 2:1).

Previously people submitted three applications, one certain, one stretch, and one intermediate. To use the work experience to your advantage, try to find programs that encourage people with relevant work experience to apply.

In the US I'd advise you not to mention the mental health diagnosis at this stage.  However, I don't know if that carries over to the UK.

Even without mentioning specifics, it is still possible to write a short accompanying statement about the poor grades early on, something along the lines of "facing a challenging family situation during years x and y" and pointing to recent spectacular successes as a counterbalance.

In general you should aim for a non-apologetic, self-confident tone, especially since you want to go into finance -- which I think is a field full of chutzpah.  If you are not accepted, you're not accepted; but no one will judge you harshly for having tried.

With regard to the money -- look, in the finance world, don't they talk a lot about "the cost of doing business"?  Two or three applications are not going to make much of a dent in your nest egg.

By the way, I wonder whether you would like to consider looking beyond your national borders?  Finance is such an international sort of field.

(I actually agree this should be closed but I had too much to say to fit into comments.)


Why people without publication can have a good placement? I am browsing CVs of some new AP who graduated this or last year and take on an AP as their first position in a prestigious EU university. I surprisingly find that none of them have successfully published a journal article when they were on the job market and till now the average publication record of them is one article in a Q2 journal. And I know some PhDs with one to two publications in a Q2/Q3 journal didn't find a tenure and so did a postdoc after graduation and even then they obtained a faculty position, the universities they join are not as good as the former group. Neither of them graduated from a university that is apparently superior to the one where they get professorship, nor a huge difference in the academic background of both groups can be found based on my observation of their CVs (I mean, ranking of the Univ in the field of economics, conference attendance, research field, language and programming skills, etc). To note, the field I talk here is Economics. I am indeed confused. Why? Does it mean in social science, publication is not that important?

TIAA-CREF has published an excellent article regarding The Changing Faculty Workforce Models by Adrianna Kezar of the University of Southern California. and can be found at the following URL: www.tiaa-crefinstitute.org
In a nutshell, the document details changes in academia resulting from several external influences that have impacted the traditional faculty model and essentially reducing the tenured faculty to just about 30% of the total faculty employed at US institutions of higher education. On top of that publishing as the key academic initiative for tenure, evaluation has changed as well. As one other pointed out books are one such alternative as are presentations, teaching, service work, and many others too numerous to mention here.
The result for those wanting to make academia a career, the days of tenured professors, earned through publication to certain journals are on the way out. I have seen this myself in over 20 years working as a professor with a Ph.D. In the face of increased accountability, governments are starting to gauge the number of graduates who find employment making them more accountable for the money they receive, this trend will continue to change the traditional academic institution and its faculty.


Getting a letter of recommendation from a socially controversial PhD advisor I am about to finish my PhD at a US university and am starting to apply for jobs and postdocs in physics and computer science. Throughout my PhD, I maintained a good relationship with my PhD supervisor. However, in the last year and a half, he has made social (not academic) comments that were very inappropriate. These comments more directly influenced other students, and the proper actions have been taken with the university and an investigation is on-going. To be clear, the comments are inexcusable and I have lost all respect for my supervisor.
I am wondering what the most appropriate way for me to proceed is, as many positions explicitly ask for a letter of recommendation from ones supervisor.
Some additional data:

I, luckily, had a rather successful PhD and have many collaborators who I could ask in his place. However, I imagine I would need to address why my advisor is not writing a letter.

I do think my advisor would write me a positive letter, but (a) I feel uncomfortable asking him for a favor and (b) I worry that (and I hope) if public action is taken, his letter will not be viewed in a positive light. Quite simply: I'd rather not have a word of support from him.

Is this something I can/should address in a cover letter or otherwise?

While there is always risk in such things, if his professional credentials are good and the other comments don't reflect badly on that, I'd suggest asking for the recommendation and not otherwise mentioning it in cover letters and such. Treat it as a purely professional relationship, which it should be.
As you note it is odd to not have a recommendation from one's advisor. And I'm assuming that your judgement is that his letter would be professional. If you have a way to find out anything about what he has written for others, it would be a benefit. A department head might, possibly, give you some guidance. But that is another judgement call - whether to ask.
Of course, you can't control the reactions of others, but you can, if asked, disassociate yourself from his views. Just say that you don't hold those views in any interview or such.
I'll note that in math and cs there have been a number of similar situations where a person is widely respected professionally, but whose views on some issues have been shunned and the people condemned. It doesn't reflect on their technical work, not should it reflect badly on you or your work.

See the case of William Shockley, and that of Robert Lee Moore.
And, of course, many people hold appalling views of things, that may be known to others, but not to their students.


Is it possible to cite from an unknown source without plagiarising? I am currently writing a document that needs pictures for visual representations of my topic. I’ve been browsing around on the Internet to find such picture. I found a very good picture that could be suitable for my topic. Unfortunately, I do not know how to cite this picture.

The reason why I say I do not know how to cite this picture is because it is a picture from a textbook (or article) that someone decided to upload on Pinterest. I know this because the picture has a small caption at the bottom that says, Figure 1.2: Blah blah blah.

Is it possible to cite something like this? Should I move on and try to find a substitute? My document will be published in the United States.

Plagiarism is about inaccurately claiming a work as your own. Thus, as long as you make it clear that it's not yours and attribute the source as best you can, you need not fear an accusation of plagiarism.

Whether this is an appropriate source to cite, on the other hand, depends on how you are planning to use it and in what degree of formality.  Since this is unclear from your post, I will suggest a few possibilities along a spectrum:

If you are not formally publishing the image and are not dependent on its content, there is likely to be no problem and you can credit very informally. For example, I recently made a presentation that included an humorous image marked: "[Photo Credit: The Internet]".  Even copyright is unlikely to be an issue as long as you do best-effort attribution and aren't annoying a large corporation or unusually litigious artist.
If you are formally publishing the image, then the publication venue will need to have copyright issues resolved. For this, you either need to track down the author or else give up on using the image.  Here, you can use the standard forms for citing a website. That is likely to not be very helpful for anyone trying to trace the image, given how unstable and dynamic Pinterest is, but will at least follow the appropriate forms.
If you are actually relying on the technical content of the image, you probably need to find another source or generate the content yourself. Since you know nothing about the actual ultimate source, there is no scientific credibility to an anonymous snippet on the internet, and it needs to be treated accordingly: for all you know it could be from a UFOlogy pamphlet or a Chick tract.


Internship paid vs unpaid on CV I have interned in two companies while I was conducting my undergraduate studies, one of the internships was unpaid and the other covered transportation expenses.

My question should I mention in my CV that these internships were unpaid or voluntary?
And does this issue make a difference in the eyes of the graduate admissions committee?

The nature of the internships is related to my undergraduate studies (general computer skills), but not very related to my research topic I want to peruse.

Whether you were paid or unpaid is a matter of compensation, which is not something a reviewing committee would care about. All that's important is that your credentials were strong enough to earn you the internship. Whether you were paid or not is irrelevant to the strength of your credentials.


Change title of the manuscript in arXiv I have written a paper and posted that in arXiv. The paper is cited once and I have cited roughly 40 manuscripts in my paper. I am now thinking that the title of my paper is not fully representing what is going on in the paper and I have a better alternative title for the paper. I have not published my paper in another journal and only the arXiv version exists on the internet.
I know when you submit a revised manuscript in arXiv all the previous version still remains public and this is not an issue for me.
My question is: Once I change the title what will happen to the cited paper (with the old title) and all the papers cited by this paper? Are the citations going to be removed since the paper is changed? Are the citations automatically point to the new manuscript? the last but not the least is Google scholar is going to point to the most recent version of the arXiv automatically?
I have read the following post: Change title to arXiv paper.

Google Scholar might show the two versions as separate articles, but you have the option to merge them in your profile. While merging, you get an option "Select the best version of the article.". So, selecting the newer version here should ensure that the correct arXiv version is linked to.
Citations also get merged when merging articles. It is however possible that the citation count will have an asterisk next to it indicating that Google Scholar is not sure if both versions are the same paper. Citations would not get lost here, you also have the option to unmerge the articles any time.
I am not sure how new citations will be counted, but as long as the versions are merged, this should not matter since both versions will point to a single entry in your profile. I am also not sure what happens to citation counts of the papers that you cite. Ideally, your citation of those papers should not be counted twice, but Google Scholar's citation data often has errors for various reasons so one should only use them as a rough indicator and not as an exact count.


Self-plagiarism: Copy part of thesis for blog posts? I am currently writing my master thesis and I am also running a popular blog about my research area. Some people asked me about certain topics and if I could write about them on my blog to make them more understandable to newcomers in our field.

Now it is tempting for me to just copy parts of my yet uncompleted thesis and mash together into blog posts. This will help me to save time writing them (I usually do not have the time) and it will benefit others. However, I worry that people see that as self-plagiarism. In particular people on the thesis committee might say I copied parts of the thesis from the internet.

What would be the right way to save me from trouble here. Shall I cite my unpublished thesis, or should my thesis cite my blog posts? Should the blog posts have clear indications that I copied verbatim from my unpublished thesis? Will I get into trouble if people see that in my thesis I copied verbatim from my blog posts (if I cite my blog posts  rather than the other way around).

You should do two things:
1) Discuss this with your advisor. He/she will know the regulations better than we do.
2) Make it clear on the blog that you the blog-writer and you the thesis-writer are the same person, e.g. by using your real name.

Another issue, that you didn't yet consider but that surely needs consideration is the copyright for your thesis. At some universities, the department/university library wants at least some rights on your thesis. If they then find parts of said thesis copied verbatim to an online platform, you might get into trouble. It might well be that this is not the case at your university or that they don't care as long as you cite your thesis, but this is something you need to clarify before posting stuff.


Sending a paper which is under review for showing competency in order to find a paid sabbatical leave I am a Ph.D. student. I submitted my paper to a highly prestigious journal and also answered with a very detailed and long answer to a reject & resubmit type of revise to this journal. I think it took a long time for the journal and its referees to read and decide.

At the same time, I have a very severe financial condition as my source of finance, cuts my salary since my Ph.D. got longer than their standard duration for a Ph.D. I want to find a paid sabbatical leave. I decided to send my papers to many people in order to find such a one year job. I want to know is it a good idea to send my last submission to this journal without telling the name of the journal to through email to obtain a paid sabbatical leave which I think is rare.

What's your advice for me? Thank you very much.

I'm not familiar with paid sabbaticals for students. They are normally granted to tenured academics, at least in my experience. But for any sort of leave from your studies, I don't think there is any issue about revealing your "work in progress" to potential employers. Since it is under review you might be interfering with the blind review process but that is really for the editor to manage. The work is yours until you give up copyright to a journal.

But, you should check the policies of the journal. It may be that in submitting, you are implicitly agreeing not to share the work during the review process. If that is the case, however, your option would be to withdraw the paper.

It is also possible that you would consider asking this question of the journal editor and ask for advice there. It might nudge the editor to make a decision, whether favorable or unfavorable.

But prior to publishing the work, it is best to label it as "in progress."


Formatting paper for submission I'm submitting my paper to Quantitative Finance (instruction to authors here). The structure of the paper should be:

Manuscripts should be compiled in the following order: title page (including Acknowledgements as well as Funding and grant-awarding bodies); abstract; keywords; main text; references; appendices (as appropriate); table(s) with caption(s) (on individual pages); figure caption(s) (as a list).

I'm a bit confused by this requirement. Does anyone know how a title page is meant to look like? All the papers I've seen simply have Title up top, followed by authors, keywords and abstract. The same goes for figure captions as a list. Did they mean itemize all the captions?!

Usually, when I write a paper for a conference or a journal, I download their template and start adding my content into the empty template. Things invariably fall into the right place. Even if you have written the paper in another template, it is a good idea to open both the documents and copy section by section into the new template.
So look for the templates e.g. http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/authors/rqufLatex.zip
and use start using it.
As suggested by @Buffy above, you should consider looking at published papers. I think they are trying to stress upon the fact that in your title page, which is nothing but the first page of your paper, you must include acknowledgements, and other information properly. So title page which is the first page will also include your paper sections.


Can I write Research Paper on improving results of a Phd thesis I do not have any prior experience of publishing any kind of research material, it would be a huge favour if you can give your comments in the following matter:

In a thesis related to Seismic Image Processing, the author has proposed a method for Automatic Fault Detection, I have implemented that method and I have improved the results of the method by introducing some more equations.

My question is, given the above situation can I publish my findings ? and how should I quote that thesis in the publication ?

Any suggestion/comment/idea is welcome.
Thanks!

This is standard practice. Someone does work and publishes it. Someone, possibly same people, but not necessarily, improves on the work and publish that. The fact that it is a thesis should make no difference, so long as the work being improved upon reflects the state of the art.


How to convince the faculty search committee to select/short list me at a place where my research interests are already actively being pursued at? I am applying for a faculty position and thereby requires me to submit my research interests. The department I am applying already have two professors that have similar research interests to mine. The research topics demand a lot of collaboration and effort and people working in that area would know that an additional faculty could complement the work being done there. But for the faculty search committee not well-versed in the area, it may appear that an additional faculty is not necessary to do research in that area.

How can I tweak my research statement to convince the faculty search committee to short list me for interview? Any suggestions or advice.

That is essentially not something you can do. Whether or not a department wants an additional faculty member in an area is something the department needs to figure out. As I mention, "The research topics are extremely complicated" is something that every researcher can and will (correctly!) say about their own research area, and having another colleague in their area will help them as well. As a consequence, if you claim that hiring you will be good for the research group then that will likely not have much of an effect -- the search committee members will know that this is true for a hire in any area already represented in the department.

In practice, figuring out in which areas a department wants to hire is often a difficult and contentious process. Everyone wants more faculty in their own area. An outsider will not generally have a voice in this process, and so you trying to convince them of something that they need to figure out themselves seems to me like a futile thing. Focus on making your application look good by having lots of publications in good journals, writing proposals and getting them funded, etc. What you can do is point out that your research would have natural connections to researchers already in the department, and who this is.


My PI publicly humiliated my colleague. I want to report the incident but don't have a recording. What should I do? Background: I am a PhD student in my final year, and I'm writing my thesis now. My PI (not a professor) is in his late 40's and is generally kind in public. However, he is often moody, and I feel he stresses his students out by repeatedly making judgemental statements about them in the lab. We usually try to keep our cool and let him take his bad mood out on us. One colleague is a major target of his bad mood. This is probably because she is not always in a good health and asks for sick leave occasionally. My PI only allows us to take in total 4 weeks of leave every year (despite our university grants 8 weeks of leave in total). However, in my opinion see she works hard on her experiments day and night.
Situation: Last year, at a lab meeting, this colleague said that two of her cousins had COVID. My PI smiled and said 'Oh now I see the problem in your family gene.' There were 4 PhD students (including me) and a technician present. I was shocked and the others also seemed to be at least surprised. After the lab meeting, I asked the colleague if she was OK, and she smiled embarrassedly.
I would like to report this to the department. However, I wonder if this may be more of my colleague's choice. In my opinion, my PI has created a toxic environment for all of us, and I don't want to let this go. He makes micro-bullying or threatening statements occasionally, but this public humiliation seemed very serious and crossed a red line. We've been treated similarly but not as bad as this, so people seemed to accept my PI for who he is. However, recently my colleague is treated especially badly by my PI and she looks very frustrated. I feel bad for her and feel I need to do something.
Question: As this public humiliation happened about one year ago, how can I report this if I don't have recorded proof? Are there other choices to make our research environment healthier? What can I do?
Thanks ahead for any help and suggestions.

We do not know your local laws and culture, so beware that advice here may be inaccurate.

He makes micro-bullying or threatening statements occasionally, but this public humiliation seemed very serious and crossed a red line.

It is the pattern of behavior, not the specific example you gave, that is what you need to report.
A recording is not necessary to make a complaint.
Reports are usually made to a union, ombudsperson, office of civil rights, or diversity office.  It depends on local customs.  Check your university's policies, or possibly local laws.
Usually being rude, offensive, inappropriate, wrong, or stupid is not against the rules, but threats, bullying, and harassment are.  Do not expect all bad behavior to result in punishment.
Do expect to get the same amount of leave that the university policy
says you should get.

making judgemental statements

Keep in mind that judging people is part of the PIs job.  But it should be done in an appropriate manner.


Should I send private email to department's dean after sending faculty job application? There is one exciting job opportunity that I am willing to apply.
The dean, I think, may know me because I have met him in a couple of conferences and I have been on a discussion panel once (as a Ph.D. student) in a conference which his department organized.

But he is a big shot, and he may know a thousand young aspirants like me. Will it be wise to send him an email or will it give a bad impression that I am trying to cajole him?

If you really know him and have corresponded otherwise, then it would be fine. Otherwise I wonder, as would everyone else, what you are trying to accomplish.

But you haven't said that you have actually applied. The title is a bit inconsistent with the first paragraph.

However, if you get an email, after applying, thanking you for the application, you could reply to that, reminding him of your earlier connection. But it would probably be improper of him to take any action other than what he would do for any candidate. Likewise, if you get an interview, you could go visit him.

But probably not a cold email. Especially since you raise it as a potential issue.


A published paper stole my unpublished results from a science fair I'm in junior high, and earlier this year, we had a science fair. My science project was mostly experimental pure math, and came in first overall in our grade.

Today, I was doing some research on a related topic, and came upon a published paper in a moderately respected journal. This paper had the same title as my science fair project, the layout was the same, the method was the same (down to the variable names), and the results were the same. The only thing that had changed was the wording, and the addition of an abstract. I have no idea how the author of this paper even came upon my project, presumably it was published on my school's website for some period of time or one of my teachers sent it out, but I really don't know what to do.

So, I really have two questions. Firstly, what can I do about this, and secondly, it had never occurred to me that my work may be of the quality to publish, so once I do get this situation sorted out, could I possibly think of publishing my results myself?

EDIT: Glad to finally be able to provide an update. Thank you all for the immense response this question received. I took Dr. Clark's advice and started at the level of my school. Apparently, my paper was shared with the local university's algebraic number theory professor, who shared it with his students. From there, even with that professor's help, I've been unable to trace it, but I'm almost sure that's how it got out.

A very long time ago I emailed the journal, simply making them aware of the situation and stating I have proof if it's needed, and got no reply. About two months ago, the paper mysteriously disappeared from the journal. And around that time, too, I got an opportunity to submit my paper to a state-wide high school competition. I just found out this Saturday that I won, and will be having my paper published in the state STEM journal. Again, thank you all for all the incredibly helpful advice. I would be lost without it.

The other answers don't seem to be taking into account that the OP is a 13-year-old junior high school student whose work was presented in a school science fair.  I think that treating the OP as a "very junior researcher" is a bit unrealistic and also may place too large a burden on him.  Every week on this site we see adult researchers placed in great distress and turmoil by issues of plagiarism and academic priority.  These are not easy matters to resolve, and they place a high level of burden on the individual academics because academia is essentially self-policing.  A junior high school student is not a professional academic, almost certainly has none of the procedural training and academic contacts that a professional academic would, and therefore does not have an ethical obligation to respond as a professional academic would.

The first thing I want to say is that I don't think the OP is obligated in any way to respond to this incident, as other answers seem to imply that he is.  He can do so if he wants to, but if so I would recommend getting help from someone else.

Another important issue here is that the OP doesn't even understand the mechanism by which his work was made public.  To me this seems to suggest that if he wants to pursue it, he should begin at the level of his own school.  Presumably there is some teacher / faculty advisor involved in the science fair.  I would contact them or have a parent contact them.  This really is (or could be) an issue in itself: a school should not be releasing a student's work
on the internet without the student's permission or awareness.

If the OP doesn't have a clear understanding of how his work got made public in the first place, then unfortunately it seems to me that he is in an unusually poor position to press a case of academic priority.  He could contact the editors of the journal, submit all the evidence of his work along with the chronology, and the authors could respond simply by saying "We don't know anything about this.  Actually our work was done [at some earlier date].  As far as we can tell, some kid stole our work for a junior high school science fair.  What should we do about this?" and I don't see what the editors of the journal could plausibly do to resolve the situation.

This sounds bad, but let me make a few more comments:

In my experience, outright theft of work by serious academic mathematicians is extremely rare.  One of the reasons for this is that the worldwide mathematical research community is relatively close-knit.  If you're working in area X, then you probably trained at a certain set of universities and have affiliation, direct or indirect, with very serious senior reputable workers in area X.  Having a senior worker in area X think you've stolen someone else's work is a penalty far beyond the reward of publishing the work, in most cases (contrary to what popular culture may lead one to believe, the vast majority of contemporary mathematicians build their reputation on a steadily accumulating body of work, not one miraculous theorem).  Most areas of modern mathematics are so technically intensive that there are very few to no real outsiders contributing.  However, a real outsider -- e.g. someone who has had no face-to-face interaction with any university faculty member -- who does do significant mathematical work is unfortunately in a much worse position.
As a consequence of the above, when a brilliant 13-year-old's work gets stolen, it's very likely that it gets stolen by people who are not serious academic mathematicians, and it gets published in a journal which is not really serious and reputable.  If this is the case, then the stakes may be too low to justify the time and effort of trying to resolve the situation.  I am a professional mathematician, and if someone republished my work as their own (this has never happened to me) I would probably be upset and try something to fix it, but there are some journals where I would give up rather quickly.

So as a summary answer to the first question:

  Firstly, what can I do about this,

Take it slow, starting in your own home and at your school.  See if you can get some help with pursuing your claim.  If the claim turns out to be more trouble than it's worth to press: you can choose not to press it.  Try to gain a clear understanding of how this happened, so that it will not happen again.

As to your second question:

  secondly, it had never occurred to me that my work may be of the quality to publish, so once I do get this situation sorted out, could I possibly think of publishing my results myself?

As I said in a comment, I would advise almost any junior high school student not to think about publishing their mathematical work.  Note that I did not say to stop or slow down in the learning and doing of mathematics in any way.  In fact, the point is that the publication process is something that is done by professionals largely for reasons of professional exigency and not because it is pleasant or educational in its own right.  When I work with PhD students to try to get their first paper published, there comes a point where they realize that the amount of effort to do so (even after all the theorems are proven) is something like 2-10 times as much as they expected.  It used to be that math PhD students could mostly just concentrate on the math and not worry about publishing anything until after they got their PhD, but unfortunately those days are largely gone.  (In my department, one of the required features of the postdoctoral application is the publication list.  An empty list is surmountable, but it certainly does not augur well.)  Moreover, undergraduates who do summer math research are now being much more pressured to write up their results -- even when they are not really significant, and even when they were largely put up to the results by their faculty mentors -- and this is very worrisome.  The OP is 13 years old.  It is widely recognized that children of this age should not be working: the Fair Labor Standards Act says that in the US one must be 14 to legally work at all.  This does not apply to mathematical research, and it is certainly legal for the OP to pursue publication, but it is almost as worryingly too-soon for the OP to try to pursue this as if he had a serious, difficult job.

Let me say finally that I looked at the OP's internet profile, and it is clear that he is remarkably talented and precocious.  I highly encourage him to continue his study of mathematics, so long as his motivations for doing so are his own.  Based on what I've seen of the OP, I do not discount the possibility that he has already done work that could get published in a reputable journal (although that is highly unusual for someone of his age).  What I would say to him instead is: keep doing what you're doing.  Think about where you are now compared to where you were a few years ago and try to imagine where you'll be a few years in the future (while still in high school!).  If you're still doing math 3,5,10 years from now, what would your future self advise your 13-year-old self to do?  Is the work that you're doing now going to be a shadow of your later work?

Look e.g. at Terence Tao, who is arguably the world's leading mathematical-prodigy-grown up.  According to wikipedia, he published "his first assistant paper" at the age of 15.  But I don't know what that means, and I can't find the paper.  His first that is catalogued in the standard places was published in 1996, the same year he got his PhD, at the "advanced age" of 21.

Note also that you should not hesitate to interact with the mathematical community, as you have been.  I see that you have a blog.  This gives you a great place to post your work, talk about it there, and get feedback from others.

The very last thing I'll say on the matter is that you said the project in question is on elliptic curves over finite fields.  In fact elliptic curves are
my leading research interest at the moment.  So I would be happy to see your work and give you some feedback on it.  Of course you should not send the work to me if (i) you are not ready or (ii) have any concerns about it being stolen by me!  For the latter, I might recommend putting it on your blog first and then sending me a link to the blog.  But I am aware of some contemporary research on this topic and would be happy to steer you in a good direction if I can.


What are good principles for naming an algorithm? My previous publication was about improving a known method A and I called my algorithm XYZ-methodA, where XYZ is a catchy word and methodA is the known method. Now I apply my general theory to method B, so I am thinking of naming my second algorithm XYZ-methodB. This second algorithm uses a sub-routine, that I also developed. I am thinking of giving it also some name like XYZ-methodC. However, this sub-routine is not that related to my general theory anymore, but is just used by XYZ-methodB to accomplish my goals.

Is this a good naming approach for methodB and methodC? Is it a good idea to use XYZ and put it everywhere like bumper sticker, indicating it is from me and increasing recognizability? That was kind of the idea.

What are good principles in naming my algorithms in general?

Naming them after myself is apparently not a good idea. But what is a good idea?

The bumper sticker idea is quite smart, provided it is indeed the same general approach being applied. Otherwise it becomes gimmicky. Also, IMO, it would be better if XYZ has some functional meaning besides just being catchy, but I understand this is not always easy.

For instance, suppose A and B are heap sort and bubble sort respectively. Suppose your general approach has something to do with hashing, and makes the sort faster. A name like Hashed heap sort and Hashed bubble sort would make more sense and have better recall value/correct association than say, Snappy heap sort and snappy bubble sort. This may be an oversimplified example, but the point about functionality is worth remembering.

Ultimately, the line between gimmicky and legacy is not predefined, and it's not in your hands. Since you've already published XYZ-method A, you could see how the response to that nomenclature has been (are other authors using that name? Do your collegaues and co-workers call it by that name? Do other people see it catching on?). If the response is positive, and the above points are met, you could go for XYZ-method B. Else consider learning from this experience and make a fresh start with a new name.


Should I answer this question about diversity? There is an optional prompt on my PhD application:

  censoredSchoolName University regards the diversity of its graduate
  student body as an important factor in serving the educational mission
  of the university. We encourage you to share unique, personally
  important, and/or challenging factors in your background, such as work
  and life experiences, special interests, culture, socioeconomic
  status, the quality of your early educational environment, gender,
  sexual orientation, race or ethnicity. Please discuss how such factors
  would contribute to the diversity of the entering class, and hence to
  the experience of your censoredSchoolName classmates.

If I were to answer, what I would write is something about how I grew up in a large family with five siblings all attending college around the same time, so though I come from a middle-class family, I have had to handle much of the financial responsibility of my education. In addition to this, neither of my parents have attained higher than a non-scientific Bachelor's degree, and I have mostly blazed this path under my own independence and ambition.

But I feel that this might not be what the question is really looking for? What I've written above does not make me diverse in the way that I think the University probably wants. I'm a middle-class white male, I will say, which my application has of course already reflected. I'm wondering if I might be better off leaving it blank rather than coming off as forcing a hollow answer, or even pitying myself when there are certainly other applicants with serious disadvantages.

Leave it blank

You don't have to play along with the diversity people, but that doesn't mean there won't be any consequences.

Throughout my time in undergrad, the US military, and now grad school, I have steadfastly refused to answer questions about my race. And why should I? My father is from Mexico and is still a dual citizen. As far as I can tell, that gives me a pretty good claim to be Hispanic. I am born in Boston, I don't speak Spanish, and I don't particularly like anything Mexican. Am I hispanic? What is my hispanic blood quantum? Am I white? Who cares?

What ought to matter is the content of your character, or so I've heard.

Just don't be surprised when people don't want to let you go. I have been called into a senior officer's office (in the military) and forced to answer a question about my race. When I told him it was 'American', he filled out the forms in question for me as white. I haven't always got off easy, but I've done alright in life, and without participating in such racist activities as classifying people based on their skin color.

PS: The original form of your question was just fine. If you have sneering contempt for this kind of diversity question, then you do. Don't let people bully you into thinking your opinion isn't valid.


overlapped results in tables for research journal In research papers (for examples, computer science journals), may I have overlaps between multiple tables containing experiment results?
My situation is like this. I have two tables Table A and Table B in the experiment section. Table A contains performance results from model-a,b,c. Table B contains performance results from model-c,d,e.
Thus, the two tables has an overlap as both contain the same reulst of model-c.
Each table highlihgts a distinct point. That is, each table is made to verify a different claim.
If I simply combine them into one table that shows all results of model-a,b,c,d,e, it will seriously degrade readability and make the points unclear.
So I am wondering if it is okay to contain overlap in diferent result tables.

Sure, there is no rule against that. Just make it clear to the reader that some of the data is the same as in the other table.
The main disadvantage is that you are increasing the length by duplicating content, but if not doing so seriously degrades the readability as you say, then I don't think it would be an obstacle.


How many excuses are too many? I know we've all had situations with students who seem to have a solid number of excuses not to be in class or get work done.  However, for the most part, it will be only once or twice a semester that I have to deal with any single student for which I'm normally happy to give them the benefit of the doubt with even a modicum of forewarning or evidence of reason (doctor's note, etc).

But I'm pretty much at my wit's end with a student this semester and I'm not entirely how I should deal with it.  The student has missed close to half of class meetings and missed so far both of the exams given so far this semester.   They have had excuses of one sort or another for each absence, but the diversity of them rivals anything Lemony Snicket could hope to write.  But all of them fall within our departmental policy for excused absences so I have to work with the student.  I'll spare details (also for FERPA concerns), but the extra work load it's resulted in has absolutely not been welcome give I'm on a large overload this semester.

When it comes to excused/justified absences, just how many is too many?  And how can one best handle it given departmental or institutional policies that force instructors' hands to be lenient even for cases where, really, a student ought to have withdrawn if they're having so many problems?

Whatever general advice this forum can offer is in my opinion extremely unlikely to offer much insight into your specific situation (though I'd love to be proved wrong by other answers). As you said, this is an issue of departmental policy, so you need to have a good long conversation about the situation with your department chair or grad/undergrad (as applicable) program chair. It is their job to set a policy on such matters that is legal and reasonable and provide you with any resources you need to do your job effectively and without creating an unreasonable workload for you (source: I am a department chair). And of course you will be able to provide them the necessary details that you cannot mention here. Good luck!


When mentioning a website, parenthesis or reference? In terms of IEEE style(IEEEtran) and ACM style(ACMsmall), respectively.
For example, when I mention Stack Overflow, should it be Stack Overflow [1] or Stack Overflow (www.stackoverflow.com)

The IEEE reference guide includes websites among the references (see section R). I've also always seen websites listed in the reference section, and I've also cited them as such.
I'm not familiar with ACM journals, but the ACM citation style and reference formats webpage gives similar indications.
Therefore, cite e.g. Stack Overflow as

Stack Overflow [1]


Reasons for dramatic differences in pay for adjuncts? I recently came across a survey of pay for adjunct faculty at California community colleges. It doesn't surprise me that rural schools pay less than urban ones, but there are some pretty amazing discrepancies between schools that are close together geographically. For example, the highest pay for a part-timer with a PhD is 50% lower in the North Orange County district (where I'm full-time faculty) than at Mt. San Antonio College. These two schools draw students from adjoining areas, and are 25 minutes apart on the freeway. Community colleges in California basically get their money from the state's general fund these days (not from property taxes, as in the past), so funding per student should be equal.

Are these wild contrasts present all over the world, or are they a specific to community colleges in California? Why do these huge differences exist? Are they evidence that this labor market is one that economists would describe as inefficient, with people not being able to make rational choices based on accurate information? I wonder if they simply reflect the political and fiscal attitudes of the schools' boards of trustees.

related: Why is it that adjunct faculty positions pay so little?

Highest pay is probably very misleading. What's the median? The survey doesn't say, and so isn't really all that helpful..

It's entirely possible that the highest-paid part-time person at Mt. San Antonio is a doctor teaching a health science course or a lawyer teaching a business course which the North Orange County school doesn't offer, and so market forces may have dictated a higher salary to the part-time person who teaches it.

Trying to draw conclusions from the outliers in a data set is very difficult if not impossible and inadvisable at the very least.


Can I demand re-submission of a manuscript that has an odd document layout? I am assigned to review a paper that has an extremely strange page layout (the pages are squares, single column with about 150 characters per line), making it very impractical to print or read. It is for a journal and was submitted via Manuscript Central.
I could of course read it on my screen (which I don’t like at all), or print it with either rotating or stretching the pages (which I tried but it’s very awkward to read and therefore extremely distracting).

Is it okay to write to the ADM and ask them to demand a re-submission in a proper document layout, i.e., A4 or US Letter? Or am I being fussy?

No. It is not your job as a reviewer to demand things. You can inform the editor that given the format of the manuscript that you will not review it. The editor will then likely look at the manuscript and either decide that you are being a pain and find a new reviewer or that the manuscript format is ridiculous. In that case, they will apologize to you and tell you that they are requesting a reformatted version.

Unless the format is really awful (like less than 10 lines a page or greater than 100 characters per line), the editor will probably conclude you are a pain.


How to call colleagues who was once your professor or advisor? After finishing my PhD in the US, I am now working in a university in an Asian country where I studied for my master. All of my colleagues are 20 years senior than me and are full professors except one. I am wondering what I should call my colleagues. Should I address them as "Teacher" if I've ever taken a class from them? (One of them is my master advisor which is especially awkward for me to call his name.) Or should I address them by their "First Name" to emphasise that our current relationship is not teacher and student anymore? (They usually call each other by First name since they are all in similar age group, seniority, and male?)
By the way, I've been in this position for 1.5 years but I never call them by their first name, it's usually ‘Teacher’ if they previously taught me; or "Teacher xx(Last name)" if they never taught me. Would that be awkward if I just change how I call them now?

[ My updated answer after the OP updated his location and more info. ]

First, congratulations on your Ph.D. That is wonderful. :-)

In Asia, in generally, you probably should always call people, who once were your professors, with the title "Professor/Teacher/Doctor" at colleges, at commercial companies, or even in general social settings.
Note: Even if they are no longer your professors now, and they are working either at the same colleges or in the business environment with you as co-workers, perhaps, it is still a good idea to call them "Professor".
Generally speaking, that shows the respect and gratitude toward your former teachers/professors in Asian culture.
In my country in Asia, I have seen one University professor calls his former college instructor "Professor/Doctor" all the time. They are both teaching at the same college now, and getting along very well as both co-workers and former teacher/student.


Why use 'advisor' or 'supervisor' instead of just 'collaborator'? This bugs me a bit. I understand that technically the advisor or supervisor relationship may be a bit different from the more senior-level collaborations, but I can't help but think when I see people say "thanks to my supervisors/advisors for their help with this project" (i.e. on Twitter press-releases of research, at the beginning/end of presentations at conferences) that it is a bit infantilising... I am not suggesting it is a particularly important problem, but from many PhD students I know and from my own personal experience, the supervisor role can certainly be very much equivalent to normal collaboration between other academics. I think it makes a PhD student sound more independent and capable if they were to refer to their co-authors on papers published during their PhD as their collaborators - even if they are in fact their supervisor/advisor.
Keen to hear others thoughts!

I think you're correct that the supervisor role can be equivalent to normal collaboration in that the student will bring their own unique ideas, knowledge, and experience to build on a mutual project collaboratively. However, where I think there is an unavoidable difference (at least, in every student I have met including myself) is the conception of viable projects. In my field I've never heard of a student (masters or PhD) conceiving from the ground-up their entire project. They're always built from a project advertised to prospective students, or developed with the supervisor (often from previous work) where a research relationship already exists.
As a student, you're learning to become an independent researcher. This means learning what is and isn't scientifically interesting and viable, how to search the literature and theory for relevant information, etc.. This is what a supervisor is teaching, and this is a very specific relationship that isn't properly conveyed with "collaborator".
This distinction is most important when there are multiple co-authors on a paper, including co-authors that are not the supervisor. The non-supervisor co-authors fit the description of collaborators and still should be described as such, no matter their academic "rank".


Which is more valued, first authorship articles or the number of articles produced? What is more important in academia (bioinformatics, computational biology) for a person when he/she has already completed their PhD:

Number of first authorship articles he/she has
Number of published articles (he/she may or may not be the first author)

I wanted to know what do post-doc positions value more, the quality (only first author journals/conferences) or quantity(more number of journals/conferences, with/without first authorship)

As an experienced researcher, I think that this choice is a false dichotomy.

What I look for in a researcher's record is their ability to do meaningful and impactful work, and the strongest researchers in most fields I know of typically have a record that shows a mixture of first-author and Nth-author papers:

If you're capable of innovating and of doing the core work of a project, that should produce some first-author papers.
If your work is impactful and useful to others, that will result in collaborations, many of which will not have you as first author.

Complementarily, I would consider it a red flag to see either very few first-author papers (often indicating poor core research capabilities) or nearly all first-author papers (often indicating poor ability to work with others).

The further along a researcher is in their career, the more that I would typically expect the balance to shift from first-author papers to non-first-author papers, both as there is more time to build collaborations and as they start to supervise more junior researchers (student or otherwise).

To answer your specific question about a postdoctoral application, then, I would typically expect to see at least a few strong first-author papers and also some non-first-author collaborations.  At that stage of career, however, the number of significant papers is typically small enough that strong candidates can have all sorts of different mixtures.  In the end, at least for a researcher like myself, my judgement regarding a postdoc is less about the number of publications than what's in the publications and what you did for them.

Note: the general expectations expressed here may not apply to certain fields with very different publication expectations, such as pure mathematical theory or experimental high-energy particle physics


As a 2nd year undergraduate, what should I do to enhance my maths grad school application if I don't get into noteworthy summer programs? Sorry for the long title, but I just received some of my marks for the semester including a C+ in a programming course and F in a cell biology course) and am worried that have ruined all my chances at getting into summer program (I'm in Canada, so I'm looking at the few US REUs that accept foreign students on a limited basis).

What should I do if I don't get into any summer activity to help my graduate school application if I want to pursue mathematics? I'm in second year and haven't taken too many higher level maths courses, so I don't know how that would look when applying for NSERCs at my school.

I was thinking of maybe just doing some reading in mathematics and working on some personal projects that may help me look like I can actually do something on my own. I am also currently self-learning combinatorics and graph theory in the hopes of working with my discrete maths prof who does combinatorial optimization (and has asked and received my CV already).

If anyone has any advice as to what I can do to enhance my grad school application if I get rejected from everything I apply to? I feel ridiculous for doing badly this semester as it was just too much to handle and doesn't reflect my work ethic at all. I want to redeem myself but don't know how? Thanks in advance for the advice!

If you have one bad semester, particularly just a couple of bad grades in non-major courses, it's not going to torpedo your PhD application, though to show it's not a concern, you should do very well in your major courses, taking what advanced courses you can.

For the summer, programs such as REUs can help broaden your perspectives.  These are also nice because they give you money and a chance to work with other interesting students.  However, another common option is to find a professor, say at your university, willing to work with you over the summer on a reading course or a research project (possibly informally).  Several of our faculty do this semi-regularly (I usually travel in the summer, though I've done it a couple of times), sometimes with a group of students, so try asking around in your department.

I personally think reading courses are just as good, if not better than, most undergrad research projects because at your stage the most important thing is to learn a lot of math.  While you can just read things on your own, a professor's guidance can be quite valuable.  Also it will provide an opportunity for you to get a more meaningful letter of recommendation, which is very helpful in applications.


How do I apologize to my teacher for cheating? In my Chemistry class, we had a quiz and I helped another student cheat by showing him the answers on my paper but the teacher caught us. I know what I did is wrong and I know I deserve punishment, but I really respect my teacher and I don't want her to think less of me for this. Obviously that's already happened and there's not much I can do, but does anyone have any advice about how I can approach her and apologize for my actions in a way that doesn't seem like I'm trying to make excuses?

To your credit, I think you've already arrived at a good way to respond:

"I know what I did is wrong and I know I deserve punishment. I really respect you as a teacher and I don't want you to think less of me for this. Obviously that's already happened. I just want to apologize and not make any excuses."

Many schools have a centralized system for reporting academic misconduct, so that a student who accrues infractions in multiple courses will be held accountable. Just be prepared to accept that fact, along with whatever penalty is specified in the class.

Apart from that, if you remain enrolled in the course, be a good student. Answer questions, turn in your work on time, and be punctual.


How to handle an advisor who communicates badly and puts me in a bad position as a result? I'm frequently put in an awkward position by my advisor: he communicates pretty badly (vague, doesn't give enough information, isn't clear with what he wants, references things that could mean many things), and then I have to interpret what he means. If I interpret it incorrectly, I often get chastised because from his point of view, he gave me directions and I didn't follow them correctly. If I ask for clarification, I often get chastised because he sees nothing wrong with the bad directions he gave me.

I'm of course open to the possibility, but I don't think it's just me -- I've been in meetings with him and several other people, showing information that everyone clearly understands but he's very confused. Inversely, I've also seen other people be confused by what he's trying to say. To try and find a positive example, the people who seem to work best with him are people who mostly do their work independently (postdocs, for example).

It's very frustrating to me because I'm genuinely trying to work hard and please him, and I do think he has good ideas -- he just acts like the things in his head that are clear to him are thus clear to everyone else.

I know he tries to stress independence as well, which I understand is a valuable trait -- I know too many grad students who are basically passive "gophers" who just go down the list of what their advisor tells them to do and never end up thinking for themselves. And I appreciate that, but it can go just as badly in the opposite direction, when I'm pulling out my hair because I just have so little information about what he wants, but he thinks I have a lot.

Is there anything I can really do? I'm usually all for it, but I don't think talking to him directly and specifically would really accomplish anything here: he's successful and seemingly pretty set in his ways.

As an advisor who often thinks I'm giving clear instructions when I'm not :), here's one thing that will require a certain amount of pain, but might help long term.

You might have tried this already, but when you're given somewhat vague instructions by your advisor, try to spell them out as precisely as you're able to and repeat them back to him on the spot.

So your advisor says, "maybe you should try (vague idea) X, Y, Z".

You  say, "so you mean that for (vague idea) X I should try A, B, ??".

Your advisor might say, "no no, I really meant D" while frowning fiercely at you. But at least then you've managed to get something precise out of him.

Or (and this has happened to me), your advisor says "Hmm. you're right: X doesn't make any sense: ignore that". In which case you've successfully eliminated one unclear option.

The "pain" here is that your first few meetings might go quite badly while you both struggle to learn to communicate with each other. But I suspect that if your advisor is merely not thinking carefully enough about the ideas he's suggesting, this will force him to think more clearly about them.


When to start contacting potential supervisors? I'm a computer science master student, and I'm planning to graduate in spring 2022.  In  Finland, doctoral programs specifically state that applicants need to find a supervisor before applying. The supervisor has be be willing to mentor the applicant, and the research proposal, which is submitted with the application, also has be approved by the supervisor. I know that writing a decent research proposal takes a significant amount of time, which is why I have to get in touch with prospective supervisors well in advance. The question is when? My studies are approximately 30% completed, by the end of this academic year I will be done with everything except for my thesis. I don't have any solid idea about my future thesis yet. However, I have certain academic interests in machine learning and robotics.
Should I wait until I know the topic of my master's thesis next fall? Or should I start contacting doctoral programs next spring? The messy thing is that some universities have rolling admissions, while others have application periods once or twice a year. I have also been hopeful that by contacting professors at home university I could get to write a master's thesis connected to their research, would it be appropriate to ask them about such opportunities? I have taken several courses with some of them but I'm unsure they remember me since we normally have anywhere from 50 to 100 students in each course.

I’ve supervised Masters for 20 years, and my advice is to think about what really interests you, not just these disciplines, but to think how they can be used. That list may include solutions to observed or perceived problems, it may also include blue sky research. The thing is, firstly, you don’t need a Masters to do a PhD, though if you do have one, it might make sense to follow up on your Masters thesis. Having a chat with a good supervisor with no commitment may offer you insight into what you want to do.
Secondly, you should think about your endpoint. Do you want to stay in acadaemia or are you looking for a commercial outcome? I worked at one of the top places for applied research. This particular University was solely postgraduate and focused purely on commercial outcomes having a worldwide reputation for its research and its students, and its contribution to the world. For example, the mirrors for the James Webb Space Telescope (the Hubble replacement) were made in its precision laboratories.
If you are looking at becoming an academic, then that will determine which type of university you might apply to. If you are looking to create a foundation for a career, you must also select wisely. My advice would be to decide which it is academic or commercial outcome. A piece of further advice would be that if you’re a practical person, you should be involved with an applied research institution rather than the purely academic type.
Lastly, research proposals are exactly that. They are only what you propose....what you’d like to do. They rarely match up to the finished thesis. Research is a living animal. It evolves, it changes, it matches its environment. The beauty of real world research is that you can point to something and say “I did that”. It’s your legacy to the World. You will go down many routes when you start to research. You will be faced with dead ends, you will have to re-trace your steps. So don’t get hung up on the proposal. A good supervisor will allow the exploration and nudge you gently in the right direction.
See which Universities are active in your specific interests. Then, check which supervisors have a track record in what you’re interested in. The supervision process is no different whether you’re doing astrophysics, chemistry, engineering or English. Methodologies and methods vary, but a good supervisor will always demand rigour. Good luck.


How to use "can" or "could" when referring to a methodology? If I say "This methodology can/could be used in the research in this area, e.g. (the relevant paper)", should I use can?

If no examples is given, should I use could? (to emphasize possibility?)

This seems like a fine line with no objective answer. It depends how ready you are to defend your point of view. If you believe firmly (i.e. have good evidence that the method is valid, even if it hasn't been used yet), you can use can. Else, if you consider that your opinion (that the method is valid) may be contested, and you are not sure that it's defensible, use could.


Address on cover letter for PhD application There are 3 PhD positions advertised on university's website and I am interested in two of them. University welcomes to give more than one choices for which candidate should be considered. For both positions requirements are similar. I know the names of professors who will supervise these PhDs but I am not sure if they are the only ones who will judge the applications. Moreover, it is written to upload cover letter in university's application system not to sent to Professors directly.

I am confused how should I address Cover Letter to be considered for both positions. Currently, I have the following

  PhD Candidate Search Committee

  {Department name}

  {University name}

  {City, Country}

  {postcode}

  Dear Members of the Search Committee,

Is it a good way to address in cover letter?

Yes, what you have written already is perfectly fine.


Pros and cons of doing PhD in a research group with a high number of post-docs? What are the pros and cons of doing PhD in an experimental/theoretical research group with a high number of post-docs?

For example, if there are a lot of post-docs, this means that the group is doing research on many different problems, in general. However, this also means that the P.I. (i.e your advisor) will have much less time for you, but since there are lots of post-docs, it might be possible for the student to make it up with the post-docs. However, it is much harder to assess a post-doc than a P.I.

There are too many variables for a general answer. How do the post-docs work? Do they work together? Is the lab environment friendly and helpful or cut-throat. Are they willing to help you? Are they new at this or beginners? All the combinations could balance out to something good or bad.

But most important is how interested your advisor is in helping you and spending the necessary time for it. The rest is probably just noise.

But a cooperative staff can be quite helpful if you are getting started. There is a lot of experience to draw on since the post-docs come from different institutions.

But do what you can to keep everything friendly and helpful. Establish a working relationship with your advisor. Don't be shy. Ask for help when you need it. Give help when you can.