How to write papers efficiently when English isn't my first language? I am a PhD student from China. I can read papers relatively fast and get the main point. The problem is that I cannot write efficiently. I don't know how to express myself or I forget the appropriate phrases when writing. Can any other researcher help me solve this problem?

The art of academic writing is essentially the practice of re-writing the same story many times, until the result is "good enough". It takes a lot of persistence and a lot of time to prepare a single paper for publication.

If English is not your first language and  you struggle with the correct phrasing, consider using an academic phrasebank  to help you. I can also recommend a brief summary of academic grammar. Finally, use English-English dictionaries as much as possible, e.g. the free dictionary, and refrain from using English-YourMotherTongue dictionaries if you can.


asking professor to fund Master's student I am a graduate Masters student from one of the top-tier universities in the US. I have been working closely with a Professor and two of his Ph.D students on a Research Project for the past two months. I approached the Professor out of my interest, hoping to gain some research experience. I have plans of pursuing a Ph.D. in the near future, and I am totally enjoying this research experience under his supervision.  Quite recently he told me that he would add me as one of the co-authors if I completed an analysis for the work I have been working on.

It's a well-known fact in my university that usually Masters students are not funded. I expressed my interest to continue working with him right through the next few semesters, and he replied back saying he was glad to supervise me, adding that he has been enjoying my enthusiasm and productivity. On an average, I spend ~30 hours every week on Research and to my knowledge, my Professor has a lot of funding. I was just wondering if I could request him for any possible funding, such as a standard 20-hour student worker position, if not a tuition waiver because it's very expensive here. Doing other on-campus job besides all this to manage my monthly living expenses, might get too hectic (heavy coursework next semester+research+20 hours on-campus job). I am so hesitant to ask him this, fearing that he might start thinking I have been doing all this for the sake of getting funded, which has not been my intention.

Should I just refrain from asking him about funding as a Masters student to maintain this healthy student-supervisor relationship that I have with him, or is it ok to ask him about funding me?

You might be mistaken about your professor having funding in abundance. Even if he has managed to bring in a lot of funding, he might be spending it all on research and researchers.

One possible way to address this might be to approach your professor at an appropriate time and gently bring up the possibility of receiving funding for your work. I would even leave it up to him how many hours per week should be paid.

As a matter of fact, you might mention immediately that you also keep working if there is no pay. It might seem that you will not receive anything when you mention this, but your professor might feel that it is morally right to provide some funding, and it will make the conversation less awkward.


Should an interdisciplinary researcher work twice as hard? My Ph.D. research is related to both computer-science and economics. I collaborate with researchers in both these disciplines, and naturally submit papers to journals of both disciplines. Now, while looking for an academic job, I find out that departments count only the publications published in journals of their own discipline. This is true both in the acceptance decision and in the tenure decision. So, whether I go to CS or to economics department, in expectation, I have only half the number of counted publications of a one-discipline researcher. What can I do about it?

One option is to choose one of the two disciplines and only send papers to its journals. But, this means I will have a hard time collaborating with researchers from the other discipline, since they will probably want to publish in "their" journals.
Another option is to work twice as hard and publish twice as many papers.

Is this true that an two-disciplinary researcher should work twice as hard to attain the same career status as a one-discipline one?

I collaborate with, and work on projects, involving human health, animal health, ecology, and the occasional bit of applied math.

Should I work four times as hard?

The simple answer is no. Because it's both impossible, and rather unlikely that you're even capable of that.

Instead, the answer is unfortunately that if you wish to be doing interdisciplinary research you should not be looking at those departments.

Because not all departments do this. Right now, my unit is hiring people working in health economics, and we've been very mindful to put their work in the appropriate context, including asking field experts what "counts" for them. We're doing similar things with other people we are hiring - for example, right now, we have representatives from at least three departments sitting on a committee for interdisciplinary hires.


GPA dropped due to a death in the family. How do I explain this on graduate applications? I'm in the process of applying to graduate school. Naturally the University will require transcripts from all coursework. The school doesn't just look at grades, and they place an emphasis on recommendation letters and a strong GRE quantitive score. I have academic issues which naturally need to be disclosed.

I first started my undergraduate studies in the early 2000s. I was young, dumb, and self-medicated for depresssion by drinking. Additionally I had an other illness which caused me to lose consciousness, and I had multiple concussions from falling and hitting my head. I didn't do well in school, and after 5 years was academically disqualified. I maintained a GPA just under 2.0.

I moved back home and turned my life around. I transferred whatever credits I had, took classes at the local community college, and transferred all this to a local university and finished my Bachelor's degree with a 3.6 school GPA, and a 3.1 GPA including my old coursework.

Even though I had a non-technical degree, I landed a contract at a big tech company through a contact. Shortly after that contract ended I got an offer from another company and did some interesting work in testing core mobile applications and my skillset grew.

I felt I had hit a ceiling in my career and lacked the knowledge base to progress because I lacked a CS degree.

I decided to do a post-baccalaureate program in CS instead of a masters. Shortly after I started my program my dad passed away unexpectedly in a violent manner. I was present when it happened.

I was emotionally messed up to say the least. My family was not near me . So I spent a lot of time traveling home to help my family. My performance was up and down, I got some B's, a few A's, and two F's, and withdrew from several courses.

Fortunately I did complete an intensive internship last year at a tech company, and have a lot of skills and strong recommendations to show for it.

I've moved home now and am figuring out if I want to continue this program (it will take several years) or just apply for an MS CS since I already have a bachelor's degree. I'll have family support near me in all the places I'm applying.

My strongest assets are my work experience, and a solid quant GRE score.

Sorry for the long story. How I should address all this. My dad's cause of death was very traumatic and violent. Should I disclose details to admissions officers so they can understand why I didn't perform academically? How should I address the issues during my first undergraduate program?

-This question was marked as a duplication to another question. I believe addressing a death in the family is a different process which wasn't addressed in the other question. There is also past academic problems.

You haven't said what country you're in, and the answer may vary somewhat.

From my experience in the US, I'd have concerns about an application with the kinds of grades you've described that didn't come with some explanation of the personal circumstances that caused the poor academic performance.  When I see bad grades with no explanation, I'll typically vote no on the applicant.

However, even with an explanation of why you did poorly in the past, I'd also have to consider whether or not you'd be likely to do well in the future.  If the personal problems that you've had are ongoing, then it's likely that you'll continue to do poorly in your academic work, and you'd be a high risk applicant.  If the personal issues are well and truly resolved, then I'd be more likely to vote yes on your application.

My advice would be to include a statement explaining your past poor academic performance, pointing out how you've done well at times when you weren't having these personal problems, and that you're confident that you won't have these problems going forward.

If any of your recommendation letter writers can also address this, it might help too- many recommendation forms have a specific question asking the recommendation writer whether the student's grades are fully representative of their performance or whether special circumstances should be considered.  .

You don't need to go too far into the details of your experience ("a family member died suddenly and I struggled with this during the xxx semester" is more than enough detail.)  What's more important is showing that when you aren't having such personal problems you have been a successful student and that these personal issues are no longer going to affect your academic performance.


Can you contribute to Public Loan Forgiveness (US) while pursuing a funded Masters/PhD? I think I can, if I'm understanding the rules right, but I was wondering if anyone had done this/could give advice.

I recently completed a JD. My dream in college was always to get a PhD in literature, but for several reasons, some good some bad, I chose to go for the JD instead (it isn't completely unrelated to my literature interests, so it isn't a total wash). I am working in the public sector after graduation, and will be paying down my JD loans using Public Loan Forgiveness, so when I sat down and thought about it I realized I might not have to abandon my PhD dream after all. After a year or two breather from school, I'd like to go back and start working towards a PhD, because if law school and working in the legal field has convinced me of one thing it is that literature (and hopefully a professorship) are where I will be truly happy.

As an overview of PLF: after 120 monthly payments made on my loans while working in the public sector (10 years) the government would forgive my federal loans (which make up 90% of my loans). I can pay income-based repayment while working towards PLF as well. I will never be able to pay my loans off on a gov salary otherwise, but 10 years and then they are forgiven is actually a pretty sweet deal.

Basically to qualify for PLF I have to be employed in a public sector job--generally government or a nonprofit--working full time, or two public sector jobs that combined mean at least 30 hours/wk. As most TA or RA positions for funded programs (MA or PhD) seem to be about 20 hours a week, doing 10 hours a week in another public position would, if I'm right, qualify me for public loan forgiveness. Probably I'd look at doing 10-15 hours of legal aid through a nonprofit or government agency to keep my legal skills up.

Has anyone done PLF while finishing a PhD? Is this dream possible, or am I crazy? I don't mind not making a lot of money--I never have, and am not making much $$ now. But I really want to go back to literature. I'm just hoping the JD won't have killed that dream for me. :/

My understanding is that you can only participate in PSLF when you are required to make a payment; as at least a half-time graduate student, regardless of your employment at the time, you are not required to make a payment, so you cannot participate.

Source: https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/repay-loans/forgiveness-cancellation/public-service#qualifying-payment

Student aid reps at your institution might be a better source for clarification on this; perhaps you can declare yourself not a student for the purpose of your undergraduate/JD loans, and begin making payments? However this would also prevent you from using your student status to limit interest accrual on some of your loans.

If you have friends in tax/financial law this might be a good time to call in a favor on a 5-minute consultation.


What are the motivations for publishing new editions of an existing textbook, beyond new discoveries in a field? In many of my undergraduate classes, professors required up to date editions of textbooks. This was across a number of subjects from Computer Science to Accounting and across introductory and more intermediate levels.

What is motivating new editions of textbooks? Are professors who published contractually obligated to publish new editions? Are they incorporating student feedback?

Publishers want new editions so that they can make money selling copies of the new edition and reduce the market for used copies.  The new edition might be significantly updated, but in many cases the updates are small.  For textbooks in lower division general education courses, new editions come out as often as every three years.

It's quite common for textbook publishing contracts to include clauses that give the authors right of first refusal to produce an updated edition but allow the publisher to add a new coauthor and produce a new edition if the authors are unwilling to do so.


Applying to a PhD in Machine Learning without much knowledge of the subject Lets suppose that I see an open PhD position in the field of Machine Learning, area whose I have only some very basic or general knowledge, but that I am willing to learn more about it. I wonder what I should put in my cover letter to show that I have a genuine interest in the subject and that I am willing to learn more about it. I mean for what I know, the first year in a PhD program is for a student to gain knowledge about the theoretical parts that will help him or her to continue their PhD studies. I have seen that also some of them receive aome training that will help them to narrow their interests into one specific topic before the writing of the thesis start.

I am somewhat traumatized after once I applied to a PhD position and in the interview when I mentioned that "I was willing to learn more, enroll into courses and being self taught for the research that they were making"; and the professor in charge reply to me in a harsh way "You are not here to begin to learn, we need people that already know what we are doing". That shocked me somehow.

So bottomline, how can I express in a cover letter my genuine interest in learning the field in which the research group is working, without being rejected?

Thanks

Florian is completely right - the level of knowledge of the field typically expected from new PhD students varies a lot. In many places in Europe, for instance, a Master's degree is a formal requirement for starting a PhD, and the first year is most definitely not there for gaining fundamental knowledge about the field. You are supposed to have a solid working knowledge of the field from the start.

  "I was willing to learn more, enroll into courses and being self taught for the research that they were making"

There is also the other problem with this statement that it is (sorry) incredibly bland and generic. Of course you are supposed to learn more about your field and do related courses. If that is the best you can say about how you are going to get up to speed in the field, I can understand that the professor you were talking to was not exactly blown away by your zeal.


What's the best way to ask a professor for their syllabus before the term starts? "I am taking your course in Spring 2021. Is it possible for you to send the syllabus if there is one ready?"
Is the wording okay?

LGTM.  I think it's very fair to ask a professor if you can see the syllabus for their class before you sign up.  How else would decide if it's something you'd like to do?


How to teach my students to appreciate all fields of study? I'm sorry if this is the wrong place to ask this but I don't know any other place to ask.

I'm a research professor, but I enjoy teaching and put a lot of time into my classes. I mainly teach introductory calculus and physics to mainly engineering students. One of the things I've noticed while talking to students is their hate and animosity towards the liberal arts.

I asked for some of my students reasoning and a lot of it was that History, English, Classics, etc. did not follow the "laws of logic and reasoning." There are other examples, but I those are the ones the most common, along with "it's not applicable to life."

I just want my students to learn that living in a bubble academically is not good for your knowledge, and the Colleges and Universities are there to help create educated individuals.

I think a well-known rule of writing applies here: Show, don't tell, in the same way it applies to parenting.  If you want to help change your students' feelings, you need to show them your love for the liberal arts.

One thing you can do is pepper your courses with relevant analogies, stories and quotes from literature, history and philosophy.  For instance, a discussion of Zeno's paradoxes and maybe some things about the ancient Greeks when discussing limits in calculus.  Or some historical context for Newton.  I don't have any good contextual literature examples at the tip of my typing appendages (maybe something in Lewis Carroll?), but it's easy to preface new topics with semi-relevant quotes such as

 The sense of danger must not disappear:
 The way is certainly both short and steep,
 However gradual it looks from here;
 Look if you like, but you will have to leap.
 -- W.H. Auden

Even just displaying some of your favorite pieces of literature in your office can be good.  This has led to a few literature discussions with students for me, and discussing literature with students who are interested in front of students who aren't can help convince the latter literature is interesting.

Of course, you won't be able to suddenly convince everyone that they need to run out and read Herodotus in the original Greek to figure out what history class they should take next semester, but you can make some impact for some students this way.

Incidentally, I personally hated having to take the GenEd requirements when I was in college, because there were loads of Math/Science courses I wanted to take.  But then when I went to grad school, I wasn't in such a rush, and I read a lot of classics.  So many of the students may not be at the right stage of life to appreciate everything.  (Also being forced to do something generally makes it harder to enjoy it---in science or liberal arts.)


Are faculty positions more competitive than government research lab positions? Whenever I've been in the audience of a faculty interview presentation, I left impressed but demoralised. It appears the bar of making it as far as the interview is very high indeed, and I don't know if I'll ever be able to reach a similar level.  On the other hand, I know quite some people employed as researchers at national/supernational scientific research laboratories, or at research divisions of operational government institutes. I don't get the same impression there.  It seems to me that people who obtain faculty positions are more outstanding than those who obtain scientist positions for governments.

Is my impression correct? Is it less competitive to get employed at research laboratories or government institute research divisions, than it is to get employed as faculty at a university?  If yes, why is this so?  At a university, faculty spend their time writing grants, teaching, doing administration, and hopefully still a little bit of science.  At research labs, the exact division of work probably varies, but involves doing research, developing products, writing reports and papers, perhaps doing consultancy or other work.  Unless one loves teaching (I suppose nobody loves grant writing), I'm not sure why a position at a university would be more desirable/competitive than one at a laboratory.  Is my impression wrong, or am I missing something?

(I have this impression for at least Sweden, United Kingdom, United States, and Canada.)

Of course the answer depends on the university and the lab.  There are plenty of university departments with low standards, and some labs are truly excellent.  However, I think your comparison is right on average for top universities vs. national labs in the U.S.  There are several reasons for this:

Many researchers at universities aren't professors, and in some universities the non-faculty research staff outnumber the faculty by a substantial factor.  To make a fair comparison, you should not restrict your attention to professors, but rather compare all research staff in both institutions (or look at especially noteworthy or high-level employees at labs).
Some research labs are huge.  For example, Los Alamos and Sandia are each the size of a whole university, but they cover a much narrower range of fields.  The top researchers at these labs are exceptional, but the sheer number of positions makes it difficult to maintain the highest standards for everyone.  (And you can't just keep positions open for years while you look for the perfect candidate, since that would compromise the lab's mission.)
Researchers at national labs in the U.S. do not have tenure, and their jobs are subject to availability of funding and political interference.  In some cases they face as much or more pressure to get grants as faculty do.


How should one turn down academic job applicants? What's a tactful, respectful way to notify job applicants that you won't be hiring them?  I see a lot of angry online discussion of this issue.  Nobody seems to like the common "if you don't hear back, you're not hired" approach, but it's easy to go wrong in other ways (too short, too long, too condescending, too cheerful, too early in the hiring season so it seems insulting, too late so it's no longer useful, etc.).  Of course, part of the problem is that being rejected is intrinsically painful, so nobody's ever going to enjoy a rejection letter.  The question is how to provide useful and timely information while avoiding adding unnecessary pain.

Just from a perspective of one who has been rejected a lot of times (although from schools and research programmer, then as an undergraduate), fast and informative feedback is the most important.

For me there is little difference between hearing "the competition was very high" and "get  out". Saying that "there was only one place" when if fact you don't want to hire someone is very short sighted. It may make the decision smoother, but in a long run it will create false impressions and hopes; and, in fact, such approach makes it impossible to say that actually you want to hire someone, but you run out of positions (see How to show interest in a candidate when no positions are available?).

Moreover:

waiting long is bad both psychologically and for practical reasons (i.e. other plans); I don't see a reason for not rejecting as soon as you are sure,
it is important to distinguish if you don't want someone now or at all,
any feedback is of great value;
otherwise one gets no idea what was wrong, if it makes sense to apply again and how to improve; I would love to hear "there were 5 places but only 1 funding for someone with your status; I had expected someone with stronger skills in X and Y (but your Z is more than fine)".


Is it okay to work in a very old research area (in TCS)? I am a Ph.D. student works in theoretical computer science, I work on the area which is related to rings and my work is to design algorithms for problems related to rings. I did my bachelor in computer science not in mathematics.

I have a strong interest in this area, despite the fact that I have been told and suggested by multiple people to not pursue research in this field; I did it because of my interest. Due to my strange choice, I did not get much collaboration. I have been able to publish just a couple of research papers (not in the top tier) and will graduate after two semesters. I worked very hard, but the output I got is not even a fraction of what I have invested.

I still like it, but the problems is that job opportunities, collaboration, and funds are very scarce. There are funds but only for those who publish in the top places. I am trying to publish in top places, but till now I was not successful. Many people around me have told me that my work is average. Some senior researchers advice me to be patient as it takes time to mature in this area.

Keeping the future in my mind, I see myself on a very different track as compared to others. My goal is to continue the research as well as get in some decent institute after my Ph.D.

My question is it possible to be a successful researcher in this kind of area? What does it mean to do some significant research? Is it okay to work in a very old research area?

You have discovered a fundamental trade-off. If you work in an obscure field and do something significant it may be harder to get recognized, but you have the field to yourself and a few colleagues. But if you work in a popular area you might just get lost in the crowd and even get scooped in your latest findings. Neither is ideal. But either can be a path to success.

However, you need a base from which to work. But so does everyone. In looking for an academic job you need to match yourself to requirements and also show that you have the potential to stand out, at least a bit. If you are competing with 40 other people just like you in background and research interests it will be difficult to stand out. But if you are unique you will raise questions about how you will fit in. It is, however, your case to make.

It is easier, of course to do what you want when you are already well established (tenured). But you have to do what it takes to get tenured. But I don't think you need to defer doing what you like. You just need to do it well.

Personally, I find your interests intriguing. But that is because I studied math but worked in CS. I'm certainly not unique in that. Being able to collaborate across departments might be seen as a plus in some institutions. So might joint appointments between two departments. Everything is a tradeoff.

But spending your working life on things that don't much interest you just because they are "hot" seems like a waste of talent. Since you don't seem to be one of those fighting to get into one of the top ten institutes in the world, but can, perhaps, have somewhat more modest goals (top 50?, 100?) I think you can do fine.

So, yes, you can be a successful researcher, but you will have to make that success yourself.


Consequences of university losing its accreditation on admission for further graduate education? I graduated 10 years ago from a school that just lost its accreditation.

What kind of consequences can I expect from this?

In particular about that affecting admission chances for further education. Although my university wasn’t a top one, I though that my 4.0 GPA would allow me, in the future, to do a top PhD program.

But now my former school is closing down. There are, so far, no plans to try to resurrect it or reapply for accreditation. It will just cease to exist and transcripts are handled by another institution.

Do you know similar cases or have specific evidence on the matter?

"If I look for a job in the future i would be applying mostly on my degree’s strength and grades and with references from former teachers."

I think that approach is completely incorrect. You need to focus much more on the fact that you have 10 years of experience as an entrepreneur. Employers will want to know what you've accomplished in 10 years. They will want to know why you decided to "go it alone". The will want to know if you are "gutsy" enough to work for them in a challenging capacity.

When they ask you where your degree is from, tell them, but you don't have to volunteer that the institution is winking out of existence. If they find out on their own, demonstrate to them that you're fully aware of the situation and the reasons for the institution's troubles. Be knowledgeable and non-defeatist. They'll respect that. You're not to blame for the school's fall. You're not the one who went bankrupt.

In the meantime, make sure you get any paperwork from the school that you need. Be proactive about this...not defeatist. This isn't your fault. And for God's sake, don't delve into a pity-party with any potential employer about how you went to a "lower tier" school because you wanted to "stand out". That's completely ridiculous. Trust me. Don't go that route.


Are Undergraduates allowed to collaborate with other students for their dissertation research? I'm not sure if this is common practice or not, but much like how we see co-authorship in research papers, I was wondering if an undergrad would be allowed to collaborate with other students (possibly from other institutions) for their research project?

Yes !

Undergraduates are definitely allowed to collaborate with other students (undergraduate/graduate) for their senior thesis/research project/dissertation etc.

Of course, the degree to which they can successfully collaborate depends on many things including their faculty adviser.

For instance, as an undergraduate I collaborated with students from Civil Engineering/Construction Management and used some of the results we obtained in my undergraduate thesis.

Currently, I am a doctoral candidate and I have worked with undergraduates in the past whose thesis has sprouted from the results of our active collaboration in a project.


Is use of the word "via" appropriate in an academic essay? In many cases the words via and through are interchangeable. However, is via viewed as acceptable to use among the academic community, typically?

I personally have a distaste for it, but that doesn't really mean much.

There is nothing wrong with the word "via," and in fact I personally have a weakness for it: sometimes it just feels more elegant and specific than alternatives like "through" or "by means of."  I also, however, have a weakness for a lot of somewhat archaic phrases, due to spending a lot of my childhood reading old books.

The general principle which I think academic writing should subscribe to is Orwell's notion of "transparent prose," in which the words are as clear as a window, letting one through to the ideas with minimal obstruction.  Using too many unusual words, such as a lot of "via" and "thus" can be distracting, particularly for an international audience.  Sometimes, though, a word is simply fit and elegant in its context, and there is no reason to avoid using it.


Giving back to alma mater What is the usual expectation of a student by an alma mater? Usually students quit after becoming a part of the alumni association. The contacts are by and large severed a few months after leaving a school.

What are some ways in which one can give something back to alma mater? Is monetary support the best way? One can also be a point of contact to current students. Are there other ways of giving back to our teachers and institutions?

Why are you concerned about expectations?  After you get your parchment, your school no longer has anything to give to you.

What you give is purely from your own generosity -- because you feel by giving back to the school, others will benefit.  You give because you feel it is the right thing to do.  You give because you want the school to purchase that lab upgrade.  You give because you want to fund this research because you think it's important.

"Expectations" from an alma mater are not only irrelevant, but it is wrong to think that you owe them something.  You paid tuition, they gave you your parchment.  That deal is orthogonal to "donations" and post-grad support of alma mater.


How important is journal prestige when researchers publish a paper? I know that certain journals are often lauded by academics as being highly prestigious (e.g. Nature/Science/etc).
However, how important is journal prestige really? Is it absolutely life changing? Is it the difference between being taken seriously or outright dismissed by the larger community? Or is this just a fad in certain elitist circles and doesn't really impact the reception of the research?
What has been your experience like with prestigious journals in general? Are they all that people make them out to be?

In principle, publishing in a prestigious journal may help reach many readers and/or boost your career. The practice of judging articles by the journals they appear in is widespread although also widely denounced (cf the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment).
In practice, a lot depends on your field of research, your career stage, and the organizations that pay your salary and/or grants. At one extreme, some people would boycott "luxury journals" as a matter of principle (Randy Schekman) or ignore journals altogether and just post their results on arXiv (Grigori Perelman). At the other extreme, some will tell you that their careers entirely depend on how many articles they publish in their discipline's elite journals.


How to inform/attract more candidates for a postdoctoral position? When having fund for hiring postdoctoral fellow, it is tricky to find highly qualified applicants, since they can get aware of the opening position by chance. For almost any postdoctoral position (it should apply for any position, but more severe for post-doc), there are better candidates who were also interested, but did not hear about the opening.

Possible approaches are not very effective.

Spreading by word of mouth through colleagues is very limited.
A few applicants may browse research group websites for checking
opening positions. Moreover, search engines do not index and rank
them quickly to reach the deadline.
Posting on academic job websites is good, but most of them are paid
websites. For faculty positions, universities have enough fund to pay
for advertisement, but it is difficult to cover the advertisement cost
by the limited fund of a postdoctoral position.
Free job websites are not very common for academic positions.

How to find more effective ways to inform and encourage more potentials candidates to apply for a postdoctoral positions to have a better chance to select a highly qualified applicant?

Possible outlets I can think of include:

Field-specific e-mail lists
Department email-list forwarded through collegues at other departments
Adverts inserted in talks/presentations held by people at your department (e.g. at invited talks, conferences etc.)
Job ad websites (national and global)
Advert at research-focused web communities/forums, such as Researchgate and Academia.edu, as well as LinkedIn.


First paper published, follow-up paper rejected by editor as out of scope? I published an article few months ago in a journal. I sent another article to the same journal, in which I improved the design idea and enhanced the computation.
I was told that my second article was sent to Prof. X (name was provided) as a topic editor.

After about 70 days, I got an editorial rejection due to the article not being within the scope of the journal. In the online submission site, it said that my article was under review for the last 70 days.
In the end, my article was not even sent to referees... is that normal?

Yes, it is normal that articles get rejected as not in the scope of the journal. Yes, it can take a long time for the people in charge (often doing this pro bono) to get around to take a look at an article.

So you published something related before in the same journal. OK, maybe they just want "new results", not the elaboration/extra details on previous ones. Or they don't want "enhanced computation" (presumably more detailed results), and prefer description of methods. Without an awful lot of additional information, we can't tell. Besides, whatever the case may be, the powers that be at that particular journal have the last say. If we consider it normal or not, is totally irrelevant.


Abbreviations in journal papers Do I expand abbreviations at their first use per section or per paper?

This is an IEEE publication, but I haven't come across any specific instructions.

I would do it per paper, unless the paper is extremely long and some abbreviations are defined (and used) in the start, but not used again until 20 or 30 pages later.

It's okay to remind a reader what the abbreviations mean, but avoid annoying the reader by being overly and unnecessarily repetitive.


Present math for non-mathematicians I am a graduate student in mathematics, and I recently got the question why there isn't a press release to the general public whenever we publish a paper (to advertise mathematics and increase interest).

Now, every paper is a bit extreme, but forced me to ask several questions:

Would arxiv be a good place to put math text aimed to the general public?
(I am currently trying to explain an article in a very metaphorical, but accessible to non-mathematicians).

Would it be considered strange to explain research for non-mathematicians either in a separate abstract in a paper, or also writing a shorter non-math version?
(I fear that this is considered slightly odd,
and metaphors sometimes dumbs down the problem so that the question seems very silly. Also, will professors think it is a waste of time?).

A partial goal is to be able to explain what I've done the last five years to my family at the dissertation, but also get some experience in explaining math for grant applications. It would be nice if news from the world of mathematics appeared more often in the news, (local news for smaller achievements, explanations etc).

I would recommend blogging. This seems like the standard procedure for explaining your papers both to the lay audience and to other mathematicians (potentially ones that don't work on your specific problem). The blog format is preferable over arXiv or journal publications for reaching the lay audience because it is more accessible. Links to blogs are easier to share and faster to read than journals (which might be behind paywall!) or pdfs from arXiv. A blog setting also allows you to interact with your audience through the comments, this is the best way to help guide them through any confusion.

A blog setting can also be used to provide casual tours through proofs for experts and graduate students. This has recently started in TCS. Since this is aimed at the slightly technical audience, it is more appropriate to put on the ArXiv, although I would still advocate blogs.


What graduation gown should a PhD-holder wear when later receiving a Master's in another field? I already have a PhD, but now I'm graduating with a Master's in another field from another university.

Question:  What academic robes do I wear?

I know it is normal to wear the regalia from the highest award but that seems strange in this case.

It varies from university to university. In Cambridge, for example, you wear the academic dress of the highest Cambridge degree you hold, if you do already hold one, but if you are not already a Cambridge graduate you wear the garb appropriate to the degree that is about to be conferred on you. So, in a case such as yours, suppose you hold a PhD from London and are about to take a Cambridge master's degree, you would wear the Cambridge gown and hood.


what is peer review journal, are they paid by authors To publish a research paper in peer review journal is good, are they ask charges to get a paper published

Definition of Peer-review in Wikipedia reads:

  Peer review is the evaluation of work by one or more people of similar competence to the producers of the work (peers). It constitutes a form of self-regulation by qualified members of a profession within the relevant field. Peer review methods are employed to maintain standards of quality, improve performance, and provide credibility. In academia, scholarly peer review is often used to determine an academic paper's suitability for publication.

There is a certain set of information you need to determine whether a journal is peer-reviewed (refereed). See the following useful links:

How to recognize peer-reviewed journal? (From: ASE Library)
How can I tell a journal is peer-reviewed? (From: McMaster University)

There are journals that are called Open access journals, which usually charge a publication cost. The Wikipedia definition of Open Access (OA) journal reads the following:

  Open access (OA) journals are scholarly journals that are available online to the reader "without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself." They remove price barriers (e.g. subscription, licensing fees, pay-per-view fees) and most permission barriers (e.g. copyright and licensing restrictions). While open access journals are freely available to the reader, there are still costs associated with the publication and production of such journals. Some are subsidized, and some require payment on behalf of the author.


When choosing the institute as a Phd candidate, what aspects should be considered? (In Germany) I have finished M.Sc. in Stuttgart, Germany (computational structural mechanics field) and planning to do Phd. Afterward, I would go to industry after Phd.
So, I would like to have your opinions about what aspects should be considered when choosing the field (or institute). I know the top priority is my academical interest. But if there are two topics (or two fields) I equally am interested in, what speculation should be taken account? For example, in Germany, is the power of supervising professor in academia, so could the professor be one of the resources when I am looking for the job in the relevant field?

Of course, as you said, your academic interests are important. And your advisor is also important: there is (in all places I know) no academic training "how to supervise" whatsoever - there are extremly bad advisors and very good ones. If you know something about the prospective advisors, take this into account.
Of course, some advisors are good for some students and bad for others. As you want to go to industry, it could be nice not to have one of the "industry is evil"-type of advisors (if they are common or not is field-dependent).

Having a good advisors is really important, especially in Germany the situation is really hierarchical and if your advisor is mean to you, you cannot efficiently complain about them.

Otherwise, pick a place where you can imagine to live in. And, it goes without saying, if you have a partner (and/or kids, or family you have to take care of) take their opinions absolutely into account! Having a good PhD position but a bad private life happens unfortunately very often to academics.


How do I register a paper URL into doai.io or oadoi.org? oaDOI.org and doai.io are services that give open-access links based on DOI.

How can I register a paper into doai.io or oadoi.org?

doai.io relies on BASE (Bielefeld Academic Search Engine)'s data. So to  register a paper into doai.io, one has to put it in an open-access repository that is harvested by BASE. There are more than 5700+ indexed repositories, the complete list can be found here

oaDOI.org relies on its own harvesting of open-access repositories, that are listed at https://api.oadoi.org/data/sources.csv


What are the consequences of refusing to grant honorary authorship to a superior? Recently, I learned about honorary authorships in papers and publications - e.g. the head of an institute or person who secured the financial grants.

If you are in an inferior position, like a PhD student or not being the head of an institute, and you do not believe in giving credit via authorship to anyone who was not significantly involved in the studies directly; (by the way, according to some scientific boards, not even securing grants or offering the lab counts as such), can you successfully deny adding an honorary authorship for your supervisor or other superior without having to bear negative consequences for your work and later supervision?

After all, honorary authorship has a bad influence on life balance of scientists if seen on a large scale.

I'm surprised this is still an issue - though I guess not as surprised as I'd hoped to be. It's rather sad that there are still people out there who demand to be credited for work they haven't done.

Some journals have clear guidance for what merits authorship. For example, pretty much all medical journals sign up to guidance from the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/defining-the-role-of-authors-and-contributors.html#two) which requires

Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or
the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work AND

Drafting the work or revising it critically for important
intellectual content AND
Final approval of the version to be
published AND
Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the
work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity
of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

(So in the example above, getting the grant money would probably count as contributions to conception or design, so warrant authorship as long as the putative author then didn't abandon the project but could meet the other three criteria; but providing space for the work e.g. in a lab or recruiting participants, on it's own wouldn't be enough)

Most journals then require a statement of what the authors did to meet these requirements which is published with the article - so in order for someone who doesn't warrant authorship to claim it they, and their 'co-authors' have to lie in print.

So in the unlikely event my head of department, or anyone else, insisted on being added as an author when I thought they didn't warrant it, I'd ask them to justify the request using the ICMJE criteria.

Of course - thats the easy bit.

If you're working in an area which doesn't work like this, you have to think about keeping on board with the community. If someone senior really thinks they deserve authorship on your paper, and you don't, you have to decide whether you're going to keep them happy.

I'd suggest you may need to find someone else to persuade them they should't be named. That may be someone superior to them in your institution, or you may need to discuss with the editor of the journal you're submitting to - who can then ask for justification of contributions should they see fit.

Fundamentally though it seems that attitudes like this may suggest something rotten in the culture of either a department, or possibly a discipline. And culture change like this will take years.


Negotiating startup package given differences in institutional norms There is a story on Inside Higher Ed (based on this blog post) about a candidate who received a tenure-track offer from a U.S. philosophy department.

She emailed the search committee with some requests related to: salary, maternity leave, sabbatical, teaching load, and start date. Her email ended with "I know that some of these might be easier to grant than others. Let me know what you think." In response, the institution withdrew the offer, saying that her requests revealed that she wasn't a good fit for a teaching institution.

Many of the comments on the IHE story or blog post are in support of the school, saying such things as:

The candidate asked for too much and came across as "entitled"
The candidate shouldn't have requested a light teaching load initially, when the school in question is a teaching institution
The candidate shouldn't have asked about a pre-tenure sabbatical, which is apparently unheard of at teaching institutions

In particular, one comment says this:

  indicates how important it is to do your best to understand the culture and needs of the hiring institution, both before and during negotiations

and another that it is

  an example of knowing the difference between negotiating with a research school and with a small teaching school

There have been quite a few questions on this site about negotiating a startup package, but these mostly describe the various things you can ask for, and which are likely to have more "wiggle room." Most of the U.S. faculty who answered those are at research institutions, and they suggest that

  It's perfectly reasonable to ask for anything

and

  Definitely ask for all that you need, and let them whittle you down.

Apparently, that advice may be more or less applicable depending on the type and culture of the institution. My questions are:

Are there really different norms with respect to negotiation in a teaching vs. research institution? What are they?

and, more generally,

What can I do pre-offer to get a sense for what the institution's culture is, and what I can reasonably ask for?

Possibly, the candidate in the story came from a research institution, got advice from her advisor there on negotiation, and never realized that her requests would be perceived poorly at a teaching institution. What could she have done differently?

I am especially interested in a response from anyone who's been on a search committee at both kinds of institutions (though I don't know if we have anyone like that on this site).

In the time between asking this question and getting some answers here, I read many comments on the original stories and blog posts dissecting the situation, many of which offered useful answers. I am compiling some of them here for the sake of others. As with most information found on the Internet, YMMV.

First, a question I didn't ask but will answer anyways (since xLeitix expressed some doubt in a comment):

Does this really happen?!?!?!?

Unfortunately, though rare, it does happen. Here are a few examples I found on Academic Job Wiki:

  When I told them I needed some time to think about the unofficial offer (and also noted how early in the hiring season the offer was coming), the interviewing professor emailed me back that it was clear I was only considering them as a "last resort" and that they were therefore rescinding the offer.
  They thought my request for a revised offer letter that included the new terms agreed upon throughout negotiation was demonstrative of a "lack of faith" which they seemed to take personally. They rescinded the offer and then blamed it on my need for this letter, and suggested that I be more careful in asking for this in future negotiations with other institutions (they claimed this advice was a show of "mentorship" on their part).
  The dean rescinded the offer. By email. And then refused to take my calls. This is exactly what she wrote: "After having read your stated requests, specifically the number of years to tenure and the MWF teaching schedule, I am sorry to say that we are not able to sustain our job offer to you. At this time I am rescinding the job offer."
  Two weeks after the job talk, I was offered the position and given five days to consider it... Upon sending my questions and considerations two days later, about 90 minutes passed when I received an email wishing me well in my further job pursuits.

Yikes. Of course, given these stories you could argue that these candidates probably dodged a bullet. But let's assume you aren't necessarily afraid of a rescinded offer, but want to avoid making a bad impression. In that case, on to my actual questions:

Are there really different norms with respect to negotiation in a teaching vs. research institution? What are they?

Yes. Also, per various sources, there are differences in negotiation culture between elite institutions and not-so-elite institutions, community colleges and four-year colleges, public and private institutions, those with current or former religious affiliations and those without, locations where a union is involved and locations where it isn't, locations with large adjunct pools and locations without, etc.

Here's one thing I hadn't thought of: institutions that are seen as "less desirable" places to work for some reason are said to be more sensitive to aggressive negotiation. In these cases,

  Negotiating demands can come across as "I’ll only agree to work at a lowly school like yours if you give me all this extra stuff." (The Professor is In)

However, there were also comments that said things like:

  I was a candidate just like W, I asked for very much of the same things (more, in fact), and still go the job. (PhilosophySmoker)

The candidate in question herself  said

  that her request for a starting salary of $65,000 equaled a less than 20 percent increase in proposed pay -- a request she says another college offering her a job had met.
  (InsideHigherEd)

So, it seems like finding out the culture of a particular institution (rather than generalizing based on institution "type") is more effective. Which brings us to:

What can I do pre-offer to get a sense for what the institution's culture is, and what I can reasonably ask for?

Start by asking: is it negotiable?

  A good strategy for starting a negotiation is to simply ask whether there is any flexibility in the terms of the offer... If you get a firm "no", you don't have to risk upsetting anyone with specific requests.  (PhilosophySmoker)

and this can even have some nice side effects! The same comment continues,

  At my institution... I began by asking this very general question, and the chair immediately responded with a better offer-without my mentioning any specifics and without consulting the dean.

Pre-negotiate by phone

Both Amatya and Samantha Kady pointed out here how difficult it is to read a situation by email, and dozens of commenters out there said the same. For example:

  You negotiate over the phone (aiming for the sweet spot between being enthusiastic about the job - you want them to still want you - and asserting your own needs). Then when that's done, you get the agreement in writing. That lets you feel out some things and get feedback on what's doable or not, and on how the requests are being taken. (PhilosophySmoker)

But, know yourself. As The Professor is In puts it:

  I NEVER want to see inexperienced candidates negotiate on the phone. Particularly women. People panic and get codependent and agree to all kinds of things too quickly on the phone.

I don't really know what "codependent" means in this context, but I can definitely see how some people might not be able to negotiate as well over the phone. Those people might be better served using a phone conversation as a "feeler" and then proceeding to negotiate over email.

Listen for subtle differences in responses to your requests

One commenter said:

  The chair indicated that this was the ceiling for the starting salary... but since he didn't make the same claim regarding the startup, I detected further flexibility, and was able to get it bumped up to 200% of the original offer, by providing an explanation of how I would use the additional funds.  (PhilosophySmoker)

Identify and use your ally

If you get an offer, there's a good chance someone really likes you and wants you to be there. Identify that person, and ask them for advice on what to negotiate. They may even tell you about things you hadn't even thought to negotiate for! Specifically, several commenters said that the department chair is often an ally. As one commenter said:

  I had a really great Chair. She told me that I was very unlikely to get a salary increase but that there was room to move the start-up. I asked for both anyway, and sure enough, was denied a salary increase but got significantly higher start-up (which I can use for summer salary). The kicker? The Chair spotted something I never would have thought of, which qualified me for thousands of dollars extra. (PhilosophySmoker)

Your ally in the department knows much more than you, and much more than any mentor you might have, what requests can be granted easily and what should not be mentioned at all. Use this!

Ask about "perks" at the interview stage

Many commenters agree that asking straightforwardly about the "perks" (non-salary) at the interview stage helps you gauge supply and demand at the institution in question. Otherwise, you run the risk of

  telling somebody who's put in a full 7 or 8 years for a sabbatical that you want one in your first 2 or 3 years? (PhilosophySmoker)

Yeah, that does sound bad! Same goes for things like teaching load and lab space - you can find out during the interview stage what is in especially short supply at the particular institution.

Place requests in the context of the institution's specific mission

This is a valuable piece of advice. As a commenter said,

  For example, if the reasoning behind fewer teaching preps was to do a better job teaching or to have an appropriate research program (whatever that may be), then frame it that way. (FemaleScienceProfessor)

Visit the library

Here's an interesting one that I hadn't heard before (though it only applies to a subset of institutions):

  I’m betting that W or other candidates often get their data from the CHE’s salary survey, which is near useless for this purpose because it is such an aggregate number... If you’re interviewing at a public school, ask for about an hour to yourself in the library. When you get it, go straight to the Reference desk and ask to see the salaries in the department that’s hiring (it’s usually public). Write these down, and when you get the initial offer you’ll know if there’s room to negotiate on this point. (The Professor is In)

While public salary information is also available online in most cases, unlike the internal data this is usually

  total annual compensation, a figure that includes summer school, stipends for additional administrative duties, and the like, rendering the number useless (if not damaging) to such negotiations. (The Professor is In)

Some commenters pointed out another, more-complete-than-CHE (though not department-specific), source of salary data: IPEDS


Contacting a potential PhD advisor I am a senior who is graduating in December 2020. In May, I contacted a potential PhD advisor at my own university, and he was interested enough to offer early admission (in Spring as opposed to Fall). It took the professor 2 hours to respond.
I emailed him 4 days ago about confirming the offer still existed, along with the possibility of starting research in Fall (why not get a good start?).  If he does not respond for another couple days, would it be appropriate to do a "walk-in" during his designated "office" hours? I don't expect him to immediately reply, however I am a bit anxious to make sure everything is good-to-go.

Yes, if you have the opportunity to visit for a few minutes in person, you should do that. Ask if there are any further steps you should immediately take.
For an email reply, a few more days of waiting is better, but a quick visit is likely fine. Express your excitement about the future, etc.
In these perilous time, few now have the opportunity to do this sort of thing in person, but it is the preferred way. And, your situation isn't very typical since you probably already know the person and you are an "out of cycle" applicant.


How to be a discussant There is another research group at another university in my town. They asked me to join one of their monthly brown bag meetings and to serve as a discussant. They have invited an external speaker and he will present something that is related to my own research.

I received the presentation slides in advance and I have read two related papers of the speaker to prepare. Although I do have some questions and points to discuss, I am not exactly sure how to go about this. I have never done this before and I have only once witnessed such a thing at a conference but thought the discussant there wasn't a good example.
So I was hoping for some general advice and experiences. Some questions are:

Should I prepare some slides myself?
How long is this kind of discussion usually?
Should I try to engage the audience or is it more of a one-on-one between me and the presenter?

Since we don't know your field, I'll add generally-speaking for my field, economics:

Slides are common for discussants at large, formal conferences, but never for more informal brown bags
Again, at conferences discussants tend to go longer, 10-15 minutes.  At a brown bag, five minutes or less seems about right
You should engage the audience in the form of opening up a thoughtful insight or question on the paper, one that the audience can then pursue in Q&A.  Usually it's presented in the form of you talking to the presenter though.

But those are just broad strokes, the key here is I think you should just ask.  You don't have to mention you've never done this before; just ask how long they want you to talk for and whether you should prepare anything.


What to do if your editor does not reply and there is no one else to contact? The situation is like this. I made a new submission to a journal via their website; I am under the impression that an author would automatically receive a copy of the generated PDF file for review and the acknowledgement of receipt, just like many journals more or less do. However, after one business day, there was still nothing about this matter that came into my inbox (used in a generic sense, including spam). I thus wrote to the editor in chief regarding this matter. The editor has not yet replied for a day (which is unusual according to the editor's known pattern in dealing with submissions). There is no email for the editorial assistant that I can find on their website, even if the position exists.

Now the question is how then a safe next move would be like. I cannot just wait indefinitely; potential possibilities are fading. But it also seems that it is difficult to make the intention to ``set a deadline for response" sound innocuous. I am asking if there is a relatively common practice our there or an all-considering well-rounded strategy regarding this matter that could serve as a signal for the editor to know my intention without tearing anyone's face.

See if you can download the PDF from the journal submission website. The editorial management systems I'm familiar with will take the author-submitted source files and generate something, which can then be downloaded by everyone (including the author). In fact, some editorial management systems will generate a preview for the author to approve before the submission is formally registered. If you've not received a "submission received" email, there's a chance that it hasn't been submitted right.

Otherwise, it has only been one day. One day really isn't a lot of time (especially since it's currently a weekend). Even if someone usually responds in one day, he could be ill or on leave. I would wait a bit longer - maybe 2-3 more days.

If the manuscript was submitted correctly and there's still no response from the editor-in-chief after 2-3 more days, I'd email the publisher. You mentioned you can't find an email for the journal's editorial assistant, but you might still be able to find a "contact us" link on the publisher's website, and they'll be able to redirect you to the right person.


Should I include that someone cited my dissertation as part of their master's? In my CV is it appropriate to include a master's thesis that cited my dissertation?

If so how would you include this in a CV and how would you title it.
I am excited to include that someone referenced my work.

No, individual citations are not typically included in a CV.  Some people might include aggregate statistics such as an h-index.


Should an instructor tell his/her students before the exam that there are multiple versions of the exam? When I was an undergrad, I had instructors who did not tell students that there was more than one version of the exam until afterwards. I also had instructors who told students that there was more than one version, before the exam started. The question is: should an instructor tell his/her students before the exam that there are multiple versions of the exam.

Why would knowing in advance matter to anyone except cheaters?  This information will not help honest students prepare for the exam or change how they approach it, so for them announcing it afterwards seems just as good as in advance.  One argument for announcing it in advance is that some potential cheaters might decide not to try to cheat (and spend more time studying or become a little more honest), but the counterargument is that it might just encourage them to find more effective methods of cheating.  I don't consider either of these arguments especially compelling, and I'm not convinced it really matters much whether the announcement is before or after the exam.  This issue tends to come up in large courses, which are often pretty standardized.  I'd bet the students who care whether there are multiple versions of the exam can easily find out what this professor has done in other large classes, so there usually won't be much of an element of surprise.


How not to come off as boasting or arrogant, if you are one of the few active students in a class? tl;dr: How not to come off as boasting, arrogant, attention seeking, etc. if you are one of the few students participating in class?

Some background:

I am currently attending a Master's level course where in-class participation of students is quite low. Typically, very few questions get asked by the students. When the lecturer asks a question to check if the class is following (or rather: at least not sleeping), the same 2-3 students provide the answers.

I try to participate actively: I'm not afraid of giving a wrong answer or of "looking stupid" by asking a question that can easily be answered. This however sometimes leads to me answering most of the lecturer's questions, which - I think - discourages other students to ask questions in the lecture (after all, who wants to announce that they didn't understand something when there is somebody else in the class who apparently did?) This in turn might lead the lecturer to falsely believe that everyone is following (not really my problem), but it might also lead to me being perceived as boasting, arrogant, attention seeking, disruptive (without ill intentions), etc., which I want to avoid.

I realized a while ago that I do like the attention and since then I try to evaluate whether a question/comment is really helpful before actually asking it. I also avoid answering the lecturer's questions immediately so that other students have a change to answer (or feel pressured to do so because of enduring silence ;)). On the other hand, I do not want to sell myself short and I do not want to be perceived as being arrogant because of not bothering to answer.

One good heuristic that you might use is to discriminate between two types of questions:

Questions with a clear "right answer"
Questions encouraging discussion

Questions with a clear answer are typically more about polling for whether people are tracking, and answering deprives somebody else of a chance to answer.  For a question encouraging discussion, however, your answer instead may break the ice and make it easier for other students to join in with answers of their own.  Answering discussion questions also benefits you more, since they are where your answers can demonstrate deeper understanding, if you have acquired it.

If you and your instructor both know you are doing well, then why not "step back" and leave most of the "right answer" questions for other students?  Especially if you let the instructor know that you have realized you are talking a lot and want to give space for others, it should not reflect badly on you in any way.


How to frame/explain that I built datasets used on several publications, but I'm not on the papers I was wondering how I could frame/explain in my CV that I built the datasets used in several publications outside of my field. I'm in the health sciences but have worked for a couple social science professors for several years. In this work I built several of their datasets that were used in papers. However, due to my lack of knowledge of their field and lack of contribution to the papers (beyond the dataset) I am - quite reasonably - not included as an author.

How can I best frame this work on my CV and for PhD applications?

Thanks!

Edit: spelling

I would cite this as work experience in your CV, without citing the publications themselves. You could mention a number of papers/projects contributed to, or mention more specifically what the projects were.

You can also see the advice on this somewhat related question: Should I explicitly remind people to include my name in the acknowledgement?

There, someone is asking about how to make sure they get properly acknowledged, but several answers and comments point out that acknowledgements aren't really cited as acknowledged papers. I'm not sure whether you are mentioned in acknowledgements in the papers you refer to, but whether you are or not the advice there would agree with mine.

Adding from @Buffy's comment, if you think this work is particularly important to your job (for example, if you are applying to a position where you will be working with datasets outside of your field and want to emphasize the breadth of your understanding) it may be appropriate to get a letter of recommendation from your collaborators.


Teaching a student (as a TA) when there is flirting, etc. and mutual interest I am  a graduate student with an assistantship. I met an undergraduate and we hit it off (talking about sex, but not sex with each other). But now I assist a class with her (and I'm not good at hiding my feelings) and she is very flirty. She also put her hand on my arm outside of class (which was welcome). I am performing my job, but I am worried that if things go bad with us she'll claim sexual harrassment. What should I do?

I am performing my job, but I am worried that if things go bad with us she'll claim sexual harassment. What should I do?

Don't let things go bad.  I.e., stop talking about sex, try to hide your feelings, don't flirt, etc.  As long as she is in your class, you have a professional obligation to treat her the same as your other students, regardless of whether she welcomes your interest.  Doing anything else is dangerous.  (Even if she makes no complaint, other students may raise the issue with the administration, if they are upset by it or suspect favoritism.)

In principle, you could try to change your teaching assignment to another class.  However, I'd strongly recommend against asking for this.  It might not be possible (maybe there's nobody available to switch with you), in which case you'll be in a real mess if you have implicitly announced that your current assignment is untenable.  Any changes will be disruptive, which will annoy the professor teaching the class as well as whoever handles the teaching assignments or has to switch with you.  Plus the teaching change will be public enough that it will probably create rumors of impropriety.


Should I ask my online PhD interview panel whether my partner can sit in? I have an online interview for a PhD program via Skype. I want to ask the panel if my girlfriend can join in the interview. She will turn off her microphone and camera, so there will no interrupting sound from her. She will only hear our conversation and see our faces (if they turn on the camera). She is there just to share with my experience, not my stress. I can do the interview alone. I also don't need to impress her.

This looks odd and unprofessional, I admit. But from what I read from the book of the professor that I follow, he is very open. He always use first person point of view. Even when at the time I contacted there was no funding for me, he managed to find one and asked me to do the interview. The professor who introduce me to contact him described him as "cool", though it is an informal conversation. Based on those observation, I want to take a little safety risk (just a little, and safety).

I think the asking question is not the important thing; just pretend they are human and ask simply:

  My girlfriend wants to observe the interview. She won't make any interruption. Should I let her in?

Q: However, should I ask this question? If there is no problem, there are some more things to consider:

Should I ask this via email or when we begin to talk?
It can have technical troubles, such as lagging. Of course the interview is more important, and if the connection keeps unstable, she shouldn't take part anymore. If this happens, would this leaves a bad impression on the professors?

One more thing: seriously, I don't need her that badly for just one hour. Yes, this is not a Nobel prize, it's just a normal interview. I just think that it's nice to have, and until I can't find a good reason to not to do that, I'll take a try. If everyone is scare of making a mistake, when they can't point out what that mistake is, then there is no development in this world. I seriously don't think that "unprofessional" or "childish" is a good reason, especially when the person I'm talking with is open-minded.

I would find this odd and unprofessional. I recommend against this.

Also, I want to be able to talk freely and openly with you in an interview, and have you respond in kind, and I would be worried about how having your girlfriend on the line will affect this dynamic. (For example: I might worry that you would be distracted by thinking about how she is perceiving the interview, or trying to impress her.)

I might also be concerned that needing moral support for an interview this badly does not say much about your ability to handle the stresses of graduate school.


Are you required to report audited courses when applying for graduate school? I recently noticed that a few of the courses I am required to take for my undergraduate program are also offered by an online university, and that they allow you to audit said courses relatively cheaply. Would it be a good idea to study ahead using these courses, or is such a thing considered unethical as it would give me an advantage when I take the course at my own institution? Am I generally required to report the audited courses when I later apply for graduate school (which would presumably look 'bad')?

Specifically I am in Canada if the rules vary by region.

Don't worry about it.

I don't believe I've ever heard of a school requiring that audited courses must be reported when applying for admission. Essentially, if you're not getting some sort of official recognition for having taken the course (credit or placement in some form), then you don't have to report it.

As far as "getting an (unfair) advantage" from it, you could get a similar advantage by getting the textbooks for your courses over the summer and reading them ahead of time. Nobody would expect you to report that or call it unethical, so why would it be any different just because you audited an online course?


How familiar should you be with a topic before assigning it as a thesis to an undergraduate? I am a postdoctoral researcher in a university where undergraduates have to undertake a diploma thesis in order to finish their studies. My professor says we should put in our lab page some short descriptions of 2-3 topics and let interested undergraduates come to us, as it usually happens.

Now, I am expanding my horizons to promising technologies, following the buzz in my domain, and I am confident I will have some personal progress in the following weeks but at the time being I am still relatively a newcomer to these latest technologies.

The question is: should I put out there a diploma thesis description in these new fields, or should I be conservative and go for the things I know pretty deeply? How do you usually come up with diploma thesis topics?

Here is one rule of thumb: You should be sufficiently confident with the topic to be able to guide your student to success.

This means in particular that you should know the topic in which the student is supposed to work in well enough such that:

You are certain that the workload is manageable in the time outlined by the examination regulations.
You know that there is enough low hanging fruit in the topic such that it is clear that even a mediocre student should be able to write a thesis that is good enough for the standards of your field and school.
There are some types of results that a student may obtain during the thesis work that would suffice for the student to write a great thesis, possibly leading to a subsequent publication (given interest by the student).
You think that you can advise the student with the problems that you expect to occur in the scope of the project.
You have sufficient time to actually advise the student and in particular have the time to read into the details of the subject in case the student needs some guidance on them.

Depending on the field, it is debatable whether it is OK to hand out topics of which the advisor has comparably little knowledge, given that all requirements from the list above are fulfilled.
Also, the list above focuses on the minimum requirements. Again, it is debatable whether satisfying all points on the list is enough already (unless I forgot something important).

As far as coming up with new thesis topics is concerned: probably everyone has their own approach for this. One way is to collect the ideas that you have in your own research into idea lists, and after some time filtering them by the criteria above.


Should I add descriptions of courses taught on my CV I'm working on my CV right now. I have been teaching EFL at a university for 2 years. It has been my first university position. I am planning on applying at universities back in the States soon. I am educationally-qualified (meaning, I have the degrees required), however I do not have much experience (6 years teaching, only 2 university). I wanted to list as much information as possible, so I have been writing about each course I have taught (about 6 different courses). I have included course name, objective, textbook, and course highlights (meaning unique projects that would set my courses apart). I am wondering if this is necessary or useful?

A brief description of the courses you've taught is never remiss, as it helps reviewers place your teaching work into context. This is especially important for teaching-primary positions. However, for many positions, you also have the ability (or requirement) to submit a "teaching statement." This would be a place, for instance, where you could discuss your unique projects.

What I would certainly want people to know about in the courses I taught:

Full course name
Whether they were required or elective
The intended audience (e.g., "freshmen" or "upper-year undergraduates and graduates in the major")
How long (how many times) you taught the course
Did you have sole responsibility, or was it co-taught
Format of the class (lecture, seminar, laboratory, etc.)
A brief description of the course, if its nature cannot be inferred from the title (for example, "Introduction to US History to 1865" doesn't need an explanation; "The Critical Period" would.)

Other information could be listed on a "courses taught" appendix, but I might not necessarily include it directly in the CV.


What type of education should I select in this form? I am filling an application form for a PhD position and came upon this field:

It seems like a stupid question, but I am not familiar with this type of categorization. For a Master's degree, which one should I choose?

I am assuming that this application form is a generic "job application"-form, rather than one designed specifically for positions as PhD students. To my knowledge, PhD positions in Austria are categorized as jobs anyway.

Then, translating back to German, I suppose the cases are:

Abitur/Matura
Universitaetsabschluss (= university degree)
Ausbildung

Thus, chose "study".


I slept, how should I respond to the professor? It was late at night I sent an email to my professor. due to time differences, it was early over there. After sending an email I slept and my professor responds me and askeS me to skype in 2 hours. I slept and I didn't even open the email. How can I ask a meeting?
I didn't know he would ask me to have a skype, (in 2 hours after sending the mail):-O

could you please tell me how to respond my professor?

Students are allowed to sleep at night. In all likelihood the prof just forgot about the differences in timezone, or miscalculated the time difference.  Just answer something like :

Dear prof. XXX,

Sorry I missed your reply. It was 22:00 hours when I sent that message, and went to sleep immediately afterwards. Could we make another Skype appointment?

Best,
YYY


Is there a tool like the Open Science Framework that can be run on a private server? I am very impressed by the Open Science Framework. Unfortunately, for some projects I cannot put any data in a cloud especially if it is not encrypted. Are there similar tools which allow me to keep my data in its present windows like folder organisation but with similar features ? E.g adding files by drag and drop and adding annotations, as well as a wiki, etc. They do not necessarily have to be free. Although I would appreciate an open source project and the possibility to donate.

Moritz,

Jeff here--I'm the co-founder and CTO of the Center for Open Science--developers of the OSF. First off, I'm happy to hear that you like the OSF. While this doesn't answer your question necessarily, you have a few options if you'd still like to use our service:

It sounds like you're interested in encryption of data at rest, which is something we don't yet offer for OSF storage, although all data is encrypted during transmission. Of course you could encrypt the data before uploading it, but that's probably not an ideal solution. With that said, Amazon S3 (one of the services we connect to) offers encrypted buckets (so you'd get encryption of data at rest in a cloud service), and we make that option available via the OSF. Alternatively, you could install Dataverse on your own server and connect that to the OSF. Owncloud and Gitlab connections are coming soon--both storage services you can also host on your own machines. These latter services don't offer encryption of data at rest, but they wouldn't be hosted in the cloud.

Depending on your needs re:storage, there are a few other options that I'd be glad to talk to you about. For example, I haven't tried it, but I think you could install the open source Minio server (which has an S3 compatible API) and connect to the OSF via our S3 add-on. We might need to make a few tweaks with regards to authentication, but we could look into adding that to the feature queue, or we always appreciate pull requests if you have developer time. You mentioned a donation, so if you did have some money for something like this, we could see if someone in the community would be interested in a bounty/grant. Alternatively, you could directly hire a developer or an intern to make the necessary changes and contribute code back to the code-base--making that add-on available to the rest of the community.

So, lots of options, and we're happy to help support community-initiated endeavors like this. Feel free to get in touch with us at support at osf dot io or reach out to me directly at jeff at cos dot io. Hope to hear from you!


possibility of paying fees by bitcoins in IEEE transactions? Is it possible to pay IEEE transaction fees/charges by bitcoins?

I don't think so. At least for the IEEE Transactions I know of, payments are managed by RightsLink, a company external to IEEE. In the help center of this company, you can find information on how to pay:
How do I complete the RightsLink order? How can I pay the charges due?
It is there written that (bold mine)

Select your preferred payment option (invoice or credit card)

and

If you submit your order with the “invoice” payment method, you can pay that invoice later using a credit card, wire transfer, or check.

They want the good ol' dirty money!


Limitations of paper size when presenting comprehensive visualisations of results When writing a PhD thesis or an academic paper, you tend to be limited in how you can present results by the physical paper size, e.g. A4 for a thesis and often much tighter when targeting journals or conference proceedings.
This seems needlessly restrictive in this day and age, but perhaps that's a different discussion about the whole academic publishing machinery and its implications for good research.
My question is: how do you approach presenting data in a way that doesn't lose detail and impact, but fits in 15 x 25 cm (if you're lucky)?
I'll use an example to illustrate - after one set of experiments I have a plot that looks like this:

This plot could be really useful in drawing out lots of conclusions and further questions.  As it is, it only covers a sample of the actual results, but shows important trends and differences.
I've had a few ideas about how I might present this.  I could:

Make an interactive visualisation available online and refer to it in the printed paper - printing just a small sample there but referring to the full results in the commentary.
Summarise the findings using tabulated numbers and perhaps just present one example (corresponding to one column of the image above).
Just squeeze it in somehow to give a "big picture" and then explain and point to full results elsewhere.

I wondered if this is a common problem and what good practice exists out there.

What do you want your readers to take from your 66 plots? You did alot of work? Great so has everyone else.
You say your plots could be used to "be really useful in drawing out lots of conclusions and further questions". Well that is your job as the author to do in the first place. As a reader if i see that in a paper, then that tells me you haven't analyzed your data and are leaving it to me to understand what your data shows.
Instead i'd either pick a couple of the most interesting/relevant plots to show, or work out how to combine all the plots in to one bigger plot.
I expect a lot of the trends could be presented more concisely simply as text. Are all 66 plots/parameters equally interesting to a reader? Probably not, they might be interesting to someone who is looking to repeat your work in which case i'd just put that data in a table (and put that in the supplementary material).


Math Thesis Plagiarism Determination I am an undergraduate student who is submitting my thesis for committee review. However, one of the committee member is unsatisfied and thinks that I attempted plagiarism from my advisor's paper. However, in my situation:

I am writing a result in extension to my advisor's paper;
I have proved new results in the almost exact same setup as the reference;
Since it is my first paper, a great deal of my explanation and logic is inherited from my advisor and his paper. Therefore, a lot of explanation and formula takes the same form (with possible slightly different definition of variables).
I pointed out directly that how this paper is related to previous work and added reference for directly quoted prop/defn.

This committee member will not support my submission of thesis unless I rewrite everything in my own words. However, I doubt if I can rewrite everything instead of simply rephrasing due to the nature of this work. I wonder what are your guys opinion and how I should deal with it?

I wonder whether the committee member is not so much concerned about plagiarism per se as whether you actually understand your advisor's work.  An undergraduate thesis is supposed to involve, at least in part, the student gaining a certain level of mastery of prior literature (as well as building on it.)  This sort of understanding is usually conveyed in a "theory" or "background" section near the beginning of the thesis.
If this section reads like it was copied-and-pasted from your advisor's previous work, then the committee member may be concerned that you don't really understand what you've written and are simply parroting it without any real comprehension.  They may then have doubts that you haven't really engaged with the material in a manner that is really worthy of whatever level of distinction is associated with a "thesis" at your institution.  Being a mathematician is not just about finding some interesting results;  it's also about understanding about how they fit into the broader picture of mathematics, and about being able to convey your understanding successfully to others.   Your institution may value these latter parts just as much as the ability to find new results (and I applaud them if they do.)
If this is the case, you may just need to bite the bullet and rewrite the section.  It's probably OK if the equations remain in the same form;  but the "connective tissue" between the needs to show, in your own words, that you actually understand how you get from equation (1) to equation (2) to equation (3).  (One of the things I always try to convey to my physics undergraduates is that the "connective tissue" between equations is just as important for conveying meaning and understanding as the equations themselves—if not more important.)


Listing "Note" Publications in CV In some journals, "notes" are original research papers that are not significant enough to be a "regular contribution". If I've published a note, can I list it in my CV as if it is a regular publication (i.e., not mentioning that it is a note)? Could this be considered as dishonest?

I wouldn't consider it dishonest, if only because I personally don't list them separately. The fact that they are notes ("squibs" we call them in my field) can generally be inferred directly from the low page count.

But then, the number of such very short publications is a very small fraction of all my publications. If it was a significant fraction, maybe I would consider a separate section.


How to Search a Paper by Citation I have a very simple question. I read a paper and need to take a look on one of the references. Say

R. Mansouri and S.U. Sexl. Gen. Rel. Grav. 8, 497 (1977).

Well, it was easy to search it if there were any title. How can I find the paper? I mean, its title or the journal it was published in. Thanks.

The following worked for me:

Google "Gen. Rel. Grav." to discover that it abbreviates journal "
General Relativity and Gravitation"
Google the journal's title to discover http://link.springer.com/journal/volumesAndIssues/10714
Look for issue 8 in 1977, don't find anything, assume 8 is a mistake (it later turned out to be the volume, which is redundant, because everything published in 1977 belongs to volume 8)
Look for page 497 in 1977, find the result (http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00762634), namely,

  Reza Mansouri & Roman U. Sexl (1997) A test theory of special relativity: I. Simultaneity and clock synchronization, General Relativity and Gravitation, Volume 8, Issue 7, pp 497–513.

In essence, I recognized that Gen. Rel. Grav. was most likely the journal's name. (The other possibility was Sexl. Gen. Rel. Grav., but it seemed less likely, because S.U. Sexl. seemed likely to be the second author's name followed by a period.) Once I had found the journal, the year was most useful to me. I then guessed that 8 was the issue. This didn't turn up anything. (Later I discovered that 8 is the volumne.) Next, I guessed that 497 was a page reference, which guided be towards Issue 7. From their, I searched for (what I presumed was the first author's name) Mansouri, which gave me my result.


Ask an expert in your field that you have never met to write a reference letter? To be more specific, I work in pure mathematics and I am applying for a postdoc position in the US.

Prior to this, I have only had my recommendation letters written by my former advisors and PhD defense committee members.
However,  my recent research, as well as the scientific profile of the job I'm applying for, deviates from what I did as a PhD.  So I feel it more useful to have professor A (an expert in the field) reference me rather than those people.

But I merely have email correspondence with A and we have never met. Indeed, in the past year I released a paper which generalizes A's earlier work, and our emails are mainly technical discussions on his work and mine.
So my question is: in these circumstances, is it appropriate to ask A for a reference letter?

If you feel that A is sufficiently familiar with your work and your expertise and can comment upon those responsibly, then it is not inappropriate to ask him for a reference letter.

Your perception of your relationship maybe, however, different from his. And if that is the case he will probably politely turn you down (he is too busy, he does not feel comfortable doing it, etc.) in which case don't take it personally and don't hold it against him, and certainly don't force the matter. Having a weak letter at times is worse than not having one at all.

If the request was made to a complete stranger, it is possible that person may develop a bad impression due to this request out of the blue. But since you have been in correspondence with A, the worst that can happen really is that he would say 'no'.

To put in a personal perspective:

I have had an experience where an expert in the field, who has read some of my papers, and who has invited me for seminars (and hence whom I have personally met), turn down a request for a reference letter because he feel he is not in a position to write me an extremely strong letter.
I have had also an experience where an expert in the field agreed to write me a reference letter based on having read some of my papers and having conversed with some of my co-authors. We only had e-mail and Skype discussions after he agreed to write the letter and want to find out more about me and my interests.


Are there any examples of popular self published textbooks? It’s a well known fact that textbooks are expensive and that writing a textbook earns you very little in royalties (e.g. https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/167367/11353 ). At the same time self-publishing is becoming a bigger and bigger deal in non-academic circles. This sounds like an ideal solution for academic textbooks.
Are there any examples of popular self published textbooks?
I am not looking for any type of (exhaustive) lists. I am either interested in even a single example of such a textbook or alternatively answers that explore the main issues with this approach. Going through my collection of books from the time when I was ‘in academics’, I cannot find a single book that looks like it wasn’t published through an (academic) publisher.

Michael Spivak's "Comprehensive Introduction to Differential Geometry" was published through the Publish-or-Perish Press he founded, probably for just that reason.


Supervisor using my dataset without my consent to submit papers with his other students During my PhD (field of machine learning) I've been working in collecting a very large dataset. The whole work took more or less 1 year. I had the idea, collected most of the data and wrote all the software for data collection and data annotation. I acknowledge I had help from other people setting up sensors and collecting data, but mostly technical work.
Recently I've found out that my supervisor is giving this dataset to his other students without my consent and even submitted 2 papers (even before the submission of my own paper, so I don't even get a citation).
In those other papers, they wrote my name in the acknowledgements. I didn't find it fair and I've claimed at least co-authorship from the other papers. But my supervisor claims that he purchased the equipment, and the funding came from his project, so he owns the dataset and he decides what to do with it.
I took 1 year doing everything, and other students spent 0 hours, and I just get an acknowledgement? I really didn't find it fair.
I'm trying to solve it internally with my supervisor, but it's not working. Since the papers were already submitted, I'm not sure I will be able to change authorship. I have many proofs that this dataset was mainly developed by me.
What's the best way to try to solve this problem? Report it to the department? Address it to the conference chairs (the papers are still under review)? Or just forget about it and finish my PhD without complain?

I don't see anything problematic here, unless the papers that your advisor wrote with the other students take credit for developing the dataset (which would be a clear ethical violation).
Many papers in computer science use one or several datasets developed by other authors, and it's not a standard practice that the dataset developers are invited to contribute as authors. In fact, doing so may lead to vastly inflated author lists for papers that use many datasets.


APA Citation Followed by in-text reference to figure I want to provide a parenthetical citation along with a reference to a figure in my text. What is the proper way to format this?
Blah blah blah (Li et al., 1994, 1997) (Figure 1).
Blah blah blah (Li et al., 1994, 1997; Figure 1).
Blah blah blah (Figure 1) (Li et al., 1994, 1997).

Assuming the figure is not directly related to the citation, I would be looking to rewrite the sentence to separate the citation and the figure reference. It seems unusual that you would be introducing what is typically your own work (i.e., a figure) and citing a reference at exactly the same point. For example, you could write something like :

Figure 1 presents the results of ... based on data from Li et al (1994, 1997)

Of course, the way to do this will depend on the details of your content, but I'd generally seek to separate the two elements.
Alternatively, if the the figure is from the citation and you are reproducing it, you could do something like this:

(see Figure 1 taken from Li et al, 1994, 1997)

Or a variant:

(see Figure 1 based on data from Li et al, 1994, 1997)