Is it usual for graduate programs not to find suitable candidates even among a large pool of applicants? About a month ago I applied for a PhD position in Germany under a research training group funded by the German Research Council. There are 12 open positions for this program. Before I applied I was told that promising candidates will be contacted in July. Then I heard that the department received nearly 200 applications for 12 open positions. I was a little disheartened but I thought I would wait July out before giving up hope.

But then I found out today that the department reposted the job ad to advertise the same position, with a new deadline! I haven't heard back from them about my application, so I don't even know if I'm allowed to reapply, or if I have been effectively rejected and probably should move on.

I guess my question is: is it usual not to find any suitable candidates from such a large pool, or is the admissions panel just being too picky?

EDIT 1 (23/7): The program is interdisciplinary, they're looking for a wide range of backgrounds within two main disciplines (one of them I have 3 degrees in and the other I have explicitly expressed my keen interest). Because of that the program will also have a series of lectures and seminars to introduce students from one discipline to the theories and methods of the other. They're even allowing them to join master level courses! So it doesn't seem like they're looking for the perfect fit necessarily.

EDIT 2 (23/7): They did have a terrible application portal when I first applied. So maybe the first round of applications was so disorganized they want everyone to apply again. But I didn't get an email encouraging me to reapply

UPDATE (23/7): I was told that my application is still under review, and I don't need to reapply. Yay!

UPDATE (17/11): Just wanted to edit this post to say that I did end up getting that PhD. Thank you everyone for keeping my anxiety at bay!

I guess my question is: is it usual not to find any suitable candidates from such a large pool, or is the admissions panel just being too picky?

As somebody who recently did not hire a single candidate from a pool of about 100 applicants, I can say that it is indeed possible that they just did not find enough good people.

We were looking for a PhD student in computer science, with a focus on software and cloud engineering. We put out announcements to a few of the widely-distributed mailing lists in the field. Here's roughly what happened:

A few candidates had completely inappropriate backgrounds. E.g., one applicant had a master in biology.
About 30% to 40% of the applicants were computer scientists, but with a completely different specialisation in their undergrad and master. For instance, many students applied who used to work on theory, AI or Machine Learning. We are not interested in such backgrounds.
Easily more than 50% of the applicants, based on their application material,  did not have a sufficient command of the English language.
More than half of the applicants came from Asian universities where we did not know the university nor the professors writing the letters. All of them had reasonable grades and positive but very generic letters. Most had done internships at companies we have never heard of. As we had no way to distinguish the good from the bad students with those (to us) seemingly identical application materials, we deemed the risk too high.
About 25% of the applicants had, or pretended to have, multiple papers in predatory open access journals. The few times I actually looked up these papers, I was either unable to find them, or they were obviously of very low quality.
The vast majority of applications were supremely generic, and obviously sent in identical form to any PhD student posting in a Western university.

At the end of the day, we found 3 or 4 candidates that we were genuinely interested in, and after Skype interviews etc. it just did not work out with any of them.


When should the erratum (or other published correction) for a paper be cited? I am curious as to whether there are any accepted standard rules on when to cite, or not to cite, a published correction (erratum/corrigendum) along with a paper.
The meanings of these terms are not universal across all publishers, so for the purposes of this question, I will follow the convention of APS journals where errata are used for corrections by the authors. In my field (physics), I often see an erratum get between zero and a handful of citations, while the main paper keeps amassing them after publication of the erratum.
Clearly then, (at least in physics) there is no expectation that an author  should always cite the corrections. This is reasonable to me: If I cite a paper in my introduction about a related interesting system, the fact that the paper has a typo in eq. (33) isn't very relevant, so no need to have it clutter up the bibliography. On the other hand, it seems obvious to cite the erratum if my paper directly depends on the contents of the erratum. Presumably there's a line somewhere in-between. However, I have never seen this formalized. What if my work builds on a paper, but is not affected by the published corrections?
So my question is essentially:

Under what conditions should the erratum be cited? Are there any relevant guidelines, or rules of thumb?

(I also welcome any discussion on how the standards might vary between fields, or between different types of publications.)

Errata are used for substantial errors in a paper, rather than mere spelling or grammatical errors.  Citation of errata with original papers helps reduce error propagation in research.  Unfortunately this is not as common a practice as it should be, mostly because authors are often unaware of an erratum, or believe that if they are aware of it, others will be too.  The problem of error propagation due to failure to cite errata has been studied in the context of physics research by Thomsen and Resnik (1995).  They find that the existence of an erratum does not decrease the citation frequency for the original paper, and the erratum is usually not cited with the original paper, allowing errors in research to propagate.

It is possible that this situation will improve now that most journals are online, owing to better online referencing of papers and direct connection of papers to their erratum.  When you look at a paper from its original source in an online scholarly journal, it is usually obvious when there has been an erratum.  However, it is still common for researchers to obtain papers from other sources where they are not alerted to this, and so this is not a panacea.  (For example, some authors print out papers and then read from printed copies.  If there is a later erratum, the researcher with a printed copy may have no idea that this has occurred.)

Though I am not aware of any formal "standard rules" on the matter, it is desirable to reduce error propagation in research, and so ideally it is best to always include citation of the erratum with the citation of the original paper.  That way the reader is alerted to the existence of the erratum, and does not propagate any error in the paper.  At a minimum the erratum should obviously be cited whenever the main citation to the paper touches on an aspect of the paper that is actually affected by that erratum (i.e., you should avoid error propagation yourself).  But even in cases where the erratum does not affect parts of the paper that were of relevance to the main citation, it is also useful to cite the erratum in case an interested reader decides to read the cited paper in full, and is not aware that there has been an erratum.  Evidently, from the fact that errata receive few citations, not many academics are doing this.

Speaking as someone who has published a mathematical paper with an error in an equation, and an erratum to correct that error, I would prefer it if all citations to my paper also cite the erratum with it, just to make sure that the original error does not propagate.  It is not offensive to an author who has made an error to have the erratum to their paper cited; we are already aware we fucked up, and it is a relief when others do the right thing to minimise the damage.

Thomsen, M. and Resnik, D. (1995) The effectiveness of the erratum in avoiding error propagation in physics. Science and Engineering Ethics 1(3), pp. 231-240.


Ethics of asking a colleague for a citation A colleague scholar was an editor for my latest published article, in which I heavily used her work and cited it. She then sent me one of her papers, so I could review it informally and give her my comments on it.
At one point in the paper, one of my articles could fit perfectly as a citation. Is it ethical to suggest that she does cite my article? And how should I go about asking her? Directly in my comments to her paper?

If the reference is pertinent, it's perfectly fine to suggest it. "Suggest" is key, rather than "ask":

By the way, I've published a paper on the topic you're discussing in section three. Perhaps you'll find it useful. See attached.


Title for a paper that theoretically compares several algorithms and implements one First, I am not asking for name suggestions. I am just not sure how to express very well the content of my paper. The paper theoretically compares four algorithms, and nominates and implements one of them. I found many papers in the literature which started with the name Comparative analysis. Does this term apply to my paper? (In all the literature I've found they implement all algorithms, not just one.) If this term does not apply, is there a proper term that can pinpoint the content? More specifically, my paper compares four pattern recognition algorithms and implements one of them that theoretically seems to be the best. Does (Selection and Implementation of an Algorithm for optimizing ... system) properly express the content of my paper ?

Difficult to choose a title without more information, but why not choose:

Performing ..., theoretical comparison of four algorithms, and implementation of ...


Concurrent workers independently published part of my results. How to convince the referees that I got the results independently? In my primary research project (not coauthoring with advisor), I got two results, say result A and result B, back in 2020. I wanted to submit it in 2020, but my advisor says that I need a further result, say result C, to be considered for a top journal.
I agreed with him as I find the (hypothetical) result C way more exciting. Now I am half-way through getting result C.
A competing group tried to get result A (with mistakes) and submitted a paper in 2020. The referee rejected their paper because they made a fatal mistake. They corrected the mistake and submitted the corrected version of result A again. They got their paper accepted at a top journal in March 2021.
I don't know how to speak with my advisor about this without offending him. My advisor says it is a good thing as it proves that I was at the right direction and a super active subfield. I think he is just trying to sooth me by saying nice words.
Now I am submitting the results A and B by myself. I do have timestamps on public cloud services to prove that I did get the correct version of result A before them. However, the timestamp is just on a poorly written draft rather than a fully written paper, because my advisor asked me to work on C.
It is my first time dealing with this issue. Shall I also submit the timestamps to prove that I had the result A?
I am thinking about putting result A into appendix and emphasizing result B in my paper. Am I correct? Is it best to submit the paper to the same journal?
I will cite their paper of course. I want to say that I am a concurrent worker work in parallel. I am afraid that the everyone think I am the follower, who falsely and unethically present myself as a concurrent worker.
What shall I say to make clear in my paper what happened?

PS:
I was not worrying before March because I thought:

The competing group made mistakes so they are not competent competitors

Result A alone is not enough for top publications. Their paper still contains some technical mistakes and exaggerated claims.

However, facts proved that I underestimated the competing group. The hard lesson learnt.
The field is applied statistics. This is a primarily theoretical work that studies the properties of two widely-adopted statistical methods.
Related: Pre-print service like arXiv but with private option, so I can correct my mistakes without publicly advertising my mistakes?

You've been scooped, I'd say it's common. You could write: Further to publication of our preliminary results [1], X et al. showed ... Or: In parallel with this work, X et al. showed ... (You could cite your technical report elsewhere in the latter instance.) You can then explain how your work improves on theirs, especially as your results are way more exciting.
Your approach to result A may be different to X et al., which may allow you to present the result in the main body. Also, your result A may be slightly different to their result A (i.e., you may have slightly different results). Speak to your advisor about how to approach this.


Is it acceptable to point out job offers in my graduate school application? Just some background: I am currently an undergraduate and I will be graduating next year. As of now I have an internship position doing research in my favorite area. This will extend into a job offer (doing the same thing) once I graduate. My employer will not require a higher degree for me to continue doing research, but I want to acquire at least a Masters, likely a PhD as well.

In order the strengthen my graduate school application, I am thinking of mentioning this situation in such a way as to demonstrate my determination and commitment to higher studies. For example, I can mention that I am already doing research in this area and that I have a guaranteed position doing research in this area upon graduation, without needing additional degrees. However, instead of taking the comfortable option, I want to invest in my knowledge and take the harder option which is going to graduate school and acquiring a higher degree. Would this be helpful or possibly hurtful?

It's acceptable, but it probably won't help and could even easily hurt your application. It might be taken as a threat to the department, i.e. it's like saying, "I could take this fabulous industry job I've been offered if you don't admit me!" I might find this off-putting if I read it in an application. Departments aren't usually short of applicants, so a reviewer might just put your application aside thinking, "OK, you just go ahead and take that position. I have 50 more applications in this pile over here to go through."

Determination to do research isn't the most important factor in demonstrating your ability to complete a Master's or PhD program. The internship by itself helps show your passion for research, and maybe helps show that you're capable of it, but the idea that you're highlighting your willingness to bail on the internship in order to pursue a higher degree might say to some committee members that you're also willing to bail on the graduate degree program if something better comes along (like a nice offer from Google or Microsoft in you're in Computer Science).

I think you're better off using the current internship to show that you are able to make progress in research, and leave the idea that you've been offered a job extending that research aside, lest you come off as pretentious or threatening. There are lots of suitable graduate school candidates with internships or prior research experience who might also be suitable to the same program. Use yours to show that there's something different about you.


Publishing a high-quality indexed book retaining copyright Two colleagues and I would like to publish a book, and we're surveying our options for the publishing company. Throughout discussions, it became clear that all these items are important to us:

Retain the copyright so we can use our work for whatever we want (for publishing new papers, create a revision of the book, share some of the material with students);
We will produce a print-ready document using LaTeX, and although the resulting pdf would be ready, it would also be nice to have digital ebook versions (.mobi, .epub) so that people can also read the book in iPad and the like;
We would like to have the book indexed by Scopus and similar databases so at least we get citations for the book (we're not interested in royalties. This means that the book has to be associated with a DOI;
The quality of the final print should be good, so that our hard work doesn't get obfuscated by poor choice of paper quality, lack of color images, an ugly cover, etc.

We have had some interactions with major publishers, and although they can accommodate to a large extent our demands, it seems their contracts are crafted in such a way that we don't really get what we want. In addition, it's very unlikely to get some of our demands with them (for instance, color images in the printed book). I would appreciate any suggestions on selecting a publisher with those points above as paramount.

One outside possibility is self publishing, though (a) it is a lot of work and (b) unless you are well connected to potential readers it will have little impact. There will be no marketing effort other than what you do, though there is little such for a lot of publishers in any case. Amazon, for example, has a subsidiary that helps with this, as do some other sellers.

Some publishers will let you keep copyright (perhaps jointly) but normally only for the superstars in the field with a long publishing history. At a minimum you would need to give them a license that satisfies them. Probably an exclusive license for some things. They want to cover their risk, as is natural if unsatisfying for authors.

But many more publishers, taking your copyrights, will give you back a license to your work that, if carefully worked out, will let you do pretty much what you want other than take it to another publisher. That may be your best bet. Think hard about what you might want to do in the future and get those things enshrined in a license.

But some of what you want is normal. New editions are actually expected for some work (textbooks especially). And cover art and such reflects on the publisher as well as the authors so may not be a big problem.

And while you say you will produce LaTex or such, you really want a copy editor to go over your book. That is one of the hardest things to arrange in self publishing. You need at least some independent readers of the book to give you feedback. Publishers normally pass this task to seasoned reviewers even before copy editors get a look.


What is considered a good GPA in a master's program? I am in a top master's program for my field of study. I completed my first semester last month and got back my grades. When I was offered admission at my current school, I was offered a partial fellowship, most likely based on my GRE scores, which were much higher than the school profile average. The only condition that I needed in order to maintain that fellowship was to maintain at least a 3.0 GPA. As a new student last semester, not knowing which courses to take, I took only the courses that were mandatory for students in my program.

I honestly did not enjoy many of my course subjects, and the one course that was required of all first-semester students was my least favorite. It was a theory-based course for all students regardless of major (whether they majored in the same thing in undergrad or something else). My undergrad major was different from my current major. This course made me feel depressed because it was in the same format as an undergraduate course with one lecture and one discussion led by a PhD student. For most of my courses, when I would inquire about grades, I would get vague responses. In my program, C is the lowest grade that could be given. I am still in good standing, which in my program is a 3.0. My GPA is a little bit higher than this, so I am able to keep my fellowship. But, my GPA is what disappoints me.

What is considered a good GPA in a master's program? Are there wide variations depending on the program of what is considered a good GPA? How important are master's program GPAs? I don't plan to move on to a PhD program. I read different responses on other sites like how a B is similar to an F.

If you do not plan on pursuing a PhD then a "good GPA" is one where you can complete your courses and graduate with your Masters. When you go into industry from academia, no hiring manager will care about your GPA - your experience matters more and your master's degree will be icing on the cake. Many graduate programs require at least a 3.0 GPA (B average) to maintain a good status and not be put on probation. So that might be your goal.


A professor I know is becoming head of department, do I send congratulations or condolences? I don't know much more about the transition - only that the professor is becoming the new head effective [date], and that they have the support of the department.
Do I send congratulations (because it's a promotion) or condolences (because apparently some professors don't actually want the promotion, and only become the head of department reluctantly)?
Edit: what about the outgoing head of department? I clearly shouldn't send condolences in that case, but should I send congratulations?

That would depend on how well I knew the person. If they were a very close friend of long standing, I'd probably offer condolences, just as a joke. But that would take a special relationship.
In the general case, only congratulations are in order.


Preventing Verbatim Answers that Match Examples? When teaching students (especially in code, but this can apply to any subject), how do you prevent near verbatim answers that match your examples?

For example, I tell students how to find a document by ID in an array of documents. I show them the code foundDocument = documentArray.find(singleDocument => singleDocument._id = id). I then ask students to find a fruit in fruitArray. The answer I'll get is foundDocument = fruitArray.find(singleDocument => singleDocument._id = id), which works, but not the ideal answer.

Some notes based on the content discussion and answers so far:

This is sort of for a project. I teach both one off weekend classes and long term coding mentorship and this comes up in both. The goal of the weekend class is to build a website by the end. The goal of the mentorship is for the singular student to have built an MVP of their product.

The array example above was the simplest and shortest example I could think of to demonstrate my issue. I also see this happen where whole files get copied and the students expects something different to happen.

What I'm hoping to prevent is the pattern matching that students sometimes do but they don't fully understand the why of what they are doing. I've also seen (and done this myself) often in the STEM fields. You find a formula that works and re apply it but not understand what you're doing.

When teaching students...how do you prevent near verbatim answers that match your examples?

I ask questions that cannot be answered correctly by near-verbatim matches of my examples.


Research with Partisan Implications - Is it worth it? I have good reason to believe that political party X engages in harmful practice Y more than other political parties.  The numbers stack up, it fits into the theories presented in other papers, and so on.  Content-wise, I believe there is enough for a paper on the topic.

However, I am concerned about the long-term career potential of this, as this would be my first paper (I'm still an undergraduate student) and there are downsides to appearing as a naive partisan hack.  Is such a paper worth pursuing, and if it is, how should I best go about minimizing that potential drawback?

A politically-focused paper may harm your standing among those with an opposing viewpoint.  This perhaps should not happen, but it's an unfortunate reality of human nature.

If you publish a paper that could be interpreted as "party X is worse than Y", people (even scientists) are going to read that through a lens of their own biases, to some extent.  If they support party X, they may be less likely to believe your conclusions, more likely to challenge you, and/or have an emotional reaction against it.  Some people will be able to be impartial and rise above their biases; for others, this may lead to a final judgement about you.

How much this harms you may depend on which side you take.  There have been many studies showing that college professors tend to overwhelmingly favor one side of the political debate in America.  Here is just one example.  This effect is far more extreme in some fields than others.

So, another unfortunate reality is that, depending on the side your paper favors, the results may be very different for your career.  You might be confirming the beliefs of 95% of your colleagues, or you might be challenging those beliefs. I hate to say this, because it sounds like a suggestion of "only do this if your finding matches the existing orthodoxy", which is a highly unscientific approach. But I do think this point needs to be acknowledged.

A political paper may get a lot more attention than the average paper.  Papers like "adherents of party X pick their nose a lot more than adherents of party Y" make great headlines and often get picked up by the media.  They are second only to studies claiming that chocolate, beer, etc. are good for you, in terms of press appeal.

More publicity for you is typically a good thing (assuming you are doing good work). The fact that you published a well-known paper can be a great thing to have on your CV.  On the other hand, it does raise the stakes.  Your paper would be subject to a lot more scrutiny than normal.

In the end, only you can make this decision; there are risks.  But my feeling would be evaluate this very carefully, but do go ahead with it if you think it would make a high quality paper.  Some points on how to proceed:

Don't move forward without someone experienced on board.  Make sure you can get some good, respected people's input.  Ask them about the general idea before you start, and make sure someone more experienced than you is willing to contribute and be an author if you do go ahead with it.
Work hard to overcome your own biases.  I would try hard to find someone with an opposing political viewpoint to review it, to make sure I'm not missing something obvious because of my own bias.  There may be an alternative reading of the data which I haven't seen, because I'm predisposed to think ill of party X.
Do the work meticulously. If this paper does get attention, any error or methodological issue is likely to get picked up.  Make sure you do everything very carefully, document all your methods, test thoroughly, etc.  (Of course you should always do this).
Report the findings in as evenhanded a way as possible.  Don't take unnecessary political potshots.  Don't assume bad intent where your results don't warrant it.  And think about the title you want to give it.  Do you want it to say "Party X is more evil than party Y" or something generic like "The relationship between Foo and party affiliation".
Make sure not to claim too much.  Be clear about the limitations of what your work actually shows.  It's quite common to see papers that jump to unwarranted conclusions or assume causality where they haven't shown that.  Steer clear of such things.  Make sure to be clear about your limitations, and if there are multiple possible interpretations of the results, make sure to discuss them all.


What tone to use when talking about oneself in statement of purpose? In what manner should one speak in her statement of purpose for phd applications?

Should she speak factually or slightly overly self-praising?

There is a difficult tension to balance here: one the one hand, you don't want to hide your light under a bushel.  On the other hand, the people reading the application will have seen a lot, and will probably be pretty good at detecting somebody puffing themselves up and will not be impressed.

Two useful strategies for approaching this:

Follow the writing strategy of "show, don't tell".  If you've done something awesome, don't tell that you were awesome: "I made important contributions to the study of newts."
Instead, show the thing that you've done: "I studied newts under Prof. Coolness as a junior, and our paper on how newts prefer turn clockwise under the full moon was recently accepted to the Journal of Arbitrary Herpetology."  Give the reader enough evidence that they can conclude awesomeness for themselves.
Once you've got a draft written, ask a trusted professor to look at it and check whether you've left anything important out or are overinflating yourself.


How is the training for MS students different from MBA students? How do universities train MBA students differently from MS students? Statistics and quantitative reasoning are vital parts of the MBA as analytics have become crucial to many aspects of business. In what sense does an MS in Statistics have better training in analytics than an MBA?
How do MBAs add value to a person's career? Is their broad (if not deep) command of statistics, economics, finance, etc., the reason behind their astronomical salaries? Is there specific training that makes them 'managerial'? If yes, what is that training?

An important aspect of MBA training that I haven't seen mentioned in other answers is networking.  A huge amount of getting things done is business is about networking, and while you will not find a formal course on networking in an MBA program, most good MBA programs will have a lot of networking events and opportunities connected with them.  MBA students are also often grouped together in cohorts or otherwise treated much more as a unified group of students than MS students.  All of this adds up to a very important extra-curricular curriculum component that is often a key differentiator for success or failure after business school, and is largely neglected in the more technically focused track of MS students.


What sources of information are there to find suitable congress, reunions, convention and other scientific gathering events? I started a PhD in bioinformatics last year, changing my previous (undergrad) research topic from genetic engineering / virology  to chemoinformatics / neglected diseases. I've already went to a few congresses related to my field, but I'm not sure I'm aware of everything that is out there.

Back in my previous lab, various senior scientists would suggest me different conferences, but I'm the only one here working in chemoinformatics and my professor is rather new to the area too.

Is there any source of information to rapidly find scientific conferences? I'm having a hard time to find good ones about chemoinformatics

Suggestions?

A quick search at the CORE conference ranking website produces the following:

Tier A:

IEEE Computational Systems Bioinformatics Conference (CSB) [can't find a link! WikiCFP seems to think it hasn't been held in a while either]

Tier B:

Asia-Pacific Bioinformatics Conference (APBC) Perennial website
Workshop on Algorithms in Bioinformatics (WABI) 2018 website

Tier C:

Bioinformatics Visualization (BioVis) 2018 website
IEEE Bioinformatics and Bioengineering (BIBE) 2018 website
IEEE Symposium on Computational Intelligence in Bioinformatics and Computational Biology (CIBCB) 2018 website

An alternative venue for searching for relevant conferences is WikiCFP, which gathers Calls-For-Papers of a great many conferences.


14 months waiting for first review time to go elsewhere? I submitted a paper to a journal , it was accepted to go to peer review and it has stuck there despite chasing up at 3 months 6 months 9 ,10, 11, 12, 13, 14 month intervals. time to give and go to another journal?
The first excuse given by the editor is that the paper is unusual and they had trouble getting reviewers. Then the excuse was they were changing the publishing process. The paper crosses entomology and physics disciplines. I m still waiting for the first review.

If you've been waiting for 14 months, and they are still not handling the paper, I think it's time for one last round of interaction.

State that you consider 14 months to be an unacceptably long time to have no response to reviews.
State that you intend to withdraw the paper and take it elsewhere unless they can give you a firm and near deadline (no more than approximately one more month) when you will receive a decision on your paper.

At this point, either they will make you a firm promise or they won't.  And if they make you a promise, either they'll fulfill it or they won't.  If they won't make a promise, or if they miss their promised response date by more than one week, withdraw the paper and send it elsewhere.


My PhD supervisor cannot promise me a date to defend my dissertation before my visa expires. Should I just quit my PhD and start over? I am doing my PhD in Germany and I’m under a three year DFG grant, which ends in September, and with it my visa. Although I can get an 18-month visa to find a job after my PhD, this won’t be granted until after my defense (when I get my certificate).

My supervisor had no idea that my residence in Germany depends on my employment contract/grant with the university.
I asked him if I could submit my dissertation at the end of July and be guaranteed a defense date in September. He told me cannot guarantee this and that I’ll just have to submit my defense earlier.

I don’t want to rush my writing (I’m technically submitting my PhD early already) so finishing earlier than July is out of the question. But if I don’t get a defense date in September, I will have to leave Germany and come back to defend it. I come from a country that requires a Schengen visa, so coming back won’t be as easy as hopping on a plane.

Right now I am seriously considering submitting my thesis in July and then flying back at the end of September with or without a defense date.  If I don’t get a defense date then I effectively quit my PhD.

What should I do? Any advice would be appreciated.

EDIT 1: Thanks for all of your advice. I'm slowly going through it.

I asked my supervisor if I can do it remotely and he said that Skype-ing for dissertation panels is not allowed. So he won't even consider a virtual presentation.

EDIT 2: My supervisor and I had a meeting and we discussed a few options. Since we are inviting a professor in the US to the panel, it is in everyone's best interest to have a tough timeline in mind. The timeline we selected is within the validity period of my current permit. Still no guarantees as anything could go wrong, but it's better than nothing.

Thanks again for those of you who gave thoughtful responses. To those of you who thought my question "makes no sense", I apologize deeply for my profound ignorance and I'm sorry that you didn't find my question relevant, unlike many people here. (Ironically my thesis is about online communities and how some more established members treat less active ones.)

You should talk immediately with the International Office (or equivalent) at your university, as well as any student-coordinated offices at your university. This is by no means the first time that they will have dealt with such a situation. Usually there are workarounds available—for instance, you could be extended on a part-time contract for a few months while waiting for the defense to be completed. You certainly do not need to be employed full-time to qualify for a visa—you just have to be able to show sufficient income, which even a 50% contract would be enough to satisfy.

However, I should point out that, depending on the university, there is no way to guarantee that you can turn in your thesis in July and be able to defend it in September. For instance, in the faculty where I used to work, reviewers were given three months to review a thesis. So if you turned in your thesis in July, you probably would not be able to have a defense before the beginning of November. You'll need to check the regulations for your program to see when the defense can be scheduled relative to the thesis being handed in.

Moreover, the "art" of scheduling a thesis defense requires getting enough examiners together at the same time, never an easy task in the German system.

However, to answer your main question, don't you think that quitting and starting over is counterproductive? If you're already writing a thesis, that shows you're relatively near to completion, and that your advisor thinks you're ready to move on. Giving that up because of the logistics of scheduling a PhD defense seems very shortsighted. Why would you not think that the same thing couldn't happen if you started over and worked somewhere else? Since you're so close to finishing, get it done!


Mastering in the same field as my Bachelors I completed my Bachelors in Human Resources Management. Is there any benefit of completing a Masters degree in Human Resources Management, or should I chose another field?

I would say it all depends on where you want to go. Of course, you may not yet be 100% sure yet. I was in a similar situation a few years ago. Here are a few things right off my head that may help you decide:

You probably did a Bachelor thesis or some kind of final work for your undergraduate. What was the closest field to the topic of your thesis? Human Resource Management in general or, say, something more specific like Employee Stress Performance (I just made that up, not sure if that is a valid subfield of HRM)?. Did you like it? Would you have liked a different topic in another subfield better?
What are fields related to HRM? Is it hard to switch from one to the other? Would one require you to learn difficult skills or acquire knowledge in disciplines considered to be difficult (for example math or computing)?. Would you like to acquire those? Would it be beneficial to acquire those skills, even if ending up working in a different field?
Do you have an idol in your field? Some guy who wrote a book about HRM that you like? Your supervisor? Check their CV's and career path? Did they study HRM for a Master's or do they have a very diversified path? Or ask one of your professors for advice.

Finally, a recommendation: why not wait a year or so and work in your field? Probably you would see much clearer which study would be most beneficial, if you'd like continue to study and you would also have had contact to people who'd just have finished their Master's and could give you some more feedback.


Answering "Why do you want to become a research mathematician?"-type questions in a statement of purpose How should one address the classic "Why do you want to become a research mathematician?"-type question that is normally asked in the statement of purpose when applying to Masters (and also) programs?

I've read (and I bet so has any admission board) lots of statements beginning with

  (*) "I've always loved numbers and solving problems, which is the
  most rewarding thing of my life"

(or variations thereof), which seems like a rather lame way to start off.

I do have an enthusiastic love for mathematics and the challenges of research work, and have some "philosophical" reasons to dedicate myself to it (I've been mostly inspired by Prof. Thurston's answer to this question which was asked on MathOverflow), and a somewhat defined (although broad) area that deeply arise my interest (which I surely should mention). However, I'd really like to avoid seeming unprofessional (or outright creepy) as in passage (*), and trying to convince anyone that I've always been in love with my field "ever since I could take my first trembling steps". So my question is:

  What points should you keep in mind to address the question "Why do you want to become a research mathematician?" in a statement of purpose without seeming unprofessional but communicating your genuine and deep passion? And what is actually expected?

A related question is Choosing research ideas to include in a statement of purpose.

I can't speak for all mathematics graduate admissions everywhere, but when I was on the admissions committee for my department (UGA) we generally did not take the statements of purpose all that seriously.  Most statements of purpose are indeed a bit dull and similar to each other.  The particular question "Why do you want to become a research mathematician?" is certainly not explicitly asked across the board (somewhat crankily I could ask "Why are you asking that for a master's program?  The degree needed to become a research mathematician is a PhD.  Depending upon your local academic culture, getting a master's degree could either prepare you to enter a PhD program or it could be totally unnecessary for that.").

It's not a bad question, but to me a very acceptable answer -- really the best answer -- is because I really enjoy mathematics, I am good at it, and I am eager to learn and do more of it.  Not to brag too much, but I am in fact a research mathematician.  Why did I become one?  Please see the above bold-faced text: even with the benefit of many years of retrospective, I don't really see a better answer than that.  In fact, honestly I think the bold-faced answer is probably better than the wordier answers I gave in my early 20's: how mathematics is the best field because it has an amazing internal consistency and a level of rigor and certainty unmatched by any other intellectual endeavor, how mathematical theorems are eternal so proving them is a form of immortality, and so forth.  Yikes.  It's not so much that I don't believe these things anymore but rather that I don't find these beliefs very interesting or distinctive: I think they fall nicely under "because I really enjoy mathematics".

The problem with taking the personal statement too seriously is that the ability to write an excellent personal statement -- especially an unusually interesting or insightful one -- is only weakly correlated to success in a math PhD program.  I looked at personal statements to see whether they were adequate, e.g.:

Do they use flawlessly correct grammar, syntax and punctuation? Do they express their (not so complicated) ideas clearly?  Do they convince me that this student has strong enough writing skills not to be dragged down by this in the future?  (Many STEM-types have alarmingly weak writing skills, and for sure it drags them down.  I take the GRE Verbal score very seriously.)
Do they avoid gross misconceptions about what a math PhD program and a math research career will be like?  I don't expect an incoming math PhD student to really understand either one: most don't, but they learn eventually and adapt accordingly.  However some students are clueless so far beyond the norm that it becomes a risk that as soon as they arrive they'll think "Wait, what is all this??" and drop out in their first semester.
Do they seem like a responsible person and not a snowflake who thinks that graduate school is a summer camp that they get paid to attend?  (It happens...)
Do they avoid sounding too weird? Yes, mathematicians can be weird, like many people, and the amount of allowable weirdness in the mathematical profession is probably greater than most.  But it is still only a finite amount, and I know people who have the intellectual skills to be a mathematician but not the requisite level of socialization.  It's not pretty but it's true.

If you avoid these and similar negatives in a personal statement and mostly just evince a sincere, not terribly pretentious or twee "I really like math", then I suspect you'll do fine with this part of your application.  You would in my department, certainly.


Paper submitted with repeated sentences in the introduction I have submitted a research paper to a peer-reviewed journal two months ago. It is my first submission. I have noticed two unfortunate elements in my introduction:

I wrote the same sentence twice in my introduction.
In one of the sentences, I have repeated the same word twice consecutively.

I think these mistakes came up with copying and pasting when I was trying to adjust my paragraphs in the introduction. Otherwise, I have already made grammar and spell check for the rest of the paper. Also, I am sure that the introduction is clearly written.

My question is that: can this kind of mistake (I think it is a minor mistake) cause a rejection by referees ? (The paper did not get a desk rejection, it is under review.) I will be really happy if you can share your experience regarding this kind of mistakes during the review process.

Regarding the repeated words, most people would not notice the the repetition at all. Regarding the sentence, they might be confused for a second, check back, see it's written twice, and continue as if nothing had happened.

Most will add a short note to the review, among those of other typos, that the sentence "..." appears twice. Nothing to be worried about, this alone will never cause a rejection of even major revision.


Plagiarism in undergraduate thesis A friend recently confessed to me that she plagiarised a part of her thesis which was submitted to graduate with honors from her undergraduate university. She graduated a few years ago. Her thesis was in biology, and the part of the thesis in question is the materials and methods section. She told me that her group had used the same non-human primate model for many projects, so she decided to use the same wording that her group had used previously. She says that is was classic copy/paste plagiarism, but she thought is was okay since it was "just methods which are the same in every project." Her thesis was about 50 pages, and about three pages were plagiarized. The rest of the thesis is her own work (introduction, results, discussion, etc.). While any plagiarism is bad, is this cause for worry? I want to reassure her since methods seem, at least to me, to be so routine. Also, her thesis was not published. What advice should I give her? Do I have a responsibility to "turn her in"?

First, the use of the earlier material may have been plagiarism or not. If the methodology was "common knowledge" then it need not be cited.
Second, if sections were copied, verbatim, without citation, then it is still an error but one of copyright violation, not plagiarism. Copyright is about words (actually "creative expression"). Plagiarism is about ideas. Not the same thing. But both need to be avoided.
But, you don't really need to take any action unless you are somehow responsible for academic integrity at the institution. Even then, it may be too late to impose any penalty. Vigilanteism isn't called for. The responsibility for evaluating the thesis was with the university at the time and while they may have failed, it isn't your responsibility to raise a now-dead issue.
If you need to give her advice, talk about the dangers to her career from repeating such things in the future. But I think you can, with a clear conscience, let the past be the past. And be sure that you understand and communicate the difference between plagiarism (mis attribution of ideas, even if paraphrased) and copyright infringement.


Can a theoretical proof-of-concept be published? I am working independently on an idea, and to test its conceptual feasibility, I have done a bit of math, and it seems to check out. The idea is in the area of web engineering, or web science.

Now, in order to simplify the math, I've had to make several assumptions, which may or may not be valid in the real world. Is this a problem? I'm trying to make the calculation as realistic as possible, but I've noticed that it can quickly get out of hand in terms of complexity of the problem.

However, I believe that the concept has value in that it is a novel way of approaching an existing problem, and it could have the legs required to flourish in a theoretical sense.

EDIT: Just to be clear, the simplification I'm referring to replaces non-linear functions with linear functions, so that the math is simpler.

From your description ("I have done a bit of math, and it seems to check out"), it sounds like you have ended up in an entirely ordinary and reasonable piece of theoretical/analytical research.  Indeed, such research can be almost precisely characterized (informally) as doing a bit of math and seeing if it checks out.

The question of publishability then boils down to whether your simplifying assumptions are considered reasonable (which you can argue and test by comparison with prior work, both theoretical and experimental) and whether the conclusions reached by checking it out are interesting and significant.

Bottom line: go forth and publish (in an appropriately scoped venue)!


Will I be treated differently from funded students if I attend graduate school without full funding? I am told, by both a professor at my US undergraduate school and here at Stack Academia (for example, at Implications of being accepted without funding to a computer science PhD in the United States?), that I should not accept an offer from a US graduate school unless I am offered full funding. The reasoning is that if they actually wanted me, they would be paying me. I agree with this.

So my question is, what would be the difference between going to a school with funding and without funding, besides the money? Would I be treated as a second class citizen? And if I was offered full funding, perhaps from a TAship, what would happen if I wanted to pay for myself anyway?

Existing answers, such as at Will self funding a PhD hurt employment chances?, seem to focus on the money and the chance that the applicant is not strong enough for the program. While I also agree with these, I am interested in learning about external factors too.

Confession:  I've tried this myself TWICE in the field of mathematics, so what I say comes from my own experience.

You need not worry about the existence of a caste-system among graduate students.  You will not be treated any differently than any other student if you are accepted into a program and not funded.  The main question is whether or not you will get into the program in the first place if you have no external funding sources...

In science-related graduate schools, it is quite often the case that students will not be accepted into the program unless they have some sort of support (i.e. department assistantship, scholarship/fellowship, etc...).  Students who try to do it all on their own often find themselves under even more pressure than a funded student.  On top of trying to pass extremely difficult courses and pursue original, cutting edge research, they may find themselves also working multiple unrelated jobs that barely make ends meet for rent, much less tuition and all other debts incurred along the way.  Often, unfunded students succumbs to financial pressures and drop out to pursue more financially stable opportunities.

Students dropping out of graduate programs also make their host departments' statistics look bad in the eyes of their superiors (i.e. deans, university president, provosts, etc..) and can lead to diminished support for those graduate programs.  Since universities don't want to hurt their own reputations (or lose state/donated funding), they tend to be selective of their graduate students.  And I believe this is a major reason why self-funded students are often not even allowed in graduate programs:  statistically speaking, their success rate is likely too low to merit taking a chance.

Of course there are exceptions (e.g. having wealthy parents, pursuing non-science graduate programs, education doctorate degrees often earned by people who work full time as teachers), but it is certainly a red flag if a student willingly tries to pursue a graduate degree in the sciences without any source of funding.

My advice to you:  If you're offered funding, take it!.  If you are accepted into a graduate program and are not offered funding  and don't have any other source of funding apart from yourself, then don't try to do it all on your own.  The sheer cost of graduate school, combined with the uncertainty of you graduating from the program, along with the nightmare of trying to pay off student loan debt for the rest of your life (even bankruptcy will not save you from student loan debt); it's just not worth it to you.


I have two PhD offers. Can I accept one while waiting for the grades for my preferred option without the latter finding out? Basically I was offered a PhD after my bachelor's degree based only on my performance in the BSc but I enrolled on an MSc and kept this offer as backup.  I have been offered another PhD but it is based on the MSc results rather than the BSc results.  The second offer are asking if I could accept the offer sooner rather than later, but obviously I don't want to refuse the first offer just yet as I know that it is guaranteed.  If I email the second offer and say that I want to accept, would the supervisor who made me the first offer somehow know that I had accepted the other offer and withdraw his offer?  I do not want to turn down the first one if I have not received my MSc grades.  I assume that different universities would not correspond over this type of thing, but I don't know for sure, and I did tell the people who gave me the second offer that I had already received an offer elsewhere and which university made that offer: is this all confidential or could they inform the people who made the first offer?

Obviously, if I don't meet the conditions for the second offer, I could then fall back on the first offer whose criteria I have already met.

You should contact both programs and openly describe the situation.

Each individual academic field is fairly small, and academics do regularly talk to each other. Reneging on an offer will tarnish your reputation. Even if you successfully pull off this stunt, you will earn some enemies, which can bite you later (e.g. seeking jobs, applying for grants, etc).


Creating an central multi-purpose dictionary / database I am trying to organize my workflow and make it more effective.

As non-native English-speaker studying in a foreign country I often need to look-up domain-specific translations (in 3 languages). As there are no specific dictionaries I am using textfiles containing translations I have collected over the time.
This is quite uncomfortable.

Often these words are related to some kind of mathematical definition which has to be stated as a theorem for proofs. Right now I usually copy these from my old publications.

It would be great to have some kind of central dictionary or knowledge-base where I could organize all this (Translations and Definitions).

Anyone who can recommend a program for this?
How do you organize definitions and domain-specific translations?

I would try http://termbases.eu/ a site that was mentioned under Software: Lexicons in Linguist List.

Broadly, what you have described is a lightweight variety of a dictionary writing system, software for developing a lexicon.

If you were translating digital documents, I would recommend translation memory software. Collecting and managing your multilingual context-specific translations is part of what translation memory software does.

Another possibility, if you happen to be comfortable setting up a wiki, is to create a wiki in the manner of Wiktionary.


Is it possible to study an MBA as a Bachelor in Computer Science? I am finishing my degree this year and I am interested in an MBA. However I have some questions.

First:

  Will I need to retake courses in order to be able to study an MBA as a Computer Scientist?

Second:

  Do I need work experience to begin studying an MBA? And if yes, should the work experience be business-oriented rather than software engineering for example?

Thanks in advance.

There is usually no specific subject requirement for a MBA. However, MBA programs usually require a few years of work experience (on average candidates have 5+ years). Often you will also need to get a good score on the GMAT test. But this is stuff you can study on your own, you don't necessarily need to take any courses.

I would think if you were interested in an MBA then you would probably be pursuing more management related opportunities anyway. But these could certainly be obtained by starting in a software engineering role and working your way up. Obviously you are not going to get a management position fresh out of university, everyone needs to start somewhere.

The company you work for may even pay for your management training if they believe you have promise.

You can read about the requirements and admissions process at various top MBA schools:

Cambridge Judge Business School

Harvard Business School


What are the 'objective circumstances' that one young researcher should take into account when choosing a research topic? Premise: I originally asked this on MathOverflow, but it was pointed out to me that it could be better fit for Academia Stack Exchange.

Note: I have received extremely varied advice on the following matter by various students slightly older than me, so I post the question here in the hope to get an objective 'technical take' from experienced researchers.

Assuming that there are several topics which are equally attractive to me and that the prospective advisors are all established researchers in their fields and "nice people", are there any objective circumstances that I should take into consideration when searching for a topic for an undergraduate research project
(clearly, this question naturally generalize to the choice of Ph.D. dissertation topics and general research advice, about which, if you please, you are free to elaborate) to maximize my chances of making an "optimal choice" (e.g., in terms of mathematical results achieved, possibility of getting a good recommendation afterwards, personal growth, etc.)? Clearly, referring to research papers in mathematical education that partially support your remarks will be highly appreciated (although it is not necessary).

Side note: Just to clarify a little further: I've only said that the mathematical aspects and the advisors are equal to me, and what I'm asking is what else I should take into account when choosing a research area.

There is no "optimal coice". Getting "good" results, and recommendations does certainly not only depend on the choice of the topic, but more on yourself and your motivation. And that is the point. If all possibilities seem to be equal I would apply for the group in which I feel most welcome. It is so important to be in an environment in which you are allowed and encouraged to fail often (and early); where people leave titles at the door; where you can build on ideas of others and people dare to be wild and have fun !

Forget the results and, the recommendation afterwards. Do what you like to do, together with people you like and the results will be good automatically. You will find opportunities for future projects you never thought of yet. And to be honest, I do not think an undergraduate research project will change your life. Explore your style of work, your weak and strong sides and be open for ideas. I would not expect too much at this stage ("in terms of mathematical results achieved").

OK, that was a statement based on my personal opinion, but it is based on my personal experience as a PhD.


How to refer to someone consistently who has multiple names/spellings? I am writing a research paper in which I mention Moroccan explorer Estaban quite often. In the books I have, his name is spelled in different ways; the Wikipedia article linked above lists even more variants, though I never saw a single scholarly source use the name "Mustafa Azemmouri". The problem I get when researching is, every scholar uses different spelling/variations on the name, so I have to search the 5 or 6 different spellings for articles and books to come up in my searches in ProQuest. How do I pick which name/spelling/variation to use?

You cannot make the different spelling variants disappear. So if there is no "official" spelling, all you can do is to pick one of the variants and use it consistently throughout your work. You might choose the most abundant version, or a version used by the person in question, or the most modern version, or the version used in your group...
If this is a critical aspect in your work, you could also include a short discussion of the different spellings of the name and why you picked a specific version. This way, you can also add some context, so the person can be identified more accurately.


Should I 'admit' a weakness of a paper even if it's 'obvious'? Example: I have a simulation to run that requires social media data sets. The data sets that actually matter are too big to be able to simulate anything useful on. Instead, I picked a data set that's much smaller that had similar properties and I (hoped) would therefore have similar behavior.

One thing I discovered was that different data sets, even when they're of a similar size, can behave radically different in ways that I'm not exactly able to predict from those properties.

Obviously this is a major weakness of the paper, because now I don't have a way to even guarantee that those 'similar properties' even matter anymore.

I wonder if your research is ready for prime time. Not getting consistent results and not knowing why is a fault. Maybe you should continue work for a bit.

But for the question itself, it is better that any shortcomings come from you rather than from someone else.

At a minimum, you have an interesting "future research" section to write. Maybe you should find a way to look at the larger data sets or others that will give you better insight into what is really going on.


How to cite a senior project in BibTeX I want to cite a senior project of a student in my thesis. However, I don't really have much information about the student.

I know, the title of his work, his name, his university and the link to the pdf file. I know that it is a senior project, because the link is something like

university.edu/.../SeniorProject_NameSurname.pdf

What should the BibTeX code be for this situation?

Thanks in advance.

First step
When I'm not sure about citation format, I usually use Google Scholar to create it for me.

BibTeX code will look similar to this:
@misc{abbreviation,
   author = {Name Surname},
   title = {Title},
   institution = {University},
   url = {URL}
}

If your style does not have the 'url' parameter, then 'note' is usually used for this purpose.
  note = "[Online; accessed 19-July-2008]"

And as Aleksandr Blekh pointed out, it's good to look in the list of possible BibTeX entries and choose the right format (phdthesis, article, book etc.).

Editors
Otherwise, for creating and editing larger citation "databases" I use JabRef. And lately I've found a simple online program for creating BibTeX citations too.


"But in the other course this was different!" - How to react on this if the other professor did not follow the rules? The situation

I'm a PhD student and serve as an assistant to several courses. Now, the students were complaining that some rules of our course are not good for them - there are some restriction what has to be achieved in order to participate in the final exam, e.g.

they need a certain amount of credits in their homework,
everybody who has failed that course in the years before, have the get the credits for their homework again.

You have freedom in chosing the threshold, but the rules are written in the examination regulations (I'm also a member of the that examination committee) that is not the problem.

There are some professors in my department who don't follow that rules; or (even) worse come up with some funny new rules contradicting the rules (like (you don't have to read this to answer the question)  If you have 50% of the credits until the third to last week of the semester, you are able to participate in the final exam. If you pass, you pass. If you fail, you are only allowed to participate in the repetition of the final exam if you have 50% of your credits in the last week of the semester).

The problem

Apart from them violating the rules, the problem is now that students come to my course and say: "Hey, professor XX did not have the rules last year. Why do you have them? That is so unfair! And you can have it, too! Because, nobody complained last year! Cmon, we will not tell anyone!".

As soon as I hear something like that, I complain. The problem is then: No student would tell someone things like that (exept in the mentioned case when they try to convince me to do it that way, too); the professors are sometimes not informed, but also sometimes aware of that und don't write anything on their course homepage. So nobody can find out. If you find out (probably at the end of the semester), it is too late and if you want to declare that course as not following the rules, you are only damaging the students of that course.

I was talking to the responsible persons in my department; they see the problem, but they don't want to have fights within the department and they don't to establish automatic announcements from the professors what the rules for their course are.

The question

What can I do against it? The atmosphere in my course was very bad because of that. I could go to the head of the faculty or the university who will end all that, but then I fair to be an abandoned person in my department. Also, I want not to damage students and declare their passed exams as illegal.

This is a standard problem in places where a mentality of unwritten rules has become standard (you know, the places that have "rules" and actual rules). If this becomes ingrained in the university culture (both in the student body and the faculty), nobody can really tell anymore what is a an actual rule and what isn't (and, really, the answer will be different for each teacher). For this reason I prefer a relatively strict no exceptions policy in my courses. I understand the downsides of this model (see for instance also here: How do I appropriately penalize late projects?), but at least everybody knows where he stands in such a model.

I understand that you are not in a position to change university culture, so you need to play the hand you are dealt. I see two main ways to go forward:

Become more lenient yourself. If a number of senior professors deems it fit to not enforce the official rules or implement weaker rules, then maybe the official rules are in fact perceived too strict. In that case, maybe the answer is just to run with the herd and allow for more exceptions etc. yourself. Of course the preferred solution in that case would be to change to official rules, but it is well conceivable that this is not feasible for one reason or another.
Announce very, very clearly at the beginning of the semester that in your case the rules will be the rules, no matter how things were in previous years or with other teachers. Follow through on your claim, and build up a reputation as being a strict guy. Note that being strict is not the same as being an unpopular / bad teacher. I have continuously followed this strategy in my teaching, and still receive good to excellent teaching evaluations.

Of course, if you follow the second strategy, some complaining, accusing and guilt-tripping  will happen. It is your task as a teacher to be able to distinguish between warranted complains (and react to them) and more manipulative ones (that are to be ignored). These examples you give quite clearly fall into the second category. What you need to do is find a number of polite standard answers to these statements, and then forget them. Examples:

  Hey, professor XX did not have the rules last year. Why do you have them? That is so unfair!

Answer: sorry, but it is impossible to change anything in a course if I am forced to always do things exactly like the were done in previous years. I am trying to be more strict this year because I have seen that unclear rules are also not beneficial for many students, as nobody really knows anymore what the actual rules are.

  Cmon, we will not tell anyone!

Answer: while I appreciate that, I am afraid that I do not want to make an exception here. Making an exception for you is unfair towards the other students that did not get this exception.

Some other minor comments:

  I could go to the head of the faculty or the university who will end all that

I am unsure if that is even true. In all places that I have been to, it would be very unlikely that a head of faculty micro-manages how professors do their teaching.

  Also, I want not to damage students and declare their passed exams as illegal.

This is understandable and correct. If you truely think that students were under the impression that a certain rule or exception would apply to them, I would let them pass as part of a transition period. If you think that they were aware that they should actually fail, but simply try to come up with a reason why this is not the case, then be strict and let them fail. Note that this is the reason why announcing your strict rules enforcement as clearly as possible is key. In your situation, being strict is only fair if you give your students advance warning, as the seem to be trained by your university that, by and large, teachers are lenient.


How to cite a drug name in AMA Style journal article? In my paper, I have used a drug name called Metformin. But I received a comment from Editor to cite the drug name.
May I know how can I cite the drug name in AMA style?
There could be multiple suppliers/companies that produce/manufactures this drug from a different location
Can help me with this?

Usually you cite drug package inserts.
See Chapter 3.13.6 of the AMA Manual of Style (11th ed.):

Package inserts, patient information, and prescribing information (the material about the use and effects of the product) may be cited as follows:

Zithromax. Prescribing information. Pfizer; 2017. Accessed June 23, 2019. https://www.pfizermedicalinformation.com/en-us/zithromax
Azilect. Package insert. Teva Pharmaceuticals Inc; 2014.

The general pattern, as I see it, would be: Drug. Type-of-document. Manufacturer. Date. Optional-internet-access-date. Optional-internet-source..
If there are multiple manufacturers for one drug, you could cite all of them (as long as that seems appropriate for the specific context within your publication).


Waiting after a review Regarding
this question on when to ask about a manuscript's status in review
I wonder (since it is happening to me): What does it mean when a paper is "with editor" for two months after a first review?

So, after the first round of review, you were asked to revise your manuscript extensively. And you made changes accordingly and resubmitted a revised version. Two months has passed since then, but it doesn't seem like the revised manuscript has been sent out for external review because the status of your submission you can see online hasn't been changed and is still "with editor." (Edit: I know some journals use "being handled by editor" or something similar at any stage of the review process except when the manuscript is with the author. You're sure it wasn't "with editor" during the first round review, right?)

If that's the case, most likely it means the editor is having hard time finding referees for the second round or maybe simply taking their sweet time examining your resubmission. Or possibly they forgot about your submission so you need to remind them.

I don't know what the norm is in your field. But if I were you, I'd send a short and polite email to the journal to ask what is up with your paper, probably after waiting a bit more. If it doesn't work, I'd send another polite email to someone else working for the journal. In any case, you should understand that the editor is a volunteer (unless you're submitting to a journal with fulltime editors like Nature, Science, PRL etc.), and sometimes it takes a while to handle your submission for various legitimate reasons. So be polite when asking what's going on.

Edit: And the best way to know if two months is too long is to ask experienced researchers in your field like your advisor if you're a student.


What levels of graduate schools can various combinations of GPAs and GREs get you into Assume that the candidate is a graduate of a good state school, e.g. North Carolina or Ohio State. Then I want to explore this candidate's probable viability in getting into "second tier" graduate schools, say 15-30th in a given field using the following academic combinations.
The best combination would be something like a 3.9 GPA and a graduate exam (GRE or LSAT) score of 175 or better (out of 180). Assuming research and activities were competitive (and are held constant between candidates), would these candidates be able to do better than second tier (say top 15)?
A second best combination might be something like a 3.5 GPA and a 175 exam score or a 3.9 GPA and a 165 exam score. How would this candidate "stack up" for a second tier grad school? Are the two sets equivalent or is one combination decidedly more competitive than the other?
Third best would be something like 3.5 GPA and a 165 exam score. Would "second tier" grad school be a reach for such a person?
If you changed "good state school" to "HYPSM" and kept exam scores and GPA constant, would that change matters?
Explanation: Unlike the other question, this one is not about getting students in from the "bottom." This question is about how the TOP three (or so) categories sort themselves out.

I'm presuming that you are referring to PhD admissions in the U.S.?  I should note that GPA and GRE are relatively low on the admissions criteria as far as I am aware.  There are other (more important) factors involved, such as research/teaching experience, statement of purpose, and especially letters of recommendation.
GPA can only help up until a certain point (usually around 3.3-3.7).  Once you are above this threshold, you are better focusing on other aspects of your application.  Especially since PhD programs are all about research and publications, focus on getting as much of that as you can, since this is also how you can get quality letters of recommendation.  I have heard of people with GPA's of 3.1-3.3 getting into top programs (even MIT) because they had research experience or publications.
Also, GRE is one of the least relevant parts of your application (less so than GPA), since it mainly serves as a filter.  Once your score is above a certain threshold, same with GPA, your time is better spent stressing over other parts of the application.  Some schools have stated they do not consider GRE (even before COVID), and because of COVID, while some will still consider GRE, the list of schools that won't require GRE is likely to grow.
HYPSM: your mileage will vary here.  At least in my field (Computer Science), Stanford and MIT are definitely at the top.  However, for Harvard, Princeton, Yale, etc. mileage may vary more, since there are state school programs like Illinois, GA Tech, that are ranked higher.  So it isn't necessarily the best comparison, to compare programs like "good state schools" between "HYPSM"


Am I harming myself by doing a PhD in a less prestigious university than where I did my MSc if I don't want to stay in academia? I did an MSc in an extremely prestigious university, in mathematics and theoretical computer science. I got an offer to stay there for a PhD, but turned it down. Instead, I enrolled on an MRes + PhD programme at a good but far less prestigious university, in a subject I thought I was far more interested in. I will soon have finished the MRes year.

As much as I am enjoying it, I've realised I don't want to stay in academia. What I'd like to go into is probably quantitative finance. What I'm studying at the moment involves a lot of stochastic processes - which would certainly help with quantitative finance. My thinking is that it would be best to finish the PhD, get really good with stochastic processes, and then apply for the kind of job I want. My issue is that, after having read the answers to this question, the less prestigious university might actually harm my career prospects and overshadow the prestige of the university where I got my Master's.

To that extent, I'm wondering: is a MSc from a very prestigious uni + a PhD from a good but less prestigious uni worse than just an MSc from a very prestigious uni (and no PhD)? The jobs I've looked at don't strictly require PhDs.

I'm in the UK (just in case this makes any difference).

Edit: I ended up writing to a place I would've been very interested in working at. They replied saying that they were more interested in my ability to produce great research than in any league table, and that my MSc at a world-reknowned univeristy already proves my ability in the subject. As such, I will continue with my current programme, seeing as I am enjoying it very much and seeing as I find my supervisor to be extremely supportive.

I don't think anyone will care, especially in industry, unless they are graduates of that more prestigious university and feel a superior attitude about it and let that overwhelm their interest for qualified candidates who can do the job they are hiring for (in which case you probably don't want to work for them anyways).

This all assumes that the lesser university is still a good research and learning environment and still lets you pursue your research goals. In the question you linked, that wasn't clear.

What might be important is that you have an answer to "why did you choose to get a PhD at this university?" which may or may not carry an additional implication of "...and why not at more fancy school?" You have an answer already (emphasis mine):

  Instead, I enrolled on an MRes + PhD programme ... in a subject I thought I was far more interested in.

That said, the networking potential of a particularly well-known school can't be understated. Still, it seems you already made up your mind. I wouldn't worry too much about that decision now that you've made it. You may be able to tap into your old networks from the previous institution when needed for a job, assuming people from that institution also move toward the industry you are interested in.


Which is more impressive -- finishing a PhD in 2.5 years or getting more research done? I am working on a PhD in chemical engineering, and my advisor mentioned to me today that I'm on track to finish in about half a year.  I only have one class left to fulfill the course requirements and I have a few papers published, with a couple more almost finished.

Personally, I'm in no hurry.  I love grad school and working on research.  However, from the perspective of a getting a good job, would a PhD at 23-24 years of age or additional research publications in high quality journals look better?  Once I graduate I plan on either doing research in industry or working at a startup.  I don't plan on going into academia.

In my field (computer science, broadly), my impression is as follows.  It is of course an over-generalization.

If you want to go into academia or industrial research, then what you
do during your Ph.D. matters much much more than how long you took,
though if you take more than 6 years to finish it starts to look bad.
On the other hand, if you want to go into non-academic industry, you
might impress people with a fast Ph.D. because you'd show yourself to be the sort of person who can finish big things fast.

If you're only 2.5 years in, unless you have an offer from someplace and need to finish ASAP, and especially if you're enjoying your Ph.D., I wouldn't rush to graduate that quickly.


What to do if most of my students have switched to a better lecturer's class? I teach a certain course which is part of the obligatory undergraduate curriculum. I teach two groups out of four; the other two groups are taught by two other lecturers. In one group I have about 20-30 students. The other group also started with the same number, but students left the group gradually, and now there remain only 5 or even less; the others go to the other lecturer who gives the same lesson in parallel. One reason is probably that I am a new teacher and still not very good at teaching. Another reason is that the other lecturer is very good.

I feel that some of the 5 students remaining in my class do so only because they are being polite. I appreciate it very much since I put a lot of effort in preparing the lessons, but it is not very efficient for me or for them. So, I thought of suggesting to the remaining students that they move to the other lecturer's group. This way, they will have a better lecturer and I will have more time for research  (the other lecturer said it's OK with him). What might be the implications of such a step?

UPDATE: Thanks a lot for all the feedback. While there are many great answers, the one thing that convinced me to keep going was the fact that this is the only way I can become a better teacher. So today I came to class as usual. For some reason, the number of students rised to 10.

You should discuss this with your department chair (the person who runs your department). While the teaching chair (or graduate/undergraduate chair) might seem more relevant, it is the chair of the department who you have to keep happy. Their opinion matters more than ours.

Describe the dwindling number of students as a concern, then see where the conversation goes.  Instead of offering your suggestion, invite your chair to offer their thoughts and suggestions first, before you launch into yours.  Who knows?  Perhaps they will suggest closing down your section on their own and you get what you want.  Their response probably also depends on the attractiveness of your research alternative versus their need to find instructors to cover sections they've already committed to offering.

Your chair may also be glad you invited the conversation, because they may have some feedback based on their own observations and conversations with your colleagues and students they would like to share with you.  They may be able to tell you how you could get better so you could one day be the instructor who draws away everyone else's students.

But I agree with and upvoted DBB's answer, that trying to dump the class could make you look bad and that if you care about getting good at teaching, you should simply "push through" and deliver the lectures.


Is it a good idea to have really busy advisor? I would like to have one of my department professors as an advisor mainly because he is an expert on the field that I am interested in and I'd like to work in.

The problem is that he is a really busy professor:

He is currently enrolled doing his PhD, he is  teaching 2 student groups, he is married also a father of two kids and I have heard recently that he is usually late so that he does not even have lunch at home. However he put his name on the list of 'available teachers to do thesis with'.

So my question is if would it be a good choice to have him as an advisor?

Is it possible for a professor to do ALL these activities and also an advisor?

I really doubt that he could give me the attention and help that I might need as a thesis student.

What do I do?

In general, the answer is no. You normally want an advisor who can spend time and effort with you. This becomes more important at higher levels of education. A too busy doctoral advisor, for example, is deadly. But the specific case may not match the general case.

Much will depend on the nature of the thesis you need to write. How "far out" from your normal studies is it? How well do you already understand the problem and see a path to its solution? A deep research topic in, say mathematics, when you don't yet know the required basics, might be too much. A philosophical paper (in any field) in which you give evidence for and against some point of view might be just fine.

At the undergrad level, having an advisor who is simultaneously doing a PhD might be an advantage as he is connected to a lot of ideas. If you are depending on the advisor for ideas for the thesis this could be a good thing.

How self motivated are you? How dedicated and hard working? You won't get a lot of face time or long answers to email from such a person. Is that ok? Can you push through with only minimal advice? Say in the time it takes to ride a couple of floors in an elevator? Some advisors are good at saying the right thing and saying it quickly.

You write that he works in an area that you are interested in. That is important. Maybe very important. What are your other options? Either for advisors or for topics.

Ultimately, though, it is is a tradeoff of many factors that only you can judge. You might make the right decision or not. Try to not make the worst decision.


Is it a bad idea to take a leave of absence to finish a degree? In general, is it better to complete a graduate degree first before deciding to work? Or is it also advisable to take a leave of absence and work while finish your graduate degree later?

It is difficult to finish a degree and work at the same time. This is especially the case if you have to write a (PhD) thesis. There are a number of obstacles. Firstly, you will have to work on the thesis during the evenings and weekends, which is both tiring and can induce RSI. Secondly, you will have no life and this is depressing. Thirdly, both your work and your PhD thesis will suffer. Fourthly, the time taken to complete the thesis could drag out 6 months or even 1 year, before you get close to finishing it. Under these circumstances, many people simply do not finish their thesis.

It's not impossible, though. I know of a few people who have completed their theses after taking on another job. It requires a lot of discipline.

If you have the luxury of taking a leave of absence from work to study, then I'd advise taking it. Get the degree out of the way in as short a time as possible.


Making corrections to PhD application after submitting it I am currently finishing up my applications for PhD programs (in the humanities) and, in working on a draft of my statement of purpose for one school that I have not yet turned in, I noticed an error. It is a typo of sorts, the omission of a verb which renders a sentence "nonsensical." The intention of the sentence is still clear but it is quite noticeable. Think something along the lines of "Excited by the interdisciplinary dialogue at Harvard." as the uncorrected sentence, missing an "I am" at the beginning.

The problem is, I have already submitted this mistake in my statement of purpose for four or five other schools. A friend, who submitted corrections to his applications when he was applying, says that it would be no problem to contact the department/admissions administrative secretary with a corrected PDF. I am afraid of making it worse by submitting corrections, but also would love to fix it if I could.

Any thoughts on what I should do? I am kicking myself for not noticing it... what's really annoying, is that I noticed and fixed it in two applications, but must have reverted to a previous draft for the rest of the schools.

All advice/reassurance/chastisement is appreciated, especially if you have experience with such a blunder yourself.

This is not a material error. I wouldn't worry about it. We get much more egregious errors such as uploading the wrong statement (such as for another school) or misspelling the name of the core faculty member you wanted to work with, etc.

You'd think those types of mistakes would be killer, but they really aren't. We realize students are under stress and that application management systems are cumbersome. We're all human in the end.

What's most important is the qualifications of the applicant as a whole.


Confused between applying immediately to graduate school and taking a break for research experience I am a junior undergraduate student (will be starting senior year in July) pursuing electronics and communications engineering. However, my interest and most of the work done till now in college is in the field of astronomy/astrophysics, a subject I am very passionate about. In terms of experience, I have been selected for some good workshops, summer/winter schools in a variety of areas in astrophysics, am currently doing summer research in a reputed astronomy department abroad and will be working on an interdisciplinary project(involving my major and astrophysics) for my bachelor thesis. In terms of coursework, I don't have any physics courses to show except for Physics 1 and 2 from my freshman year, as my college is very inflexible when it comes to taking courses outside one's department. My GPA is 8.2 on a scale of 10. I'll be appearing for GRE General test and TOEFL in July and haven't started preparing for GRE Physics yet.

My problem is that I don't know how to go about applying to graduate school. From what I've gathered, there are 2 options for me:

1) Apply to a Masters program next semester that doesn't require GRE Physics score. I'm willing to consider a not so reputed graduate school. The primary aim is to get some coursework.

2) Taking a break for year after graduation. I plan to do the following in that period:

a) Prepare for GRE Physics.
b) Build a stronger research profile by doing more projects. There are good research institutes in my country that offer upto 6 months project positions like research assistant-ship.
c) This also gives me 2 more semesters at college to improve my GPA further.

So my questions are:

1) Which option is more suitable for my situation?
2) Will the second option increase my chances of getting selected for a direct PhD?

First and foremost you need to research specific graduate programs -- focus on the program and the specific research topics and opportunities. If and when you find one that really excites you, apply now. If you don't get accepted, or change your mind in the meantime, identify what would most interest you next. Maybe this will be your "Option 2". If so, and after a year there you still want to get in to the original graduate program, apply again. Frankly, if this is the way it works out, you'll be better off, as you'll have much more perspective.

Don't fixate on a higher degree in a specific field per se. Depending what country you are talking about, you could be working at the degree for several years. It better be something that you're obsessed about, in adepartment with a pleasant and helpful culture, in a liveable town/city. The odds are that the expectations you've build up in your mind will not resemble the reality for very long, so the reality better be workable.

I worked in industry for almost five years before going to graduate school, and during that time I flatly rejected suggestions that I should consider it. Ultimately I realized I did indeed want to go deeper, and applied. One bit of advice I got was "if the thought that you should be going to graduate school isn't the first thought on your mind when you wake up in the morning, don't go." By the time I applied, that was true. I had a fantastic time in the early years, but was very frustrated by an uncooperative advisor by the end. I finished, and tried to make academia work for another ~12 years. I quit a year and a half ago, as I realized the university was no place for somebody with my priorities and level of integrity. The PhD per se is of no consequence to me now; in fact it renders me overqualified for just about everything. My specific areas of study are of no consequence either. I'm not sorry I did it, but if I'm honest, there was fair bit of waste involved.

If I had to do it over again, I would (1) get myself organized and leave industry for graduate school after 3.7 years instead of 4.7 years, (2) switch labs when I first started thinking about it (after about 3 years into the degree), and (3) quit the academic charade when I first started doubting it, about 7 yrs post-PhD, rather than sticking it out for another 5. If I could redo things, I'd be in just about the same place I am now, but with 8 more years up my sleeve, and I'd be far less disaffected.


Is it appropriate to 'build up' your findings in a paper? I'm working on a Mathematics paper at the moment, and my first finding was fairly specific. The next finding generalised the first finding, and my third finding generalised my second finding.
My first and second findings are therefore just special cases of my third finding, but they are still significant.
Is it appropriate for me to write all 3 findings in the paper and build upwards from the first, including the proofs for the the 1st and 2nd finding and generalising as we go, or should I just include the 3rd finding only, and point out afterwards that there are a couple of significant special cases that follow from it (namely finding 1 and finding 2)?
(Although including all 3 findings would lengthen the paper, I also feel that it would provide more of an insight into how I found result 3, rather than just mysteriously producing it from scratch.)

Either way could be made to work, but consider:
If the proof methods of the three are essentially the same, then the first way would be boring (possibly).
But if the second builds on the first (etc) by using different insights and methodologies, then the first way might well be superior.
Don't just consider the progression of results but of the progression of proofs and, especially, insights, that get you to the final result.
And if the latter is the case, make sure you emphasize those insights. They might (and often do) lead to developing other ideas.


PhD Physics Europe vs. United States I've just finished my undergraduate education in Physics in Europe and as I want to stay in academics I want to pursue a PhD, which means either a master and then PhD in e.g. UK, Switzerland or Germany or a PhD in the United States. I have now heard that for postdoc positions especially in the US it is generally better to have a US PhD. Is that true?

As the higher education systems are quite different and I have already attended courses like advanced quantum field theory or general relativity and the core courses like qm, classical mechanics, statistical mechanics or e&m on graduate level for my bachelors degree, is it generally the case, that I would have to take those courses again?

International experience is always a good thing these days; but in general I don't think that a US PhD is inherently superior to a European PhD. (This may be highly variable within different disciplines, however, so physicists might want to weigh in on this particular point.)

As for the repetition of coursework, that is entirely department-dependent. Different programs will have entirely different means of handling this:

All students may be required to complete the entire set of coursework requirements, regardless of past experience;
Students may be granted placement out of courses they have already completed, but not given a reduction in the number of courses required;
Students may be granted both placement and credit for prior equivalent coursework.

In the second case above, the student would replace the core courses with more advanced electives in different areas.

However, the only way to find out which policy a department uses is to contact the department directly. (Sometimes this is publicly stated on the webpage; other times, it's not. And sometimes special cases arise, which is why it's best to contact the graduate office of the departments you're interested in and ask them directly!


Does a reference to a work inside a footnote have to be in the bibliography? If in a footnote I write something like, "For more on the debate, see... so and so"

Does that work I referenced in the footnote go on the bibliography page even if I did not reference this work directly in the essay?

You did reference it, it is in the document, so of course it goes into the bibliography.

Imagine the other way round: Someone reads the text, finds it interesting, sees that there is more to be found about this topic in a source and then can't find said source...


I won't be applying for master's programs until next year. Should I start studying for the GRE now? I'm an undergraduate in mathematics, and won't be finishing my Bachelor's degree until next Spring or next Fall (2016). I plan on applying for a master's program before possibly moving onto a PhD (if I like the research) after I get my bachelor's.

Should I start studying GRE-type material now, even if just in my free time, to hopefully have a bit more of an intimate knowledge of the kinds of questions it will ask, as well as really solidify my problem solving in those areas? Or is that overkill?

First, the GRE, especially the subject test in math, is a very highly stylized version of a very particular slice of a fairly low-level piece of school-mathematics... Whatever one thinks about it, it is widely used, and its idiosyncrasies and limitations are often over-looked for the sake of the convenience of having a single number to (supposedly usefully) compare people from very different backgrounds. Thus, you don't want to show up and be surprised by what it is, for sure! As in comments, do some practice exams to see what the questions are...

Also, do think in terms of the possibilities for "gaming" a multiple-choice exam. The most successful of your competitors will have some success with that aspect, apart from knowing or not-knowing mathematics.

But do not let the GRE too-much affect studying actual mathematics. For example, things that don't admit "testing" by multiple-choice questions can't make it onto the GRE, yet arguably are far more important in the larger enterprise than things that can.

The possibility of gaming the exam also means that "problem solving" is not really what it's about. It's about doing enough diagnostic stuff to eliminate wrong choices, and then whatever's left has to be right. This is methodologically wildly different from the practice of mathematics.