Is there a way to get a complete name bibliography from Scopus? How can I set my scrape, in that case? I need a complete name bibliography from a search but I'm only allowed to have the surname and then the names'initals. Is there a way to get them?

You just need to click on the author and it will take you to the author details page. There you will find the complete name of the author.

The bibliography you are exporting should be in the form as it is. While you can follow the above description for complete names.


Is EF-SET English Certificate accepted? Is EF-SET English Certificate accepted for higher education or jobs across the world? Did anyone try using that? I have not yet seen any place where they accept this.

The EF-SET English certificate is a test you take online without any supervision. From the EF-SET FAQ:

If the test is available to the public online, how is it secured from cheating?
Because it is intended as a learning tool, using the EF SET to its fullest advantage is the learner’s own responsibility. [...]. As an adaptive English test that covers multiple CEFR levels from beginner to advanced, the EF SET is designed to be useful to an individual as a measure of growth in proficiency over time and as a proxy to other expensive, high-stakes English tests like TOEFL, TOEIC or IELTS. To take advantage of this design, we advise that the test taker follow the timing guidelines and not try to cheat the test.

The homepage of EF-SET has three "buttons":

Check your students
Evaluate your employees
Check your English

So the EF-SET test is intended either as a self-assessment tool, or as a tool that can be used by universities or companies to evaluate their students/employees, in which case the company or university will take care of the supervision.
If you come with an EF-SET certificate that you got by yourself, the institution has no way of knowing that it was really you who took the test. Therefore, it does not make much sense to accept this as proof of English knowledge. I have never seen this accepted at a university.


Should I apply for PhD with a 4 on my master thesis? Today, I just got the very bad news that I just got 4 on my master thesis

Marks:
Excellent – 5 (> 80%)
Good – 4 (60–79%)
Satisfactory – 3 (41–59%)
Unsatisfactory – 2 (< 40%)
 I am applying for a PhD. I don't know how to tell people I just got 4 on my thesis.
I begin to doubt if I am suitable for PhD.  I did have very high expectation for this thesis. Finally, the result let me down.

My goal is to apply for one position with funding. I don't care the ranking of the university. below is the comments from my supervisor.

You  should apply, for the  following reasons:

First, you really  want  to do  a PhD. This should  be reason #1
A PhD is an adequation between a candidate, an advisor and a subject (possibly  a team), thus:
Grades matter, but adequation is more important. And you have timelessness.

A MSc is a first time test into research, but:

The topics are often not the same. You can excel in a PhD, while having performed modestly in a MSc. The  converse may happen, too, because:
MSc and PhD are quite different, require seemingly different skills


If I have a PhD in computer science, could I contribute to philosophical outlets or would I need a philosophy PhD to do that? In the future, I'm planning to pursue a PhD in computer science. Alongside making technical contributions to the field of computer science (artificial intelligence in particular), I'd like to give my philosophical take (or two) on where the field of artificial intelligence is headed.
My question is: If I get a PhD in computer science, would I need to get a PhD in philosophy in order to contribute to philosophical outlets that discuss computer science topics? More broadly, if I write a good enough paper, could I contribute to philosophical outlets in general or would me not having a PhD in philosophy be a barrier?
I was reading this answer and this part stuck out to me (a comment on the first answer):

I'm having a really hard time identifying a career path that requires
two formal PhD's, unless one discipline is in the humanities and the
other is in a STEM field, and one decided to start with the non-STEM
field.

I'm starting with the STEM field here, so I'm not sure if in my case it makes sense to pursue multiple PhDs.

You don't need even one doctorate to contribute to any field. Publications accept or reject papers based on the papers not the "qualifications" of the authors.
Just write your papers and submit them. Of course you might also work to develop some collaborative relationships with philosophers who can also give you advice on things.
And at any large (and some small) universities, you can just wander over to the philosophy department, find their coffee lounge, and start up a conversation.
Doing actual research in philosophy, however, probably requires a somewhat different skill set than in CS, but you can develop that.
And don't confuse Opinion with Philosophy. In any field, you need a basis for what you write for it to be publishable.


A PhD program recommendation fell through. How do I deal with this? I am finishing up a MA in Global Affairs, and I am in the process of applying to several doctoral programs. Two and a half weeks ago, I asked three of my professors if they would recommend me. I made sure to note in my emails to them that if they chose to support me, one of the program deadlines was substantially sooner than the others. Two responded positively almost immediately, but one did not. However, he has encouraged me on numerous occasions to apply, and speaks very highly of me. Needless to say, I was very surprised when he responded 5 days before the first deadline to say that he was not prepared to recommend me. He said that he normally only write recommendations for students who have served as his GA, and that if I want him to write one for me I have to draft the letter I expect him to write. I said I could do that... but would we be able to do this in time for the upcoming deadline? He said no, and there was no way I could ask someone else with such short notice.

However, I really do not know what I should say to the other people who recommended me. I know they have already submitted their letters. Do I say that I simply couldn't get my act together in time, and risk looking unprepared? Do I tell them that one of my recommendations fell through, and look like I must have done something to change that person's mind? Do I tell the full story, and look like I am just trying to place blame elsewhere? Or, do I just not tell them at all? They all know each other, so they could find out even if I don't say anything. None of the options seems great, and I am kind of at a loss.

Edit to add (taken from comment): My main concern is that asking someone else to submit something last minute or late might not be appropriate.

Get another letter. Grad app deadlines are many times not as strict for letters as they are for your application materials.


Impact of W's on grad school admissions in CS theory (TCS) I'm an undergrad at the University of Maryland College Park who just finished a computer science bachelors a few days ago. Unfortunately, I didn't realize how much I liked theory (algorithms, combinatorics, graph theory) and math until this past semester. As a result, I plan to work for a few years while self-studying upper-division math and getting the necessary TCS research experience (I plan to reach out to professors at the local university once I'm ready).

My question is whether or not my undergrad academic performance is salvageable from the perspective of grad school admissions. Although I ended up with a 3.895 cumulative GPA with relatively good grades in TCS-related classes (e.g. A- in discrete math, A in algorithms, A in number theory, A in cryptography, B+ in advanced data structures), I have 4 W's (withdrawn designations) on my transcript across different semesters. Moreover, these W's are all in math classes (euclidean & non-euclidean geometry, numerical analysis, combinatorics & graph theory, machine learning). However, with the exception of the geometry class, I dropped all of them since I didn't meet the official prerequisites. I had originally requested prerequisite overrides to register for the courses, but left due to not being able to catch up.

Also, due to COVID-19 I opted for the pass/fail grading system this past semester. Therefore, even though I took theory of computation and combinatorics & graph theory and scored an A, A- respectively, these classes show up as P's on my transcript. Thus, I'm wondering (a) if a master's will help my case and (b) if one is necessary. If at all possible, I'd prefer to apply directly to PhD programs after getting some research experience.

Additionally, would having a publication by the time of application change any of those answers? I know theory programs in machine learning and computer vision basically require publications these days in order to be considered, but I'm not sure if the same holds for subfields like combinatorial optimization and graph algorithms.

First, I strongly suggest that you talk directly with the theory profs in your own CS department.  First, they are the people who actually taught you and are best placed to understand the circumstances of your withdrawals.  Second, they are the people who make graduate admissions decisions for your department, in your target subfield.  (Third, they are the people most likely to provide you with recommendation letters, so making contacting with them early can only help you.)

Opinions on W's differ, but as far as I can tell, most people treat them as no-ops.  Students drop classes for all sorts of reasons.  Some faculty might wonder why you waited until after the drop deadline to withdraw from these classes, especially if the W's were spread over several semesters, but that would be a minor concern, especially if you retook the same classes later and did well.  But it really doesn't matter; the W's are already on your transcript.  You can't do anything about it, so you shouldn't worry about it.

COVID-19 hit everyone, everywhere.  Every graduate admissions committee still has to figure out how to make admissions decisions with a full semester of grades missing, or at least obscured by a myriad of different pass/fail and Credit/No-Credit options.  Different people and places are going to interpret this semester's (and the next several semesters') records differently, some with more sympathy and others with more strictness.  You can't do anything about it, so you shouldn't worry about it.

A master's degree is a somewhat risky option.  At least in the US, PhD applicants who have graduate experience are held to a higher standard than applicants who do not.  Students applying from masters programs are compared with each other, not with undergraduates, and considerably more of those masters-level applicants will have research publications.  To first approximation, publications are a de-facto requirement for masters-level PhD applicants.

Persistent rumors notwithstanding, publications are not a de-facto requirement for undergraduate PhD applicants, even in hot fields like machine learning, even in top departments.  Research experience is necessary to get into a top PhD program; research papers are not.  Yes, a significant fraction of new PhD students in ML have publications, but an equally significant fraction do not.

All that said, a strong research publication is definitely a advantage in PhD applications, especially if the recommendation letters make it clear both that the work is good and how the student made it happen, and the topic of the paper meshes well with the research interests of the faculty where you're applying.  Good research results can overcome all sorts of other weaknesses in your application.

On the gripping hand, nothing in your question suggests that you have any weaknesses in your PhD application.  Your GPA is high enough to draw the attention of human reviewers.  At that point, your research statement and recommendation letters matter far more than anything else.


Undergraduate in Computer science and now graduate in Bioinformatics I am a computer engineering undergrad (from Asia) and now trying to pursue my graduate studies in bioinformatics (in US). I have quite a strong programming skills and now more than one year of experience too. Since I do not have a strong background of biology, is it good to choose that field? Also, I have been doing some research to get any assistantship (have applied to few colleges) but could not start a communication with the professors. How should I approach?

Any help would be great to me.

There are a number of bioinformatics programs that do not require you to have experience in both programming and biology. For example, the program at BU

What if I don’t have experience in both computational and experimental fields?
Applicants are not required to be well versed in both fields. Even if you do not have the academic background in both the computational and experimental fields, we are looking for highly motivated students

So only having a programming background should not be too much of a problem. You will probably want to have picked up and had a look at some undergraduate biology texts so that you are not completely clueless about the field.
As for approaching professors, it really is no different from other fields. Applicants to graduate school, whether for a PhD or a Masters, don't have all the skills to carry our independent research in the field. To get a research assistantship you need to find professors who are doing research that is interesting to you and send them your CV along with a well written email expressing why you want to work with them, what skills you bring with you, and what you want to learn. There are a number of related question on AC.SE that can help you in this regard.


Ethics of conducting research on a class I'm a repeat Teaching Assistant in a fairly large (100-200 students/semester) core, required CS course at a large, private US research university.  I'm very interested in researching what factors influence success in the course, possibly with an eye toward SIGCSE.

I'm concerned about how to ethically conduct research on students.

Yes, I know a little about IRB, and I assume at some point I'd need to get IRB approval. However I'm so unsure about this, I'm not even sure what to ask the IRB yet. I'm hoping y'all can provide me some guidance and advice as I begin to plan for next year.

I assume I have to ask for explicit, opt-in consent? Obviously, participation or non-participation couldn't affect their grade. However, if only a very biased subset bother to opt in, the research might not be worth conducting. Can I compel students to choose to opt in, or opt out?

Additionally, the course is very similar year to year, so the extent that it would be very useful to be able to include previous semesters. I imagine this is even trickier.

I have the full encouragement and cooperation of the faculty member, but working with human subjects, much less students, if totally outside their expertise.

This is similar to this question, but slightly different and, I think, more difficult.

I conduct biology education research at my large, state research university, so I have experience with this process.

An IRB is necessary if you plan to make the results public. Educational research is considered "exempt" research under IRB regulations, but this really just means you have fewer flaming hoops, not NO flaming hoops. You will likely be able to convince your IRB that students do not need to sign consent forms, since you will post a study information sheet and they have the opportunity to opt out to someone else without it affecting their grade. You may also be able to get student data from previous years with a retroactive IRB.

An additional hurdle is that you will probably need the approval of your FERPA specialist in addition to IRB approval, as FERPA is very concerned with the sharing of private student information. Our FERPA guy is in our registrar's office.

As you can see, I'm being a bit vague. Every institution interprets the human subjects regulations a bit differently, and sometimes schools are relaxed... and sometimes they are not.

So, it's doable, but not at all trivial. If you still want to move ahead, I recommend you call your institution's IRB office and say you are considering education research and would like to meet with an analyst. And the first question to ask the analyst is, "who else on this campus has ever done education research?" and get the real skinny from that research group.

Then, the basic steps will be:

Design the experiment, do a lit review, write up the IRB proposal and study information sheet
Send the proposal and SIS to the IRB analyst, and they will help you make changes
Send the proposal and SIS to the FERPA specialist and they will send an approval letter to IRB (in a month?)
Wait for the IRB subcommittee to approve the proposal (another month?)
Post the study information sheet on the class website, and get another grad student or postdoc to be the "safe" researcher that students can contact to opt out. This researcher will make a short announcement on the first day of class.
Teach using your fabulous new technique
Ask the registrar for grades for previous years (if you've worked this out)
Do analysis, write it up, present it. Fair warning - most of the time we find that the first try is the beta test, and the SECOND try generates better results.


Should I make project report public before publishing journal article I have written a report about a piece of user research that was carried out with an industry partner. The partner wants to make the report public, and I would also like it to be public as soon as possible and disseminated widely as it is of interest to the (fast moving) industry.
However, i also plan to write an academic article (which will obviously take longer to publish) based on the research, and am concerned about self-plagiarism.
Should I

Wait until after journal publication to make the report public
Make the report public and reference it in the article
Make the report public and include a reference to the article ("in preparation")

Check the rules of your intended target journal(s) about their rules for posting to a preprint server. Many journals will exempt posting to a well-established preprint server from their rules about pre-publication.
If the rules allow it, post the report to the preprint server (preferably in a form close to that expected for an academic paper, but you can always call it the "first draft"; most preprint servers allow posting of updated versions).


Is it a misuse of school resources to use school accounts for non-school work? I work as a public school teacher. Due to a lack of current textbooks in my niche subject area, I am working on writing my own textbook which I hope to publish next year. In the meantime, and unrelated to this, I enrolled half-time in some college courses.
Being enrolled in the college courses means I have access to the state university's research tools, librarians, inter-library loan program, etc. I think I can get better assistance from the librarians if I am open about what exactly I am doing, however, it has no relation to the college courses I am taking. Can I be open about why I am doing the research, borrowing books and journals via inter-library loans or is this regarded as a misuse of those state-funded resources? How do university staff generally feel about assisting people with research not really related to the college?

In the US and some other places there will be laws (at the State level) and regulations about use of resources in general, but for the things you suggest there should be no issues.
But this is because the libraries, in particular, at universities serve as a general public resource of information. You could probably get the same services even if not enrolled just by asking for assistance.
There might be exceptions, but for most universities the mission is varied and broad. A university is more than just a place where students are taught and more than just a place where research is done.
As long as nothing you do actually interferes with any of the missions (and sometimes even if you do), the resources are open to you and, it is citizen taxes that support much of it in any case.
Feel free.

The cases where you might run afoul of regulations would more likely be in the use of specific equipment purchased for one thing but used for something else.


My manuscript status says that one referee sent a message but not a report About three weeks ago, I submitted a paper to a highly reputable physics journal. (I had another paper recently published in this journal as well.) I have been checking the status continuously, and today I saw the following as a follow-up to a referee request:

  message received (not a report)

I am curious about this status update, as I have never encountered it before. What does this notification mean – rejection of my paper or acceptance?  It would be really appreciated if anyone could share experience on this.

It means that they received some communication from the referee other than a report.  Different journals have different workflows for referees.  Some do not send the manuscript until a referee has agreed to referee the work.  Some let the referee see the manuscript and give a short-ish deadline for the referee to decide whether they can eventually send a report.  Some other journals (such as the journals of the American Physical Society), send the manuscript and ask for the referee to send them back a report, without ever asking for the confirmation that the referee can do the job.

I suspect the journal works using the second system.  This is significant, because the first response that the editor might receive from a referee may be the final report.  Or it might not be; the potential referee might write back to decline the assignment or to ask for more time.  So it is important to identify whether a response received from the referee is or is not a report--and that's what you are seeing.


Switching field after a PhD in math I am about to finish a PhD in mathematics with a thesis in an area in between differential geometry and PDE. I still have more than half a year, but I want to start thinking about my future.
In the last years there were moments where I was feeling quite depressed and frustrated, but overall I have to say that I have enjoyed my time as grad student. I love learning new things and being challenged by some nice problems.

At the moment I don't feel like pursuing a post doc in my field. First of all, I am scared of getting stuck in a sort of "dead end" (it could happen that after doing several postdocs around the world I will not find any permanent position and at that point I will maybe be too old to do something else..).  Secondly and most importantly, I don't know if I like math enough. It's a nice and interesting activity, but I'm not sure if I want to dedicate the rest of my life on that and I feel that I don't have enough motivation for fighting for a job in academia.

Working on some topics related with the ecological and climate crisis that we are facing, would probably motivate me more than just dealing with theoretical problems in differential geometry.

My questions: How common is to switch field after a PhD? Could I get a job in some research institution (possibly in Europe) where I could do research maybe on ecology or climate change?

I don't have any statistics about how common it is, but that shouldn't really concern you. The more important question is whether it is possible.

I assume, without statistics, that in a competitive job market that many people must, in fact, change their direction. If there are too few jobs then people must look elsewhere or find a way to be more competitive themselves.

The issue you face is really only finding a job. To do that you have to be attractive to the ones offering the job. Math is a great background on which to build as it gives you analytic and deductive skills that can be brought to bear on many problems. But you can also appear over-qualified for some positions.

But if you want to work in specific fields, you probably need to get some qualification in those fields, even if it is pretty informal. Employers probably don't want to support you while you learn if it takes too long and there are other, better qualified, candidates.

Some applied math or statistics might put you in a better position.

But you need to search out jobs, selecting those that best fit your skills, but also finding a way to promote your skills as appropriate.

You might, in fact, look for a "bridge" position, say as a postdoc, that gives you time and an opportunity to get some qualifications in an applied field that appeals to you.


Where can I find information about the demographics of Finance PhD applicants to US schools? Where can I find information about the demographics about previous majors of Finance/Econ PhD applicants to US schools?

I mainly want to know what are their undergraduate/graduate majors. I assume most of them would be Econ/Finance major, but how many actually comes from a different major? How many of them carries a math double major?

Even information of a particular school would be helpful.

Other than surveying separate programs and students in these programs, you might find the PowerStats (National Center for Education Statistics) product helpful. NCES collects data on undergraduate majors, graduate majors, etc. It'll take some exploration to see if the data is there -- and you will likely have to merge different datasets.

http://nces.ed.gov/datalab/powerstats/default.aspx


Which department does a professor in a joint appointment get his/her graduate students from If someone is a professor of department A, however, s/he also affiliates with department B in a joint appointment. Which department does the professor in a joint appointment get his/her graduate students from? Department A or B? The original or affiliated department? Also, does he/she evaluates the admission of A or B? Or both? Thank you. I did a web search on this site with the keyword joint appointment, but I can not find any similar discuss.

Both.

In general, a faculty member with an appointment in a given department normally has full rights to having graduate students from that department. Typically, though, the relative ratio of recruiting tracks well with the relative "weight" of the two appointments. A professor with a true joint appointment (50% funding, etc., from each department) is much more likely to recruit from both departments than a professor with a merely "courtesy" appointment.


How can a TA help a student who is certain she sucks at programming? I am a TA for an undergraduate Signals and Systems class (Electrical Engineering). As part of this, I lead a lab session, where we teach students how to code up various signal transforming operations in MATLAB, and visualize the transformed signals (for example, time-scaling, time-shifting, etc). So far it has been just basic stuff (it's only week 3), but the complexity will scale up quite a bit.

One of my students has some kind of "code-fright". She understands the theory (because there's a pre-lab in which you write down the theory of what you will be coding in the lab, and she does well here), but when it comes to coding, she just can't get started; her editor is blank till the very end, and she doesn't ask for help when I go to her; eventually, she's on the verge of tears, and is clearly very, very upset.

When I try to talk to her about what the code should look like, asking questions, and trying to get her to answer, she just remains stuck on the line, "I'm not good at programming". I repeatedly tell her that she has the theory down, and she simply needs to write it up in MATLAB, and reassure her gently that she can do this. But it doesn't help at all.

How do I help her out? The lab has 20 students, so as much as I wish, I can't spend more time with her. But I don't want her to forever think that "she sucks at programming".

EDIT - I forgot to add, this lab has teams. But she refuses to work with her partner (presumably because she wants to be able to do it on her own?). The partner does manage to get her code to work on her own.

When you tell her that she doesn't suck at programming, all she hears is that you don't understand how bad she sucks.  The psychology is the important thing here, not pedagogy.  If I were in your situation, I would say something like, "Yes, you do suck at programming.  In fact, most of us suck at programming. (Heck, have you ever noticed that Windows doesn't work???) But by doing some of these exercises, we get a bit better at programming.  Likely, you'll never be World's Greatest Programmer, or even a programmer, but by struggling, even unsuccessfully, with some of these exercises, you'll make yourself a stronger thinker.  And therefore a better person."

I've gotten a lot more mileage out of "We all suck, so let's do what we can" than pretending that everyone's a genius.


Can a university retract a degree for actions taken after the degree is awarded? I was looking at this question on The Workplace, where in the asker was considering doing homework for students for a fee. My initial thought was that it's possible he went to the same university*, and if discovered they would attempt to revoke his degree. I considered that this would be analogous to failing and expelling a current student who was found to be breaking the academic honesty policy. I know that some universities have recently retracted honorary degrees awarded, but of course, the course work was never done to deserve these degrees. So my question is...

Is it possible for a university to retract a degree that had previously been awarded for a full course completion if the individual does something that would clearly harm the university/violate the ethics of the university?

*this is completely speculative, and the question is theoretical at best

It would depend on the jurisdiction. In the US, you have a property right to the degree that you earn and pay for (regardless of the ultimate source of funding -- the student has the responsibility to pay), and as long as you don't violate the conditions for obtaining the degree (various forms of dishonesty in admissions and satisfaction of the degree), improper actions after the fact don't license depriving a person of what they have earned. In Europe, the legal basis may be different. Whereas in much of Europe state law governs revocation, in the US revocation is governed by university rules.

In the case of Dutch psychologist Diederik Stapel, the thesis data had been destroyed so it was impossible to prove fraud in the thesis, and also impossible to disprove it (Stapel short-circuited the university's proceedings by returning his degree). It appears that there are, in The Netherlands and possibly other European nations, vows that you must take in order to receive the degree, to act honorably (defined locally). "Not committing fraud in the future" is a likely candidate for such a vow.


Applying for tenure-track research position and lecturer position at the same university? there is a very good research university (actually many of them; this is mathematics in the US) that have both tenure-track assistant professor open positions and lecturer open positions. I want to know what you think about applying for both. Ideally I want the tenure-track position, but the job market is tough, and I would also be happy with a lecturer position (which is much more teaching oriented). How would a hiring committee look at this? I am afraid that the tenure-track guys will say "Well, this guy/girl doesn't think he/she's good enough to get a tenure-track job because he/she is also applying for a lecturer position, so let's ditch him/her". At the same time, the lecturer guys could say "Well, it seems that he/she wants a tenure-track position but he will settle for a lectureship. We want someone more motivated."

There is a similar question here: Should I simultaneously apply for multiple jobs in different ranks at the same university? which is more about "post-doc vs. tenure-track". I think this situation is slightly different.

In my department, tenure-track hiring and lecturer hiring are done by different committees. When I was associate chair (until a couple of years ago), I was on both committees, but, as far as I can remember, I was the only common member. So if someone applied for both sorts of positions, that fact might not get much (or any) attention.  Also, you shouldn't worry about the tenure track committee thinking you have a low opinion of yourself. We generally don't care very much about your opinion of yourself (some people are naturally modest); we care about other people's (especially experts') opinion of you.


How many references should be included in the bibliography of a Master thesis? Surprisingly, I have not found a similar question to mine - all I found was a question about the maximum number of citations per sentence.

However, I am more interested in the total number of citations that is considered normal for a paper (to be more specific, a Master Thesis, which in my case will be around 60 pages of content.)

I heard that about 1 - 1.5 multiplied with page count would be a good number of sources cited.

I am asking because I am a little worried that I might have cited too many sources.

There is no definite answer. It really depends on how much previous literature exists, how much of it you have reviewed and cited appropriately, and (loosely) what the word count of the document is. Page count can misleading, as some theses have many more figures and tables than others.

No one is going to skip to the bibliography, think negative thoughts, and say "you have too many references!" without reading the document. If no individual part of the thesis could be considered as having too many citations, then the thesis as a whole has an appropriate number of citations.

These related questions have answers as to how you can decide if a particular part of the thesis has too many citations.

Maximum number of citations per sentence?
Is there such thing as too many references for one paper?


How should I treat this prior work? I submitted a theoretical paper about new algorithms to a computer science conference. Now I found out that the most important theorem of my paper was actually proved 20 years ago (in a workshop paper with less than 15 citations). The other theorems/algorithms of my paper are kind of easy corollaries of this result, so this makes the theoretical contribution of my paper lower. However my paper connects these results to a lot of literature of past 20 years to which the old paper has not been connected before, so it still has good motivation and a lot of original contribution.

What should I do if the reviewers do not find this old paper and accept my submission? Could an accept turn into decline if I tell them about this old paper? Would it be ok to just add a footnote where this old paper is cited?

Options:

Ignore the newly found paper for now. The result would be the same as if you learned of the paper just after the conference rather than before. Downside: People might get a chuckle over your lack of knowledge of prior art. Someone might point out the prior work at the conference if you don't mention it there. Some might think you plagiarized. However: You did the work in good faith and submitted in good faith.
Inform the conference chair of the issue and ask for advice. Tell them you can add a note about the recently found paper OR you can do a rewrite incorporating the old work and emphasizing your own contributions. This assumes there is time and process for rewrites. Downside: The chair may withdraw the paper or just let it go, again assuming good faith. However: You clearly show due diligence.
Withdraw the paper and rewrite it for the future. Downside: You don't get a publication just now. However: Time can also let you rethink and possibly extend.

The sticky wicket here is that it was the most important theorem that was previously proven, leaving you, perhaps, with less novelty.


What is the meaning of the official transcript? I am going to apply for graduate admission in the US universities. Most of the universities require official transcript  which  must be sent from my institute with official envelope and seal.

I went to my university to send the offical transcript to the US universities. The controller of the examiner asked me that which one I want. New transcript or copy of my transcript verified by the controller with envelope seal.

More precisely, they asked me to give them photocopy of my original transcript. After I give them the copy, they will sign and pul offcial seal to send to the university I wanted to send.

My question is that,,

  will the US universities consider the  copy of the main transcripts(verified by the exam controller with enveloped and seal) as official?

or

  US universities  are expecting original transcripts (with seal and
  enveloped) like I have a copy with me?

If this is about graduate admission, universities normally require an official transcript (i.e. NOT a copy). An official transcript normally carries the signature of the Registrar, is in color, and is put in an sealed envelop prepared by the Registrar's office.

Some US universities require that your transcript comes directly from the Registrar's office of your institution, while some would accept one that you send in as long as it's inside the sealed envelop prepared by the registrar's office.


Recommendation letter sent from non-institutional email Would it hurt the student's evaluation, if I were to send their recommendation letter from my gmail account as opposed to the institutional?

I use my gmail account for all my correspondence, it is listed on all my papers, university website, etc.

I use my gmail, but gmail has the capability to manage the sender addresses. You should authenticate your gmail to send from your institutional address. The recipient will then have the confirmation that you are indeed who you say you are, as gmail will have already done the authentication.

The authenticator in gmail  has the ability to either use the SMTP server of your institution to send (if your systems team permits it), where gmail is then acting as the mail client, or it can use the From headers to indicate your authenticated affiliation.

If you were doing it properly you could manage all your email through the gmail account and choose whichever outgoing account and sending method you choose. This is what I do, for the several academic institutional affiliations I possess.

So in summary: you can have it both ways. You can use gmail for official institutional correspondence and you can use the options provided in gmail to choose which of your attributions any particular email uses. It is appropriate to badge emails for official correspondence, such as letters of recommendation, with your institutional addresses. I would   suggest not using a personal email addresses for business purposes, but using the tools properly you can customise your environment in a professional manner.


What can a PI do about a low-performing postdoc? This is a hypothetical question inspired by a flip side of the situation described here.

Consider a PI on tenure-track position, facing tenure / promotion panel in a few years. The PI has just got their first significant research grant, allowing to recruit one postdoc (research fellow) and maybe buying out a few hours per week of PI's time to administer and manage the grant.

After careful selection and recruitment process, following the regulations of the University HR Department, a shortlist was composed, the interview was held, the best candidates were identified and finally one of them accepted the offer and arrived to start the post. Suppose the project and the funding is for one year only.

Following the usual induction process, a program of research has been agreed and weekly meetings has been set to monitor the progress. A few weeks later, the PI is worried that the progress is slower than anticipated. The majority of time is spent by the postdoc on reading the  literature, discussing the problem with other PhD students in the group, formulating strategic suggestions on how to solve the problem and possibly also problems of other students in the group. However, when it comes to writing publications (and scientific code when appropriate), the progress is insufficient.

Suppose that the PI has tried to focus the postdoc on their area of responsibility by making verbal remarks, but it did not improve the situation and only made the relations a bit tenser. The PI feels that the postdoc is under-performing, but the postdoc denies such discussions and in discussion with other students describes them as non-constructive and abusive.

The question: Assuming the restrictions and processes of your current University (or other places your are familiar with), what would you do as the PI in this situation?

I assume that the short-term goals of the PI in this situation are to produce enough high-quality publications to successfully complete their grant, secure the following grants and increase the chances of successful tenure. However, if there are also long-term goals which are more important and should influence the chosen strategy instead, please describe them. I also assume that 3-4 hours per week is just about how much time the PI has to manage this grant, and the rest of the time is spent on teaching, working with PhD students, etc, so the strategies requiring let's say 2 hours of PI's time per day are not very realistic. This is based on the typical breakdown of time for EPSRC First Grant scheme in the UK — please feel free to point out if it's not applicable in other places.

This really depends a lot on the contract situation. In some countries, such as Germany, there is a “probationary period” of several months wherein either side can choose unilaterally to end the contract. This lowers the risk from a bad hire. Saddled with a hire gone wrong, I’d try to get what output I could from the postdoc during the period and start a new hiring process right away (or see if anyone from the previous search was still available!).

In countries like the US where contracts may not include probationary periods, you have to try to figure out how to best help the postdoc out, since you’re stuck for a potentially much longer period. If it’s some sort of missing knowledge you figure out how to provide that. If it’s some other issue, you try to work around it or solve that problem. Without a more specific example, it’s hard to draw up a good “plan of action.”


How is a paper with multiple authors usually written? I am attending graduate school this fall and one thing that I still could not wrap around my head is that some of the papers are written by seemingly a group of authors (5 people or more). I am curious how this is usually done.

Are each person assigned a small chunk of work and the paper is put together when everyone is done? This raises so many questions such as what if a person doesn't finish his or her part? How do you piece together the paper so that it is coherent throughout (since people may have different perspectives or understanding).

And is there important differences between a paper written by two person and those written by five or more?

I think that this article from the Research Whisperer covers aspects of how multiple authors can collaborate to get a paper done. It is an interesting and quite brief read that I would recommend.

TL;DR version:

One leads the project and the initial drafting with others
contributing to an almost complete draft.
The team splits the work into broad sections for each collaborator, which then draft, combine and revise.
Decide on all the details and each writes its own section with minor final corrections.

From my experience, the first one would be the most common with an almost final version making it to the very senior people in the article.


Poor Master's grade but demonstrably passionate about the field- do I stand a chance of getting a funded PhD place? I am graduating with a pass grade in my Master's degree from a good university in London.  I want to apply for a PhD scholarship at the University of Sheffield in non-communicable diseases.

I did public health undergraduate degree and became interested in non-communicable diseases in low income countries as it's a neglected area overshadowed by the high rate of infectious diseases. I wrote my undergraduate thesis in this area. I also have a personal interest in this field because I lost my mum to cancer within one year of her diagnosis. My pass grade in the Master's can partially be explained due to difficulties with illness.

Do I stand a chance of gaining my desired PhD place, taking into account the medical reasons for the low grade and my proven interest in the field?

The obvious answers is: ask (University of Sheffield, not us) informally whether a (formal) application has any chances of success.

From my own experience in the UK, that answer depends (1) on which agency is funding the PhD studentship and (2) on any (additional) rules applied by the University/Department. AFAIK, research-council funded studentships in the UK require a minimum grade of 2.1 (upper second) in (any) undergraduate degree (but exceptions may be possible, I'm not sure). So if prior to said master course (where I assume you only obtained a 3) you managed that, this would be fine (I know a PhD student in a UK Physics Dept, who obtained only a 2.2 in UG Physics from Oxford, but has previously graduated with a first in architecture, which sufficied to satisfy the rule).


Dropping UK PhD - is it worth switching to MPhil? I am just over two years into a CS PhD, and have decided to drop out. I was in a competitive field, and found it difficult and frustrating trying to make a worthwhile contribution. I didn't complete many of my experiments as it became apparent they were not sufficient, though I've done an extensive survey of the literature. Talking to my supervisor, he offered me a transfer to an MPhil course instead.

I have no interest in pursuing academia further, and intend to move into industry. I already have a reasonable STEM BSc and good CS MSc from top UK universities, and I'm confident in my tech skills (although some are a bit rusty after two years of research). I feel like I can explain my choice of leaving positively at interview. On the other hand, I have limited work experience, and there are skills I've learned in my PhD which I have no evidence for.

Given this, how does an MPhil compare to simply dropping out, purely in terms of my CV and employability?

Edit: in my mind, the difference is between listing "PhD in [topic] (not completed)" vs "MPhil, dissertation: [topic]" and I'm wondering if the latter is significantly better due to the qualification and documentary evidence.

This might not be the most popular of answers and it might not be the answer you're looking for, but it's what I would sincerely advise a friend facing similar problems.

You say you have limited work experience, so I'm guessing that you are pretty young. In that case, look at what you've put into the PhD:

You spent two of the best years of your life on this (around ages 20-30 is one's intellectual and physical peak).
You also spent tens of thousands of GBP on this. Maybe it didn't come out of your pocket, but there was certainly an opportunity cost from not taking a better-paying job using your MS degree. Quantified, this difference is likely in the tens of thousands (especially if accounting for loans / investments).

If you leave with nothing now, both the time and money you've invested go to waste. You will forever be someone who dropped out of a PhD program, presumably because you weren't good enough (these first impressions apply even if you can justifiably claim to have learned a lot from the PhD). However if you leave with an MPhil, you have something tangible to point to. You have your university's brand name behind the skills you claim to have, and you get to avoid questions such as "Is it possible to make leaving a PhD look good on a CV / Resume?".

It's true that MPhil from my cursory searching is not the most empowering of degrees - for example reed.co.uk lists 200,000 jobs, but only returns 4 results for "MPhil" - but it is better than nothing.

I would strongly incline towards getting the MPhil. DPhil would be even better. "I need a PhD because it helps me find a better job afterwards" may never impress a graduate admissions committee, but if it motivates you to finish the DPhil, it's good enough.


How secure is it to receive a verbal offer for an academic position in UK? I recently accepted academic offer from a UK university. I comminicated wtih the head of school via phone and email, and I have not yet received the official offer letter. I am wondering how secure this situation is? In particular if this is a good time to decline other offers (I feel bad to let them wait too long and decline their offer eventually)? Or should I wait until receiving the official offer? Thank you for your input in advance.

I saw a similar question, but that is for postdoc positions and I suppose it is not exactly the same.

An email offering you the job is not a 'verbal' offer, and although it's not as binding as a contract, I would certainly consider it secure, particularly from the head of school.

Note that the contract may come via snail mail and if you're on a different continent that could take a while. Perhaps you could try to get a confirmation from HR that the contract has been sent.


Canadian PhD application process for international students I am an Australian interested in applying for a PhD (specifically in mathematics) at several universities in Canada. I have already got a Bachelor of Mathematical Sciences and a Master of Philosophy in pure mathematics.

I have put a bit of time into trying to verse myself in the various scholarship opportunities, PhD programmes and potential supervisors, but I am starting to think I don't fully understand the correct order to do these things in.

Is there a standard etiquette or order for applying to a PhD? For example, would you first apply to the institution, then apply for scholarships once you have an offer, then look for a supervisor? Perhaps all three should be done in unison?

In Australia (it is my understanding that) it is customary to get a supervisor willing to commence a project with you first, then apply for a scholarship.

Any advice on the correct pathway would be greatly appreciated!

You should visit website of universities that you are interested in. Most universities provide detailed information about their application process and scholarships in their website. The application procedure may be different for different universities or even for different departments within a university. For example, as I know and at the moment, Department of Computer Science in Simon Fraser University, University of Toronto  and University of Western Ontario offer entry-level scholarships for applicants that receive an offer of admission. On the other hand, as a part of the application process, Carleton University asks applicants if they are willing to finance their own studies or like to be considered to scholarship knowing that the university will not offer admission if it cannot offer/afford funds. Many professors encourage applicants to contact them before applying but I have seen CS professors at University of Toronto that encourage applicants to apply without contacting them before applying.

So the advice that I can give is to visit the website of the universities of your interest. I know that this is a very general advice and that it can be a cumbersome and time-consuming process but in my experience, it is the most accurate one.


Is it possible to confirm if someone is enrolled at a particular school? So I know there's roadblocks like FERPA (this is in the United States by the way), but if I already knew:

Full Name
Date of Birth
Name of school (obviously, since I'd have to know who to ask)
(Supposed) Major

Would a college/university be able to confirm or deny that the student is enrolled, since I'm only asking to have information I already know confirmed or denied, and not asking for any new information? If so, which office/department at a given school would I (generally) direct a question like this to?

In the US, under FERPA, institutions of higher education (rules are different for K12 education) are required to define what pieces of information about a student are "directory information."  This typically includes the name, address, and phone number of a student and may include other information such as the student's dates of attendance, major, and any degrees that the student has been awarded.  The list of what items constitute directory information has to be made available to students, and students have the option of to keep this directory information confidential.  Other more detailed information (such as courses taken, grades, class rank, etc.) is automatically confidential and can only be released after an explicit waiver from the student.

If a student has chosen to make their directory information confidential, then the university won't confirm or deny that the student has any connection to the institution.  if the student hasn't opted for confidentiality, then the registrar's office will typically provide the directory information when asked.

There are good reasons for this protection.  For example, consider the situation of a student who has been the victim of domestic violence and is hiding from an abusive family member.  The abuser could call the university, talk them into providing the student's contact information and then use it to track down the student and harm the student in some way.

On the flip side, this confidentiality provision can cause problems with reference checks for former students.  If a student chose confidentiality and years later an employer calls the university and asks "Did John Doe complete a BS degree at your institution?"  The institution would have to say "We can neither confirm nor deny this."

In my experience, a fairly significant percentage of students (maybe 10 to 20%) at my institution opt for confidentiality of their directory information.  Given the problems that this can cause with reference checking, I'm somewhat surprised by how many students opt for confidentiality.

In general, the office to ask would be the registrar's office.  They regularly handle requests from people who are conducting reference checks and background investigations.


Can I resubmit an unpresented conference paper to the same conference? I submitted a paper to a major conference last year, it was accepted, but I had to withdraw from the conference before it could be presented. There is no proceedings for this conference. I am wondering the etiquette surrounding resubmitting the article to the exact same conference this year. Since the first submission, it has not been presented or published anywhere else.
Thanks in advance.

Considering the COVID-19 pandemic, most people would consider withdrawing from an in-person conference to be a smart and ethical move.  In this situation, it should be fine to resubmit.  If the conference is peer reviewed, you should draw the conference's attention to the resubmission so they do not waste time re-reviewing a paper.
Do not make a habit of withdrawing papers.


Is there a convention regarding frames around plots in engineering? I am writing my PhD thesis in engineering at a research university in the US.

My question is about using frames (or boxes) around a plot, specifically simulation results plotted as a function of time.  These figures are intended to span the entire width of the type-area (i.e. paragraph width) and are to be displayed prominently.

Here is a simple example for comparison between the two options (framed and open):

Is there any convention regarding such frames, e.g., as documented by prominent style guides? I am all up for minimalism (use greyscale, avoid clutter etc), but I wonder if removing the surrounding frame itself is too much (and may surprise exam committee in unexpected ways) due to going against existing conventions.

My university doesn’t have a style guide. And when I checked with the research support office, they said that as long as it adheres to acceptable scientific style, it is fine.

PS:

When this question was originally asked on the graphic design SE site, a user recommended that the x-label should not be near the bottom edge of the frame, but rather a horizontal axis should be drawn at y = 0, and the labelling of the x-axis should be done near this. I am skeptical of this advice, since most engineering software (eg. MATLAB) does not do this.

There is no convention or guide on this, at least none with appreciable universality. Having said that, one doesn't need a style guide for things like this.

The intention is to be clear to the reader. Minimalism or any other aesthetic ideal is secondary. In engineering, the values on graphs are potentially of interest, not just the trend. So a reader could potentially want to know the value of y(x), and your graph of y vs x should make it as easy as possible for him/her to do so. The top and right  axes make it easier to read out values, because (a) you now have two sets of axes to check your value against, (b) a point on the top-right is as easy to read as a point on the bottom-left.

Given that, I wouldn't recommend removing the frame or the ticks on the frame.


How do Graduate Admissions Committees view an applicant from Industry? At the time of writing this, I have been working for Raytheon Missile Systems (RMS) for about 2.5 years since graduating college.

Prior to graduation, I was on track to go a more academic route due to graduate work and independent study projects I was involved in related to computational mathematics. I ended up choosing to try out industry first, however, since I had no experience with it and wanted to know if this path would be preferable for me long term.

While I have been successful at RMS and used my computational math background to achieve a lot there, I don't think industry is where I want to stay and so I am now working on applications so I can pursue a PhD and more academic career.

Given my industry background, are there any common beliefs in academia, whether good or bad, about individuals from industry I should be aware of for the sake of my application? Is there anything I should strive to highlight or avoid in my application that would help me fare better in the application process?

EDIT:
My experience pre-RMS was largely in numerical analysis, optimization, and simulation, with emphasis in nonlinear systems of hyperbolic partial differential equations. One sample project, for example, was implementing a Space-Time Discontinuous Galerkin Finite Element code to tackle a system of Hyperbolic PDEs and doing validation and convergence studies to validate the theory. I also gained decent experience via independent studies and working at NASA JPL in computer vision. Other skills gained were in parallel computing using OpenMP and MPI.

At RMS, I have worked on clusters and have primarily developed and built codes in areas like numerical optimization, adaptive sampling of unknown functions, supervised machine learning, controls, bayesian estimation algorithms, and simulations.

In terms of research, I am planning to apply to computational math or computer science programs and hope to get involved in machine learning with emphasis in Reinforcement Learning for partially-observable Markov decision problems in continuous state and action spaces.

There are several considerations that may make it difficult for you.  Here are a few based on gut instinct:

1) You are an 'outsider' - the traditional route of undergraduate to graduate school often entails nurturing relationships with other academics at your home institution and abroad.  Those relationships help grease the wheels when it comes to letters of support.  But, this can be overcome. Perhaps you already maintain relationships with academic circles.  Failing that, strong letters from higher-ups at a place like RMS are probably just as noteworthy.

2) From the PI's perspective, taking a graduate student is a long-term investment. You would occupy a spot that could be offered to someone else, so in addition to promising productivity, PI's generally prefer the person have the goal of continuing on and pursuing an academic life.  Since you've been in industry, there is always the fear that at some point, you'll simply abdicate and return to industry.

I think you can spin your industry experience 'narrative' to your advantage.  First, you can stress that your time in industry did not meet your needs for academic development.  In other words, only academics provides the platform to realize your highly technical goals.  Second, people in industry usually have a very strong work ethic and know how to get things done; something that is often lacking in new graduate students.  You might consider documenting just how productive you have been.


Why do universities place a weight on GRE/TOEFL scores? This is one question that has been bugging me for a long time now. Why do universities consider GRE/TOEFL scores at all? Perhaps it is fine for master's degrees, where there will be an enormous number of applicants whose language abilities cannot be otherwise established. But what is the necessity for a PhD degree? Why not zero in on a small group of candidates based on their profiles and then conduct a Skype interview? That way the professor gets to know both the verbal and the research potential of the student. Why isn't this the case for PhD admissions?

GRE/TOEFL scores are used in a number of different ways (some of which are alluded to above)

GRE scores are sometimes used as a university-level filter (if your GRE score is < X, then you'll need a strong support letter from your department to get admitted)
TOEFL scores are used as a filter for giving people TA funding (if your TOEFL score is too low, you can't be assigned to be a TA, and if it's lower, you can't even get RA funding)
More informally, the GRE/TOEFL scores are used as a "do you even care' filter: for a CS program, a quantitative score less than 600 might be considered to be a warning that the candidate doesn't even care enough to prep for it.

But for Ph.D programs, the GRE/TOEFL are either used as a high-bar disqualification filters to prune applications (in top schools), or as low-bar disqualification filters to prune the non-serious applications.


Where can I borrow books that my own university's library doesn't have? I need a book for my teaching and/or research, but my university's library doesn't have this book.  I don't think I'll use it enough to justify spending money out of my own pocket to own it.  What other ways should I try?  I searched Internet, there is no "free" (in whatever sense) PDF of it either.

Ask your university librarian.
Usually universities libraries collaborate with each other. They can look whether the other universities have the book (I know this happens within Canadian universities)..


Professor takes our money and goes incommunicado, do we complain to the department or the police? Several years ago an academic publisher I worked for were setting up a new journal. We approached the prospective editor-in-chief, lined up some plans for the first issues, signed a contract, and paid him the first installment of his honorarium. Then he ceased being contactable. We knew he's still alive & active because he was writing papers, supervising students and attending conferences, but he didn't answer our emails and phone calls.

If we had chosen to pursue the matter then, should we have taken it up with his department/university/research institute, or with the police?

If it matters, the prospective editor-in-chief is from India.

Obligatory disclaimer: I am not a lawyer...

This sounds like a contract dispute: whether the editor has discharged his side of the agreement. As such it is likely to be a civil matter rather than a criminal one. I very much doubt the police will be interested in pursuing anything. In general terms, the legal recourse would be to sue the editor in the civil courts. I suspect that the costs of doing so outweigh the benefits.

Could you report it to the editor's university? Yes. However, it isn't clear what this would achieve. As @ZeroTheHero says, they (apparently) have no involvement in the dispute so far. From their perspective it will be your word against the editor's; even if they wanted to resolve the dispute, it is not clear how they would go about doing so.


How should the CV for the application of a pure math PhD applicant be structured? I currently have four sections:

Education
Academic and research experiences
Honors and Awards
Work and Volunteer Experience

I have the following questions:

Should I include a section which gives a detailed account for the advanced math courses I have taken?
Should I elaborate on 3 and 4, or do I just list my awards and experience in those sections without explaining anything?
Should I include my research interest and standardized test scores in my CV?

I don't think a "detailed account" is necessary for anything that's a standard part of the math curriculum: a simple list would suffice. (Note that this would also apply to any other discipline with a "standard" curriculum, such as chemistry or physics!)

I would not include research interest and test scores, as they may be "restrictive" and turn off potential readers. (Test scores, if needed, must be provided in a more official way than just a CV listing, so you might as well leave it off.)

As for honors and awards and experience, I'd include specific information if it is relevant to your career aims; otherwise, a simple listing suffices.


How to teach students not to use other people's work in an assignment or a thesis? When reading submissions by students, for example coding assignments or bachelor theses, I stumble upon code or text not originally written by the students themselves, usually not referenced properly (see the edit below). After being confronted with this, I often hear or read statements like:

"I did write it myself -- using a source, and making some of my own modifications."
"Wikipedia explains this topic very well. I didn't know that I am
not allowed to copy the article in my thesis. Wikipedia is
even on my list of references!"
"Our code looks similar, because he helped me with some bugs I had."
Or that plagiarism in the methodology section is small and unimportant (original version).

I usually tend to see these statements as lame excuses, because I thought it would be common sense how not to plagiarize, but maybe they are right that they really do not know it better. It seems like they think the correct way to avoid plagiarism is to modify the source even more instead of doing it on their own in the first place.

Our usual approach to tackle this problem is to state that we do not want
plagiarism, search for indications of plagiarism and then have endless
discussion about it afterwards.

There are methods to circumvent this partially, for example by providing
individualized tasks, and our university also provides workshops that teach you for example how a reference list should be built, but I am searching for ideas for the everyday teaching (programming labs, supervising students writing a thesis...) to promote the mindset that taking the text or code from someone else and modifying it is not the correct way, especially when it comes to graded submissions or publications.

EDIT: After receiving multiple comments about what I am worried about is not plagiarism, I would like to explain this aspect a little more by means of some examples:

There is no reference at all: This is clearly plagiarism, period.
The reference is not sufficient: This is the Wikipedia case from above. Having only "Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/" in the list of references without any indication which part of the text is from which article and which part is written by the student does not help at all and is in my opinion nearly as bad as having no reference at all.
There is a proper reference: As others have noted, this is not plagiarism. Still, in the context of grading, we have to look deeper:

Written exam: Everyone should agree that a student should fail an exam if he copies the solution by another student even if he writes "This solution was copied from the student sitting next to me."
Code Assignments: I had cases where students wrote "I copied this part from ..., because I was not able to do it myself and the rest of the program would not work without it". This is totally fine for me, but the student should not expect to receive points for the copied part, but only for the other parts written by himself. The same holds for code copied from other sources and modified afterwards.
Lengthy text passages: This is the example of copying significant parts of a Wikipedia article, again. But this is already covered in several other questions.

It seems to me that you have an "Academic Integrity" issue as opposed to a "Plagiarism" issue. Academic Integrity covers many areas including:

Plagiarism
Collusion
Fabrication

and so on...

In my personal experience the biggest 'excuse' that students will plead is ignorance. What this causes is the following cycle:

students submit work
work is marked
issues are found
issues are discussed with student
student pleads ignorance
student is educated
(sometimes) student is allowed to resubmit

The problem here is that education comes after the crime, and any resubmissions can drastically delay students receiving marks and feedback (which feeds into other assignments).

Now I do not have a solution that will stop all cases of academic dishonesty and personally I do not think it is possible. If people want to cheat, they will. The key is to remove the accidental plagiarisms so that the focus is on the intentional cases.

To remove the ignorance excuse the answer is simple: education. Now you are already employing education as your solution, however, you are doing it after the submission. The key is to do it as soon as possible. Personally, I use part of my first tutorial class to teach the students what Academic Integrity is, and then get the students to work through some examples and questions. Lastly, I require them to complete an "Academic Integrity Quiz" which is regulated by our University Library. Before the students can gain access to our assignment submission boxes they MUST have scored 10/10 on that quiz (this is automated). Unlimited attempts are allowed on the quiz as well.

The solution above forces students to learn about Academic Integrity and thereby removes the "I didn't know" (ignorance) excuse.

I hope this helps.


Feasibility of a partially remote postdoc (This question is somewhat related to those answered here and here, but is different in the "partially" remote aspect, and in a few other details I list below.)
I am currently finishing my PhD in theoretical physics in the UK, and have received a funded offer for a 3 year postdoc on the US east coast. I also have at least one postdoc offer from the UK. Both positions come from individual PIs, and are not tied to e.g. teaching requirements.
At the individual group level the difference between the offers is not huge, though I do slightly prefer the US position. However, in my field the US is very strong and active, and I have been advised by my supervisor that it can be a significant advantage to my later career prospects to have exposure to the US scene, especially early on in my career. Ultimately I would be aiming for faculty positions in the UK.
My dilemma is that I have significant ties to the UK (e.g. two-body issues, though no children), and I am not sure whether it is worth disrupting this for the potential long-term benefit of being in the US. One possibility my partner and I have floated is a "partially remote" postdoc. By this I mean something like spending ~2/3 of my working time in the US, and ~1/3 of my working time in the UK. In practice that could mean spending, say, 6 weeks in the US and then 3 weeks in the UK.
I am asking this question because I am wondering whether anyone here has done something like this, and how they found it personally and professionally. Other answers about the balancing of long-term benefits of exposure to the US vs personal situations would also be helpful.
A few notes:

Since my field is theoretical in nature, it is in principle possible to work remotely. Of course there are still significant benefits to working in person, but the hope is that being available in the US ~2/3 of the time would provide enough time to do this, and also get most of the other benefits of "US exposure".
This question is conditioned on my potential supervisor agreeing to this. They have mentioned that many of their collaborations have been largely remote (even pre-Covid), so they may be used to this mode of working. However, I think this has mainly been with US-based collaborators, so the 5 hour time difference may present an issue.
I have worked out the personal finances of this, and think it would be doable.
I am not sure about the visa and tax implications of this arrangement. My initial impression is that if I am on an H1-B visa then there shouldn't be any visa issues. If anyone has any idea about the tax implications that would be very helpful.

Ask the PI or recruiting HR department
I think the main consideration will be what the PI thinks of the plan. Some PI's want to be able to chat face-to-face to post docs every day, whereas others are happier with a more light touch interaction. This can also vary for the same PI between different projects with different aims. This will be quickly resolved by asking the PI. If you have a job offer there's nothing to lose here.
There may be other issues such as tax, insurance and other employment law things. I'm not an expert but our university has raised issues about staff working in another country even though most staff haven't been to the university buildings at all since March last year. This will be quickly resolved by asking the recruiting HR department. They should be able to give a relatively quick yes/no depending on their own current working pressures.
In long form,

explain as you do here what your constraints and motivations are.
have a concrete plan of how the remote part of the work will go. For example, are you able to shift your working time to be available for meetings during US working hours.
be prepared for the answer to be no.

You seem to have a reasonable fall back plan so I see no harm in simply asking.
Edited to add: You should also be realistic about how travelling will work during the current on-going pandemic. How will quarantine affect your plans? What if you are not able to travel for a prolonged period of time.


Introduction to how journals and other research publications work? I need a comprehensive introduction to how research journals work and conferences relevant to the point of view of a student, and as a researcher.

Although I have read many research papers, I think I still don't understand a lot of the basics. I googled my problem and maybe I am not searching it right but I came to know what the volume number, issue number, etc mean just yesterday from here: https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/nmp/sonet/rlos/ebp/journals/what_are_journals/index.html. This was helpful but I still need to know more e.g. what does impact factor mean, how important is this metric, who has the right of distributing the article considering I want my research to be publicly and freely available, what is general process of writing and review, etc.

Maybe I am not searching for the right terms. Any help is greatly appreciated, thanks.

what does impact factor mean

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_factor

  how important is this metric

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4150161/

  who has the right of distributing the
  article considering I want my research to be publicly and freely
  available

The publisher is typically granted sole distribution rights, with exceptions for distribution via personal websites and sites such as arXiv

  what is general process of writing and review

That's been answered elsewhere on this forum.


Is this ethical: "I like your paper and if you submit it to Journal X, I will be the reviewer" Is this ethical?

Researcher A asks Researcher B, "Where should I submit my paper?"

Researcher B says, "If you submit it to Journal X, I will almost certainly be the reviewer and I think highly of your paper."

All journals in the field have single-blind review policy. That is, the reviewer knows who the author is, but the author does not know who the reviewer is.

If it is unethical, is it only unethical if researcher B actually submits to Journal X and gets researcher A as a reviewer? Or does the ethical problem disappear if researcher B submits to a different journal, or submits to Journal X but gets a different reviewer?

If we replace the word "reviewer" with "editor", this would typically be seen as normal behaviour. I.e., editors often have pre-submission discussions with authors about the suitability of a manuscript for their journal.
In the case of editors, it is a standard part of their role to have discussions with authors about submissions and in some cases encourage authors to submit their work to their journal.

In addition to "editor in chief", many journals have associate editors and the like who act as editors for submissions related to particular topics. They also often have some scope, although typically less than the editor in chief, to encourage submissions.

Finally, the person you mention sounds like they might be a very active reviewer for a journal and quite often get asked to review submissions on a topic related to your paper.

I think the ethical issues relate mostly to whether everyone is acting honestly and in good faith, and that conflicts of interest are not perceived.

Editors are allowed to solicit submissions, and they almost always know the identity of the submitting authors. They are meant to be well-regarded members of the academic community and are trusted to make publication decisions based on academic merits and not based on friendship or other bases.

Reviewers are a little different. Reviewers are meant to review in good faith and base their decision based on academic merits. For journals that expect double blind review, I think that encouraging authors to submit to a journal where they are likely to be a reviewer is problematic. For journals that only have single blind review, the issue is more one of honesty. Specifically, the reviewer should generally inform the editor if they encouraged the authors to submit the paper. That way, the editor can integrate that information into the assessment of that reviewer's review and assess it for bias.

More generally, the implications of the reviewers comments are problematic. A more appropriate comment would be "I think your paper is good and it would be a good fit for journal X." or "I know that the editor of journal X would be interested in your paper." By focusing on the idea that they might be a reviewer, it implies that they might give a more favourable review than a random reviewer, which from some perspectives implies a biased review process.

If you are submitting the paper to that journal, you could remove most ethical issues by acknowledging in your cover letter that your colleague and potential reviewer recommended that you submit the manuscript to this journal. This would allow the editor to consider whether they want to let your colleague be a reviewer, and if so, how their review should be treated.


Is it allowed to publish an explanation of someone's thesis? Last spring, I did a research project where I tried to develop code, modelling a physical system using a method developed by a researcher and presented as his PhD. thesis.
Now I have completed my work and am required to present documentation of the theory used and the performance of code. Now, while I was explaining that paper, I did detailed derivations of all the steps taken which had been omitted from papers for brevity. These derivations I have put in the manual as well so that any other undergraduate trying to work with same paper can quickly get started.
However, is it plagiarism to upload such a manual on my homepage and GitHub repository where someone else did the hard work of deriving concepts in the thesis and I just present proof of intermediate steps?
I am unsure if this is a right practice even if I state that I am only explaining his derivation.
What else can be done to mitigate the copyright infringement? One option, I think, is to submit the report to my supervisor and he will personally distribute it to students in his research group who he thinks will benefit from it.

Properly credited, posting a piece that fills in all the details of a published paper (or thesis) should be fine. Indicate clearly that  the ideas are not your own - that you are just hoping to help others read the original work.
You should probably write the person who did the original research, thanking them for their theorems and telling them what you hope to do with your work filling in details. They will probably be delighted that someone has read their thesis.


What are pros and cons for an adjunct professor job at a community college for an IT professional? I've just been contacted by a friend's friend who decided I'd make a great adjunct professor at a community college, IT department, application development. Suddenly I heard myself agree to an "informal" job interview, and now am freaking out. What am I getting myself into?

I have all the hard skills necessary, in fact probably overqualified as far as the hard skills go. Soft skills, different matter. I am shy and fear public speech. Counselling one-on-one is no problem, but I do get a bit shaky in the knees thinking about standing in front of an audience. Which is why a part of me wants to do this job - to overcome my fears, to develop leadership skills, which I could then use in private sector. I also have a few interesting curriculum ideas I'd like to try. From tutoring my nephew through his university years (different school), I saw much in the Comp Sci curriculum that I think could be improved.

I wonder though whether this will help or hurt my career in the private sector. First of all, the very fact of being an adjunct professor at a community college (one of the weaker community colleges actually) - is it a resume builder? From looking at the faculty, it just might be.. the staff seems to have good bios.

Then there is the RateMyProfessor.com. As a newbie, and a pretty anxious one at that, there is a non-zero chance of me screwing up and getting a bunch of low reviews that will then haunt me for the rest of my career. The HRs do google job candidates' names.

My current career as a software developer has had its ups and downs: have worked for a few prestigious, big name corporates, left for a startup of my own, the startup is imploding, time to get a day job. While the bottom of my resume (where the old jobs are) looks great, I need to build up the recent part of my resume, need references. Would  this be a good move or not?

Without wanting to sound harsh, this whole post is all about you and how it will benefit your further career (after leaving this job). You seem to forget that you will be teaching real, young people that need a good teacher, in order to get the education they deserve. So, unless you refocus on them first, perhaps you should reconsider getting this job for simply "overcoming your fears, developing leadership skills, which you could then use in private sector" and leave it to someone more passionate about it.

To directly answer your question: Getting a job you are not sure you are going to like and risk being bad at it or prematurely leave, always looks bad on any resume. So, unless you are really passionate about this, perhaps you should stick to what you already know.


How to find GPA distributions for US universities I have been tasked with making a grade equivalence table for a small list of US universities to translate to grades at a European university.  To do this I thought it would be easiest just to look at the GPA distribution and try to map percentiles. However, I am having problems finding them.  Can this data be found for

University of California
University of Maryland
University of Texas at Austin
University of Wisconsin

This is for students in their third year of university who will be spending one year in the US.

The subject of particular interest is computer science but any data would be better than none.

Stuart Rojstaczer maintains a web page with information about average GPA at many universities in the U.S. The data on that page was last updated in 2009, and is next scheduled to be updated in February 2016 (according to a note from the author on the page.)

At the end of that page, there are links to the historical GPA at each of the schools for which he has data. It also indicates the source of the data, so you can find out whether the school actually publishes the data, or whether the school simply made the data available to the author.

For example, if I click on his link for University of Wisconsin - Madison, I learn that this data was collected from the registrar's website. While the particular link he cites is no longer alive, searching the registrar's site yields this page that allows me to find out grade distributions from any course and term. Similarly, I found out through his page that UCSB publishes this data through its office of institutional research, which led me to this page of reports that include average GPA by major.

You can follow a similar procedure to find grade distribution information for other schools if available, but it may not be available for the schools you are interested in. Universities are not obligated to publish this information.


Academic Writing: Numbered points in text etiquette I am writing a computing conference paper, it's for a high quality conference, and my friend and I have a mini dispute. The loser pays for drinks, so no pressure!

Which of the following is better/appropriate/there is no difference?

  The loser will: 1. get laughed at, 2. pay for drinks and 3. have to run outside naked.

vs

  The loser will: 1) get laughed at, 2) pay for drinks and 3) have to run outside naked.

In all seriousness though, is one more formal/acceptable than the other?

Also, I think I remember that maybe a ";" should be used instead of the ",".

Thanks for reading!

They're both acceptable, nobody except very careful English fanatics are likely to care, but the latter is preferable. Reasons:

Periods are more "final". They indicate the end of the sentence. That implies that you should instead use capital letters if you stick with periods:

The loser will: 1. Get laughed at, 2. Pay for drinks and 3. Have to run outside naked.

Because periods indicate the end of the sentence, one doesn't expect to see multiple periods in a single sentence. Using ) avoids this problem.

As for whether or not to use a semicolon, again it's up to you, but the comma is fine here. That's because the three things listed are all pretty related, short phrases, and on an equal footing. Semicolons are better when a sentence is complex or has other punctuation symbols. Example of something where I'd prefer the semicolon:

This new year, I resolve to: 1) cook 100 breakfasts for my wife - she deserves it; 2) set tests such that 50% of the class fails to shake my reputation as an academic Santa Claus; and 3) run for president.


Can a PhD from a non-TU9 German university become a professor in a TU9 university? Suppose, someone does a PhD and a Habilitation from a non TU9 university.

Is there any practical barrier for him to become a professor in a TU9 university?

Of course you can. Otherwise their pool for hiring would be awfully small.

But don't take my word for it. To provide some evidence we can look at a department at one of the TU9 universities. For example the Computer Science Department of TU Darmstadt (mainly because I'm somewhat familiar with it)

If we look at the list of full professors and eliminate those that have non-German doctorates, we are left with 18 Professors, 9 of which did not receive their degree from one of the TU9. (Though in practical terms almost none of them did, as the TU9 was only established in 2003.)

Carsten Binning TU Darmstadt
Christian Bischof Cornell
Johannes Buchmann Universität zu Köln
Dieter W. Fellner TU Graz
Marc Fischlin Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main
Johannes Fürnkranz TU Wien
Iryna Gurevych Universität Duisburg-Essen
Reiner Hähnle Universität Karlsruhe
Matthias Hollick TU Darmstadt
Stefan Katzenbeisser TU Wien
Kristian Kersting Universität Freiburg
Andreas Koch TU Braunschweig
Heiko Mantel Universität des Saarlandes
Mira Mezini Universität Siegen
Max Mühlhäuser Universität Karlsruhe
Jan Peters University of Southern California
Christian Reuter Universität Siegen
Stefan Roth Brown University
Ahmad-Reza Sadeghi Universität des Saarlandes
Thomas Schneider Ruhr-Universität Bochum
Neerja Suri University of Massechusetts, Amherst
Orkar von Stryk Technische Universität München
Michael Waidner Universität Karlsruhe
Karsten Weihe TU Berlin
Felix Wolf RWTH Aachen


RA position doesn't give feedback on rejected application I recently applied to an economics pre-doctoral RA opportunity at a North American research university. I was asked to do a 7-hour empirical exercise, which I did (took me closer to 10 hours). Unfortunately, I was not asked to proceed in the interview process.
I did ask for feedback (or just the solution set for the empirical exercise), because I wanted to figure out where I went wrong and how I can do better the next time around, but the hiring manager informed that they aren't able to provide any kind of feedback.
I found this to be extremely frustrating and somewhat annoying -- I don't care that I didn't get the job, but I think it's wrong to ask applicants to perform many hours of uncompensated labor and not even provide an answer key! Is this the wrong way to think about things?
Really appreciate any insight or guidance you might have.
Thanks!

Unfortunately for applicants, academic job environment is very competitive: there are tens, hundreds or sometimes thousands of applications per post. The employers (Universities) are often overwhelmed with the number of applications. Their recruitment processes are designed to optimise their own convenience, not the one of the applicants. To put it bluntly, they have too many people who want to work for them to care about the feelings of those who is not successful this time.
Universities often make it clear that they won't provide feedback for candidates who were not shortlisted for the post (i.e. not invited for the interview). You could assume that they are supposed to provide feedback for those who bothered to prepare and attend the interview at least --- but in practice it happens less often than not.
Even though this behaviour is common, you are right in thinking that it is wrong. It is very frustrating to spend 10+ hours preparing the application, several days preparing to the interview and actually attending it -- just to never hear from them again. The good news is (at least) that if this place has a selfish and unfriendly attitude to candidates, you probably don't want to be there anyway.


After an unsuccessful first PhD position in experimental research, how can I get accepted to another program? I am a new PhD student, almost one year into the program. I was in theoretical research in my Master's program and switched to experimental research for my PhD. During my studies I have used a programming language but I do not have any expertise with it. I immediately started to working with this language, but still have great difficulty working efficiently it. I don't have any positive contribution and my supervisor doesn't seem to be happy.

I don't want to just quit and go back to theory. I really want to continue with experimental study, but not in my current university. When I talked to my supervisor about this he just told me to quit and find something else but I don't believe this is the proper way to motivate a student.

I've applied for other positions which are of a different topic but also experimental. The people who I contacted were very interested in my studies I have done before. But at the end, these people will contact with my supervisor about my progress and I think he will not say good things about me.

I think I behaved very honest for my new application. One of them knew my supervisor and he wanted me to ask about my current performance and I told him to ask if he wants, but I also explained that this talk wouldn't be a glowing recommendation since I have been unable to meet objectives in my current program. Now I think being honest didn't work for me since I didn't get any response back...

What should I say to those people to get accepted into a different program, since I really want to continue in this experimental field?

If your relation with your current advisor is not good, you probably don't want to cite him/her as reference or ask them for recommendation. Usually one ask recommendation only from people we are sure they have a good opinion. Maybe someone else from your Master can give a better opinion of you. Or colleagues/postdoc/teaching assistant in your current position.

This does not mean you need to hide the current situation. It is better to introduce the problem when you say why you want to change position. And be super clear with the situation, if they ask you what was the problem, be open with it. If you are hesitant to speak, they will feel there is something shady and might become suspicious. Also you should not try to discredit your current supervisor, but you can try to explain why his/her expectations were not met.

If they still insist on contacting your current advisor, then let it be, there is not much more you can do.


How long after graduating can I use my former professor as a reference? A few years ago I graduated from a master program at a university. Since I since then has been working mainly in my own company and with granted projects, I don't have so many references from work life or post university activities, even though it's four years since I graduated.

When I apply for grants and jobs I am often asked for a reference, preferably a professor (which I have in my former professor) or a supervisor (which I don't have, since I'm not employed at a company).

How long is it "normal" to use your former professor as a reference when applying for grants and jobs?

There is no hard limit, other than the professor being alive.

Generally, it is useful to include only references that are relevant and can express something about your current abilities. So, if a professor can say something meaningful and relevant about you, even after a decade or more, then you can include them as a reference.

If, however, your abilities and skills have significantly changed in the respective area (e.g. you gained substantially more experience in this particular field), then the reference is outdated, and it is better not to include them.


Reference recent paper to join group? I'm in my second year at uni.
There's a professor whose group I want to get into. My question relates to what's appropriate to send in a "hey can I join" email.
For example, this man quite recently (in the last 7 months) published a paper relating surveying different search algorithm techniques to find ideal locations in a molecular lattice w/ xray diffraction (this is a made-up research topic for privacy haha).
I really like this approach and wanted to use similar techniques in my graduate studies. However, he's so far only published this paper based on it. Should I not mention my specific interest in my email?
Also in general, there are a few people at my school who explore a similar "scale" of physics as this man. I'm unsure about how much detail I'm meant to put in my emails. Are professors looking for someone who's completely in-tune to their specific subfield of the subfield, or do they expect "someone who wants to work with physics on this scale and thinks your papers are cool"? Obviously the former is preferred, but I'm wondering if the latter is the usual.
Thank you for reading.

Rather than explaining in the email why you would want to join this particular lab over any other lab, I would simply write an email that says something like

Dear Professor X, I'm in my second year at uni and I am considering
which group to join. I read your recent paper ABC and would love to
learn more about the work you and your group does. Do you maybe have
45min in the next week where we could chat about this in person?
Best, anon.jpg

EDIT: Anonymous Physicist just rightly pointed out that this is for an undergraduate study and not searching for a PhD lab as I had mistakenly assumed. I would still ask for a large enough amount of the profs time though to make the meeting worth while. In my eyes there is no point to meet for such a short time that another meeting would be required. So maybe ask for 30 minutes. If the prof won't find 30 min time, then I think this means this prof is too busy for undergrads in the lab.