Is PGCHE more valuable that PGCE? There have been a few questions relating to PGCHE certificates, including:

How is PGCHE by distance learning viewed relative to in-class?
What is the purpose of peer evaluation of teaching?
University Teaching Certifications for Different Countries

As far as I understand, the PGCHE is more specific to higher education (hence the HE). However, there is another more general PGCE which deals with education overall (not limited to higher education).

Given that the PCGHE is more specific, do faculty selection committees value the PGCHE as a 'better qualification' when hiring a lecturer or do they simply consider that someone has specific training in teaching and there is no significant difference? Does this vary by country?

In the UK community colleges are not part of the higher education system and the US equivalent of a small liberal arts colleges essentially do not exist. That means the vast majority of UK universities hire for "research excellence" and hiring committees are really only interested in if you can teach a needed module and that you will not be awful. The PGCE, unlike the PGCHE, would not satisfy any university requirements and therefore I don't think hiring committees would consider it at all.

As for the PGCHE, while many universities require new members of academic staff to obtain one, The universities that I am familiar with offer the PGCHE curriculum in house via the School of Education. Since it is presented to new staff as a hoop to jump through, I know of no one outside of university administrators and schools of education that think the PGCHE, in any form, is of value. Further, while I have seen many job adverts where a PGCHE is a "desirable" qualification, I have never seen one where it is "essential". During hiring, we briefly consider the presence/absence of a PGCHE, but never more than that.

Overall, I would say that the PGCE is useless for getting a job and the PGCHE is only marginally more valuable for being hired. As a PGCHE is. Requirement once you have the job, it may be beneficial in that it would make your first year, or two, easier since it is one less thing to do while you are drowning in new teaching, admin, and setting up a research agenda. The disadvantage of this is the PGCHE course was one place where I met new faculty members outside my school.


Is it plagiarism to copy formulations from others? As a non-native speaker of english, I often struggle with always finding new, well-sounding, non-repetitive descriptions for the same thing and I also, to be honest, find it a waste of time of always having to do something different. For example:

Section 1 describes the X while section 2 is about the Y.
The Z is explained in section 3 and section 4 refers to A. The next section is about B...

Is it ok to just copy the formulation of someone else (of course my X,Y,Z,... are completely different) and always use the same thing?

Sentence patterns are not intellectual property; otherwise, every author who wrote "To X or not to X" would be plagiarizing Shakespeare. (They are "riffing" off of him, but not plagiarizing!)

The example you are citing is perfectly innocuous, particularly since you are not doing anything more than summarizing the paper contents. The only thing that would make it wrong would be to copy those sentences directly from someone else's work.


Is it possible to remove an author's name after publication? If a paper was published with an author's name without that author's consent, what can be done about it?

It there a way to disassociate oneself with a published paper? is retraction the only way?
If the paper is retracted, does it still stay online and is associated with that author's name?

All journals that I've come across require the submitting author to certify that all authors have consented to publication. I would think that therefore if an author gets in touch with the publisher to indicate they have not given consent, the publisher would be forced not only to withdraw the paper, but also instigate investigations into misconduct.


Will reference letters from a researcher who does not have a Ph.D be valid? I'm applying to Ph.D. programs in the biomedical field in the US but I have a question regarding reference letters:
Can I request a reference letter from a co-worker that has no Ph.D. (instead has been working in a research institute for many years)  or a professor from my undergrad university (does not have a Ph.D. but has years of experience) and still be valid? Or should I request a reference letter just to researchers that have a Ph.D.?

You can, of course, request a reference letter from anyone. However, the point of having a reference letter is to speak to your ability to succeed in a research program. Because a PhD is a marker of having succeeded in the same program they're recommending you for, it is highly recommended that you get a letter from someone with a PhD.
If these researchers know you well, then their letters can be valuable, but you should make sure to get a letter from someone with a PhD, if you can.


Can we send our research paper to multiple journals at once? I have heard that if someone sends his paper to two different conferences and is somehow caught, then there would be severe consequences for the researcher.I did not know that before but I heard two supervisors talking about it yesterday.
So is it okay to send a research paper to different journals at once?( I am talking about sending to all,not publishing in all).
My field is computer science.

Short answer: No. Then to expand on the different aspects of your question, acceptable or not and effects:

It is generally not acceptable to send the same paper to two journals (in your question your title states "journals" but your text talks about "conferences", I will focus on journals). Typically you sign or agree to a statement that the work is not under consieration elsewhere when you submit work. If so then you are clearly violating an understanding you have agreed to. This does not prevent people from doing so. I have experienced (as editor/reviewer) a paper that was submitted to three journals at the same time.
There is no way to provide formal punishment if you break the rules but you will become "known" for this behaviour quite quickly and you do not want a bad reputation. Again, this does not prevent the problem from happening but I guess some authors think the world is too big for anyone to notice and prior to Internet and its search capabilities, this was probably at least partially true; now it is much easier to trace duplicates.

Your final commnet confuses me a bit. why would you send a paper to a journal if you do not intend to try to get it published there? If this is to get free feedback to improve the manuscript, I would strongly advice against such behaviour.

A final comment: I deliberately did not consider the case of a conference since all conferences may not lead to a publication, but then you would submit an abstract and not a complete manuscript.


How to cite the same source across an entire subsection of a thesis? My thesis is based on the application of a evaluation process. Therefore I want to add a subsection in the "Theoretical Background" chapter where I summarize the whole process. The process is described very well in an official (extensive) document so it is the only source I need to describe the steps of the process.

The problem is that it seems kind of awkward to cite the source 2 to 3 times per paragraph and several paragraphs in a row.

Considering that the whole subsection is based on this official document. What would be the best way to make the in-text citations?.

I am using IEEE reference style and my thesis is about Computer Science.

The following section summarizes the process as described by Smith [16, pp. 14-22].

Then summarize the process.


Research ethics and Google Forms/Survey Monkey I am currently an MBA student in a college in Western Europe. As part of our thesis, we need to do a piece of original research (fairly standard, I would assume). I had planned on using either Google Forms or Survey Monkey to collect the data from respondents. Apparently, the college is not happy that I use these tools, and would prefer for me to use in person interviews. This is problematical as I had hoped for a few hundred responses, which is obviously not possible to do in person.

As part of a compromise with the college, they have asked for additional ethics data on security of data, as well as ethics guidelines from other 3rd level educational institutions. A Google search does not bring up any ethical guidelines on using either tool for educational research.

My two questions are:

1) Is this a standard request, or should both of these tools be standard use for this process?
2) Are there any 3rd level educational instutions that have published ethical guidelines on the use of either Google Forms or Survey Monkey?

In Australia, human research is conducted under the National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Human Research [1] released by the National Health and Medical Research Council in 2007. Since the National Statement was released, the use of online survey tools has ballooned and Human Research Ethics Committees have been forced to acknowledge their use in research projects.

I am aware that Swinburne University has released advice to its staff about the use of the platform [2]. In addition, several other universities such as Deakin and Monash require that (1) the option to collect IP addresses be disabled and (2) that the recruitment of participants be undertaken outside of the SurveyMonkey platform (that is, cut and paste the survey link onto an email that you distribute separately from outside SurveyMonkey.)

You should note that SurveyMonkey itself has sought to address its relationship to HREC and IRB requirements [3].

I hope this help, despite the more than 18-month delay in my response.

Perhaps you can update us about your experience, thereby closing the loop somewhat.


What does it mean when someone says a discussion section is not "well-developed"? A reviewer of my paper told me that the discussion section is not well developed.

What does this mean? What should I work on to improve my discussion section?

If the reviewer says the Discussion section is not well developed, it suggests you either need to cover more of the elements that go there or go into greater depth on the things you do say there.

Carnegie Mellon has a nice handout about what different traditional elements of a paper should contain.

  Discussion sections contain the following moves:

  They summarize the main findings of the study.  This allows readers to skip to the beginning of the
  discussion section and understand the main “news” in the report.
  They connect these findings to other research
  They discuss flaws in the current study.
  They use these flaws as reasons to suggest additional, future research.
  (If needed) They state the implications of their findings for future policy or practice.

Further, if the Results section does not comment on the results, such as attempting to explain them and evaluating whether the results support the hypothesis, then that should be part of the Discussion.

Finally, as henning recommends, let a trusted colleague read the paper and ask for their suggestions for improving the discussion section.


How to deal with sensitive individual data in open science? I work with governmental register data, which includes sensitive information about individuals, and therefore cannot make datasets available to the public lest I risk violating the privacy of my subjects. Even though the data are anonymised, it contains information such as addresses and dates of medical prescriptions that should not be made public. I myself need to work inside a secure computer lab and don't have free access to these data. What are the possibilities for open science in this case?

Edit: My terms of use prohibit any sharing of the dataset with others not authorised to use the data. I am not allowed, in addition, to transfer the data from the computer where they are supposed to be analysed.

Great question! Unfortunately, I think there are not going to be great answers. Three ideas have come up in my discussions with users of registry data:

Describe data access procedures completely: Be as transparent as you possibly can be about how you acquired the data, how others can acquire them, and what the policies and costs associated with acquisition would be.

Show everything that you can: While you cannot share the raw data, you can likely share a considerable amount of information from the data. For example, you can include descriptive statistics and graphics that convey the univariate and multivariate patterns in the data. You may also be able to share certain aggregated statistics (e.g., data aggregated at a block or city level).

Offer to collaborate: You may have privileged access to data (i.e., other simply will not be able to access it). In that case, to the extent allowed by data access rules, you should offer the ability to run analyses for others and collaborate with them using the data. This would mean that even your critics can use the data in a meaningful public exchange of ideas, even if the data themselves cannot be made public.


Undergrad GPA: Will a C affect grad program application? I am currently in a public university (top 50 nationally, top 10 among public schools) for undergrad (3rd year), double majoring in operations research and economics. The past quarter I took 5 major courses because two of them were easy, and I ended up with 3 A's, an A- and a C. The C is a core math upper level course (real analysis serial B, about Riemann integral and Jordan regions) and the reason that I got the C is because of the professor's harsh policy that nearly 80% of students received C or worse grades. I planned to apply for master programs next year, and I am not pretty sure is that C a big problem to me? I am interested in master programs like applied economics, business analytics or finance.  My GPA overall now is 3.43 with operations research overall 3.2 and Econ 3.6. This is the first C on my transcript. Thanks!

The short answer is "yes". However, depending on the school you're applying at, they may use a holistic approach to your application, meaning the C could have a small negative impact. However, if it came down between you and another candidate and you're the one that has the C, the other candidate will most likely get accepted.


Grad school with 2.62 EE GPA. Does self study help? I'm highly interested in going to grad school in electromagnetics (eventually a Ph.D.) but for various reasons, most of which are my fault, and some aren't, I graduated with a horrible GPA. In short, my transcript sucks.

My initial attempt to get around this was that if that I do extra-curricular research that is impressive/relevant enough, it will at some point outweigh the GPA and let someone consider working with me.

I volunteered at a professor's lab for a year (not interested in his field, but it was the best opportunity I found). I studied on my own for an average of 4hrs/day on online grad course material for about 2 years and can say that I now have a somewhat solid understanding of the field, comfortable reading and understanding published papers, wrote my FDTD solver, as well as other self-study projects that are directly relevant to the field. Left my full time software job after 2 years to fully devote myself to this cause because I didn't want to waste more time.

After almost 3 years from graduation, I started contacting potential supervisors but never heard back positively (aside from a professor stating that her work is Chemistry and not EE based and stating that my background is "super interesting" which might be just a compliment.)

My question is, will this approach get me anywhere? I'm confident that my background in the field will consistently get better the more I keep doing this, but what if it is a dead-end as far as graduate admissions are concerned?

EDIT (with GRE information):

My GRE scores are slightly above average, 158 quant. and 156 verbal.

I did pretty awesome at my job, in fact I was called the "brightest person in the company" by my supervisor, and the "smartest person in the team" by a VP. That team including two fellow classmates that graduated with distinction.

However, I quit because I felt I was wasting my life doing something I didn't like. I tried getting a job exactly my field of interest (electromagnetics/optics) but I wasn't successful.

The push for grad school is because I believe my horrible grades are not a reflection of my ability, and are at least partly due to mistakes that I have learned from. The other part is rampant cheating and serious unprofessionalism on part of some of the professors, but I don't like stressing that part as I believe owning my mistakes is far better than blaming others.

I truly find myself in doing research work, contributing to the field I like, and I'm willing to do whatever it takes to get there.

Grad school with a 2.62

You may need to accept grad school is not in your future.  At least not in your near future.  Exactly why do you want to go to grad school?  Have you considered starting a company working in a field you're passionate about?

If you really want to go to grad school, here is what I'd do.

1) Stay at your current company and get raises and promotions.  Be sure to stay in touch with everyone who praised your work.

2) Make sure you have a very concrete reason why your GPA will be a lot higher.  Having a few good semesters won't cancel out years of bad grades.

3) Get your company to pay for it

4) Make sure your GREs are AWESOME!


What are the various designations/stages in the academic career of the person In context of a person's academic profile in a web application, I need to broadly classify the various degree/designations/stages in the academic career of the person.

For example I would like to clearly know what is the current stage the person , in his academic career path starting from a pre-university student & progressing ahead.

So I would like to classify something like (below) & ask user to select one of these designations:

Edited:

Pre-university student

Undergraduate(Bachelors/diploma/associate degree) student
-doing
-earned

Masters student
-doing
-earned

PhD(Doctorate) studs
-doing
-earned

Postdoc

Faculty

Scientist

Independent researcher

Does this cover most of the stages/designations in the academic career or is anything missing ? Is there a better term to represent any one ?

Update:

I don't really need a fine grained classification like assistant prof, associate prof, etc but I do want to include all the academic community & related people who have interests in academic topics(which includes scientists or self learners as well) & ranging from university student to faculty, independent researcher or whatever are the higher positions. May not be necessarily a hierarchical list but at least an exhaustive list is needed.

Update 2:

Another idea was too use classification which includes people from academia & even outside that work on/ explore  academic topics & removing ambiguity between faculty, scientist & research positions . Something like this:

    -> A Learner/ enthusiast,

    -> Pre-university student

    University/Research Students:
    ================================

        -> Undergraduate(Bachelors/diploma/associate degree) student
            -doing
            -earned

        -> Masters student
            -doing
            -earned

        -> Doctorate(PhD, DPhils, etc) student
            -doing
            -earned

    University Faculty/Research Positions:
    ==================

        ->  Professor
        ->  Associate Professor
        ->  Assistant Professor
        ->  Lecturer
        ->  Emeritus
        ->  Other

        -> PostDoc,

    -> Scientist

    -> IndependentResearcher

Like EngergyNumbers said, you should tailor your classification to the culture of your targeted audience. This list of academic ranks for various countries might be helpful for that.

Also, "Scientist" and "Researcher" doesn't really mean anything. A postdoc, assistant professor, principal investigator, or someone doing research in the commercial sector can be a scientist or a researcher.

I think you know this but just in case: "postdoc" is an (often) temporary job that people take up after obtaining a PhD, and not a qualification. Some people do not do postdocs, and go directly into teaching, industry or become assistant professors after getting their PhD.

Finally, "Post Grad" can refer to both masters degree or PhD students. It is common to say "applying to graduate/grad school" to when referring to applying to a PhD course.


Bad score in IELTS, should I send it anyway? A graduate program I'm applying for in mathematics requires fluency in English but didn't set the lower bound for the IELTS score. I'm very good at English but I went to the test unprepared and got severe headache during the test, couldn't complete some tasks so I got 6.
5.5: reading, listening and writing.
7: speaking
But in reality I can do better. My BSc. thesis is well-written so my question is, if I sent my IELTS score would it be a sign of weakness in my application?
It would be very difficult to take another test before the deadline of the application process but not impossible though.

If IELTS scores are required, I recommend you to send them anyway. But from your question I understood that it isn't obligatory, so I suggest you rather not to send them or to take an exam one more time because it can be a sign of weakness in your application.


Why do some universities require use of approved suppliers? Some universities in the UK require that all purchases from budget available to researchers happen through one or more authorized suppliers. They tend to be strict in this regard, even though some equipment might not be available or the price of it might be higher than elsewhere.

What is the rationale behind this policy?

I fail to see any. If university where concerned with financial control then allowing outside purchase should make no difference, as they would still have to be approved by the administrative personal. If they are concerned with providing adequate IT support this might be done as well, just under a different contract with the supplier.

Some universities can get a better deal from a supplier by promising them to buy exclusively, or to buy sufficiently much from them
It is easier for the accounting department to deal with the same provider, since they can re-use the same documents.
Dealing with a new provider has a certain degree of risk, including the quality of products, the timeliness of delivery, etc. If you deal with the same provider, you acquire enough information to feel yourself in control.


Doing PhD on computer vision with an engineering background I'm coming from an electrical engineering / telecommunications background; I studied extensively in hardware-related areas and took lots of courses in wireless communications and signal processing. Although I took several classes in signal processing, some image processing courses, and some classes in mathematics (e.g. calculus, linear algebra, probability) during my bachelor's and master's studies, I lack the typical computer science background where one is exposed to courses like data structures, algorithms, and specialized software engineering courses. I also never took a formal computer vision course at the university.

I recently developed a passion for computer vision, and I'm convinced that it is the right path where I would like to develop myself, publish, and obtain a PhD degree. I'm planning on building an academic career around computer vision. However, when I look at and go through the papers from top-tier academic computer vision conferences such as CVPR, ECCV and ICCV, I realized that although I can follow most of the arguments and math in the papers, I certainly need some fundamental academic knowledge on computer vision if I want to produce such publications myself. Based on my technical abilities, I don't think that creating the necessary (research) software would be the main problem but rather, coming up with the algorithms and making effective use of the building blocks of computer vision would be very challenging for me. Especially, some necessary techniques from machine learning and optimization are not very familiar to me. Moreover, although I have some up-to-date knowledge about the recent methods such as deep learning with convolutional neural networks, I do not really know the working details of the older, classic algorithms (e.g. SIFT, SURF, HOG) that could have many applications under different branches of vision.

Considering my background, how would you recommend me to proceed on my way to doing research on computer vision? More concretely, should I first go through a full computer vision course online (unfortunately, since I'm not at a university, I can't go on and attend to a real lecture), or should I first try to fill the wholes in my more fundamental knowledge such as machine learning, optimization, and matrix computations/linear algebra? Another (more practical) possibility would be to go through an OpenCV book such as this one, and develop an all-around working knowledge more quickly. I'm more apprehensive about this approach since I'm afraid it would not give me the more solid theoretical knowledge that I need to be able to come up with creative solutions to computer vision problems. How do you think one should approach to the balance between practical and theoretical knowledge from a beginner's point of view?

My second question is: How can I find an interesting problem in a certain subfield of computer vision, which I could take on as a PhD topic? I have already figured out that I'm more interested in the semantic understanding of images/videos rather than geometrical or 3D scene modelling. For example, I like problems such as multiple person tracking and pedestrian detection. However, I'm having a hard time coming up with a concrete research problem that I will devote my attention to and bring together in the end as a coherent PhD thesis. This confusion is mostly caused by the lack of a supervision from an experienced researcher, since I don't yet have an official supervisor/professor who would give me a research topic. I know that is unusual, and makes one question whether obtaining a PhD is feasible at all in my current research environment, but that is just how the things are. Unfortunately, in my situation, it is hard to approach a professor without any concrete research proposal and even some initial results in hand.

Thank you for your time and kind interest, and I apologize for any possibly vague parts in my question. I would be happy to clarify and elaborate.

Firstly, I would definitely recommend taking an online course (a commenter mentioned one from Coursera, and EdX also has some good ones as well) associated with a reputable university. Taking some kind of structured course designed to build a fundamental understanding of the topics and math involved is a great way to jump in and get started.

Once you do that, you'll know where the biggest gaps in your preexisting knowledge are, and you can address those with books/resources covering the theory and math involved, and other resources involving the practical application of what you want to do.

Since you mentioned in interest in pedestrian tracking, a topical and interesting thesis question could concern pedestrian tracking by an autonomous car, and an algorithm for reading "clues" from pedestrian motion to detect what they are likely to do next so that the car can make a choice about whether to slow, stop, or keep going and monitoring the situation. (Just an idea, but there's tons of practical applications for being able to track things).

Once you gather some fundamental information, and know what direction you want to go in, you would probably be in a position to start talking to some professors. If you can demonstrate that you understand the concepts involved, that you have an idea about what you want to research, and that you're serious about doing what it takes to be successful, most professors would be willing to listen and advise you from that point forward. The idea you bring to the table at this point does not have to be your final research idea, but bringing something realistic that you're interested in allows you to both show that you're serious about the research, and also to have a starting point for coming up with a final research plan with input from an experienced researcher.


Is it usual that a master’s program refuses to reveal graduation percentage? I’m preparing to apply for two master’s programs. For one of the programs, I asked an advisor how many people graduate each year.

I asked because of the 350 people who apply each year about 120 are admitted. (It’s an online master’s.) This is a very high number to me, especially when compared to the other program I’m considering. So it makes me curious how many people actually graduate, which also can give me insight into competition in the workforce.

She told me they don’t keep records of graduate numbers because it fluctuates from year to year.

This sounds extremely fishy to me. Is this a common practice for master’s programs?

The comments above are all correct that this information is available and you have every reason to want it. In reality, it may simply be that the person you are asking does not have ready access to this information, especially if you are contacting a grad director or some kind of advisor. She could manually do the calculation (or, better, should make a habit of compiling it each year so she can answer such questions).  I have directed grad programs and can say that I have access to applications in our online system, so I could tell you how many applied and were admitted, but if I want to know graduation rates, I have to track down each student myself and find out. At the university level, this is probably more straightforward and you can get a rate, but it might not be broken down by program.

So, it may not be fishy. On the other hand, that adviser should know how it is perceived, and should compile the information each year. If it is a university with an entirely online curriculum, it would raise a red flag for me. Especially if it is a for-profit online university. But if it is a major on-campus university with an online offering, it may just be what I described in the first paragraph.


I'm 2 months into my PhD. When can I ask my supervisor about the rejected candidates? I was recently accepted for a PhD position after going through the application process of submitting the usual documents (CV, motivation letter,...) as well as an interview.

I have heard, from my now colleagues, that during the application process, my supervisor had mentioned that I had come across as very motivated.

I am curious however, if there is ever a good time (say after one has established a rapport with one's supervisor) to ask about the other candidates who fell short? Or is it something quite taboo?

You can ask, but it's really none of your business.  Admissions committee deliberations are generally treated as confidential.  Asking about the other candidates and why they were rejected will almost certainly be seen as intrusive.  It's the kind of thing that's likely to cause them to wonder how they made the mistake of choosing you over all those other candidates who would likely have known better than to ask that question.


Student "self-plagiarism" What shall I do with a student who self-plagiarized large parts of one of his previous work (for another class and another professor) for my own assignment (without stating it)?

Is it fair, considering he obviously chose to work on the same topic but without telling me that it was the case? I guess it happens all the time among students, to "recycle" like this...

Best

This issue has undoubtedly come up before, and your university probably has an explicit policy in place for how to deal with it.  For example, Harvard's policy says:

  It is the expectation of every course that all work submitted to it will have been done solely for that course. If the same or similar work is to be submitted to any other course, the prior written permission of the instructor must be obtained. If the same or similar work is to be submitted to more than one course during the same term, the prior written permission of all instructors involved must be obtained. A student who submits the same or similar work to more than one course without such prior permission is subject to disciplinary action, and ordinarily will be required to withdraw from the College.

Similarly, Yale's policy says:

  Students may not submit the same paper, or substantially the same paper, in more than one course. If topics for two courses coincide, a student must have written permission from both instructors before either combining work on two papers or revising an earlier paper for submission to a new course.

In particular, you should not improvise a response, unless you find out for sure that there is definitely no official policy (strange but possible).  If there is a policy, then it will specify what the rules are and how they should be enforced.


A long gap between BSc and MSc when applying for PhD My BSc was in physics and graduated with GPA 2.46/4.00 about 12 years ago. I am 33 years old now and I have got an admission to a master program in mathematics in Armenia (as an international student). The department didn't care about that my BSc that was in another field, that my GPA is very low and there is a 12-year gap between my BSc and MSc. [my low GPA is mainly due to not being present in the classes and also missing some midterm exams and quizzes; my grades are normally either near 4.0 (when attending was not mandatory with one exam assessment) or between 1.0-2.0 (for otherwise) and rarely between 2.1-3.7.]

My story is that I loved physics since childhood and even used to study university books when I was in highschool. However suddenly everything changed when I 16 when my father died so I had to take the responsibility to support my family. Nonetheless at the same time tried and tried to keep my dream of becoming a great physicist alongside of spending lots of time working to support my family (we don't get any money from the government in my country); and that extreme desire for becoming a ('the') great physicist when the circumstances were the worst caused me a severe mental break down and being hospitalized too (it was about 5 years ago)..

Afterwards I couldn't think about physics anymore because it was making me sick. It took me a few years my mind to be repaired (=being recovered) and I started studying mathematics instead but this time I had a much better financial circumstances and I could finished by self-learning all BSc and MSc books that I would need to know them in my studies in MSc.

After finishing my MSc I want to continue my studies in top universities esp. in Canada. I have a strong belief that I will have a high GPA and good research results in my MSc; however my low GPA in BSc and a huge gap between BSc and MSc and also being my BSc in physics irrelevant to mathematics that I want to study in PhD makes things less hopeful when I want to apply for PhD especially if I desire to get an admission with scholarship.

If I write about my strong enthusiasm for science then I have to say my period of mental breakdown too and if I don't say about my enthusiasm they should probably consider someone who has started and finished young with better and relevant BSc.. I am sure that some universities in Canada ask for BSc transcripts as well as MSc when applying for PhD.

Please help me what should I do when there is much less hope even if I can show a dramatic results in MSc. Thanks!

You do what you can with what you have. You have a record with some pluses and some minuses. That won't change. What you need is an explanation for why your record is what it is but that also suggests that you will be successful in future studies as the obstacles are behind you.

In many universities there is an opportunity to personalize the application through interviews and other communication. Contact with a specific professor with whom you wish to work is often possible - and even preferred in some places. Having an idea about what it is that you want to study/research in a doctoral program is helpful.

But in general, the time between degrees isn't a big problem. The low GPA in early studies isn't a huge problem if it is overbalanced by better performance in recent work. Having goals and good work habits is a definite plus. Knowing enough about a field to begin research relatively soon is very positive. Do what you can with what you have. Focus on the positives, not the negatives.


Possibly, quick acceptance for publication Two days ago, a physics journal received my manuscript and today they informed me that the editor and reviewer accepted my manuscript for publication. this is the first time for me publishing a manuscript, but two days, isn't that quick?
and they told me that I will pay around 700 Euros for the first installment.
I really need your advice here, I am afraid of getting screwed.

It is very unusual for a paper to be reviewed and get accepted in two days. Of course, there are some exceptions such as:

Solution to a very well known and long studied problem (even in this case, it is highly unlikely for the review process to be completed in 2 days).
Dramatically improving the conditions of a current crisis (e.g. a vaccine for COVID-19 outbreak)
Very short

Other than these extreme cases, I, personally would not choose to publish in that journal, let alone pay for the publication.

Also, you can check this famous list for future considerations.


How to reply to reviewers on an unintentional wrong proof in my research paper? I submitted a research paper and the reply has come back. The reviewers are positive overall, but one of them pointed out a flaw in one of my proofs. This happened because I made a wrong assumption regarding the proof. Now I have found a way to get around this and have a better proof. How do I present that my previous proof was wrong, the reviewer was right in saying so, and that now I have a better one?

If the reviewers and subsequently the editor does not consider the error enough to warrant rejection, you should simply make the changes necessary and submit the revised manuscript according to instructions. Since the reviewers spotted the errors you should acknowledge their helpful comments (unless this is not the custom in the field for some reason).

It seems to me that you may be lucky to get the chance to revise the manuscript since the type of error you describe, I would think, would likely lead to rejection. But, with a favourable verdict you just revise the manuscript and return it as per instructions.


Which year do I use for an in-text APA citation? The first year is when the data was collected: 2013
The second year is when the paper was written: 2015
The third year is when the paper was published: 2017

"In total, 121 women and 61 men completed the experiment over the course of several months across 2013." is where I am getting the 2013 from, so if I was to say, in a study conducted in 2013, blah blah blah, very specific to the data itself, and I do an in-text citation in APA format, which year do I use?

It needs to be the year of publication in the in-text citation (same for the reference at the end of the paper). This is backed up by the Purdue OWL:

  When using APA format, follow the author-date method of in-text citation. This means that the author's last name and the year of publication for the source should appear in the text, for example, (Jones, 1998), and a complete reference should appear in the reference list at the end of the paper.

https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_the_basics.html

If the date the survey was conducted is important then you should definitely mention it in the surrounding text like you’re doing.

Due to the fact that writing a paper then going through peer review takes time, it’s not unusual to see some delay between the date the experiment was done and the date the paper was published. Even though this does seem like a bigger gap than usual, I probably wouldn’t even question it if I was reading it.


Can one prevent a co-author from publishing on arXiv without consent? This is very much related to a previous question I posted here: How can one prevent a co-author from publishing without consent? It is not the same question though.

Consider a situation where a co-author submits a paper without your consent to arXiv. This seems to be more problematic than them submitting it to a journal, because on arXiv it is published (almost) immediately and there does not seem to be an easy way to stop it, and also arXiv does not ask about consent from all co-authors.

It does not seem to be illegal to do this because the co-author has copyright as well and so it seems that legally they could grant a non-exclusive license to share the work. However, it does seem to go against the principles of academic honesty to publish without the consent of all co-authors (and that would include IMHO publication on a non-refereed source like arXiv.)

It does not seem possible to remove papers from the arXiv.

The question is then if there is a way to prevent it beforehand. Assume the co-author is not malicious, but simply a bit slack, so they would be willing to cooperate after it is found out (though if there is a way to prevent even malicious actors from doing this that would be even better).

If it is not possible to prevent it, is it possible to remove one's name from an arXiv article if one does not endorse the paper submitted?

I am aware that the best means is having a good relationship and communication with the co-author in the first place, but I would like to ask what other practical means there are.

To show this is not a completely made-up scenario, here are two examples of papers withdrawn from the arXiv due to this issue: http://arxiv.org/abs/0810.4310v2 and http://arxiv.org/abs/1307.4296

Once an author has put their work into the public domain, it is very difficult to rescind it. All of the authors still have rights to the works, like attribution or trademark, but not copyright since that was given up as part of uploading to arXiv. So it might be impossible to force arXiv's hand with any legal tool where both of you are co-authors of the works. You do have one option though, but it's not pleasant...

If the co-author claimed joint-ownership over some part of the paper that you can prove (or they will agree) that they do not have rights to, then the works was illegally shared with arXiv, and arXiv have a duty to take it down if you DMCA it. The key is that you have to be sole owner of the copyright, and not shared ownership. Since you never personally signed off on the publication, that should be fairly easy to put forward. I don't know what arXiv says about this though, since their may be a fee for the co-author for retracting the paper - which I suppose you could both share, and i think you should, since arguably you should have done more to prevent a communications error like this ever arising in the first place.

Finally, may i just add, that this would not be illegal, but it would go against the principles of academic honesty...


How often should I review my notes? Many years ago I was studying with the Open University. During that time I bought a revision aid. The basic principle was that you wrote out all you knew about a topic immediately after learning it. The note pages were marked so that they could be referenced against a sort of calendar. The idea was that you read through your notes something like the next day, again a week later and again something like 4 weeks later.

I recall that the thinking was that the frequency set coincided with the way your brain moves stuff from short- to long-term memory.

I'm just about to start studying again and I wondered if anyone might know what the frequency for reviewing one's notes might have been.

There are several algorithms for scheduled repetition of information on flash cards. It's possible that the software you liked uses one of these. This Wikipedia article on spaced repetiton discusses Pimsleur's graduated-interval recall and Leitner system, among others. This isn't the easiest topic to search for, but the Wikipedia article calls it "spaced repetition", and includes a list of alternative names. That should help you do further research.


How to withdraw a paper (under review) from fake journal I have sent two research papers to an open-access journal. It seems a very good journal. One of my papers sent back to me for a minor revision (the condition for accepting my paper is the quality of the revision). The second paper is now under review. I just found that the publisher is fake. Hence, I would like to withdraw my papers. I could not find any way to withdraw my papers from the journal website. What should I do? I did not send the revised manuscript to the journal.

Simply let the editors know that you withdraw your submission. Tell them that you do not grant them any right whatsoever to internally keep or externally distribute that paper.
Publishing occurs on the basis of a bilateral contract. If one of the parties – in this case: you – does not agree with the agreement's core performance (here: the publication), there is no contract. No obligation arose for you.
Things, however, may get complicated: It is possible that the publisher will claim that a contract was initiated through your submission (and with the help of some hidden agreements and terms of services). In this case, you can argue that entering into that agreement occured "under a mistake as to a matter of fact essential to the agreement". Make sure to list any evidence that would qualify that publisher as predatory, that is, any evidence through which you were misled about their identity. In many laws around the world, there are explicit provisions about contracts being voidable if it was agreed upon under an erroneous belief about the identity of the contract partner.
But let's hope that no argument will arise. Otherwise it would help to know which publisher you are talking about, and which country's law is applicable in your case.


Is it acceptable to use mainly websites in a literature review? I'm writing a literature review for a project and due to the nature of the project (website and database) I haven't used any books etc. I have used a number of websites to get information on subjects such as hosting a website and a database using Azure, is it acceptable to use websites in a literature review?

Website or not website is not the point. Printed journal articles are favored over website because i) they are peer-reviewed, carrying some degree of authority, ii) they are archived and retrievable, with payment or free of charge, and iii) once published, the contents do not change until they are formally revised, rebuked, or retracted.

So, it would mean that when citing websites, a few more steps need to be done to increase their worthiness. First, you'd need to assess the credibility of the website and be able to critically evaluate the contents. In journal articles this step is done to some degree but in websites you're on your own. Second, you may need to do most of the archiving (including downloading, dating, and archiving the data sets you may download, or printing and dating website into PDFs, etc.) or use website archiving to save a cross-section of the websites. There are free services like http://perma.cc and http://www.webcitation.org available.

Once they are archived, in your paper, it is a good practice to cite both original link and the archived link as well as the date you accessed the original link. For details, consult the project leader or editor. Some journals specialized in publishing Internet-related research such as Journal of Medical Internet Research may also provide useful format-related examples in their guide to the authors.


Minor correction of In Press article I noticed an obvious minor mistake in an in-press article. It is related to the description of symbols in an equation, but it does not alter the rest of the manuscript in any way (they were used properly in the rest of the manuscript). Also, any attentive reader could note (and fix) it.

Should I contact to the editor or what to do?

EDIT: I also thought in contact directly to the editorial team due to the smallness of the changes.

If your article is in press, don't contact the editorial board. Their role of handling peer review is over. What's left is for the publisher to publish the paper, and they're the ones who can fix this. You can fix this, and any other minor issues you find, when you receive the proofs from the publisher.


Does it matter how many Nth authors there are on a literature review? I am a student hoping to kick start my research career (biochemistry). I hope to start a PhD in the coming months and in the meantime have drafted a review which I hope to submit in the next few weeks.
I was wondering if it is important how many second/third/etc authors there are on the paper? At the moment I would have had 3 other people contribute/proof-read my review (including our PI), and potentially a 4th. When it comes to job hunting later on, or becoming a reputable researcher, would they check to see how many other authors worked on this review, or would it only matter that I am first author and the quality of the paper itself? In other words, is the lower the number of authors on a review the better, or does it not matter?

Whether a review has one, two or more authors does not really matter in biochemistry, but being first author is useful, and so is a good quality paper that gets cited. It will be very helpful for your career to build a network and show your skills, and a good way to do so is to collaborate on a review.
Buffy's comment is also correct: authors should contribute intellectually to a paper to earn authorship.
I don't mean to discourage you, but unless you are an exceptionally talented student and scientific writer, you probably need help from someone who has experience writing and publishing reviews to get your work accepted.
Most people would agree that there is a difference between a review written by 1-5 authors and one by 20 authors (if those exist - I do not remember reading one). And of course there are always the rare exceptions of readers who value single author papers more (you did everything yourself), or who may prefer multiple-author papers (you can collaborate).


Should papers try to be self-contained? I gave my supervisor a paper draft today. They told me that I need to cut out the 5 pages of appendices that give all the equations (along with references of their original sources) needed for reproducing the results found in the main text.

My supervisor's argument was that papers should not be self-contained but rather that papers should direct readers to the different sources that came up with these equations. My supervisor went on to say that others might think I am trying to steal their future citations by attempting to have people cite my paper for a formula that someone else came up with (even though I provide attribution for the formula).

In my particular case, I am submitting to a journal with no page limits, albeit there are page charges that my supervisor will pay for.

Obviously, I am going to do what my advisor says for this paper. However, is this the general advice that I should carry with me throughout my career?

There is no hard and fast rule on whether to include calculations in papers that have appeared in other papers. It is a judgment call on the part of the author. For my papers, I have sometimes included these equations (either in the main body of the paper or in the appendix) sometimes I have omitted them and directed the reader to the bibliography, and sometimes I have just provided a brief sketch of the argument.

The reason to include them is because sometimes they are convenient for the reader. The main reason to exclude them are because they detract from the focus of the paper. As an extreme example, if your important new ideas in a paper take up 3-4 pages, it is strange to include 50 pages of previously published calculations, say, even if it is in an Appendix. It makes it harder for me as a reader to understand exactly what is the main point of your paper, and I might get the impression that the authors are adding fluff to make their contribution seem more important than it is. You want to keep your novel, important ideas at the forefront of your paper.

And don't discount the page length: even if they are no explicit page limits in a journal, you generally want to convey your idea in as few pages as possible. First of all, is the possibility that potential readers might be discouraged from reading your paper if it seems too long. Secondly, journals do hold longer articles to higher standards. When I was submitting to the top ranked journal in my field (which had no explicit page limits) we were told by a senior professor that our idea was worth publishing there if we could keep it under 30 pages, and probably not worth publishing there if it hit 40. In other words, there was a sense where our idea was not worth wasting 40 pages worth of someone's time, although it was worth wasting 30 pages worth of someone's time.

In summary, papers don't necessarily have to be self-contained, and how much to include previous work is a judgment call on the part of the author. I will add that as a student, it is probably best to defer to the advisor when making these judgment calls, as the advisor will be more familiar with the conventions and culture of your research area.


Is it acceptable to ask a professor who is not your supervisor to give you M.S. thesis topic? I'm currently a M.S. student. My supervisor give me freedom to choose thesis topic. Since it is so hard for me, I decide to ask another professors whom I consider to be their PhD candidates in future. I have written an email to ask them.
Is it a good idea to do so? And is my email appropriate for this purpose?

  Dear Professor xxx,

  I am a M.S. student at University of xxx-the most prestigious university in xxx- with a major in information technology- multimedia systems. I will graduate on September 2016.
  I had the chance to read your publications and some of your articles. I really enjoyed them, and it gave me many ideas for my future research. Due to my strong interest in your research area and considering the experience I have gained from my relevant courses, I believe I can be a beneficial part of your research group, if I get a chance.
  Since I haven't chosen the topic of my M.S. Thesis, I prefer to ask you to give me some information about the topics you are currently working on, in order to get a higher chance to be your PhD student in future.
  I know you’re very busy so I appreciate any time you can give me.

  Thanks very much,
  Sincerely,
  xxx

I occasionally get emails along these lines, and I am almost never thrilled. The sole exception where I would consider this case is if I know (a) the student personally and think (s)he is good, and/or (b) I know the advisor personally, and (s)he recommended the student this model. In all other cases, my response would be negative.

What you need to be aware of is that a master student who is actually somebody else's student, and who presumably even sits physically remote, is a risk on so many levels. You have no idea how good the person is. You have no idea whether (s)he actually works or is just procrastinating between status updates. You have basically no leverage, so if you assume the student is not working hard or is involved in unethical behavior (e.g., rigging the data), you can do pretty much nothing except pull out of the cooperation. You have no idea whether the person's actual advisor is fine with this, or will start sabotaging the agreement when (s)he figures out that her/his student is actually working with somebody else. It is even unclear what the implications for the student are - maybe her/his university does not even accept a thesis primarily supervised by somebody outside of the institution. And even if all goes well, you are still supervising a student in somebody else's name (i.e., doing the work of somebody else).

All these things considered - would you invest one of your good ideas, or, even worse, your limited time supervising such a student?


Two professors declined to write LOR for me because they are busy? I had my M.A. degree in a public university in the States. After working in media for two years in China, I want to pursue research and teaching career so I started to plan for PhD in media psychology (under communication).

I had my GRE tested (the last one has expired) in Sept and got good scores. But due to my heavy workloads and procrastination, I hesitated to contact two professors who instructed my thesis and know me relatively well until I finished SOP in November. After a week, with my follow-up letter, both of them refused to write me strong LOR.

My thesis advisor said "as the Director of PhD studies I am unable to write letters this year."And he suggested me to ask the other instructor.

But the other one replied: "It is good to hear from you and nice to hear that you are applying to doctoral programs. Part of the reason that I was so delayed in my response is that I am a bit overwhelmed with work right now.  Given all of my existing demands,  unfortunately I do not think I am in a position to give the time and effort to write you a strong recommendation. I am sorry about this."I discussed about possibility of pursuing PhD with him when I took his seminar, but he was not very encouraging.

But reading between the lines (especially "part of the reason"), I feel like they are not confident that I will succeed as a researcher. I asked my thesis advisor for more feedbacks like whether he thought I am less than qualified and where to improve and if I should take another M.A in Psychology. But he did not reply.  ：（

I know to a large degree it's my ill plan to blame. But I am not certain if they are making excuses and whether to ask them for LOR next year. Is it often for faculty to refuse LOR because they don't see your potential with other excuses?

There's a chance they're trying to avoid writing the LOR because they don't think they can write one that's good enough to help you.

If an instructor can't write an LOR they think will actually help a student based on what they know to be the truth (even if only because they don't think they know you well enough), most instructors will try to encourage the student to go to someone else.  No one likes writing a bad reference.  But they also struggle with how to do that without hurting the student's feelings.  Some just won't tell you the bad news directly and they may foot-drag and hope you go away or they may make silly excuses about being busy or whatever.  That's spineless and it's not right, but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

So, if you ask someone for an LOR and they don't seem to want to do it, you should probably just ask someone else.


Chances of getting in at a world top 50 graduate school for Economics with a C+ in Calculus II? My GPA (Economics) at the moment is 3.7 but I have a terrible grade on Calculus II (C+)- the reason being that Calculus II clashed with another mandatory course of mine, and I couldn't attend most of the Calculus II lectures (furthermore, the Calc II Professor refused to accept my homework since I wasn't attending all the lectures, and all the grade weight fell on my final exam- most people who attended the lectures got super nice grades; also, the homework problems for that course were easy). On the other hand, I have perfect scores on all of my other Math and Statistics courses that did not have clashes. Furthermore, I will probably have my name on 4 papers by the time I graduate next year (please note that I have made significant contributions to the paper, and it's not just "some helping out on the research and my Profs. are too kind" thing). Apologies for the lengthy question.

If you don't get in to a great school it won't be because of a single grade. More likely it would be that there is so much competition from good candidates for very few actual positions.

In almost every place you apply people will look at your whole record and how you present it in the application materials. It is up to you to make your case. But you will need to make it well, showing that your background gives you the basis and your goals are appropriate and attainable.

It is possible that a few schools with a small staff and too many applicants may have to depend more on counting up chits than most, but it is possible to make your case even there.

But I wouldn't stress the low grade and the reasons for it initially. Give the explanation if asked, but don't put a spotlight on it.

Oh, and it probably isn't a good idea to self describe as a "dunce" in any application. But you know that, of course.

Let me say a few words here for the benefit of future readers. I worry more about an applicant with a perfect record than one with a few flaws. Nearly everyone will eventually reach a point in which things aren't easy anymore and have to deal with struggling through hard problems. If they have never experienced anything close to failure before then, when the going gets tough, they may just collapse. I've seen this happen.

I was lucky to get my struggles behind me early so learned how to work hard for success. One of my sisters totally outshone me in school, but found college a struggle as she hadn't learned that lesson. I was the turtle, but pulled ahead in the end. She wasn't lazy, like the hare in the story, but just hit a wall she couldn't seem to push through.


Should I revise and resubmit? I have just received a decision letter for my submitted manuscript to an Elsevier journal. It was a revise and resubmit (R&R). Two reviewers comments were included in the decision letter. One of the reviewers suggested minor revisions. The other reviewer on the other hand recommended rejection and his comments were really unfair. Evidently, he hasn't bothered reading the manuscript completely.
I am really disappointed and don't really know how to even respond to his comments. what do you recommend me to do? I am really frustrated.

Most journal articles are often a revise and resubmit before they get published.The final article that you see in journals is often never the first submission attempt but rather, crafted through continuous revising and editing.

You should revise and resubmit, you would be doing yourself a disfavour if you don't.

The editors had two very contrasting reviewers for your piece, one who suggested a minor revision and the other an outward reject, so a Revise and Resubmit is a pretty good outcome from that, but also highlights a stark contrast of views.

When you receive harsh comments, it's good to take a step back for a few days and let the anger and frustration that you undoubtedly feel to disappear. At the moment you might feel like it's a bit of a personal attack, and have used language such as 'it's unfair' and 'he hasn't read the article completely.' These are emotional responses and are not helpful for your success.

Why are the comments unfair and how can you determine whether they've read the article completely?

When you are ready, sit down and read them with fresh eyes, highlighting what you can do to improve the article. There will be things in there (difficult to find) that you can utilise to strengthen the quality of your article. You don't have to address everything the second reviewer says but you might be surprised that once those personal feelings die down, the number of things you might find helpful from that second reviewer.

When you do your revision, you'll need to prepare a summary report regarding all the comments, highlighting what you changed, and what you didn't. The things you do not change you provide justification for in your summary report.

You would be surprised by the number of academics who never bother to revise and resubmit a paper to a journal, the numbers are outstanding. Revising and resubmitting allows for you to continue to improve your ideas and produce something of high quality.


How to best approach literature with low information content for good retention My question relates to a certain type of opaque pseudo-technical prose that unfortunately is so pervasive in management literature. Authors with this kind of writing style like to make completely arbitrary distinctions between imaginary concepts which are devoid of any internal logical structure, inconsistent throughout the literature even within individual sources, and of highly questionable empirical value. Because of the low information density of such literature, I find it very difficult to retain and it is frustrating me to tears.

How can I approach this kind of literature in a way that allows for satisfactory information retention?

Again the most important characteristics:

Extremely low information density
Complete lack of academic wit
Inconsistent use of unclear terminology throughout
Distinctions which are introduced only to be violated
High noun-to-verb ratio which obstructs flow

To give you an example from a 'leading' textbook in this field:

  The financial perspective specifies the financial performance objectives anticipated from pursuing the organisation's strategy and also the economic consequences of the outcomes expected from achieving the objectives specified from the other [...] perspectives

While this is merely a badly-written, not necessarily difficult sentence, I find it very difficult to pinpoint the central statement or to paraphrase the sentence in such a way that a clear, concise, and informative sentence results. This is typical of the kind of literature I have described above.

To clarify: Ignoring this source -- which I would usually do with literature of this kind -- is not an option as this source is the official textbook for a class I am taking and which I would like to complete. So what I am looking for are little tricks which I can use to maximise retention of this thin material and to extract what's truly important, while efficiently ignoring the rest.

Last-resort, completely-silly trick: When I had to force myself to read through a particularly awful textbook, I decided to read it aloud to myself in a series of silly voices. That actually did make me pay attention to what I was reading, so I could get the emphasis and inflections right... and perhaps surprisingly, I did find and retain the new ideas I was reading for.

Another approach can be to take it as a translation or editing task. Into another language, or into the same language minus the sequipedalian verbiage and jargon. Again, the goal here is to try to make a bit more of a game out of it so it isn't a completely uphill slog.

Note that if you have any interest in publishing your own textbooks at some point, this can be an excellent education in what not to do... you might want to take notes on that too.

Occasionally, the right answer is not to read the textbook at all and just work from the lecture notes. Or see if you can find a set of Condensed Cream Of Textbook notes somewhere -- Cliff Notes-ish things do exist for some books.

... But in the end, the real answer is "try things and see what works for you."


Borderline on appropriateness from teacher Being a western (white) teacher at an Asian university I constantly have to worry about being the subject of gossip and rumors between students (and others). So, I do need to be more careful about my actions with students and how my intentions are viewed by others.

What if I see a student has a strange blink pattern? Should I consider that (potential need for glasses) integral to the learning process and pull that student aside to tell them or is it generally considered that teachers in my situation should only consider issues directly related to the subject matter?

Strange blink patterns are not necessarily a sign of a need for glasses, one of my students has similar symptoms as part of Tourette's Syndrome - there are a myriad of other reasons what this could be a symptom of.  Having said that, asking the students how they are individually as they enter class may give some insight.

Beyond that, I would ask your supervisor or someone in administration first if something has already been documented about the potential condition the student may have.  If not, then it is your superior, the nurse or someone in administration that should be informed of your concerns, this will do 2 things:

save any potential embarrassment for you and the student.
provide evidence of you chasing-up the concern through official channels


Is there an increase in papers authored by undergraduates? I am an undergraduate student in STEM.

I have noticed that several of my peers (also in STEM) have published in journals or conferences (multiple times).
I have also seen that in online forums for graduate admissions (such as PhysicsGRE), almost all the profiles have published several times in conferences and journals (granted that profiles in online forums do not present a well-rounded view of undergraduate students).
Many of them are also first or second authors in their papers.

Has there really been an increase in papers co-authored by undergraduates? Does this mean that publishing a paper does not carry the same level of significance as it used to in graduate admissions?
I know I am being paranoid, but I am hoping to apply to graduate school and I feel under pressure to publish since it seems like there are so many who do this, and hence someone who has not published any of their research would not stand out to the admission committee. This pressure is at the back of my mind every time I am working on my research, and is preventing me from enjoying its process.
Of course, this could be confirmation bias and I tried to find statistical answers regarding this, but could not find any, so I am asking here, since several members here take part in the graduate admissions process.

Has there really been an increase in papers co-authored by undergraduates?

These facts can be established:

There has been an increase in the number of undergraduates, except for recently in a few areas that have falling birth rates.
There has been an increase in the number of papers published.
The average number of authors per paper has increased.
For most papers, it is impossible to tell if an undergraduate is an author without asking the authors.

On balance, I think that there has been an increase in papers authored or coauthored by undergraduates, but that it is impossible to tell how big that increase is because nobody is collecting the data.

This pressure is at the back of my mind every time I am working on my research, and is preventing me from enjoying its process.

As a PhD student in STEM, you will be assessed primarily on your research publications.  If you particularly dislike being assessed that way, do not get a PhD in STEM.

Does this mean that publishing a paper does not carry the same level of significance as it used to in graduate admissions?

The number of PhD students is also increasing and admissions practices are slow to change, so I doubt there has been or will be much change.


How important is publication for PhD admission? As a master's student in computer science, I would really like to go for a PhD at a good CS department. However until now, I have no publications and really have no idea how to start research. I'm interested in many subjects but I have not yet been able to narrow down the choice to a specific one. For someone like me who just began his or her master's studies and wants to plan for a PhD, what is the real number one priority besides a good GPA?

I would say publications dont matter to start with a PhD, in general. Having them might help in reducing length of your PhD.

A good thing to have is liking for one area in CS, and good knowledge in that area atleast. e.g. systems or security or algorithms or formal verification or databases or distributed systems etc. Later when you join for the PhD program, you will do courses and talk with people to get an understanding on what is a good research problem etc.


When citing a book (Harvard) what should year be? I always see tutorials on Harvard referencing saying things like:

  Last name, First initial. (Year published). Title. Edition. City published: Publisher, Page(s).

What do I need to put for year published?

Is that the year of the book's first publication, or the year that the copy I have was published.

Specifically, I am trying to cite a translation of A Doll's House.

It was originally published (in its original language) in 1879.

This translation was first published in Great Britain in 1994. Reprinted 1999, 2001, 2002, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2008, 2009 (twice)

Its ISBN number is 978 1 85459 236 1

You write down the year in which the particular book that you are holding in your hands was published -- not any earlier or later reprints, not the first publication.

Since you are citing a literary work, and since that work has been republished many times, the date of its publication is not very meaningful. You may be better off using an author-title format (MLA) rather than an author-date format (Harvard).


Am I pursuing a “degree in” or “of computer science”? On my profile, I described my career status as:

  Currently pursuing a degree in Computer Science at Temple College.

Is using in or of the correct preposition used in an academic setting?

In the context 'in' is right, even if the eventual degree is called "Master of Computer Science". I hold a degree in mathematics, but its formal title is 'Master of Mathematics'. My first degree, also in mathematics was, formally, Bachelor of Arts.

There is a distinction between the subject of a degree and its formal title.


Why doesn't the university give past final exams' answers? My professors usually give solutions for part term tests. But it seems that, they never gave any solutions for the past final exams in any courses I've taken.

Does anyone has the same experience? Or does anyone know why it's like this? I personally believe that students could use past exam's answers to prepare for their own exams.

Edited: Wow, it's amazing that so many people shared their opinion here. I'd just like to clarify my question here cuz I see my question mislead few people, my apologize. Say, I am taking some course this year, and the professor would usually post some pasts term tests with answers and the past exams from previous years(with no answers, or sometimes they just post a link to the library website, where answer-free version of past exams can be found) on the course web-page.

This depends on the institution & department and potentially the instructor/course.

The last two institutions I have been at (UK) have provided solutions to past exams. One only odd numbered years, the other all years.

I'm sceptical about the value of providing solutions to past exams for studying purposes. From my experience the temptation to look at the solutions instead of struggling through the questions is often irresistible for students, especially those who are struggling. This leads to the false impression of knowing how to solve the problems. Of course past exam solutions can be used effectively to study, for example by only using the solutions to check answers after completing the entire exam as practice. But I have rarely seen students do this.

Developing appropriate exam questions is difficult so instructors may also want to recycle past questions and therefore not provide past exams (questions or answers).


Publishing a second paper which is an extension of the first paper- same methodology, problem formulation and literature review I have submitted a manuscript to a journal and it is currently under review. I have also written a second manuscript which is essentially an extension of the first manuscript. The first manuscript mainly deals with establishing baseline behavior while the second manuscript deals with expanding the results of the first paper by considering additional conditions. The problem formulation, literature review and solution methodology are the same with only minor changes.

In such a situation, should one rewrite these sections or paraphrase from the first paper? The results and discussion stand on their own. Since I am working full time in the industry now, I am not aware of how I should deal with this. My advisor from my Master's degree is not helpful. Is there any advantage to submitting the second manuscript to the same journal?

For reference, the manuscripts related to deals with numerical simulations.

If the first paper has not been published yet, you may want to contact the editor who is handling it and ask him whether it would be possible to withhold publication (in case it gets accepted) and publish the two papers together as a series of papers. In this case setting up the context for the second paper should be fairly easy, as you wouldn't need to rewrite the introduction and literature review from scratch.

If that's not possible then you'll have to rewrite introduction and conclusions so that the paper can stand on its own. Of course, you can be a bit more concise and write upfront that the second paper is an application (or an extension) of the first one, and that additional details can be found in the latter. However, note that if you rely too much on another paper some journals (depending on the field, I guess) might complain about a "lack of novelty".


Publishing with/without advisor as new Master student I am a new master student in a ranked university. The academic program I have been admitted involves doing a Master and then continuing for a PhD (after fulfilling adequate academic requirements). As an undergrad, I published some papers as first author, and I am very familiar with the whole process, to the point where I can get papers accepted on my own. Now, I have some ideas lying around which I could quickly turn into papers.

However, as a first-year master student, I was told that I am not expected to do research (due to the tough courses). I also don't get a fixed advisor until I start the PhD part of the program. So I could just publish on my own. I don't want to sound arrogant, but I am very familiar with the topics and the literature of my current paper ideas, and have no real need for feedback in order to get them accepted on a good journal. I am not sure about the possible disadvantages later on. Here are my possible choices:

Publish on my own, with university affiliation.
Contact a professor (potential advisor later on), ask for feedback, and probably publish with him as coauthor.
Wait until I begin the PhD, and then start pumping the papers.

What is the most sensible choice?

Don't be shy about pushing your work forward. The stage at which a person becomes able to do original research is not fixed. Some people are more advanced. Well done you.

Generally speaking, a single paper isn't enough of a benefit that it should cause you to burn bridges. So I suggest you scope out how the faculty in your department would think about such an idea.

Your option 1 could get some feathers ruffled. Your option 3 seems to needlessly delay your advancement.

I suggest you find some variation on 2. In the school I did my PhD there was a head of graduate studies in the department. You could ask that person for some guidance. Present it as wanting to satisfy both being a good member of the university as well as advancing your work.

It isn't necessarily the case your department will push you to have a co-author. If you have come up with the topic and done the work entirely on your own, most profs will agree you should publish it as the only author.

It's different if you have any kind of assigned supervisor. Even if it's a very distant and high level kind of thing. For example, maybe there is one prof who deals with all the masters students. In that case, you would still want to approach that prof and discuss how to proceed. Still frame it as wanting to be a good member of the university while also advancing your work.


How can I get an idea on relevance of my data? I have a lot of data from my PhD, which I believe confuses my supervisor quite a lot. Therefore, he is hesitant to publish them for now. How can I get good academic feedback on this data without submitting it as a paper?

Talk to as many people as possible about your work

This can be in formal settings, such as a poster or oral presentation at a conference. You could also ask to give a presentation to colleagues within your department. Or it could be informal, such as chatting at a coffee break or after a seminar with fellow researchers.

It's often tempting to hold on to your work and only present it when it feels "finished", but these early stages are often the most useful ones to get feedback. So you need to be brave, and accept that there may be flaws or complications that you've not yet thought of. That's why you are doing it.


How to get a mentor or supervisor for PhD studies in Computer Science? If I have already completed a master's degree, but  no longer belong or have contact to the institution in which I followed my master's degree; how to approach one professor to see if he or she wants to supervise me? Actually I see lots of different areas that I would like, but I feel afraid of not having the enough background (I can only contact the potential professors by email because well I am actually in the North America area, and I would like to aim for an European university)

I know that some times there are some published open positions, but in those cases mostly the competition is really fierce.

Any advice, mostly based on experience, will be very useful.

Thanks

Apply to PhD programs in your area of interest.
Visit the schools that accept you into their programs.
During your visits, talk to professors about (a) whether they're taking students and (b) whether you share mutual interests.

You can also try emailing professors before you apply, to get a sense of whether their school/department/research group is a good fit.  But be warned that many will ignore your email unless you've already been admitted to their program.  (Expert tip: pay close attention to the warnings and admonitions posted on their personal home page!)

A much better way to make first contact is to attend conferences or workshops in your area of interest (and make a paper/poster presentation, if possible).  These events let you meet many potential advisors all in one place.  Plus, you get to hear about their work, and get a sense of their personality, hygiene, etc.

  I feel afraid of not having enough background.

You and me both, pal.  It's called impostor syndrome, and everyone* in academia has it.

Good luck!

*…except for the real jerk-Os.


Duration of courses: hours to weeks and self-study time I'm trying to apply for a Master's program and on the application form I have to list all subjects I have taken for my Bachelor's degree. For each one, they are asking for the duration in weeks and then Lectures (hrs./week), Tutorials (hrs./week) and Practical courses (hrs./week).

In the documents I have from my university, the duration is only given in hours and the number of weeks taken for a single subject can vary greatly. Some may have been in the form of a block within two weeks, some have been spread over 10 weeks.
Is there any common conversion from hours to weeks? I'm sure they are only interested in the total time spent on this subject, not in the number of weeks in which I actually had lectures on it.

Secondly, my current university lists lecture time and self-study time, which added together make up the total course time (workload). As far as I can see, this self-study time does not match any of the three categories given. Should I just leave it out / substract it?

Regarding your first question for a "common conversion":

In Germany, workload for a course is measured in "hours per week in a semester" (abbr. "SWS" for Semesterwochenstunden), which would be what you are looking for. For singular events without a weekly schedule or for events where you need to calculate from a fixed number of hours, you can use the average (14 weeks / semester) or the real (12w / summer semester, 16w / winter semester [in Germany]) number of weeks and if needed the "academic hour" (which officially lasts only 45 minutes here) to calculate back.

As an example: A short practical course in the winter semester goes over 4 days with a daily workload of 6 full hours (breaks etc. already substracted).
This corresponds to 6 * 4 / 0.75 = 32 academic hours. As the semester has 16 weeks, the 32 hours correspond to 2 "SWS" or hours/week.

Formula: full hours [/ 0.75 if needed] / #weeks = hours per week

Covering your second question:

If your current university includes "self-study" time in the total course time, I would also stick to that in calculating the final "hours/week" for the course. Although it might be confusing if some course include self-study in the total course time and others don't, you should not alter the official course time given by your university.


How many grants it is possible to have simultaneously? It is feasible to assume that you cannot have more than one grant, since getting a grant means that you are paid for a research project and you cannot work on too many projects at once. So answer should be one. Nevertheless there should be some researchers that have more than one grant. How common is that? Is this field related?

At my institution, most researchers have more than one grant.  It is extremely common over a wide range of disciplines, at least in the USA.

Often, one is required to include the "level of effort" in each grant proposal; i.e., the percentage of one's time that will be spent on that project.  That number is never 100%; more often, it may be 10-50%.

In many fields, the "principal investigator" on the grant may do only a small part of the actual research, with the bulk being done by students and post-docs.  This part is very field-dependent.  In some fields, full professors at top universities are expected to have very many grants simultaneously, or at least some very large grants that involve a lot more than the full time of a single person.


What to do when your supervisor is not really supervising you? Context:
 I am a first year master student in mid-level university in North America. I started in September and I’ve almost finished all the required course works. My supervisor is very well-known in his field and he is currently supervising many graduate students.

Problem:
My supervisor is a nice guy and he’s very knowledgeable in his field, however, he’s too busy and does not have any time to actually supervise me(or other students in his lab). He is always traveling or busy doing other things and since his lab is huge, it’s not possible to see him more than few minutes a week.
Additionally, the area that I work in is a bit far from his expertise and I feel like I’m all by myself and I’m wasting my time and efforts.

Question:
Is there anything I can do to improve my experience in the graduate school?

Since no other professor in my department work in my field, changing the supervisor within the department is not an option.

Given the constraints and assuming that you can't move to another institution, I think you are stuck with coming up with your own plan. A well known and respected advisor is an advantage to you provided that he signs your thesis and writes a good letter of recommendation, even if he doesn't do anything else. Sad? Yes. Probably true.

My suggestion, in your huge lab, is to try to start up a study group in which a group of three-six students decides to meet regularly and discuss their work and any blocks they have. Study groups are a feature of Law School, of course, and some other disciplines. Perhaps you can adapt the idea to your work. It would depend on how closely your work aligns. If too different, it probably wouldn't work.

I will also note that some professors consider letting students work almost entirely independently as a feature, not a bug. This is probably more common at the doctoral level, but the large lab you are in makes it almost mandatory. But the ability to work as an independent researcher is an important skill for any academic, though being forced to do it too early is a disservice.

The best advice, however, is to get the thesis done, get it signed, and move on. Look for a better situation in the future.


Is submitting two papers with identical introduction and methods considered plagiarism? Our research (me being one of the co-authors) consists of two main sub-cases which are too long to be in a single paper. So, they were divided into two parts--Part1 and Part2. Both of these papers contain the same text in many places (theory,introduction,procedure). The authors for both the papers are also the same.

If we were to submit this to two different journals, is it plagiarism?

If we were to submit this to two different journals, is it plagiarism?

Reusing text from another paper (even a closely related paper) without explicitly saying so would generally be considered self-plagiarism.  Unless they have exceptionally permissive publishing agreements, you would be in violation of your agreements with both publishers if you didn't get explicit permission to do this.  Even if the journals have the same publisher, they would probably still be unhappy, because this is a violation of scholarly norms.

If you feel your particular case is reasonable and would be considered acceptable in your field, then all you need to do is to be clear about it.  Include a sentence like "For the convenience of the reader, Section 2.1 is copied verbatim from [citation to part 1]" and explain the situation to both publishers when you submit the papers.  If they are OK with it (and you are honest with the reader), then everything's fine, but you certainly shouldn't submit the papers in this state without comment.

For this to work, you'll need permission from both publishers.  In mathematics that would be an unusual request, and I doubt you would receive permission, but things may work differently in your field.  In any case, you may come across as naive or eccentric if it doesn't work the way you expect, but at least nobody will be able to accuse you of being dishonest or manipulative.


How to describe a paper for which you have not yet submitted revisions in CV? I have submitted a paper. The reviewers might agree to accept its publication, but they have asked that I revise it. I have not yet submitted the revision to them. What can I say about the paper ? Should I say that the paper is under revision or under review, or something else ?

I would use some of the following:

submitted
under review
submitted to …

and do not stress that there is already a revision going on. Even revised papers may get rejected, so being in revision is no guarantee to get the paper published. I also would not state the journal to which the paper is submitted to because I do not see how this says anything about the quality of the paper. If you think, that the paper is good and interesting for whoever reads the CV, make it available as a preprint and provide a link.

I myself have a section "Preprints" in my CV where I list submitted but not published papers with links to the arXiv and add the line "submitted, month, year".


Reference style where authors are abbreviated with long underscore What is the name of this reference style? In which other fields have you seen it?

It replaces author names (in the list of references) with a long underscore when it's the same authors as in the previous item. Also, numbers of the last page are abbreviated if there is too little change. With the latter I am not sure it's part of the reference style, or just a convention.

I found this reference in Economics, namely here: https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/2118200.pdf

I don't really agree with the other answer. It's still used in recent publications, and not just in the US. I've recently seen this in the Annales Mathématiques Blaise Pascal (random French example) and all AMS publications until very recently (at least 2013, although they changed the style between then and now). "I've never seen this" doesn't really prove anything.


Is it okay for a PhD supervisor to claim co-authorship... even if it's my work, and he didn't ask? About a year ago I noticed that my PhD supervisor has listed on his faculty page that he co-authored a conference presentation together with me.  The problem is, he didn't-- the research itself was entirely mine, and I wrote and gave the presentation alone.  (This is in the social sciences, not the hard sciences).  He never talked to me before claiming co-authorship on his faculty profile, and in fact, has never mentioned it to me-- nor have I mentioned it to him.

I can understand that he may have felt he needed the "extra credit" to beef up his publications last year while he was trying to get tenure.  Now that he's got his tenure, though, and now that I've finished my PhD and am applying for jobs, I am worried that, should my potential employers google the items on my résumé and come across his co-authorship claim, it will contradict my résumé's claim that I was the sole author... making me look like the liar.

I'm really reluctant to "give in" and credit him as co-author for the presentation on my résumé too, because (a) it doesn't feel fair and (b) I don't have many publications/presentations to begin with... so including him as co-author could dilute what little power my résumé has.

However, I am also embarrassed to ask him to take this "publication" down from his faculty page, because I am worried that he may get defensive, which could ruin our relationship-- which would be a problem, because I still depend on him for references as I look for a job.

Any ideas/perspective on how to handle this??  Thanks!!

In a number of fields it's standard for the supervisor to be listed as the last author on papers or presentations that their students produce. This is because the supervisor helps in a number of ways, some of them indirectly: they get grant money, they train you to use the lab, they train you to do statistics... or they might make suggestions for the research design, the main theoretical focus of the presentation/manuscript, etc. If I wouldn't list my supervisor on a conference presentation, the only possible reason would be that it slipped my mind to add his name.

I would therefore ask other PhD students in your department what the standard is in this case, because your supervisor might not think that he's doing something wrong.


What are the different committees for in a conference? I would like to take the example of QIP 2018 conference. I've always wondered what the roles of committees are. In this conference, for example, there are three.

Organizing committee
Program committee
Steering committee

It's obvious what the Organizing committee is, but what are the other committees for?

The organizing committee (OC) represents all organizational departments of the conference, such as local arrangements, publications, publicity, satellite events, etc. Typically, for each of these departments, the OC includes one or two chairpersons. The OC is usually coordinated by a General Chair, who is the main responsible "manager" of the conference. Members of the OC usually change between different editions of the conference.

The program committee (PC) selects which papers to accept and to reject. The main task of PC members is to review papers and, afterwards, to take part in discussions of the reviewed papers. The PC is usually coordinated by one or two Program Chairs, who are actually part of the OC. Usually, the PC is more stable across different editions of the same conference than the OC; PC members often stay for 2-5 editions.

The steering committee (SC) steers the direction of the conference, for example, by selecting the location and General Chair of the next edition, and by deciding the direction of future editions (e.g., which topics to include in the Call for Papers). Compared to the OC and the PC, the SC is particularly stable across different editions of the conference. It is often comprised of former General and Program Chairs of the conference.

These considerations assume a typical medium-sized to large conference. There can be variations, especially in small and very large conferences: Small conferences may have a scaled-down OC and no SC. Very large conferences may have several main tracks with distinct PCs, or an additional committee on top of the PC (such as a "Shadow PC" or a "Program Board").


Should examination questions be ordered in the same way as they are presented? I'm writing my midterm and am currently coming up with questions that relate to important course concepts that I want to test. This is being done in a somewhat ad-lib manner, and my questions are out of order in terms of how the concepts were presented in class.   Is there a compelling argument to ensure that the order is the same as that in class?

If the questions are not dependent on one another, then in many cases it is better to mix-up the order. Student responses will be less likely do to basic memorization of their notes/material and more likely to reflect higher-level learning.