Postponing faculty start date due to covid and Pregnancy? Any advice? I’m just a few weeks pregnant, due in June. I’m supposed to start a faculty position (tt - great fit) at a research intensive R1 school. Our plan had been to move back to the US in December.
If I start the position in January, I’d have probably about 4 weeks of paid leave.
On my current fellowship in Canada, I have a full year. (Could start the 1 yr in June) But I’m scared I’d lose my position.
Anyone have any thoughts? I’m also concerned about moving back to the US mid-COVID super pregnant.

You should chat with your future department, starting with the department chair. (The views of random people on the internet, by the way, should count for very little!) Based on past experience, asking to defer one's start was not uncommon even pre-Covid. Keep in mind that (i) your department wants you to succeed, and making a case that you're more likely to succeed given x, y, and z is a good thing to do; (ii) it's possible that there are external constraints on the department, like a need for someone, perhaps you, to teach certain courses. Still, it's important to realize that (aside from rare, dysfunctional departments) the department is on your side.
Less important, I will note that personally I would think it better to start sooner, in January, rather than when you're due. Having a new baby is exhausting for the first few months at least, and starting a faculty position at the same time sounds very challenging! (I have two kids, one born before, one after, and zero at the start of my professorship!)


Research norms, looping in other researchers for ideas Let's say that I and a couple of a researchers have made good progress on some work but got stuck on something, say, a biological system that we derived but it's not quite working the way it should.  Would I be breaking any research norms by looping in one of my former professors (in the same department) who specializes in computational biology and can likely help us?  Or should I really let the advisor of our group decide on who to loop in for ideas and help?

This may be field dependent, but in my field (math), where groups of people that work on a paper together are rather small, you should ask all involved people before you enlarge the team.

Note that there is a gray area, though. If you run into somebody and discuss your recent research and it seems like this discussion may be fruitful for the point where your team got stuck, it may or may not be a good idea to discuss your particular problem (depending on whether you know that guy before, there is a trusted relationship,…). When you are in this situation and are in doubt, you could resort to something like "It sounds like you could be the right person to discuss a particular problem we are having in our group. May I contact you later about this?" and then ask your group. In your situation, I would definitely ask the other group members before involving further people.


Should I publish a working paper in several different websites? I understand that it is a good idea to publish my working papers and preprints so that they are accessible to other researchers. But there are many different ways to do this, e.g:

ResearchGate;
arXiv;
CiteULike;
Academia.edu;
The university website;
My personal website;

etc...

Is it a good idea to put my working papers in all these websites?

An apparent advantage is that it increases the visibility of the paper (however, with Google Scholar, I am not sure it matter).

An apparent disadvantage is that, if I update the working paper, I have to remember to update it in all these places. Otherwise I risk having old versions of my working papers flying around the web.

No, there is no need to. Uploading to Arxiv is more than enough. Your Google scholar profile finds all arxiv papers and will notify those who follow your work about your new paper. You can also add a link to the arxiv PDF in your university and personal page. That way, you will only have to update the arxiv version of your paper, without having to ever update again your personal and university webpage.

For academia.edu and researchgate I would never bother to upload PDFs. If someone is interested in your work and cannot google your name to find the arxiv uploaded version, then I doubt you will get anything meaningful or useful (e.g., citation, collaboration) from such a person, no matter where you upload your papers.


Is it mandatory to declare conflicts of interest? I know some journals require authors to declare conflicts of interests as a matter of policy; even if there is no CoI, a section title Conflict of Interests is still included which declares that there were no conflicts.

However, I notice that for some journals this is not the case. For example, this paper in the Journal of Organic Chemistry does not appear to have a CoI section.

Is declaration of conflicts of interest considered optional for scholarly publications? Is it possible to ascertain whether CoIs exist for a paper like this, where nothing is indicated?

I'm fairly confident that most scholarly journals require that you disclose conflicts of interest. If the publisher or journal doesn't discretely mention it, it wouldn't hurt to include it in the manuscript anyway.


Should I sign this letter or force them to fire me? What are the differences between my prospects with the two options? I was a first year PhD student and have mentioned before I was forced to quit although hardwork and grants. Now the head of the school admit that the supervisor was wrong and he had nothing to do with the supervisor which is awkward, he also confused about another student who hadnot passed his viva after years of work and publishing in top tier conference.

In to the retrospect, they asked me whether to sign a resignation letter or to be fired and asked me to sign in the moment, but I refused and asked them I will take the letter and do it later during this week.

They asked you have to do it during this week ( obligatory), could any one recommend me whether this is good direction to sign this letter as it is first time for me and I am not aware of many LEGAL stuff.

PS. For more details why this happened:

I am a first year PhD student, I was working in a new topic, I found a problem in research and then I proposed a methodology and verified it. My PI said from few months ago that it was good what I did verbatim. Then I got two grants from top conferences although I waited a lot of time to do experiment in other lab, and this lab was not happy because I proposed different approach than they use, but I explained what I proposed and how it could solve. Honestly, I worked so much hard as you can imagine, but in the same time I noticed that my PI is underestimating from my ideas sometimes and have sharp looking at me without any reason, at the beginning he didnot want to publish anything or attend conference without any reason, sometimes he didnot listen to me and I made correction for him which was critical for research, but I did in very polite way

He began to catch small mistakes in report for instance which was very trivial and inflate it and never acknowledge the two grants I got and I did other stuff for free like videos for the group and sketching which he was astonished by it.

Until I present my work in the committee which every one told me that they do it to see every thing is okay and every one pass, this committee is my PI, another professor who have never worked in my research topic and asked questions  was very sketchy and the head of the school also not related to my domain they see presentation and report no exams no other things, so just presentation and report. Of course this PI made badmouthing behind me and that what I know later and it was mentioned that I didnot do a good bibliography and he doubt the methodology although I got the same results as the real experiment based on physics approach, but he doubts. I was shocked and I confronted this PI, why you didnot tell me from few months ago when you said it is good, he lied and I told this PI, if you have doubts could you please tell me what are these doubts like 1,2,3 and what you suggested, he didnot say anyword and go. In conclusion, he wasnot specialized in this new topic, even when I am doing any proposed formula he accuse me that I stole it or from where I had come with this equation, I did that on my own, it is quite hurting because he accused me many times of any schematics drawings, sketches formula that may be I stole it, and I tell him that I did that on my own, and BTW I have never ever stole something so that can interpret his actions. In conclusion,  this PI told me your are independent  and he didnot like that and also know that I worked hard but he dont want to continue in this research this is after making badmouthing about me as I am not eligible to continue and even the committee yesterday which the head of the school told me I know you are very good and you did a good work, but no one can speak, the head of school recommended me to find another lab in different country. Sorry for English grammar mistakes and typos.

If you can afford to do so, consult a lawyer. That way you will know all of your options, not just the most apparent ones. If you have no option other than to leave, then your decision should rest on whether you want to fight/contest your removal or not. If you don't contest it, then it is probably (subject to legal advice) better to sign the letter. But if you sign it, you are probably giving up options.

But advice like this should come from a lawyer.


Creating a reading group with one of my students I am currently a PhD student (on a teaching scholarship) at a UK university. A part-time MSc student in one of my classes has asked me for some advice on how they can prepare for their courses next year. I'd like to suggest that we spend some time over the summer (when there are no classes) learning something that would be mutually beneficial to us (in a sort of reading group style). I feel that this would be a good opportunity to motivate myself to learn some basic things that are missing from my education and also perhaps to make a friend. However, I wonder whether this would be unethical as it could potentially lead to this student having an "unfair" advantage over their peers?

Note. Other PhD students in the department tutor some of their students privately (for money).

As far as having an "unfair" advantage by preparing over the summer is concerned, I don't think that having a "club" or some other form of advanced preparation is a problem. Studying in advance is not inherently unfair if anybody can do it. (Some students take a class that a grad school might require as an undergraduate; is that unfair as well?)

The ethical question here is whether or not you will be an active instructor for that student in the coming year. Showing favoritism to individual students that would put them in an advantage—or give the appearance of having done so—should be avoided. If you're not teaching them again and anyone who wishes to participate can join, then that mitigates the problem significantly.


Making sense of U.S. assist. prof. salaries: gross vs net, 9 vs. 12 months Having recently received a PhD in Economics from a European university, I am entering the academic job market for economists this year. I am targeting research-intense, PhD-granting universities in the U.S. and Canada. I am thinking about Tier 4-5 institutions (certainly not Tier 1 or 2, I do not think I would have a chance there).

I am now trying to wrap my head around the quoted salaries for tenure-track assistant professorships. Having little clue of 9 vs. 12 month appointments, notions like "nominal academic year salary" and the like, I am trying to figure the gross annual salaries from the job adds. After that I am interested in deriving the corresponding net salaries; my lack of familiarity with the U.S. or the Canadian tax systems certainly does not help here.

For example, "Survey of the Labor Market for New Ph.D. Hires In Economics 2015-16" reports "expected and actual offers" on p. 8. Should I understand this is the actual annual gross salary, or should I divide or multiply it by 9/12, or add or deduct something?
Similarly, "American Economic Association Universal Academic Questionnaire Summary Statistics" (2016) list "nominal academic year salaries" in their tables. Are these the actual gross annual salaries, or..?

Once you help me figure out how to infer the gross annual salary, the next step would be to tell approximately what net salary that would correspond to. Should I expect to earn, say, 60,000 net given 100,000 gross? When I say "net", I am interested in hard cash going directly into my pocket. I would not consider any pension or insurance contributions that circumvent my pocket as part of the net salary. I am interested in how much money I would have at the end of the day to pay the bills and to put food on my family's table.

In short, what I am looking for is a brief introduction into the U.S./Canadian academic salary accounting accompanied with a couple of examples.

Edit: The first two answers focus more (although not entirely) on gross vs. net salaries (where taxes etc. feature prominently). However, I am still very much interested in how to read the job adds as well as tables with salary comparisons. That is, does the nominal figure typically equal the gross annual salary, or not exactly? What about my two examples mentioned above?

In the United States, the "academic year" consists of the 9 months that comprise the fall and spring semesters. This is the period during which you are formally employed by the university and receive a salary. These 9 months also define what salary you are essentially guaranteed. However, it is possible that you will also get a salary for the remaining 3 months; for example, if you have grants from a funding agency or from industry, or if your department runs a summer program and you teach during these months. You can inquire with the head of the department that made you an offer whether they run a summer teaching program, and what your chances would be to get an assignment to teach. In other words, your salary may be up to 4/3 of the nominal, academic year salary, but that is not guaranteed.

How much of this money ends up in your pocket depends on a number of factors that are hard to estimate without knowing more:

You can look up the Federal tax rate for this income. If you're single, I would think that you have to estimate a tax rate somewhere in the 20-25% range on your total salary, including the 6.2% social security tax. But it may be significantly less if you have family and your spouse is not working.
Some but not all states (and in some cases, cities) have a state income tax. You can also look that up. Many states use a flat percentage of your income, typically somewhere in the 4-8% range. I don't know whether that includes deductions for dependents.
Retirement: Most universities have switched to a 401(k) system where you get no benefits from the university after retiring and both you and the university instead pays into an account over the time of your employment from which you can later draw money in retirement. Depending on university and state, you will have to expect to pay 6-10% of your total income into this account.
Health insurance: If your health insurance has to cover only yourself, then you can expect that your employer picks up all or almost all of the cost. On the other hand, if you have family that needs to be insured, then you have to expect that your share of health insurance will be in the range of $500 per month (for only a spouse) or larger (if you have children).

So if you add all of this together, if you start with $100k per year, you'll end up with maybe $100k-25%-5%-8%=$62k in your pocket if you're single, plus or minus several thousand dollars. But it may be quite different if you had family, depending on the state you're employed in, and any number of other factors.


Is it an ethical issue if about half of a subsection of a paper consists of quotations? I wrote a lengthy mathematics paper that consists of about 8 sections.

For comprehensiveness and consistency purposes, I have a subsection that massively quotes one of my supervisor's papers (there is no other paper in existence that covers that subtopic in the same detail, I tried to preserve the original rigor and formulations, and that paper is simply brilliant). I stated what is being done at beginning of the subsection, and everything is properly referenced.

About half of the subsection is citations, and about half of it is my own text.

The supervisor was extremely happy with the paper, and I got great feedback from the faculty.

However, I'm a bit embarrassed by the massive citations in the subsection, and I am concerned that there may be an ethical issue with that. Normally, I don't  quote any text in my papers (although of course I use references) -- the entire text is my own.

I would appreciate your opinion on this issue.

With a proper citation,
and if the total content of the paper has enough substance that is original,
and the supervisor/advisor is happy with it,
and the other faculty are too,
then it is fine.


"Dressing down" to impress in academic settings I came across this highly-upvoted comment on reddit (15,300 karma) by /u/Semi-Hemi-Demigod

  The CEO of the company I work for said that it's not uncommon for
  programmers to be asked to dress down for important meetings.
  Apparently investors don't think programmers who dress well are good
  programmers.

I was wondering if this logic applies to academia, particularly in fields like math, computer science, and philosophy where stereotypically many top people  dress sloppily. In other words, are there academic contexts where dressing badly will make me seem more competent at my job?

Perhaps this would be an interesting social science experiment to perform, if it hasn't been done already!

If an academic is dressed in an unusually casual manner, I generally ignore it.

If an academic is dressed in an unusually formal manner, I assume one of these:

They are an administrator, or manager, rather than an academic
They are here for a job interview and they don't know it is not necessary to dress formally
They are going to an event outside academia, like a funeral

I do not think anyone is impressed by either dressing up or down, but it can send a signal.


What to write about in a master thesis that's mostly software applying common knowledge? I have got a topic for a thesis that I'm interested in.

It's not a very difficult task and is well covered by the basic theory in the field. I'm not doing anything new and I'm not supposed to either. I'm convinced that a person knowledgeable in the field would consider it trivial.

Working on the task is mostly only software development, although there's also some hardware involved. Of course there's a huge open source software library that covers pretty much everything in the field.

In essence, I'm calling 2 to 3 functions of the library that are specifically made to solve the task that I have. What I spent most of my time on was writing software that makes some hardware talk to each other, deliver data to and from the library, doing some format conversions, etc. None of this is particularly interesting for the actual topic, it's only providing the logistics of using the library. The academically interesting part is already handled by the library.

I didn't do much except applying the provided functionality to solve the problem in the obvious way as I've been told. I don't really know what I should write about in my thesis.

It looks like my supervisor is very interested in seeing the functionality (of the library) "in action" for this particular application.
I feel like an unpaid software developer disguised as a thesis student.

How do I come up with content?

from the comments

  I'm convinced that a person knowledgeable in the field would consider it trivial. — So then, why would you choose it as your thesis topic?

I choose this topic because it

is interesting to me. I like it. I have a positive mindset about it.
is a topic that I estimated to be able to handle and it turned out I can.
helps me gain more knowledge in its field that I was previously not very knowledgeable about.

How do I come up with content?

The first thing to do is ask yourself why your supervisor instructed you to perform this work in the first place. Unless they wanted to give you completely meaningless work for no reason (unlikely), they are likely interested in whether the system you are building demonstrates some interesting and non-trivial result. For example, perhaps they are interested in how different types of hardware interact with each other using this library. Perhaps they think that this setup might make x protocol go more quickly. Who knows, the point is that you should find out what their motivation was, and then write your thesis as an analysis of the result they were trying to measure.

I feel like an upaid software developer disguised as a thesis student

You're not going to like this, but in my opinion, what you've described does not qualify as a master's thesis. A master's thesis is essentially a doctoral dissertation of (much) smaller scope. It is by definition a research endeavor. What you have described sounds like just a very basic software project that should take no more than a few days to hook up and measure.

I don't blame you for not knowing this, I blame your supervisor for not making this clear. Some of the main motivations for doing a master's thesis are typically to give a master's student experience with research, and to get them published so as to help them in applying to PhD programs or other research positions. In this case, I think you are justified in being confused about what content to discuss in your thesis because it doesn't sound like your supervisor has directed you to do any research whatsoever.

If you were planning on using this thesis as a boost to your career (be it for PhD applications, or in industry), it may be worth sitting down with your supervisor to figure out how to actually get you involved with research. If the supervisor is giving this kind of work to do as a thesis, then in my opinion it means that they're taking advantage of you as free labor rather than doing what they should be doing, which is guiding you as you learn how to perform research.


How should I proceed if I am late in applying for postdoc positions? I am submitting my Aerospace engineering PhD thesis in August. However, my colleagues have pointed out that I am very late with postdoc applications for this year. I should started searching much sooner.

Now, I am still being funded by my PhD supervisor, and she has said that I can stay in her lab after my PhD as a postdoctoral fellow until I find something else. I personally would like to do that because I have lot of publications pending and staying back will help me push those through. Also it would provide me time to learn a new modeling methodology which will significantly improve my profile and improve my chances of securing postdoc positions.

However, my colleagues are saying that doing postdoc from the same place is extremely bad for an academic profile. I do want stay in academia, and I am now regretting my delay in applying for postdoc positions.

How should I proceed? Is it true that my profile is going to be looked at negatively if I continue under my current supervisor for the next 6-8 months after my defense? At the moment, I don't have any financial debts or anything. But, I am really concerned how my future will pan out provided I have to stay here. This is really stressing me out.

my colleagues are saying that doing postdoc from the same place is extremely bad for an academic profile

Doing a postdoc only with your PhD advisor might look bad, because it looks like you couldn't get a postdoc somewhere else.  But a brief extended stay at your PhD institution is more likely to be seen as a no-op—most people will understand that it was just a timing issue—especially if you later have a productive postdoc somewhere else.

In any case, you don't have a time machine, so worrying about what you should have done is completely pointless.  Your job now is to make sure your eventual postdoc/faculty application package is as strong as possible.  Do that research!  Publish those papers!  Give those talks!  Build that network!  Cultivate those letter-writers!


Can refusing to attend mandatory Title IX training be grounds for suspending a tenured faculty member? In the US all the universities that receive federal funding must ensure (or so I heard) that all their employees and students take one class about the Title IX law, concerning sexual harassment and related subjects. Can refusing to attend these classes be a motive for firing or suspending a tenured member of faculty? Is there precedent of tenured faculty being fired for this?

[I ask the question not for myself, but because at my university (Brandeis), the administration has decided on its own to add to include in the title IX course a new "racial awareness" training that I find highly objectionable. Before encouraging others to boycott these trainings, I would like to know what I expose them to.]

Put yourself in the shoes of a university administrator. The federal government has made a law requiring your university to do certain things if it wants to maintain its federal funding. Those things are to some extent subject to interpretation, but according to legal opinions of your university's lawyers (e.g., the general counsel or other high-ranking legal advisers) requiring your faculty to undergo Title IX training about race is a good way to comply with the requirements and minimize the risk to your institution. So, you institute these requirements as mandatory. Some months later you are informed that a tenured faculty member is refusing to take the training.

What do you do? Select the answer that applies:

  A. Invite the faculty member over for a chat in your office, where
  over cigars and a glass of scotch you both joke about the silliness of
  the federal requirements. You congratulate him on his good sense in
  objecting to these requirements, ask him to keep quiet about not
  taking the training so as to not make trouble for your university, and
  jovially send him on his way with an invitation to meet soon for a round of golf.

  B. Invite the faculty member over for a chat in your office, where you
  tell him that you are dissatisfied with his disregard for university
  policy, but that you understand that he is objecting to the training
  on principled, conscientious grounds, and confide that you even agree
  with him to some extent. Taking that into account, and taking into
  account the fact that he is tenured and that you value his research
  contributions, you tell him that you have decided not to take any
  disciplinary action. You caution him to keep quiet about not taking
  the training and not encourage others to follow in his footsteps so as
  to not make trouble for your university, and send him on his way.

  C. Send the faculty member a sternly-worded memo, with a copy to his
  dean and department chair, where you inform him that following his
  refusal to follow the mandatory requirement to undergo Title IX
  training, you are initiating disciplinary proceedings against him.
  You caution him that disregard for university policies on Title IX
  will not be tolerated under any circumstances, and that such
  proceedings could lead to various sanctions up to and including his
  termination. You conclude the memo by saying that until the
  proceedings have been set in motion some weeks from now, he has one
  last chance to satisfy the training requirement.

Now, it may be that you are the kind of person who would select answer B, or even A. I'm not saying it is unreasonable or wrong to be such a person, but if that is the case, I maintain that that would be in strong correlation to the fact that you are not a high-ranking university administrator -- let alone a successful one -- and probably never will be (I say this as a completely neutral statement, which I consider to be neither an insult nor a compliment). In practice, answer C is the only answer that a REAL university administrator (and certainly a successful one, who has a good ability to weigh the consequences of each of the different options on his/her own career and institution) will realistically choose.

To summarize, the answer to your question is an emphatic Yes: refusing to take mandatory training not only can lead to suspension or termination, but that is in fact the most likely outcome of such an action, by an overwhelming margin.


Graduate School Offer of Acceptance Due Dates in the US? I am applying to biomedical science Ph.D. programs, and the programs have very different deadlines for applying. For instance, many applications were due at the end of Nov/start of Dec, however, I have several due mid-Dec to mid-Jan.

Already, I have received an offer to follow up with an interview at the University of Arizona for their Ph.D. program, even though I have not submitted my final 2 applications due over the next month.

Does anyone know if Ph.D. programs tend to be strict about when one can accept an admission offer from a Ph.D. program (i.e. giving an applicant 1 week to accept an offer or decline it)? My worry is that if the University of Arizona offers me admission, I will only have a few weeks max to respond (likely before I even interview for other programs, if I am to be chosen for interviews). I know when I applied as an undergraduate, I was given a lot of time to choose my school. However, when I applied to summer internships throughout college (e.g. Amgen Scholar), I was given 5-7 days to respond with my decision on whether I want to partake in the program that offered me admission.

As noted by @NateEldredge in a comment, almost (and I only say "almost" because even one exception would preclude saying "all") every university in the US admitting students to a biomedical sciences PhD program does so based on the April 15 resolution:

  Students are under no obligation to respond to offers of financial support prior to April 15; earlier deadlines for acceptance of such offers violate the intent of this Resolution. In those instances in which a student accepts an offer before April 15 and subsequently desires to withdraw that acceptance, the student may submit in writing a resignation of the appointment at any time through April 15. However, an acceptance given or left in force after April 15 commits the student not to accept another offer without first obtaining a written release from the institution to which a commitment has been made. Similarly, an offer by an institution after April 15 is conditional on presentation by the student of the written release from any previously accepted offer. It is further agreed by the institutions and organizations subscribing to the above Resolution that a copy of this Resolution or a link to the URL should accompany every scholarship, fellowship, traineeship, and assistantship offer.

This means that you will not have to accept any offer prior to April 15th, and that no accepted offer is binding until after April 15th (though it would still be impolite to accept and then withdraw, so this should only be done in extreme circumstances). The explicit purpose of this resolution is to not allow universities to pressure students to accept an offer before other schools are done presenting their own offers.

Once you know for sure which offer you want to accept (and no earlier), however, it's good to accept as soon as possible and let other institutions know you will not be attending - this can let them extend offers to people on their waitlist and therefore gives those waitlisted applicants more choice.


During applications, how can I prove I was the first author of the papers that I couldn't become first author for various reasons? One year ago, I started working on a subject with one of the professors of our department. The idea was mine, and all of the subsequent steps including modellings, simulations, generation of figures, writing the paper and even responding to the reviewers were done by myself completely, and the professor just reviewed the paper and reminded some typos and minor mistakes of this kind, and also added a short paragraph (completely unnecessary in my opinion) to the Introduction section.

But at the end he wrote his name as the first author and submitted the paper. He told me that being second author for him means getting no credit from the department.

Anyway, I'm going to apply for grad school, and he told me he will compensate in the recommendation he will write for me.

As this is my only published paper as an undergrad, and being first author means everything for me in my application, is there any way for me to prove to the admission committees (or the professors; whoever will review my application) that I was the main contributor of the paper?

As this is my only published paper as an undergrad, and being first author means everything for me in my application, is there anyway for me to prove to the admission committees (or the professors; whoever will review my application) that I was the main contributor of the paper?

Short answer: no. Aside from the professor writing in his letter that he did indeed not do the work and just put his name front to brush up his CV, I see no way how you can prove that you were indeed the "actual" first author. And, given that this would essentially mean that the professor confesses unethical behavior, I see very little chance of this happening.

Anyway, I am not so sure whether being first author means "everything" for you. Undergrads are often not the first authors of publications (for many reasons, not just the unethical reason that you were denied first authorship). Further, if I see a paper with a senior author and an undergrad, I am not assuming that the professor did most of the hard work and undergrad just advised - independently of how the authors are ordered. I would assume your average admission committee to be similarly realistic.


Omitted question mark in quoted material How do I insert a question mark into a quotation that was omitted in the original material? For example, "Now we find that our land has unacceptable levels of contamination. Will it never stop[?]” Or "...Will it never stop"?

How about: "Now we find that our land has unacceptable levels of contamination. Will it never stop” [sic]. This indicates that the error was in the original and the quote is exact.

See https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sic, the first definition here.


The editor doesn't respond after accepting the manuscript The journal editor accepted my paper and told me to ask his assistant about the next steps in the publication process. Four months ago I corrected some minor points and sent an updated manuscript to the assistant. Since then the editor's assistant remained silent. About two weeks ago I asked him about the status of the manuscript and next steps, but he hasn't replied yet. What should I do? Could the editor reject my manuscript after acceptance?

You should write to the editor and tell him what you have told us.  Really your concrete problem is that your correspondence has not been returned so you don't know what's going on.  Maybe everything is proceeding as it should, maybe it isn't, but you need a reply.

  Could editor reject my manuscript after acceptance?

Why do you even ask?  Are you worried that the editor thought, "No, hang on, I don't want to publish this paper after all.  Let's not publish it, never contact the author again, and hope for the best"?!?  That's just totally loopy, unprofessional behavior.  In this big, bad world of ours, anything could happen, but the chance of this happening to you -- provided only that you are dealing with a partway reputable, professional journal (essentially: not a journal that you learned about via a spammy, semi-literate email) -- is negligibly small.

Just get back in contact with the editor ASAP and take it from there.  Be polite, but be persistent.  Give the editor a week or two to reply.  I honestly expect that he will.  If not, write to the editor-in-chief / managing editor / some other members of the editorial board.  You'll hear back from someone.  Again, don't assume that something has gone terribly wrong, and certainly don't worry that your polite, professional behavior will jeopardize the future of your paper.


When a contributor stops contributing In our research I had many meetings and discussions regarding our work (i.e., solutions, implementation, related work, etc) with three other researchers. When I wrote the papers, they were also responsible for reviewing the manuscripts and making decisions together about anything related to them (publishing, editing, assessing comments from journal reviewers etc).

These contributors were my coauthors in every paper I wrote for this specific research. They are all researchers, PhDs and teachers in different institutions.

There are still two papers left: one in the process of being published and other brand new. However, one contributor simply stopped contributing. He didn't say that explicitly, but every time I write a new paper version and our reviewing process starts, he either does not respond to e-mails or takes too long to answer or finish his duties. Usually, the reviewing is only partial (e.g. "I couldn't read all the paper, so here is my comments regarding the first two sections").

My question is, even though this person contributed to our overall research and for the papers in the past, should I put his name in the next paper, assuming he is not going to contribute anymore (while the others will)?

How would you deal with this situation?

If you plan to change anything in your authorship agreement, you should bring this issue up as soon as possible.

You could politely ask if the person is still interested in working on the paper,  e. g.  ask "I've noticed that your responses for this paper come slowly. Probably you are busy with other things. To complete the paper I would need... from your side. I could also try to finish the paper without you, but wonder if you still want to be a coauthor." (Just a first shot for a formulation...)

You don't know the motivation on the other side, so it may well be that the coauthor is really busy, but feels obliged to continue to work on the paper and they would be happy to say "I'm out." I have they can't work on the paper but insists to be coauthor, that is another topic for which your field plays a large role.


How to write the information related to referees in an application form? What's the best way to give information about the person who's going to give recommendation letter, in an application form?

John Clark, Ph.D. in Physics and Mathematics
Associate Professor
Teacher of 'Web Programming' course during the 6th semester
Email address: email.address@example.com
Telephone Number: +00 1234 5678

Is there any need for the 3rd line, at all? Do I need to add information related to the department the person is working in?

Looks to me like you've left out the "organization" and the mailing address. I'd change line 2 to something like: "Associate Professor, Department of Physics, The University of Exampleville". Then you should add several lines below the telephone number that gives the work mailing address of your recommender. If they can't provide that to you directly, you can almost certainly provide the departmental mailing address which should be on their website.


Is it self-plagiarism to repurpose a government report into a journal article? I wrote a report to the state department of transportation for a research project they sponsored. Can I use the same texts/paragraphs from the report to write journal articles? In other words, does it consider plagiarism to do that? I am the author of both, the report and the research papers. Does the final report for a project consider a published work?

Can I use the same texts/paragraphs from the report to write journal articles? In other words, does it consider plagiarism to do that? I am the author of both, the report and the research papers. Does the final report for a project consider a published work?

The short answer to your questions are it depends. The long answer is likely yes, you can probably publish both with some caveats.

In principle, there is nothing wrong with using a project report as the basis for a journal article. Speaking from experience, I have co-authored several completion reports that were used as the basis for manuscripts. For example, the Great Lakes Fisheries Commission Sea Lamprey Control Broad publishes completion reports on their webpage, but still encourages the investigators to publish the work in peer reviewed journal articles. However, there are some important considerations:

Make sure your funding agency is okay with you publishing their report. On a more positive note, some funding agencies will encourage you to publish.
Is your completion report public and is it citable? You may or may not need to cite your previous work. Mentioning the completion report in your cover letter would also help address this problem with the journal.
The completion report likely will not be formatted correctly or written in a style suitable for a journal. Likely your methods section will be okay and possibly the results section. Most likely, the introduction and discussion will need to be adapted to fit the journal's style and tone.


If I am enrolled in Bachelor's degree taught in English, Can I in the future continue with Master's Degree taught in different language? Is it possible?, do Universities recognize the knowledge you have and believe in your billingual skills in the field that you are studying, or is it completely not being acknowledged, and require you to retake the degree in the language you want to get Master's degree as if you were without the degree in the first place?

There is no need to repeat the degree. Just as non-English-speaking students can do graduate studies in the US after passing the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL), other countries also have language proficiency exams. For example, Germany has the "Test Deutsch als Fremdsprache" (TDAF). When you apply for your master's degree, they may require this test or something else (e.g., an interview) to prove your fluency.

The more subtle point is that not all degrees are interchangeable. As my answer in this question points out, there may be a whole procedure to verify that your degree is compatible with the foreign one. This is unlikely to be an issue if you go to a reputable English-language school, but you may want to do further research before committing to this.


What is a "white paper"? I recently came across a call for papers by NASA, asking for submissions of possible further missions using the Kepler spacecraft, given the mission-crippling loss of two reaction wheels. The call describes itself as a "Call for White Papers", and I am slightly confused by the term. What is a white paper, exactly? What other 'sorts of paper' can you call for, and how are they different?

Some funding agencies (e.g., DARPA, AFOSR) use the term "white paper" to mean a brief synopsis of a project idea; this is similar to NSF's "Letter of Intent".  White papers help funding agencies evaluate project ideas quickly, and provide feedback to the proposer about whether or not they're interested, without having the proposer go through the (considerable) hassle of preparing a complete proposal.

Wikipedia shows other meanings of the term (link), but given the context my guess is that NASA is looking for a synopsis of your idea.  You might look at this DARPA solicitation for an idea of what sort of information an agency might want to see in a white paper (see Section 4, and note the length limit).


How to thank a potential supervisor's email? I have recently interviewed by a professor in US after sending him my CV. A few days after the interview he mailed me and told me to do the formal application process and mention him as the professor I want to work with.
Now, I want to thank him for considering me as a choice of his future PhD student. What should I write?

Do not overthink this (and do not write a very long text). Just write

  Dear Prof. NAME,

  Thank you very much for considering me as a PhD student.

  Best, NAME


Is there a "Facebook" for researchers? (to collaborate on projects) I'm writing my PhD-thesis in economics at a fairly small university.
Accordingly, there are relatively few scientists in my department.
I am planning to write a research paper on a specific topic that nobody else at my university is researching.
However, I think that it makes sense to write this paper with several people so that the expertise of others can also be included in this study (and many more reasons).

My question now is where I can find other researchers on this topic. Is there a "Facebook" for researchers? And how can I contact them?

I would also be pleased if someone would tell me about their experience on this problem.

Facebook is not a collaboration tool. It is a tool for advertising companies and the government to gather information about people; that is the business model and the primary intent. Interaction and collaboration are at best secondary effects.

Now, other social networks controlled by commercial entities and many have business models which involve advertising, but Facebook is among the worst.

At any rate, have a look at:

https://researchgate.net
https://academia.edu
https://linkedin.com

The first two are sites intended for researchers to showcase their work using a generic UI/UX. Users of both complain about their spamminess; and Academia.edu apparently has most functionality limited by a paywall. I personally have found ResearchGate less spammy than Academia.edu, but some comments below suggest otherwise.

The third one, owned by Microsoft, is more geared towards recruitment/head-hunting, and is about presenting one's professional profile rather than research. But I've found both ResearchGate and LinkedIn to be places where I've discovered people who are potential collaborators or sources of useful material for my research. I have not, however, used these networks to actually engage on collaboration.

But of course, that is also true for scientific conferences and journals, or rather their on-line form of websites and downloadable proceedings.


How can a decent student find a doctoral advisor from another faculty? I am a last year student at the Moscow State University (I study maths). At our university there are two somewhat similar mathematical faculties: Faculty of Mechanics and Mathematics (this is where I study at the moment) and the Faculty of Computational Mathematics and Cybernetics - CMC for short.

After almost five years of study, when the time came to think about what will my PhD research topic be and where to apply for PhD study, I started to investigate possible options and eventually found that all the chairs that are close to my interest are of the CMC faculty. So I started contacting professors from CMC, attending their courses, detailing my interests and asking them whether they are interested in teaching me etc.

To my disappointment, all three persons whom I've contacted so far said that my interests are close to theirs, that they may have been interesting in working with me but, unfortunately, they have many students of their own, they have many applications and it would be difficult for me to find a PhD student position at their chair.

I also want to mention that I consider myself a decent student - I have a top mark in absolutely every course I've attended during my 5 - year study. Still, no one seems to want to even bother taking a "foreign" student (or even recommending me to some fellow scientists who may be less busy with students). I don't know what is the reason for this and how to overcome this, and after several refuses I feel demoralised and close to abandoning the very idea of a PhD study. Maybe you can give me some advice on what could help?

Thank you very much in advance.

Just in order to formally mark this question as resolved:

Thanks a lot to the people that showed concern in the comments! The things have worked out pretty good for me. The thing that I've personally learned from this struggle is that one should explore all the possible options, knock on every possible door and keep trying - if you are really interested in your subject, there will always be somebody who will be ready to share your interest.


Separate books from papers in bibliography of a paper Is there some automatic way to single out the books in bibliography of a paper in IEEE format?

For example, write some program or use some functionality of some editors to find out the books mentioned in this paper with 303 references in its bibliography?

It's a partial answer, since it's not really automatic, but since this paper seems to have been done with Latex, you could probably ask the authors for their bibtex file, and then using a reference manager such as Bibdesk, Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, etc, you should be able to sort them by category, and therefore isolate all the books.


Should one thank colleagues for interesting discussions that have not actually achieved anything? I am currently finishing a paper, and I am writing the acknowledgements section.

There is a colleague with whom I have discussed several times about the question answered in the paper, who certainly spent some spare time thinking about it, and suggested some interesting ideas. However, none of these ideas actually turned out to be fruitful. While I appreciated their interest in this question, and things definitely might have turned out differently, the paper as it is has not actually benefited in any tangible way from my discussions with this person.

Do you think it is appropriate to thank them anyway? (And, if yes, with what formulation? just the standard "I would like to thank Prof. Smith for some interesting discussions", or something else?)

If it matters, the field is pure mathematics.

The acknowledgement is not just for the results you get ultimately, but for the time and effort spent by your colleague in discussing your problem. Research is not deterministic, so you can rarely know beforehand what  approach will work; you need to try different methods and then see what gives you the results. It's unfair to credit only those which ultimately worked. (Also, what didn't work now could work in a different scenario, with a different approach.)

To offer an experimental analogue, often we need to use several different instruments or techniques to get a result. This means we need to collaborate with different people for instruments and inputs; once they give time and access, they are acknowledged irrespective of the results.

As for how to acknowledge, the standard line is safe and respectful, unless you want to highlight a specific contribution.


Career advice: Post-doc away from my primary interest, or not I'm in a need of a career advice, and I can't really think up any better to ask than all of you.

There is a post-doc position within upgrading biofuel that I am almost certain to be offered. There is some catalysis involved, but it is somewhat away from my primary interests: Organic synthesis and polymers. Similar positions within these topics are scarce, but at my alma mater they would hire me immediately if they get the funds nescessary.

What should I do? Accept being away from home ground for two years, working on getting funding for the Chemistry department, or sit tight and hope that a better fitting position comes along?

Cheers,

EDIT:
I would like to precise, that I am going to apply for funding for an industrial post-doc together with a company. They are highly interested in me, but lack the funding. The job would be way more aligned with synthesis and polymer chemistry - but I will have to take a calculated risk: There is a 60% success rate for the applications, but I'll have be without job (2 months) until we get a (hopefully) positive answer.
Is the post-doc really that career-determining?

The most important thing is to evaluate if you will be able to keep a steady output of papers during this post-doc, if you can't hit the ground running than you will lose time to get comfortable with new material, two years go by very quickly. Also you should consider if in your country a post-doc in a different place is valuable experience to get tenure. You are the only one that can decide.


Advisor wants to be the first author I'm a computer science graduate student (Master degree), I have done my thesis defense, and it is accepted. So, the problem is that I want to publish a paper based on my thesis but the advisor wants her name to be the FIRST name! Claiming that she has done enough work to be as first author. So, here how the research has been done:

At the beginning she didn't have any good idea to be done as thesis. Thus, I had to go through existing research for couple of months until I came up with a new idea.
As any new idea, it develops with the time. What I mean is that she suggested few things to be added. However, I added much more things to enhance the algorithm (my idea) and achieve better results .
I wrote the whole thesis, but she revised almost all of it (except Related work and conclusion) because English is not my first language.
She did the mathematical proof ( I mean she found the equations to proof that our algorithm is better)
However, I codded all the simulation programs, and I did the simulations and collected the results.
Also, she stayed in contact with me during the summer (one Skype call a week)

I spent almost two years working on this research, and I don't want to be unfair with her. I would like to have your opinion

In my experience, in CS, it is rare but not unheard of for a professor to be first author.  Usually I think that is really when it is the professor who has taken lead, both in running a project and in writing the text, and typically it is when it is a group project where each student has a moderate contribution but it's the advisor who pulled it together.  This is often the case when the paper is an overview of the project as a whole.

In the case of your project, it certainly sounds like you're getting a raw deal and should push back.  But without seeing the professor's side of the story, it can be hard to tell.  They may have a different view of the relative contribution.

IMHO, even if it's 50-50 or 60-40, the student should get priority.  There's a tipping point where it's more understandable, but from your description, you're nowhere close to it.

Good luck!


What can one do when emails to the editor go unanswered? I submitted a research article to a reputable mathematics journal in May 2014. The status of my article is still "under review." I have contacted the editor at least three times regarding the delay but have not gotten a reply to any of my mails. Under such circumstances, what can I do? It's really very troublesome and painful for me to bear this.

Can you contact an Associate Editor or another member of the editorial board? More than 18 months with no communication does seem excessively long and the lack of response from the editor suggests something is wrong. You might also try the secretary in the editor's department and ask her if she can get in touch with him.

If you don't hear back from them either, I would withdraw the paper and submit it somewhere else. Hopefully, there's a way to do that in the online system -- but if not, contacting them one last time with the notification should be sufficient. They can't publish the paper without you signing some forms.


MPhil applications - How flexible/sure should I be, and should I mention this possibility? (I don't think there's a master of philosophy tag here)

I'm applying to PhD programs in pure math. I have a research master's degree in applied math. While it doesn't have a thesis, it has a course project. I've been reading about requirements for PhD programs and it turns out US-style PhDs expect only a bachelor's and a statement of purpose while European-style PhDs expect a (research) master's degree

I'm applying to universities places not in Europe or in the US that are somewhere in the middle. These universities offer MPhil.

Now, I have a feeling I won't be seen by universities as qualified for PhDs but will be qualified for MPhil. My ultimate goal is to pursue a PhD. I am perfectly fine with having to do an MPhil first.

My understanding is that

if I would apply for a PhD, then I should specify a certain area of math (for a statement of purpose; for a research proposal that's just the basics I guess) which I should be sure about researching otherwise I am a candidate who is not sure about research interests
but if I would apply for a master's, I should be flexible and thus state a certain area/s of research as merely a possible route

So what should I do for a statement of purpose for MPhil, which is somewhere in the middle of a master's and PhD? How sure/flexible should I be?
Additionally, is it disadvantageous to:

state in a PhD application that I am open to doing an MPhil?
apply for both an MPhil and a PhD in the same university?

I am concerned that doing either will count against me in being accepted for a PhD because it seems like I'm not so sure of myself.

I was advised to ask the admissions offices of the universities but that seems to me like asking a jury how to appeal to the same jury. I would ask a lawyer how I would appeal to the jury.

I was advised also to apply to MPhil's in some universities and PhD's in others. What do you think?

Typically departments (at least in the U.S.) will tell you on their website whether they have a preference about how you present your intentions.

I think you should try to get into a PhD program if possible.  However, you could apply to one or two master's programs just in case.

If your intention is to eventually get a PhD, just be honest about that.  In fact, for many departments, that would be a plus.

No one is going to hold you to what you write in your SOP.

They want to make sure you are motivated and have some sort of creative idea(s) -- but no one is going to check you against your SOP two years from now.

I'm not sure I covered everything.  To get useful responses, try to modularize.  It's okay to write more than one question.


Transitioning from a BS in CIS to an MSE in Software Engineering I'm considering an attempt to gain admittance to an MSE program in Software Engineering but I realize that most of my education may not be fully relevant. My BS is in CIS where the focus was real world application and lots of management type stuff, so there wasn't much math and I know that is going to be be a problem. I was looking at ASU's MSE program which implied that the only pre-requisite was Calc I. However, when I was looking through the pre-reqs for each individual class, there were things like Intro to Embedded systems and such; subjects that were obviously not included in CIS. I currently work as a Software Engineer, but our focus is pretty level in that it's typical information systems type stuff (just moving data in and out of databases). I have a true passion for it, I'm not terrible at math, and I really do want to get deeper into the matrix so to speak, so motivation won't necessarily be a huge issue.

So, I'm wondering if anyone had any experience with this or could give me some info on what to expect or what I'm going to need to do in order to make this happen. For instance, am I going to end up getting a second BS (in CS) before I can make the transition or should I still be able to make the switch outright? I haven't contacted ASU yet because in my experience, they push you to apply without actually providing guidance first.

Most MSE programs in the US do not require you to have a BSE in the relevant field. The listed prerequisites for the courses are often requirements that undergraduates need to fulfil before being allowed to enrol in the graduate class. That said, you may need to take some undergraduate classes to get up to speed and you may need to work harder to make up for starting slightly behind. If accepted, it is likely that the admissions committee thinks that your previous background is enough to be able to succeed in the program.

In summary, admissions committees do not accept students that they think will be unable to complete the program.


Editor not taking action after I reported plagiarism. What steps can I take? Some people erased three author names including mine from a paper previously submitted (and rejected by three different journals) and got it accepted by Case Reports In Emergency Medicine.

I presented the publishing editor of the journal multiple clear proofs of the plagiarism. Although the journal declares that it complies with COPE, the publishing editor is dragging feet not to publish a retraction about this article despite the proofs. Instead, they are trying to overlook the situation by involving the politically driven hospital administration from where the paper was submitted from. This in turn caused  violation of my rights both as a human and as a researcher. I am currently subjected to serious mobbing by the hospital administration secondary to the inconclusive behaviour of the journal. This mobbing includes the change in my workplace and an official warning because "I ruined reputation of the hospital by contacting the publishing editor".

I also sent a message to COPE but there is no response.

Would anyone suggest any further action?

Working with the editor, until that process is finished, is probably the only thing to do at first.  It will undoubtedly be a long process, with delays, so patience and persistence will be necessary. Try not to let the mobbing get to you, and try to remain calm and professional at all times, despite any pressure others may exert.

If the editors, in the end, are unable to come to a resolution you accept, then the options will be (essentially) to escalate the situation or to let it go. But making an action of that kind while the editors are still working would be premature, in my opinion.


Is it possible to attend my "backup" school but reapply to my top choice and go there if accepted? I applied to several graduate programs and was accepted to my back-up choice. The professor at one of my top choice schools contacted me personally to say that he was interested in my application but had no room for me this year; he suggested applying next year, as "re-applicants" have a good chance of getting accepted on their second attempt.

Though pleased, I mentally dismissed this. I had a tangible acceptance to a school I did want to attend (albeit last choice), and I enrolled in classes. I immersed myself in my new environment, took on a healthy course load with a teaching assistantship, and have received lots of praise for my work and work ethic from my professors and colleagues.

However, with each week I am here, I hear more and more people--students, professors, the head of the department--admit that my program is lacking in many ways. The school offers very few courses in my actual field (a fact they omitted on the school website that boasted what the program had to offer its students). There are two professors in my field, and one is always away. One of them has also been known to cancel classes frequently, a fact that had been addressed to and dismissed by the department. This means that the few opportunities I have to study in my field have decreased. The program is very heavily based on teaching--that is, the teaching as part of my assistantship. Two of the required classes I am taking this semester are teaching-oriented, and while I am happy to teach now, it is not a long-term career goal of mine, and I expressed this to my advisor. It seems, though, that despite what I was made to understand before coming to school, that this program ultimately tailors its candidates for a teaching career.

Ordinarily I would just accept it, as each program has its problems. Yet, I cannot shake the fact that, especially given the last fact, I am going to be geared toward a career I specifically do not want. Add to that the invitation from the professor of one of my top-choice schools, and I find myself wondering if it is unprecedented for a graduate student to switch. I would not be losing any time; if anything, a switch would save time, as the program I am currently in is unusually long, whereas the program I would be entering is comparatively shorter and more compact. Plus, as the assistantship the other school offers is not a teaching-based one, I will be able to take courses in the field of my choice. But before I keep considering, I would like to know if it is even possible.

Common scenario: a professor is recruited to go work at a different university; s/he takes his or her students along.  No one bats an eyelash.

The quicker you can make the change the better; you need not feel at all guilty.  It's just not a good fit.  Your current school would be a great fit for someone who wants to teach.  But it's not a good fit for you.


No mention of previous work = reject? I am asked to review a paper for a fairly highly regarded conference.
The paper presents some 'novel' algorithms to do a particular job, but it fails to mention any of the various related previous work which address the very same issue.
Even if the algorithm is sound and their method is thorough I am hesitant to accept the paper, since there is no comparison to existing techniques; neither on a methodological level nor on the level of results.
Can I reject such a paper based on the non-existent comparison to related work, or should I focus more on their method and results itself?

One of the key questions for any piece of scientific work is this: how does this work contribute to human knowledge?
If a work fails to even discuss its relationship to prior work, then it is entirely appropriate to reject it. Likewise, if the authors mention algorithms that are directly comparable but fail to actually make a comparison with any of those algorithms. When I am given a paper that is entirely isolated in this way, I will not even bother to check the details of the algorithm's soundness, since the work already has a major disqualifying failure.
For many algorithms, however, the differences are qualitative and not quantitative, and thus a direct comparison would be unenlightening or pointless.  For example, if algorithm X tolerates a class of failures that prior algorithms do not, then it is enough to show that algorithm X tolerates those failures.  One does not necessarily need to re-prove or empirically demonstrate that the others do not.
Likewise, the number of potentially related prior works is often vast and complicated. No algorithm paper will ever compare to all of the other related algorithms, because "related" is a broad and fuzzy concept. You and the authors will generally not make the same judgements about which algorithms might be interesting to discuss in related work or to directly compare against.  Thus, the standard to which you should hold related work is not "Do I want to see comparison against Algorithm Y?" (that's Evil Reviewer #2 behavior) but rather "Does the comparison provided sufficiently support the author's assertions?"
Bottom line: be generous in your judgement of comparison to prior work, but papers with no meaningful comparison should be rejected.


Why don't most law schools show, let alone teach how to draft and interpret, complete contracts? The author's just referring to US. I don't know if Commonwealth law schools show students complete contracts and/or teach how to draft and interpret. But I'm flabberghast that you can graduate JD without actually reading a complete contract or sampling different types of contracts!

How "if you develop the critical thinking skills necessary to understand and interpret contract law, the ability to draft and interpret contract themselves will follow"? I don't understand this theory. At some point, won't new law graduates have to see and self-teach a contract before drafting and interpreting them?

If JD graduates have to work with contracts some day, why do law schools delay the inevitable? Even if not a mandatory course, why don't  law schools offer an optional 2L or 3L course on perusing, drafting and interpreting complete contracts?

      In class, most likely, you will never actually read a complete contract.  You will probably never study typical sections included in most commercial contracts. You will not see a sampling of different types of contracts. Instead, your contracts course will teach you contractual principles of interpretation. The theory is that if you develop the critical thinking skills necessary to understand and interpret contract law, the ability to draft and interpret contract themselves will follow.

Steven Sedberry J.D. (Vanderbilt). Law School Labyrinth: The Guide to Making the Most of Your Legal Education (2011) p 83.

I went to law school in Australia, not the US, but I also had this experience --- that courses on contract law never involved reading any actual legal contracts, and that this latter exercise was almost completely absent from the whole program.  Across my LLB and LLM, the only time we ever did anything like this was in a legal skills workshop in LLM (required for registration as a solicitor) where the teacher went through an actual legal contract and the class discussed the drafting of each of the sections, and their good and bad points.  This exercise was probably about one hour over the course of about five years in law school.
As to why this is done, I can only assume that legal academics believe that it is more valuable to focus time on discrete legal issues, and the theory pertaining to them, rather than spending substantial amounts of time holistically analysing an actual legal contract.  Furthermore, I think the law schools regard this kind of exercise as something you learn on-the-job in a legal firm, rather than in university programs.  There is some degree of demarcation between legal theory and ideas taught in university (which is more abstract), and the on-the-job knowledge you get from supervising solicitors when starting in a legal firm (which is more concrete).
To give some historical background to this, it used to be the case that law schools did not exist at all.  You became a lawyer by doing an apprenticeship under an existing solicitor, just as you would have to become a blacksmith, etc.  Throughout the middle ages the legal profession was conducted on an apprenticeship model, so students learned skills by performing or observing tasks from an instructing solicitor.  The size of the profession was small, and limited to upper-class males, so you might have had a solicitor who agrees to take on one or two apprentices who do clerical work for him while observing his practice.  In the 1200s an institution called the "Inns of Court" was established in London to teach young upper-class men legal skills and the broader social graces and skills of becoming a "gentleman".  Even then, formal legal training was light, and most of the learning was done on-the-job by apprenticeship under a practicing lawyer.  (Incidentally, this institution is still around, and is now a professional association for barristers.)  Students were also encouraged to learn by directly attending and observing court proceedings.  In more recent times, when the universities began teaching law, they had to demonstrate some value-added in conducting courses through their own institutions; they did this by taking the view that they would teach the kinds of higher-level abstract principles of law, while leaving other skills to remain within the apprenticeship.  Gradually the apprenticeship model has waned and disappeared, but there is still some degree to which the universities consider early career at a law firm to be a supplement for this.
I partly agree with the Sedburry quote --- it is descriptively accurate about what happens at law school.  I disagree with his assumption that academics assume that concrete knowledge of how to draft good contracts follows automatically.  To the contrary, I don't think that legal academics think that the ability to draft contracts automatically follows from conceptual understanding, but they do seem to regard this as a skill to be learned during one's early career in a law firm, rather than something to devote time to at university.  Personally, I think that is a mistake, and that it would be beneficial for the degree to include many more exercises involving full reading/critique of a whole legal contract, even if this crowds out some of the theory knowledge in the curriculum.
Finally, I will just note that you are probably not alone in viewing this as a deficiency in the law school curriculum.  This is a situation where you could take the initiative and start your own study group, with the goal of reading and analysing actual commercial contracts.  You could treat this like a book-club --- each week you all get a legal contract to read and discuss/critique for the next week.  If you can find ten or more other students who are keen on this, you could probably go to some of your lecturers and see if any of them are interested in helping you (e.g., attending a one-hour study session each week to help with discussion).  Some academics won't have the time for this, but if you've already done the leg-work of organising the group yourself (and if you meet in a room very near to their office!), you will probably be able to find a willing academic.


Removing co-authors after re-running study 2 years ago, as a PhD student in Department X at a European university, I designed and ran a study and then over the next year wrote it up for submission to decent but not top-level journals. I did 100% of the work, with no useful suggestions from anyne else, and in particular from my PhD advisor, who is also the department head. In fact, the work is quite far afield from his methods, knowledge, and expertise; however, it is understood in local academic culture that the department head goes on the paper, regardless of their contribution (which is typically zero). While preparing the manuscript, we solicited comments from my advisor's colleague, who is a respected researcher on this topic. The comments mostly related to structure, presentation, how to build the story better, etc., but nothing substantial in terms of subject matter. He also said it was a good paper and he wished he were on it. My advisor then "advised" me to put him on the paper. Being a young academic, I didn't know how to say "no", and also thought that maybe it would be strategic to have a more respected name among the co-authors.

Fast-forward to now. I have my PhD and am now an assistant professor in Department Y, no relation to X. The paper has had 1 review from a good journal and 3 desk rejects. To summarize the feedback, they generally say the paper is good and would probably be accepted, were it not for an issue which is considered a methodological flaw in one (but not the other) of the 2 fields which this paper straddles. I am convinced that I should re-run the study to fix this and, if the results stand up, submit it to the remaining relevant journals for which it would be appropriate. My co-authors, when they can even be bothered to respond to my requests for input/opinions on how to proceed, don't want to be bothered with rewriting, etc., and want to just keep trying to push it to the remaining journals.

I am very interested in the idea, I believe it is a good one, and I want to pursue this by rerunning the study without the flaw. Since these co-authors (my former PhD advisor/department head and his colleague) have not given any substantial input or help, it seems justified that they cease to be coauthors when the study is re-run -- it is virtually a new paper at this point. My questions are whether the community would generally agree that this would be wise -- especially since it hurts my job prospects to have papers with big-name researchers, since it's potentially unclear that I'm really the one doing the work. If advisable to eliminate them, I would appreciate any advice about how to navigate this.On the other hand, I do have fears about the potential fallout and am open to keeping them on the paper if necessary, but it's impossible to make progress when they don't respond to my emails about e.g. finalizing design, running/analyzing the experiment, preparing the manuscript, etc. Perhaps it is wiser to keep them, but then how can I make progress with my work without them holding me back?

Just ask them if they’d be okay with you reworking the paper and cutting them out of the author list, or they’d still like to contribute to it.
So your paper has a flaw that you need to rework to get published.  Your coauthors aren’t interested in doing so, so why not just do the polite thing and ask them if they still want to be involved?
If they agree to be cut out of the revised paper, they wouldn’t have any reason to be upset with you for doing so. If they agree to take an active role in revising the paper, they don’t have any reason to be upset, either.


Studies on lost teaching hours due to USA Affordable Care Act? In the USA, the Affordable Care Act requires employers to provide health care to employees working above 30 hours. Some employers to save on costs have either cut full-time employees hours to part-time or eliminated some full-time positions entirely.
 I'm a part-time instructor at my university. My hours were cut to put them below the 30 hour cut off for next semester. This reduced my classes from three to two, with a reduction in pay.

Have there been any studies on how the ACA has affected employment of adjunct faculty?

While the requirement of "adjunct faculty" likely makes this too specific to have a study done looking at this, that doesn't mean we can't at least drawn some expected inferences from wider observed market forces and more general studies.
It's a "known issue" that the 30-hour requirement is resulting in some people having their work hours reduced so they don't count as full time. Back when the Affordable Care Act was not even passed yet there were employers - especially restaurants and other low-wage institutions - stating explicitly that this is what they'd be doing. So without a study, we'd explicitly expect this to be one effect of the law
As for studies seeking to quantify the effects, there are some, such as Effects of Federal Policy to Insure Young Adults:
Evidence from the 2010 Affordable Care Act’s
Dependent-Coverage Mandate. On page 23 we see:

Our data allow us to investigate the effects of the federal mandate
on whether young adults report working, whether they report working
full-time (30 hours or more), their weekly work hours, and their rate
of job turnover. We also examine the impact of the mandate on their
work schedule flexibility by evaluating the probability that young
adults have work hours that vary from week to week.
Our results,
starting with the first column of Table 7, show no statistically
significant evidence that the mandate affected the probability of
employment of young adults. Since the receipt of ESI is usually tied
to full-time work, we examined this measure next and find that the law
is associated with a reduced prevalence of full-time work by close to
2 percentage points (roughly 5.8 percent) during the period after
implementation began, relative to pre-ACA enactment. We also find
statistically significant evidence for a reduction in hours of work
(about a 3 percent reduction); these effects are statistically weaker
when we examine log hours as the dependent variable.

So this isn't a specific study to adjuncts, and this study specifically looks at young adults who aren't so likely to be adjunts, but without a specific study we are certainly permitted to assume that this is a real effect of the law - some people will see a cut in pay/hours so as to avoid having to be provideded benefits.


How to arrange courses to timetable? I would like to ask if there is some algorithm how to arrange courses to timetable. I study at the university and we can choose a few different lesson times for each subject.

The problem is how to coordinate all subjects with student's requirements, for example to have school only 2 days a week and/or to select some hours based on capacity.

One subject - you have to select one from the first table and one from the second table (it's lecture and seminar). There can be only one table to select from (only seminar/only lecture):

Why did this get moved to https://academia.stackexchange.com/ ?  This is an algorithm question!

Anyway, it so happens some friends of mine have one of the top timetabling algorithms, based on competition wins.  Here is a link to the paper (which will include references to other state-of-the-art timetabling algorithms)

  An automatically configured modular algorithm for post enrollment
  course timetabling Chris Fawcett, Holger H. Hoos, and Marco
  Chiarandini - Technical Report TR-2009-15, University of British
  Columbia, Department of Computer Science, 2009. [pdf]


Techniques for good board handwriting I'm a math TA and I find that my most consistent comment for improvement involved my board handwriting. Anybody have some tips or techniques I can use to make things a little neater on the board?

There are, of course, time constraints with teaching any course, so I don't want to simply write more slowly in order to assist in writing more neatly. Thankfully in a math course much of what I write is symbols which are easier to (borrowing a typography term) kern than sentences, but I still feel like I need to vastly improve my handwriting on a board if I plan on teaching for any length of time.

This is a sample of my handwriting:

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

EDIT: After checking the room in which I'm assigned to teach this semester, it turns out I do actually have a whiteboard instead of a chalkboard. Like I commented below somewhere, I'm sure 90% of the answers mentioned (those not expressly about chalk, anyway) will be completely cross-transferable and I'll try to make them all work. Thanks again for all the great answers!

I have struggled with this too.  Two things that I find help are:

Write much bigger than you think you should.  It's easier to be neater with bigger letters.  You can fit less on a board, but honestly that's generally a good thing.
Move your body along with your writing as you go.  My writing gets worse the farther my hand is from my center of mass, and tends to trail downward too.


Undergrad CV – listing posters you presented but did not author There seems to be a bias, particularly among more established researchers, to only include posters that they presented. There seems to be a trend towards not including (or including as abstract accepted) posters where they are listed as an author, but someone else presented.

My question is the reverse of that: If you were not involved in the project (thus no authorship), but presented the poster at a conference, would you include that on your CV?

Example: I attended a conference this year; my PI was supposed to present two of their posters, but couldn’t make it at the last minute. We’re currently working on extensions of that research, so I was familiar with the topic, but I wasn’t involved in those particular projects. I was also presenting at that conference, and so I presented my PI’s posters as well.

Is it acceptable to include those on my CV, with a note about “presented by [self] at [event]”?

Yes, it is acceptable. However, I would not list it in my "publication section", rather in a separate section called "Paper/Poster Presentations".

If you received any certificate (or letter) after the presentation, then that is a plus.


Half points and IELTS overall band score categories My IELTS overall band score is 8.5 and I am wondering what to call it, i.e. what's the name of the category for this score. Rounding rules of half scores in terms of categories is not explained in The IELTS 9-band scale and I have not found any other resources regarding this specific question either.

Possible options are:

Rounding it up and calling it an "expert user". This makes more sense as there is no score or band above 9.0, so the "expert user" band could be interpreted as anything between 8.0 (exclusive) and 9.0 (inclusive).
Rounding it down and thus calling it a "very good user".
No rounding and calling it "expert / very good user".

Be as specific as you can. When asked for IELTS results, specify a decimal result of 8.5 wherever possible. If specifically asked for text description instead of a decimal result, be on the safe side and call it "very good user". For all my experience with IELTS, a result above band 7 is considered a pass for all purposes.


Graduating with a PhD in May, should I take a good offer in an undesired location? I'm not sure if this is the correct StackExchange site to post this on, but I did not see one that was a closer fit.

I'm graduating with my Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from a mid-tier program in the US in May. I am targeting industry as my prefered career path and was advised to start applying to jobs a few months ago.

I've had phone screenings with a few companies that have told me to get back in contact in the new year. However, I got a good offer (pay/benefits/semi-interesting work) from one company that's far away from my hometown (which I would prefer to be near).

So after all this set-up I have two questions

Does anyone have resources about the pay for a newly minted ME PhD? I found a report from the ASME/ASCE from 2012 (Exhibit 11) that lists some statistics. But I was hoping for something more up to date.
Should I be worried that I'm not getting more interviews, or is this simply a product of May being relatively far out for companies to hire?

Thank you

If you care about your career, be prepared to move to wherever you find the best opportunity.


Taking a graduate version of a course I took in undergrad I am currently a second year masters student that will be applying to PhD programs in CS Theory. I have finished all of my required coursework for graduation, but my tuition is essentially free and I enjoy taking classes so I am looking for one to take this semester. The few that I am very interested in are full (with no chance of additional spots opening) but there is another that I can take.

My problem is this: It is a introductory graduate level combinatorics course. My undergraduate degree was heavily focused on discrete mathematics so I took two combinatorics courses (one that had a similar syllabus to this one until about halfway through the class). I did ok in the class as an undergrad but not as well as I would have liked in terms of grades.

My question is this: How would taking this course look to PhD admissions committees? Would they think I was sandbagging not taking serious coursework or simply retaking a class to boost my GPA (I would like to note that this is not the reason I want to take it. I am interested in the sections of the course that I did not have in my undergraduate class, but the difference between the classes will probably not be known to PhD admission committees. That is, they will just see Combinatorics for both.).

My undergraduate GPA was quite low, but I have good research experience. In this sense, my main goal is to minimize the impact of my undergrad GPA on my admission chances by taking graduate coursework and doing well (so far, my graduate GPA has been very high).

Thanks in advance.

Edited to clarify "sandbagging".

You said your exact problem is solved, but I want to answer in a more general way.

PhD admissions are not uniform or even consistent year-to-year. Additionally, the at some departments, the professors who are on the admissions committee change year-to-year. Thus there is no magic bullet for admission into a PhD program.

In my opinion, someone like yourself who has undergraduate research experience, will be in a situation where the admissions committee won't care about your exact courses on your transcript. Your GPA may or may not matter, depending on the whims of the admissions committee.

Most likely your success with applying is a completely subjective decision made by people: and like all people they are biased and irrational. I am not trying to be insulting. All I am saying is that you cannot expect a process which is subjective to work like a deterministic computer program: where the same inputs result in the same outputs; where if you change your initial conditions slightly, but taking a graduate course, your outcome will be affected by it.

I will also add that some PhD program/departments may have objective thresholds. For example a GRE minimum score, and no matter how strong the result of your application is, if you scored lower that the threshold, your application is thrown out.


Website for admission results? Is there any website/forum where people post their application results? For instance a website where people write the name of university they applied for, their GPAs, their GRE/TOEFL scores, their subject, ... and the result of admission? I'm just eager to see some admission results from top US universities specially in Statistics and/or Computer Science.

As others have stated, thegradcafe.com is the most used site for posting results. It seems that applicants from almost every discipline use their results tracker. However, it isn't very comprehensive when it comes to stats, and many people choose to omit the limited information that it can track.

Their forums are sometimes frequented as well depending on the discipline, while some disciplines have other common discussion sites. As far as I remember, the statistics forum at gradcafe was fairly active during the admissions season. I know that a lot of math grad admissions discussion goes on at mathematicsgre.com, while most economics applicants gather at urch.com. I'm betting that almost every discipline has some kind of forum or discussion site that people congregate at, but I am not as familiar with other fields.

If you're looking for in-depth profiles, these forums are often the best places to look. The sample size isn't very high, but most of the time they have some kind of "Profiles and Results" thread each year that people post in (e.g. stats, econ).


Should a formal academic grievance list what an action the student hopes will occur? I have a problem with a course, but my informal communications with the instructor and chair led nowhere.

My student handbook shows a policy for filing a formal grievance, which seems more like a legal process for solving problems. I must mail a letter to my instructor and wait for a reply from them.

In the letter, I will explain my complaint regarding the course. Should a formal grievance letter also list which actions I hope they will take to resolve the problem? Such as, "My grade should be raised." or "Let me retake the course without record of the first time." or "Tuition refund."

The reason that the grievance process sounds like "a legal process for solving problems" is that it is indeed a pseudo-legal process for solving problems. In particular, it is used when the instructor has done something that violates university policy - unfair grading is a frequent complaint.

These grievances typically follow a detailed policy to try to ensure that student complaints are treated fairly. The first step is often to formally notify the instructor in writing, and that seems to be the purpose of the letter.

In the letter, you should lay out the facts as you see them, and you should include the resolution you would like to see. Try to write the letter in a businesslike way - you want to advocate for yourself, but keep to the facts and try not to say things that you cannot justify later.

If the instructor and department chair cannot or do not resolve the issue, it will move up to the next level, which is typically review by a dean. If the dean cannot resolve it, it goes to the next level, which may involve a hearing of some sort.  In my experience many complaints are resolved by the department chair or dean, particularly when the situation is clear cut (e.g. a professor didn't follow the grading policy from the course syllabus).

I cannot say what remedies will be available at your school - this will vary by school. There are certainly colleges where the higher-level administration could allow you to take the course again, or drop the first course from your transcript. The instructor will not be able to do those things, but you have to work through the process one layer at a time in any case.


What are useful tips and tricks for collaborating remotely? What techniques have you found to improve collaboration with a remote colleague, in particular to make it feel more like collaboration in person?

The majority of my collaborations are with colleagues outside of my state.  The simplest model I've used is that we each write up certain proofs, and then eventually one of us organizes the various pieces into a draft of a paper, which gets passed back and forth via email until we agree that we're ready to submit.  However, this typically feels quite different from collaborating in person.  One technique that I've used with surprising success is to skype with my colleague.  He was actually able to write on the chalkboard so that I could read it.  What techniques have worked best for you?

A good Revision Control!! I use Git coupled with github being an efficient way (and free) to share and complete a collaboration, especially for code and latex files.

Else, google docs is also free,  allows to multiple persons to edit the same file at the same time, and you see who is doing what. You can do most "Microsoft Word" formats and things. You have also have as service free video-conference and chat.

I highly discourage Dropbox to share files edited per more than one person.


How to address having been plagiarized by senior scholars without ruining the relationship I recently came across a book written by two senior scholars in my field (anthropology), who cite a paper I published with a colleague two years ago.  They cite us quite favorably and in most places they cite us correctly. However, there are two passages which they have copied verbatim from our paper but without attributing them to us, nor even citing us anywhere on the respective pages.

What should we do about that?  We certainly don't want to ruin our relationship.
What are appropriate steps to be taken?

We have never met the authors in person but been exchanging emails with one of them a few times – all very positive exchanges. He is also supposed to participate in a conference panel with us this year. How to bring it up and what should we expect from them to do?

It is difficult to say if this was intentional or only an oversight - though an improper one. But the fact that they cite you generally, seems to imply sloppiness, not malice. Ask for a correction.

I would simply point out the passages to them and provide them a proper citation for them. Since this is a book, it will likely go through several printings and it may be possible for the future printings to be corrected. Published books often come with an errata page, usually online these days.

You don't need to make accusations, just point out the correction.

If you get a poor response from the authors, then try to contact the publisher, starting with just the same information and request.

But if you get a favorable response, then thank them and, if you desire, say positive things about their work and point again to your own. From a bad situation it might turn in to a good one. But that assumes good will.


What are the consequences of a recommendation from someone in the distant past? I am in the not completely unusual position of having an eight year period between my Master's and PhD degrees. During this time I was gainfully employed in a completely unrelated and non-academic field.

I have now graduated from a PhD and am looking for work.  Many good post-doc and academic jobs require three referees to speak on one's behalf, and to be competitive these references must surely be academics.

I had a great relationship with my Master's supervisor, including co-authoring papers together, and I believe that despite the 12 years since I was her student she could still speak credibly, confidently, and highly favorably on my behalf.

In the non-academic world it would stretch credibility to call upon a reference from such a distant point in the past.  But for an academic position, I think things could be different.

What are the potential advantages and disadvantages of using her as personal reference?  Are potential post-doctoral supervisors or hiring committees likely to discount her reference as stale and irrelevant?

If research is a substantive part of the jobs you are applying for, then you should be wary of asking your Master's supervisor for a letter.  It could work out OK, but there's a serious risk.

The issue is that hiring committees want information about your current research, rather than what you did for your Master's degree.  If your Master's supervisor has read some of your recent work and is capable of discussing and evaluating it in detail, then it will be a useful recommendation.  However, you don't want a letter that focuses on the past and just includes a brief paragraph saying "And the Ph.D. research seems to have gone well, but I don't really know anything about it."  That could actually hurt your case by suggesting that you couldn't find three people who understand and think highly of your more recent work.

A strong letter that focuses on the past is certainly better than a weak letter, so it could be your best option.  You might also talk about this issue with your Master's supervisor, and see how compelling and up to date a letter she thinks she can provide.  If she has read or wants to read your recent work, then that's great; if she is hesitant about the idea of writing a letter, then I would ask someone else.