Approaching researchers about collaboration? This question is quite premature for the current state of my studies, but I already have a few people in mind to which this question applies.

In Academia, would it be considered normal to approach a researcher you respect (who's work has great personal value or interest to you) and suggest that you would be interested in assisting with their future research efforts? In this case, I'm speaking less about full collaboration/co-authorship, and more about being willing to assist with the 'grunt work' of a given research project, purely out of interest in the subject matter.

Would this be construed as insulting to the researcher?

Is this sort of offer commonplace?

Is there an expectation of credential equality in this situation? For example, would it be inappropriate for an Undergraduate student to make such an offer to a PhD?

To show interest is never wrong so from that point, I think such an approach would be fair. What complicates the issue is the picture of prerequisites. When you approach someone, does not matter at what level, you need to show how you can be of interest. What that entails is showing you have the background (courses and scientific literature) that allows you to be efficient help. I think this is where the plan is most likely to fail because the recipient of the request will not likely be interested in taking on help that needs much coaching to function. If your request is within the department where you study, matters might be easier but if you contact someone in another university of perhaps even department the difficulties may arise.

So, I cannot see anyone being offended by a request such as this. The problem lies in seeing how you can fit in and be a contributor without to much costs (in terms of e.g. time) for the researcher or research group. However, a personal visit is far more likely to lead somewhere than a letter or E-mail.

Requests such as these are not uncommon but in my experience have most often been very uninteresting. Again, some have visited which has provided a very good possibility to assess the common interests and in what way a possible "collaboration" would work.

As for the last question, I cannot see a problem except that a PhD student may not be in a position to bring in an external person into a project that in essence is run by their advisor. A PhD student, on the other hand, may be a good way into a research group since they may be open to a meeting more readily than a busy project leader.

So, showing interest is good but you need to be able to show clearly what you bring to the table to wet the appetite of the person you target.


Setting exercises and assignments when everything is on the web These days there is so much material on the web that it is difficult to set good exercises/assignments for students, because they often find the questions on the web simply by googling (or else ask at a site such as http://cs.stackexchange.com).

  How do people deal with this problem? How do you generate unique assignment questions?

For the record, the area I teach is computer science.

Here's what I do (or at least try to do) in my algorithms classes:

Make homework useful.  The whole point of homework is to help the students master the course material.  Students learn by doing, not by passively reading or listening.  So I try to choose homework problems that exercise the insights and skills that I want the students to master.  (Among other things, this means keeping busywork to a minimum.)  If a student "writes" their homework solutions using Google and a stapler, they've robbed themselves of an opportunity to learn; all else being equal, that student will do worse on the exams.
Give homework relatively little weight in the final course grade, usually 30%, with the other 70% from exams.  I'd make the homework worth 0% if I thought the students would still do it.  See the previous point.
Tell the students that homework is useful.  Many students think of homework primarily as a vehicle for points, not as a tool for learning.  This is not entirely unreasonable—in some classes, homework is primarily a vehicle for points.   Better warn them early!
Include new questions in each homework assignment and exam.  Because I want to sleep occasionally, I regularly recycle homework problems from previous semesters, but if I recycle too much or too quickly, students don't learn the material as well.  (Whether they should learn the material as well is immaterial.)  Coming up with new useful problems is really hard, even if "new" just means "I haven't used it before".  I scour through a lot of textbooks and papers and web pages; if you teach algorithms, I have mined your web page for homework problems.  Still, I don't always succeed.  (On the other hand, failure sometimes suggests interesting research problems.)

Insist on ethical scholarship: proper citation of all sources, and no verbatim copying of anything.  Within those minimal constraints, students can use whatever source they want, and can collaborate with whoever they want, with no penalty.  In particular, students are welcome to use my official solutions from past semesters, if they can find them, as long as they cite them and don't just parrot them back to me.  Breaking this rule has harsher consequences than not doing the homework at all.
Homework presentations.  I used to ask students to present their homework solutions three times a semester, instead of submitting a writeup.  Here's the whiteboard, you have ten minutes per problem.  A single question like "But what about the empty string?" or "Why did you split the cases that way?" usually reveals students who didn't work out the solutions themselves.  Sadly, growing classes and shrinking TA budgets make this impossible now.
Remind the students that the course staff also uses Google.  (Remember, we're already scouring the web for new homework problems!)  And we have all the old textbooks, and their solution manuals.  And we read StackExchange.  And we have all the official homework solutions from past semesters, because, you know, we wrote them.  (I really wish I didn't have to say that last bit, but more than one student has submitted my own homework solutions, typos and all.)


1st year Ph.D. student in Computer Science - want to switch fields I finished my Masters in Computer Science at a decently reputed university in the United States. I was (and still am) excited about doing research and I applied to the Ph.D. program at the same university. I was accepted and I started the program this Fall.

Because of my experience in the department, I could start working in a lab from my first day in the Ph.D. program. I'm currently working on a topic that is closely related to my Master's thesis topic. But now I feel that I should explore other areas before committing on a Ph.D. topic.

I've been working on Operating Systems for as long as I remember, but recently, I attended a couple of seminars on NLP and Bio-informatics that got me excited. I don't have any background in either topics. But this makes me think that I should take a semester to explore other areas of research in Computer Science.

How should I go about this?

Update - I told my advisor. He said I should devote 100% of my time on his project. I fired him.

First of all, it's better to make the exploration now than later. Having a good place to apply your CS knowledge can be very powerful, and now is a better transition time than you will ever receive in the future.

With that said, there are several bioinformatics courses online that you can try out; one popular one is Coursera. This allows you to spend a few hours per weekend exploring the topic from a well known professor, and can help you decide whether or not you are truly interested. From there, as @ff524 stated, it is best to ask your advisor for information on how to continue applying your skills to both your PhD and bioinformatics.


How is my position named? My advisor is responsible for assigning teachers to conducting excercises to lectures. Since there is a lot of students (and groups) sometimes last year students help by taking excercises in some groups. For the past 5 months I've been employed by the university and I've worked a couple of hours a week taking classes, without a formal position at the university (and for sure won't have until I finish my masters).

Right now I am writing a CV and I would like to include the last 5 months in my work experience but I don't know how to name my position - is "Math teacher @ university" a good one?

Having worked at a university in HR, you are classified as an employee and you definitely have a "job title". Since you're a graduate student, you could be classified as a "Teaching Assistant" or "Graduate Assistant". I would recommend reaching out to your HR department and simply asking them what you your title is in the system.


Clarification on taking Calculus subjects as prerequisites for Economics classes? I am mid aged person going back to school and planning to take MicroEconomics I and Econometrics in the Summer. In order to take these classes, I am planning take Calculus as Pre-requisites.

However, we have two levels of Calculus taught in Summer. Calculus - I which is of beginner's version and Calculus - II which is of Advanced Beginner's version.

Though, I dont have much details on each of them.

My question is, whether taking Calculus - I ( Beginner's version ) will be helpful for taking those two Economics classes?

I believe it depends on the Microeconomics class you take. Some Micro classes are calculus heavy but primarily at the upper division level, intro Micro classes generally are not, the equivalent to Econ 100 (versus Intro Econ/Econ 001) I took in school was Calculus heavy, but it involved methods you wouldn't learn in a standard Calculus I or Calculus II (presumably) e.g. Lagrange multipliers.

Swallowing my pride, I also took a Calculus II equivalent for "non-science" majors, this class introduced Lagrange Multipliers,  while the "science" track wasn't introduced to the method until multivariate calculus.

so my advice would be to talk to an advisor and or faculty to see if one of the classes is better suited to what you will be studying, as far as Econometrics goes, someone else will need to take that one.


Can I delay a while signing an official postdoc offer letter I have got an official postdoc offer letter. The HR now is requesting my signature and then return the letter back asap. But I haven't made a final decision to sign it or not, because there may be another offer coming very soon, which seems better to me. I wonder if it is appropriate to delay the received offer a little bit. After that accept or turn it down.

Sitting on an offer (e.g. ignoring emails from HR, taking forever to answer or other delay tactics) is generally not appropriate in my opinion. I would suggest honesty and transparency.

Let your prospective postdoc advisor that you'd like a bit of time to consider your options (they will likely get the hint that you're considering other positions, no need to be too blunt). In addition, talk to your alternative option ASAP and let them know the situation. It is absolutely acceptable to tell them that you have another offer who's waiting for your reply, and you'd appreciate an answer from them soon.

Whether either party would agree really depends on them. I would be careful of losing both options: if you wait for too long then your potential host might get annoyed and just rescind the offer. They could be holding off on other good applicants thinking that you are about to sign, and you waffling might result in them going ahead with other applicants.

Your other option might not be getting back to you because they actually don't have an open position right now, or they themselves are waiting for some other applicant's final answer (if they say yes, you're out).

These are all considerations that you should weigh out for yourself, and I cannot offer any concrete advice on. Just to reiterate - lying/misrepresenting your status/using delay tactics is probably a bad idea.


What can a scientist learn (only) from patent literature/database rather than from research literature? I'm currently diving in a field I'm no expert in, mainly I have methodological expertise and a theoretical background, but not in the research object itself.

Now I'm seeing this is a field of applied phyiscs with really a lot of patents being published, still a fundamental science field. To me it's clear that in branches like AI or quantum computing research the Intel, IBM, Apples research groups are probably several years ahead in some research questions in comparison to academic research groups in expertise, depth and equipment and probably most of their secrets and knowledge is not published, rather kept secret and in the best case (for scientists) filed as a patent. Of course they collaborate with some academic groups intensively and also publish papers (last weeks quantum computation record of google unintentionally became public). But papers can only be published years after a patent is granted to my knowledge.

Though I'm no expert in patent research and databases and language. But as a researcher/postdoc can I risk to focus only on journal publications to inform myself and stay up to date or is not a necessity to also look up the recent patents as they are more up to date in state of the art and knowledge than papers? Often keywords don't help here as patents are written very different to papers. So also practically, patents are really not good to self-inform.

What strategies are there to not start research on something already solved by industry? Attending much more industry symposia? Skimming patents? Has industry in general a high/low incentive to share their secrets and questions/problems they try to solve? In my field a lot of governmental and industry money (several hundred millions) are flowing into this research branch in form of academic funding. How do you deal with this problem/opportunity to keep yourself informed? Reading the most cited patents like for papers and do citations have similar value at all in patent literature?

This may vary by field, but in my opinion most patents are not very useful for a researcher. The patents that I have read are all written by attorneys in attorney-speak.  Trying to figure out what is the real technical content behind the attorney-speak is difficult if not impossible.

To give an example: I used to work at a large company.  My company wanted to patent some of the work that I had done. My boss had me send my material to the attorneys, and they drafted the formal patent application based on my work.  When I received the patent application back, I could not even understand what the patent was talking about, and it was something that I had literally invented.  So good luck to anybody else trying to understand what it means.

Occasionally I have come across some good technical content in patents, but it's usually in the situation where the researchers have filed a patent first and then published a journal article immediately afterwards.  They did the patent just to protect their intellectual property.  In that case the patent does have some good info, but the corresponding journal article is even better.

Again, your mileage may vary.  In some fields I guess this might be different.


Papers from thesis - short term postdoc? I am a PhD candidate in Physics who handed in his thesis a few months ago and will defend soon. I am based in Sweden and I am now applying for postdocs outside Europe in different fields and working (mostly "translating" materials which was already in the thesis) on three papers from my thesis. At the moment I have no papers published, but my thesis work is quite good.

Do you think it could be possible (and a good idea) to find a short-term (1-2 months) grant, so that I can work full time and finish the papers before starting a postdoc (my supervisor has no funding for that)? Otherwise things will just take longer, I think. Do you have any suggestion regarding where to look? Thanks!

While I'm not in Physics, my experience and knowledge (Comp Sci) would suggest that:

Finding such a grant would generally be difficult.
Your best bet would have been some kind of late-PhD-research-assistant/short-term-PostDoc employment with your PhD advisor or at your lab; if that's still an option, try it;
Maybe it's possible to get a part-time short-term teaching/teaching assistance position instead of a proper research grant; it "eats away" some of your paper-writing time, but it might be better than no job at all


Oral vs Poster vs Workshop. Which is the most prestigious in the context of Computer Vision and Artificial Intelligence? This question is mainly about the perceived prestige of various events at conferences. Is there a hierarchy to it? Asking this in the perspective of being the presenter. Another way of putting it would be is "10 oral papers on my resume better" or "3 oral, 3 posters, 3 workshops, 1 tutorial on my resume better".

Oral
Posters
Workshops
Tutorials
etc.

A detailed post regarding which is the most prestigious and why would be appreciated.

Example conferences:

Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition (CVPR)
International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR)
Association of the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI)
International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML)

0. Invited/plenary talk at the main conference

1. Paper in the main proceedings with an oral presentation

2. Paper in the main proceedings with a poster presentation

3. Everything else

Having a paper in the primary conference proceedings is more prestigious than not having a paper in the primary conference proceedings.  If I understand how CVPR, ICML, and the like work, that means (oral presentations and posters) are more prestigious than (workshop, tutorial, or other).

Only a small number of CVPR/ICML/etc papers are accepted for oral presentation, so having a paper with an oral presentation is more prestigious than having a paper with a poster presentation.

Workshops and tutorials are apples and oranges.  A workshop presentation is more likely to be associated with your own original research (if only in preliminary form).  On the other hand, a tutorial presentation is a significant community service, and being invited to give a tutorial is a mark of community standing.  I would rank tutorials slightly ahead of workshop papers, but I'm sure not everyone would agree with me.


Is it possible to create a bachelors programme that focuses on being able to read any/most scientific article? I was thinking about whether it would be possible to create a 3/4 year bachelors programme which goal is to teach the student to be able to read any/most scientific article? If so, do you think this programme would be valuable? What would you think the prime courses should be? I myself would believe high level mathematics would definetly be a must.

It would not be a real bachelors program.  A bachelors program should not be focused on a single skill (reading) and it should not be focused on solely on consumption skills to the neglect of creation skills.


What should one consider when pondering a career as a scientific editor? I'm in my 2nd year postdoc, considering getting a science-related job. I looked for jobs at PhD level, and found that one of my options is becoming an editor for a scientific journal.

How many years' experience (after a PhD) is typical for an entry-level editor role? What else should a recent PhD know when considering such a position?

I'm a former academic publisher, and assume you're looking to join an academic publisher full-time. Do note that absent a very few elite journals like Nature and Physical Review Letters, you are not likely to be handling only journals (or be directly involved in choosing the papers to publish). You will also be doing books.

  How many years' experience (after a PhD) is typical for an entry-level editor role?

For these entry-level positions, in principle, a Bachelor's degree suffices. In fact, many of my former colleagues had more or less completely forgotten everything they learned in university and they got along just fine. Especially ironic was the case of an English Literature graduate who couldn't read calculus symbols handling an engineering journal - and she did well enough to be promoted.

(In fact there are positions even more entry-level than these entry-level positions in which a high school degree suffices, but the job responsibilities are very mundane and tedious.)

But you have a PhD. This means you won't be working at entry-level. You'll have more advanced duties that people with Bachelor's degrees might not be comfortable doing. These could include:

Acquiring new projects (this is a big one). E.g. you might be expected to identify a niche in the market for a new book, write to people who can write that book, and commission them to do it.
Attending conferences. You might have to manage the publisher's booth, answer questions about your journals and review processes, network, and yes, acquire new papers/books.
Come up with a strategy to advance your journals. This isn't easy, but it has to be you, because most people with Bachelor's degrees will have no idea. It could involve, for example, finding a trendy topic and commissioning someone to edit a special issue on it; or perhaps to split the journal into two new journals each with different focus, etc.
Help the people with Bachelor's degrees out when they approach you with (academic) problems. In my experience this was actually quite rare because most of those people aren't confident enough to ask, but it can happen. Real-life example: a paper is accepted, then during copyediting the desk editor discovers that there are only four data points. The authors have drawn a line through two of the points, but since it's only four data points, they could equally have drawn one of several other lines that also go through two points (they would fit worse, but still look good enough to be viable). What do we do now?
Make a decision on whether to accept projects. The authors put together a publication proposal, the acquisition editor has gotten reviews for the proposal, and now you have to decide whether it's a good idea to take on the project. You'll need to appraise the reviews as well as how many copies of the book you can expect to sell, etc.

  What else should a recent PhD know when considering such a position?

You're going to experience a ton of rejections when acquiring projects. I think the ratio of the number of replies to the emails sent is at best ~20% (and that's only if you're good). The ratio of acquired projects to emails sent is obviously even lower. You have to be ready to deal with this.
You're going to meet people who're very critical of you because they view academic publishing as a scam, and you by working for an academic publisher are complicit in the scam. For example, you could be doing your best to get top management to approve a lower article processing charge (APC) for your journal, knowing that these lower APCs are going to lead to the journal making a (hopefully temporary) net loss, and then get the very authors you're trying to help openly wonder how it's acceptable for you to charge APCs at all in the first place. You have to be ready to deal with this. If you end up doing the job you linked in a comment, it's going to be especially bad, because lots of academics hate Elsevier.
Don't expect to be well-paid, at least at the beginning.


How to encourage a math teacher to present material in a more accessible way? My math teacher speaks like a college professor teaching a Mathematical Analysis course and many of the students (including me) find it hard to follow along. Once a student asked him rather bravely what the application of a power series would be to a question and he just had this "Why the heck are you even asking me this, isn't it obvious" look. Any tips to deal with this?

The ideal would be if students in the class could support each other.  In the example you described, after student A asks about the application of a power series, and the teacher makes the unpleasant face, it could be helpful if student B said, "I'm wondering about that too."

Consider that the teacher might make a face because he's embarrassed that he didn't explain things more clearly.  Who knows!

You may want to let the department leader know how things are going, and request that s/he sit in on the class, to form a direct opinion.

Consider also that sometimes people with poor social skills excel in their field, and display an astonishing ability to alienate or offend people.

In short, don't take it as a measure of your own abilities.  Just let it wash off like water off a duck's back.  Make sure you ask one or more questions each week.  By asking questions, you'll get more comfortable asking questions, and the teacher will get more used to people asking questions.

If you don't understand something, do check what your textbook has to say; but also, you may ask, for example:

I'm not clear about (topic).
Could you explain where such-and-so comes from, in a different way?  OR: Is there a way of looking at this that would help it feel less abstract? etc.


Mention marking duty for a course in an early academic career CV I am first year post-doctoral fellow. I have been asked to carry out some marking duties by my PhD supervisor from another university which I am not currently affiliated with, but where I got my PhD from.

Can I mention this marking duty under my teaching experience on my academic CV?

You can mention it, but there is no benefit to doing so.  Your marking and grading experience is not important to hiring decisions.


How to be a co-author anonymously? I am from country A and am studying in country B. A researcher from country C would like to collaborate with me.  However, my home country (country A) has poor (hostile) relations with the researcher's country (country C).  I'm concerned that if I accept this collaboration offer, which will be done in country B, I may get into serious trouble when I return home (should officials in my home country realize what I've done).

I do not want to lose this offer, as it may result in a paper which would be helpful for my career.  Is there a way that I could use a pseudonym on any paper but still be able to claim authorship in the future when applying for jobs?

Edit

I am a PhD student and I do not care if I don't get the credit of the possible paper when I get retired in coming decades! I just need it for my first post doc position. I hoped others who had similar situation would write about their experience. I am sure I am not the first person in country A who is in this situation.

I hoped that I might use a fake name but use my original ORCID ID, so that when needed I can expose the paper in my profile for a limited time.
I also thought that a recommendation letter from the coauthors would be good too even if I choose not be a coauthor of the paper.

You are clearly in a tricky situation that the usual customs of academic publishing are ill-prepared to deal with. There definitely doesn't seem to be a standard, off-the-shelf solution to your problem like some kind of registry for anonymous authors. However, with a bit of creativity there might be a path forward. I suggest the following:

Agree to collaborate with the researcher from country C, but make clear to him/her that you would like your identity to be kept secret for an indefinite period. Make sure that the collaborator is okay with mentioning you as an anonymous coauthor not just in the paper you end up publishing but also in talks, presentations, posters etc. Make sure this is a person reliable enough to trust on such a serious matter, and keep in mind that as with any secret, there is always an unavoidable risk that the truth will come out and somehow make itself known to officials in your country.
If/when you write a paper on the project, have the collaborator submit it to a journal, asking the journal to list you as an anonymous coauthor, under a name such as "John Doe", with a note explaining that this author chooses to remain anonymous due to fear of political persecution. I cannot be sure, but this strikes me as a request that a reasonable journal is likely to agree to. The journal may ask to have your identity disclosed to them so that they can at least have it on record for legal reasons. It may be okay to reveal your identity to them (which could actually help later on in your career when you wish to get the credit for the work), but keep in mind that this again increases the risk that the secret will come out before you intended it to or will become known to the wrong people.
If/when you ever wish to claim credit for the work in connection with job applications or other career-related reasons, make sure you have a reliable promise from your collaborator to vouch that you are indeed the coauthor, as well as some supporting evidence like email records, files, notes, etc. E.g., you and the collaborator can plan to have him/her send a letter of recommendation explaining the situation if and when you need it. Or, you can have the collaborator publicly disclose your authorship, e.g. in a signed letter he/she will send to you that you can post on your website. If the journal knows your identity you can ask for similar confirmations of your authorship from the journal.

Keep in mind that it may be good to have a backup plan in case something goes wrong, e.g., the collaborator dies or turns out to be unreliable, or is worried about political repercussions for him/herself in country C. Having supporting evidence as I mentioned above, and having a few other people you trust know about your authorship, will all make it easier for you to confirm your authorship if and when you want to. Of course, the more people know your secret, again the higher the risk that the truth will come out in an unintended way.

The thing to remember in this analysis is that there is no approach that is entirely without risk. Given that political persecution is no joking matter, you would be well-advised to give very serious thought to the risk you are taking versus the possible reward. I don't know which countries you're referring to in the question, but I can think of examples where if your actions became known you could easily be accused of espionage and thrown in jail for many years.


Rainbow flag in paper I am making a diagram in my paper. In that diagram I use several squares of different colors and one rectangle of multiple colors. An easy way to get a rectangle full of colors is the rainbow flag. I am sympathetic to the LGBT cause, but I am not LGBT. I thought the flag could be a small gesture but I am not trying to make a strong political point.

One labmate told me to not put political symbols in papers (+could make people think I am LGBT, nothing wrong with that, but false); another says it's completely fine.
I am considering whether to keep the flag or find an alternative (different colors, structure, or move the colors around).

Any ideas/opions?

I'm a strong supporter of LGBTI+ rights, but if I encountered a rainbow flag in an article with no particular connection to those issues and nothing else to explain the choice of that symbol in particular, I'd be more confused than anything else. The editors may also be confused about whether you're trying to sneak in a political statement.

Leaving politics aside: rainbow colour schemes are often a bad idea because they're not very good at communicating information.

As Dmitry Savostyanov suggested, it's wise to ensure that your diagrams are still readable in grayscale. Rainbows often fail this test because colours far apart on the spectrum may be close together in luminance (brightness), and vice versa. Even for readers who have full colour vision and are reading the colour version, rainbow palettes can create the illusion of abrupt changes where there are none, and so forth. For those with colour-vision impairments, they're extra-poor. For more information, see Borland and Taylor's Rainbow Color Map (Still) Considered Harmful.


Three given names, the second being my calling name: what to put on paper? I have three given names, say Adam John Isaac. Furthermore I have one family name, say Harris. (The names are not my own, but the initials are.) On this website, I read that I can freely choose which names to put on a paper.

My first given name is not the name that I'm actually known as. Therefore, it feels a bit strange to put Adam J.I. Harris on a paper.

In other papers, I often see people placing initials between their (first) given name and family name. So far I have never seen initials before the first given name, like A. John I. Harris. This looks strange, in my opinion, both because an initial before the given name is uncommon, and it might be read as the word 'a' instead of the initial 'A.'.

Now I've been thinking of using John A.I. Harris on the paper. This way all my names/initials are there, and it looks less strange. Furthermore it's kind of funny, as I'm an AI student.

Another option would be to just stick with my calling name and family name: John Harris.

Do you have any thoughts on this? Can the initials A.I. be seen as some (stupid) joke, so could I better leave them out? Or doesn't it really matter at all, and should I just pick an option?

I would not base such a decision on the fact that it is funny or not, as funny depends by the person that reads.
Naming it is not a big issue as long as you are consistent during all your career.
I would suggest you to pick up one of your three names, your surname and use the composition of them. As far as i understood, you are known as John Harris, so just go with this.

Cheers!


Does the Math GRE allow a calculator? I can't seem to find the answer online.

If no, can I assume no one would ever need to? I haven't looked at sample GREs yet because I haven't tried any yet, and I don't want these exams compromised when I take it in the future. I tried a 10-number GRE and thought it would be helpful to have a calculator for

$$\binom{5}{3}$$

I believe the answer is No.
From GRE Subject Test Web Page

Dismissal from a Test Center
◾Using any aids in connection with the test, including, without limitation: mechanical pencils, mechanical erasers, pens, pagers, beepers, digital watches, calculator, ...


How to get pornographic movies for scientific research purposes? Recently, I have being planning to design an automatic pornographic movie detector with the machine learning knowledge that I just acquired.

I am now in the stage of planning how to perform the system evaluation. The intuition is to just test the algorithms with some pornographic movies and some non-pornographic movies and compute the false negative/positive rates. I simply feel that for any evaluation method, I would have to obtain real pornographic movies to test the system!

Here comes the dilemma. As you know (or may not know!), basically all the pornographic movies are not free. I do not regard it as ethical to just download illegal pirated movies, as after all they are for a scientific research, which values copyright a lot. On the other hand, it is a bit awkward for me to request funding from my PI to buy the porn videos! Paying them myself is definitely not a feasible solution, either.

How may I handle this case properly?

I really don't get this. This is a little like the Movies Classification Board or the Classification & Ratings Administration feeling awkward about asking to view the movies they are going to rate.

If you are developing an algorithm for detecting pornography, why would it be awkward to request funding to acquire test resources? This is an entirely legitimate application, that has huge potential, both economically and socially (note: use of bold inspired by OP). There are many researchers all over the world working in similar fields. Clearly, at some point you will need to discuss your work with your PI, and presumably, they are already aware of the work you have been doing in the previous 6/9/18 months, and perhaps already requires justification against existing research funding.

Whatever the case, your work will need to be approved by, and comply rigidly with, your institution's ethics committee.

There are also a number of steps you could consider before committing to viewing full-length extreme hardcore films. In making some suggestions, I'm going to make a few assumptions:

1 Your definition of a pornographic movie is one classified as
"mainly concerned with sex", and involves extreme nudity and acts of
sexual behaviour.
Your algorithm looks at exposed and interacting body content in some way, and does not work on quality of script and acting (otherwise daytime soapies will bring up many false positives)
Your algorithm looks at small fragments of movie clips, and not the entire 60/70/90 minutes worth, or however long these movies go for.
Your PI knows what you've been spending your previous doing, which is most likely already associated with existing research funding.

So, some suggestions

Acquire a number of movie trailers; these are usually freely available for all types of movies, and typically run for about a minute. Contact the various movie studios directly if you need to.
Speak to your national Film and Television archive body. They are likely to have a number of suitable media to preliminary early test procedures on. Various bodies exist.
Speak to other researchers in this field. There might be a good standard set of images/movies that can be used to determine baseline effectiveness.
Go to your local friendly adult shop and check out the "specials" bin.
Finally, and not the best approach to take, look at the internet. I'm guessing if you typed in the right combination of words, you'd get unlimited supply of short, copyright-free videos, to use both as a test group and control group. But I stress, this needs to be done in strict accordance with your institutions policies for network and    computing use, and therefore should be approved by your PI and ethics committee.

However, whatever approach you take, the summary is: talk to your PI.


How usual/feasible is it for European universities to accept PhD candidates right after their bachelor's degree? (computer science field) I am nearing the end of my bachelor's degree and wish to know what my options are for continuing. Optimally, I would be able to immediately pursue a PhD, but I get conflicting information on the matter by different professors, advisors, and online sources.
The institutions I am mainly interested in are: EPFL, ETH Zürich, University of Edinburgh, Technical University of Darmstadt (TU Darmstadt), UCL, and University of Warsaw, as this is where I could find advisors most relevant to my research interests.
I was told that, besides the advisor being interested, the university has to have a precedent or a way for the master's degree requirement to be bypassed, but I am having a hard time locating such information. Any and all insight on previous cases of the aforementioned universities accepting or explicitly denying a PhD candidate on the basis of not having a master's degree is very useful.
Personally, I will have four to eight publications to my name by the time I graduate, but probably six at the time of sending out applications, and a very very strong research thesis. If that is not enough regardless of universities accepting without a master's degree or not, that would also be some useful information to have.
I repeat; I do not care about the rest of the criteria, just whether or not not having a master's degree is an absolute deal breaker for a PhD in the aforementioned institutions.

In contrast to Stephen McMahon's answer, which holds absolutely true for the UK, the situation in most of continental Europe is the opposite.
On the continent, it would be very unusual to start a PhD directly after one's BSc, hence the suggestion to look for "precedent or a way for the Master's requirement to be bypassed" at your Unis of interest. This is in direct contrast with the UK, where this is not even a requirement.
(Source: PhD from France, professional network from all over the EU, followed by a postdoc and a permanent position in the UK.)
As a side-note, PhD programmes in the UK often offer different levels of funding for home and international students (it used to be home+EU, but, alas, Brexit) -- or worded alternatively, some/most PhD programmes in the UK are only fully funded for British students. In my anecdotal experience, the international students that do apply to a very limited number of available fully-funded positions tend to be finishing an MSc while applying (or already hold one), despite it not being a requirement. And given a choice between an applicant with an MSc and an applicant with a BSc only, the one with an MSc typically has more to offer simply because they have had more time to demonstrate their skills. (However, your specific situation of 6 publications at the time of application + 2 submitted is definitely "a lot to offer" from your side, and on par with MSc applicants.)


Releasing one version of a Scientific Paper under an Open License I am going to release a Technical Report that will be archived and made available online by the university's library. An abridged version of the work was accepted by a peer-reviewed conference and will be published in the proceedings. For this to happen, I have to sign a copyright form, assigning to the publishing institution all rights under copyright.

My questions:

a) What is the best way to grant readers of the Technical Report the freedom to quote (unlimited length), distribute, and build upon the work? And point out that they have this freedom without asking for my permission?

b) Is a Creative-Commons License the way to go? If yes, in what form should include the lincense in the work?

c) Is there any conflict between the copyright form for the conference paper and releasing the Technical Report under an open license?

A Creative Commons License is a good way to achieve this.  It doesn't really matter how you convey this information, as long as it's clear.  (A footnote on the first page is fine, for example.  Whatever you prefer.)  The attribution license (CC BY) sounds like a good choice for what you're looking for.

However, this definitely conflicts with the copyright form.  You can try asking the IEEE for permission, and there's some chance they will agree, but they tend to be picky about copyright.  If you can't come to an agreement with them, then you will have to decide whether publishing in this conference is worth giving up copyright, and they will have to decide whether it is worth losing your paper over this issue.  (If you have already signed the form, then there's nothing you can do except ask them.)


How does the lockdown affect the application and admission processes in the Western Europe, Scandinavia, and the US? I am about to submit my PhD thesis and thus my studentship will terminate. Along with my studentship, naturally, my scholarship and my stipend also will be gone.
I have some savings, but I doubt I can manage more than 3-4 months.
I need to apply to postdoc positions, and unless it is a low profile university, I cannot find any positions in the country I finish my doctoral studies, and even neighboring countries. It is kind of a unwritten policy in the Central Europe.
My viable options are western Europe, Scandinavia, and the US.
How are the application and admission processes in those places? Will new positions be available in a short time? If so, will foreign applicants be able to travel there?
Comments based on experiences are highly appreciated!

The main problem for you now is not COVID-19 but simply the summer holidays. If you are looking now, you won't find much. The number of job offers may increase again in September, October.


What does it mean "English proficiency" for a J-1 visa? English is not my native language. Meanwhile,  sometimes  I should read and write in English due to various reasons and work duties. In most cases, I understand a lot of (approx 80% and more) from the newspapers and other articles without a dictionary. The main idea and specific moments understand without serious difficulties in listening to different conversations or TED talks. I don't know my exact CERF level because I have never passed the corresponding exams before. Meanwhile, I have passed through the interview with PI in a US university and got an offer, so my English is acceptable for them probably.  However, speaking fluently is difficult for me (I have not had enough practice for the last two years), especially when a topic does not link with work. Sometimes seem that the current speaking problem is due to a long break.
Now I am preparing for the J-1 visa interview, where "English proficiency" is one of the requirements, and I am a bit confused by this moment. What does it mean "proficiency" for an embassy officer? What should it be minimal CERF level?
Sometimes I am sure I will not have got the visa due to my English ((

Candidates must be proficient enough in English to participate successfully in their exchange program and to function on a day-to-day basis. J-1 Exchange Visitors must have sufficient, verifiable English language skills.
The CEFR Common European Framework of Reference for Languages is a European certificate. Notice that it's CEFR level, not CERF.
In the US, they expect a TOEFL certificate or equivalent (like SAT or Pearson tests). An acceptable grade for some programs in the internet based TOEFL would be 79 points, which is the equivalent to a B2 level in the CEFR.
There are sample tests online that might help you get an idea of your present level. For example, this one. However, judging by your post, I assume you are at a more than acceptable level, probably at the C1 or even C2 level.
PS: I have the impression that you believe it's the US gov who is setting the English proficiency standards. Actually, it's the university who sets the standards and how to prove proficiency. If the university accepts you I don't see how the government can reject the J2 application for lack of proficiency in English.
Consider taking some Zoom 1-to-1 conversations lessons, but more for brushing up your knowledge and for peace of mind than for need. As said above, your English seems fine.


Professor refuses to write a recommendation letter to students who haven't written a research paper with him I am currently a fourth-year  Electrical Engineering student. I have been a top-ranked student in our department. I have passed 3 courses with a professor in our department and have received a full mark in all three. I did participate a lot in all classes and had many discussions about the courses in his office hours. He knows me very well. I have also been the teaching assistant of this professor twice, for two distinct courses. I believe that I have also done a decent job as a TA for him. I also have worked in his research lab for a year now.
Recently I have asked this professor for a recommendation letter for graduate school and he refuses, arguing he has decided to only give a recommendation letter to people who have written a research paper with him. By the way, he is willing to accept me as a master student, in his group but I prefer moving to another university.
My professor is new to the field I am currently working on and I believe it is hard for an undergraduate student to write a scientific paper in this situation.
I wanted to ask whether his refusal for recommendation letters is reasonable and also ask for some advice on how to handle this situation.
PS:
Maybe "reasonable" is not the best choice of word. I mean whether only giving recommendation letters to co-authors is something "common".
I am applying to a direct PhD in the US. But I am from a different country. Direct PhDs are not possible in our country.
I Professor obtained his bachelor degree in our university and his PhD in the US.
He has also worked as a professor in the US and in Europe before joining our department.

I wanted to ask whether his refusal for recommendation letters is reasonable

My personal opinion is that if you worked in his lab for a year (satisfactorily), it is unreasonable to refuse a letter. All the more so if you had other good interactions (TAing, etc.) with him.

  and also ask for some advice on how to handle this situation!

Unfortunately, my opinion counts for absolutely nothing. You cannot force this professor to write you a letter, and would be unwise to try. All you can do is find someone else. Preferably someone who can comment on your research, or at least someone who can confirm that your advisor almost never writes letters for undergrads (i.e., vouching that the lack of a letter from your advisor should not reflect poorly on you).


How do MIT OpenCourseware and real MIT courses compare? Are MIT courses much different from MIT OpenCourseWare? I am curious, because as a high schooler, I have some intent to study from MIT OpenCourseWare.

Will this allow me to be more comfortable if I am admitted to MIT?

Also, how are MIT courses so different from those at other places? I heard that these courses are hard..

MIT OCW doesn't offer "courses".  It offers "courseware" — basically textbooks with videos.

Real MIT courses have live instructional staff who answer questions, run recitation sections, and offer feedback (in particular, grades) on your solutions to the homework and exam problems.  Real MIT courses have deadlines that force (well, encourage) you to actually work on the course material regularly.  Real MIT courses also have a community of other students, all following the same lock-step schedule, that can work together to develop ideas, internal feedback, social outlets, and later professional contacts.  Real MIT courses give you an official record from MIT of your performance in the class.


How long does it take from the application for a professorship to the invitation to a lecture? On average, how long does it take from applying for a professorship to being invited to a lecture, provided that one is actually invited?

I am referring to an application for W2/W3 professorships in Germany (both Fachhochschulen and regular universities).

And what is the time before the lecture: "Hey, you're invited for next Monday"? or a little more time?

I can offer a few data points here: being somewhat OCD, I've kept a log of all applications I've sent out over the years. Keep in mind that this mostly refers to computer science departments at German universities, but I guess it won't be wildly different for other departments.

So between 2015 and 2020, I've sent out 37 applications for W2/W3 (and some W1 tenure-track) professorships. Of these, I've only ever gotten an official response of any kind for 22 applications, which is a bit sad IMHO.

Anyway, the median time for these responses was 90.5 days, with a minimum of 25 days (for a "sorry, not interested" response) and a whopping maximum of 247 days (for a "sorry, we've hired someone else" response).

Last but not least, I was invited for an interview in 9 out of these 22 cases. Here, the median response time was 41 days, with a minimum of 33 days.

Based on this data, my rule of thumb is that if you haven't gotten any response to an application after two months, then you can assume they are not interested.

P.S. I didn't keep a record of how long I had until the interview after the invitation, but it was never less than three weeks, usually rather 4-6 weeks.


How to be persistent in a polite way? Recently I contacted an important researcher in my field, and he offered me a collaboration with his group. He told me to email him a proposal. Moreover, he recognized that he was usually very busy and received a lot of email, so I should be persistent. He even gave me his personal phone number.

I sent him the proposal, and alerted him by an SMS. He replied that he would look at it. It's been a couple of weeks, so I SMS him again, and he replied that he hadn't had the time yet to look at the proposal, but that he would soon.

This is a very important and unique opportunity for me. In view of his advice to be persistent, and the fact that he is very busy, I want to do what I can to remind him of this, until he acts on it.

What is the most polite way to insist? What time window should I wait before reminding him again?

Having worked in sales and academia, I have often come across the "how often do I contact this person" question. The answer heavily depends on the situation and the person whom you wish to contact.

You have contacted him twice thus far, and he encouraged your being persistent. I would think he would have no problem in you checking back with him every two weeks. Going to his office may even be suggested after several attempts had been made.

Try to approach the professor in your emails with courtesy, but also with urgency. Always thank him for his time, but also stress that you would like to get your research plans finalized, so if he could respond by such and such date it would be helpful.


Do I ask the editor of the rejecting journal where to submit next? I got a rejection after one review cycle, with a comment that reviewer comments are useful and will help you in submission to another journal. Can I ask the editor's opinion on which journal to target?

Sometimes a referee or editor will offer an unsolicited suggestion.  When that doesn't happen, asking for suggestions would be unconventional.  As an editor, if an established professional asked me for suggestions, I'd be a little annoyed (they should be able to figure that out themselves), and I'd give a terse reply like "Sorry, I'm not sure what the best place for your paper would be."  If a beginning researcher asked me, or anyone dealing with a truly unusual situation, I would try to be more helpful.  The response you get may depend on the editor, but the worst case scenario is probably annoying the editor a little and getting no reply.  (I don't think there's any risk of dreadfully offending anyone, assuming you don't press the editor further if he/she doesn't reply or seems impatient.)  I would ask the editor only if you don't have any mentors you could ask, but in that case it could be worth a try.


What is the difference between a research paper and a student paper? The i-Society conference calls for Research Papers, Student Papers, and Case Studies.

What is the difference between a "research paper" and a "student paper"?

A research paper is original work and could be written by anyone with the background.  A student paper is a research paper written exclusively by student(s).  The reality is that faculty will be involved in some way, even if it is only running the research program which made the work possible.  In reality, the faculty will be more involved than that: discussing, reading and suggesting.  But that's part of the job, in my opinion.


Placement of illustration: before/after text? I've been reading conflicting advice on SE about the placement of an illustration (figure, table, algorithm). My questions are thus (refer to Section 3.3.1 in the attached figure):

I understand that, ideally, an illustration should always be placed inside the section where it is first referenced. Should an illustration always be placed in a section after it is referenced? Could it be placed in the same section before it is referenced?
Can an illustration be the last entity in a section (as shown in Section 3.3.1)? Or does there need to be text after it, such as a short line on what is to be discussed in the next section?

Thanks!

Figures always go after the first reference to that figure.
Figures always have a caption. In almost all styles captions go after the figure, but before tables.
Having a figure as the last thing in a section looks a bit odd and you might want to stick in an extra sentence just so it doesn't look odd. Having said that- you can avoid this by not dividing the text very finely (that is, no sub-sub-sections).


How to avoid supervisors with prejudiced views? There seem to be professors who hold beliefs such as:

Women students pose a special risk to male supervisors
Certain ethnic groups are smarter/lazier/harder-working than others
Older students are worse investments than younger students
Students with disabilities are less capable/more trouble than nondisabled students

No student should be saddled with negative prejudices from their supervisor. But how can this be prevented?

The big problem is that bigots are often hard to identify early on. They think of themselves as just being honest and realistic. Asking their current students might not help, because if they don't belong to a marginalized group, they will often only notice other characteristics, such as that the supervisor is nice and explains things well. Unfortunately, it's possible to be a very nice guy and also a horrible bigot.

There's also a corrosive secondary bigotry where the bigot insists that they themselves aren't bigots, but other people are, so good opportunities would be wasted on the marginalized student.

How can a prospective student identify these people and avoid them?

Note: There are very strange answers and comments here. I just want to know how a student can find out if supervisor might hurt a student because of hidden bigoted beliefs. Especially if the student does not have a lot of time to get to know the supervisor, for example when choosing a graduate program. I hope this is clearer.

I will sound snarky with this answer, but have you tried talking to them?

Your question may ask well be asked as "How do I determine the values of another human being before I meet them?" And I would say that is not something you can truly learn and understand until you talk with them.

You may respond with, 'What if they lie?' And that's a very valid point. But I would tell you that all of human social interaction is this very problem, and that you will not gain the wisdom of how to interact with humans without interacting with them!


How to write good and effective lecture notes? I am an undergraduate student. During the lectures the professors simply keep talking and at times write some stuff on the board. I am not sure when and what to write in my book. I am asking because I am facing two troubles: 1. unhelpful peers 2. dull teachers.
So how do you take lecture notes?

The first question to consider is what you want the notes for.
Situation A: to improve listening comprehension
If you just want to take notes to help yourself listen better (which is what I do), then it's not a big deal what you actually write down, but you should practice scribbling fast while listening. You could practice on (relevant) YouTube videos for a little while, which has the added bonus of showing you the material twice (so you're better prepared when you actually get to class).
Situation B: to use as study material
If you want to take notes that you can use to refer to later, it depends more on what you're studying. In general, though, here are some tips:
it helps to read whatever material your professor gave you ahead of time (videos, textbook chapters, their own notes...) so you have some idea of the structure beforehand, which helps you know what's important and what's not.
There are several different"note-taking systems" floating around online, like the Cornell method and the Mapping method, that you might find helpful (personally, I find it slows me down, but I know people who swear by structured note-taking). I'd recommend doing a bit of research to see if it might help you stay organized and keep things legible.
You should also work out some shorthand that works for you (stuff like -> for "implies", ^ for "is a subsection of"... Whatever works in your field). These are great, but you do have to develop them yourself so they make enough sense; otherwise when you come back at the end of the semester, you won't know what you wrote.
The other thing that I find works for me is having a color-changing pen so I can use color changes to easily denote subject changes, but that's more personal and probably a holdover from my 20-color notes in secondary school.
(Can someone help format this for me? I'm on mobile and I keep messing it up.)


Is PhD funding updatable? As many universities provide funding covering only part of the tuition fee or living expenses, especially in the UK where tuition fees are different for UK/EU and international students while most scholarships only cover the first one, i.e. international students have to pay the difference. My question is whether it is possible for PhD funding to be updated/upgraded (to cover more expenses) if a student performs well, e.g. produce high quality publication, while doing his PhD.

I cannot speak for the UK/EU but in the US, your funding is not generally "updateable". It always increases by a non significant inflationary rate amount every year.

The only way in which funding is generally updated is if you acquire for yourself some other funding sources which replace your base funding because they have a higher stipend level eg. NSF graduate fellowship, MSR fellowship, Facebook fellowship etc.

The other way in which my funding has been supplemented at least in my case is my ex-adviser used to give me some more funds as research expenses out of his discretionary funding (or other grant funding, I am not sure) because I was involved in extra projects (not directly related to my own but I was brought in as an analyst) on his request.

I do not think that publishing in great journals/conferences will bring in more funding for you (in general)


Thesis reviewer requests update to literature review to incorporate last four years of research. Do I need to do this? I'm about to defend my Phd thesis in November 2016 in software engineering. I  started my Phd in February 2010. One of my thesis reviewers stated in his review comments that my bibliography references are too old: the most recent work I have quoted in my bibliography is from 2012; that was when I was elaborating my thesis' state of the art. He stated that I have to check main works done in the field of research since 2012.

I am not excited about completing a new literature review two weeks before my defense. Thus, I was planning to say at the defense that the bibliography is old because my thesis began several years earlier. Is this an acceptable response? What would you do in this situation?

The criticism is that you're not up to date on the current state of your own field of specialty, and it is not a light matter.  If the "reviewer" is some sort of committee member that can throw a wrench into your exit process, you should address the criticism.

The real issue is how to address it.  My assumption here is that your defense will be "typical", with a formal presentation followed by some sort of closed session.

You have a very limited amount of time before your defense, and you need to use it wisely.  To start, I'd pick the five most relevant citations to your work that you have, and search them forward to see who cited them, and read those papers-- there will probably be less than 20.  If nothing earth-shattering has happened, you will eventually add those to your reference list, and all should be good.  If there is something earth shattering and pertinent to your work, you probably have more research to do at this point.

How will your reviewer know you did it?  Well, for the closed session, you should have a slide in your rack entitled "review of recent literature".  In closed session, make the opportunity to say "in review, a criticism of how up to date my knowledge of the field was came up.  This was accurate, and this is how I've responded...  I think I've covered this, and will continue to stay up to date with the literature".

To add, they may require a bit of a rewrite-- that's actually fairly common-- but worry about that when the time comes.  The strategy is to to convince them that you've done the work, and you're ready to do that rewrite.  You don't have the time to do it between now and your defense, and my experience is that the document is largely sealed until it's defended anyway.  You're trying to set things up so your revised dissertation will be signed off on without a thorough going-through.


All my papers have alphabetical author lists, but an award application asks for author lists to judge contribution I am a graduate student in pure math, namely graph theory and combinatorics. I have recently been nominated by my department to be the math department candidate for a university-wide research award. In the award application materials, it asks for my CV and is very specific that the authors names need to be in the same order as on the published paper so that the level of my involvement can be judged.

I am in a field where the convention is to put all names of co-authors alphabetically, regardless of input. It is clear to me that I need to mention this on my CV, but I am worried that if I just say that that the order of the authors is irrelevant in my field, the people judging my CV will be unsatisfied because then they won't have any information about how much I contributed to each paper.

Is there a tactful way to deal with this issue?

If you are concerned, you may want to include more information about the culture of coauthorship in mathematics.  For instance, you could enclose the following updated AMS culture statement.

As a mathematical "lifer," I want to be honest: the way that we handle coauthorship in mathematics does sometimes obscure the individual contributions of the authors.  On the job market, this is often circumvented by getting letters from one's senior coauthors describing the contributions you made.  You might consider doing that here, or that may be too heavy-handed for this case.

You could also talk to a mentor in your department and see what they think.  They may have more experience with what happens at the university level.


Can a professor require that I collect personal data from family members for an assignment? I have an assignment for a psychology class that is "requiring" me to contact dozens of family members to find out their traits and what health conditions they may have. Truth is, I don't have the best relationship with many of my family members.

My question:

Can my professor require, at the penalty of point loss, that I actually contact my family members? Or can I provide obviously fake data?

edit: I wanted to clarify. When I said "obviously fake data", I meant to convey that I would actually inform my instructor that the data was false before turning in the assignment.

Can my professor require, at the penalty of point loss, that I actually contact my family members?

No, because for all the professor knows, you might be an orphan without any living family members.

However, I suspect the request is meant in less literal a way than what you are taking it for. You should clarify this with your professor.

The issue is that the professor probably wants to create such an assignment that involves a number of subjects, without overburdening any third parties, while at the same time avoiding that everyone asks their classmates and all answers to the assignment are based upon essentially the same sample.

Some examples of similar suggestions to students that I find completely normal:

"Have your girlfriend/boyfriend proofread your thesis before submitting it."
"Ask your parents to use your prototype before running the study."

None of these means that you really need to ask these specific people, or that you shouldn't ask anyone else. They are just a way to express that you should find someone that probably only you are in touch with (so these other persons do not have to spend days for answering the requests of dozens of students), someone who might possibly have a different background (which, depending on the task, might be desirable), and at the same time someone who you can reasonably ask for such a favour without coming across as too demanding.

In these examples, the exemplary nature of the mentioned roles is usually understood; at least, I have yet to see a student who would truly respond to the first (w.l.o.g.) request: "Ok. But I can't have my thesis proofread because I don't have a girlfriend/boyfriend." Of course, it's just an example of a single person who might or might not exist or be available.

The request by your professor, in contrast, to ask "dozens of family members", seems a bit extreme in comparison, but as a bottom line, you should still try to find out whether it wasn't just an example.

  Or can I provide obviously fake data?

This, in contrast, might be counterproductive. You already wrote you were going to inform your professor if you do so, but better do this earlier than later. In most situations that I can think of, using an arbitrary group of real people as a sample for something is a closer match to one's real family members than making up that data.

The issue I'm seeing become apparent when considering the possible pedagogical goals of the assignment:

The professor wants to point out a phenomenon that typically appears in data from real people. In this case, fake data will probably not exhibit the respective traits and thus will be worthless in this respect.
The professor wants you to get the experience of interviewing real people. Obviously, this experience is not gained from producing artificial data.

In contrast, the following education achievement that you might be reaching is probably not aimed for:

The professor wants you to practice ways to create a realistic set of artificial data. If that were the task, the assignment would have asked you to generate artificial data right away.

Therefore, my two suggestions are:

Asking another group of people rather than your family members should be accepted by the professor. You may want to ask the professor, even though personally, I might even do so without commenting on it.
Producing fake data, even when known to the professor, might be counterproductive to the goals of the assignment, and therefore should definitely first be discussed.


How do graduate admissions committees view taking a lighter courseload in your final year of undergrad? I'm currently an undergraduate Computer Science student entering my fourth year at a Canadian university, planning on applying to graduate programs in Theoretical Computer Science. I'm going to be starting with school in a bit over a week, and I'm still finalizing what courses I plan on taking this coming year. At my school we typically take 5 courses per semester. I'm strongly considering taking a lighter course load (3-4 courses per semester) this year, for a number of reasons, in no particular order:

I've completed all of the requirements for my school's CS program (plus a math minor), and I only need three more courses in any area to finish my degree.
In theoretical CS, I've exhausted all of my university's undergraduate courses in the subject, as well as a couple of grad courses. This year most of my course work will consist of more grad courses in this area.
I'm hoping to spend more time on research this fall. Last year I worked on a research project with a professor, and found myself feeling like I could have gotten more out of it if I had been taking fewer courses at the time.
By taking fewer courses, I can save a few thousand dollars in tuition fees. While I can technically afford the cost of taking a full course load, it doesn't seem to make sense to pay much more than I have to, especially if I can put the money saved towards something else.
Even if I'm not taking as many courses for credit, I'm still planning to audit a few extra courses. These would mainly be outside of my primary area of focus, but where I'm still interested in learning about the material. It would also be less stressful, since I wouldn't have to worry about assignments and exams for these courses.

Overall, I have all of these reasons to justify to myself my plan to take fewer courses during my final year of undergrad. However, I was wondering how this would be seen from the perspective of a graduate admissions committee, since courses that I plan on auditing will of course not be visible on my transcript. I don't want to give off the perception that I had gotten "lazy" in my final year by taking fewer courses, if that makes sense.

It's normal for seniors to take a lighter course load in order to work on their senior research project. Most universities have a "senior project" faux course at the 400- level to indicate this. Some do not.

As far as how grad admissions will view this. As long as you can show that you weren't slacking off your senior year -- perhaps by showing your senior project results in your application dossier, or alternately asking your research supervisor to write for you -- you should be ok.

If you do feel burnt out, I would take a gap year -- either between junior and senior years -- or right after college. Grad school is a long haul.


What is the purpose of publishing in such journals? I have always been wondering why some mathematics professors choose to publish problems in journals such as Crux Mathematicorum, Mathematical Reflections etc, which only focus on elementary mathematics.
I don't think that these journals are highly regarded by the academic community and I don't see how publishing problems here helps them in their career(of course, they may only be doing it as a hobby, but it seems highly unlikely for those who publish lots of such problems). Such journals seem more suited for high school teachers, even though I don't see how they may benefit from publishing there either.

There appears to be a mismatch between your view of "Math" and what math means to a broader community. Sure, there are those doing leading edge research, publishing bold new results, and so forth. But, there are also those who have a calling to do things like teach mathematics, including dedicated high school teachers. Why should there not be a journal for them to read? And if there is such a journal, somebody has to write for it, and those people are normally professionals closely engaged with teaching (remember that many professors, including in math, are at teaching-focused institutions).
In a non-math context, I would point to the American Association of Physics Teachers (aapt.org), associated with the American Physical Society. Their mission statement reads (AAPT Mission):

Mission:
AAPT's mission is to enhance the understanding and appreciation of physics through teaching.
When the organization was established in 1930, our goal was clear: "ensuring the dissemination of the knowledge of physics, particularly by way of teaching." Decades later, we remain committed to that core value, but with a new emphasis and meaning provided by our current mission statement.
Our vision is to be the leader in physics education. We are committed to providing the most current resources and up-to-date research needed to enhance a physics educator's professional development. The results are not only a deeper appreciation of the teaching profession, but most importantly, more enthusiastic involvement from their students.
The Association has identified four critical issues that will guide our future activities:
Increase AAPT's outreach to and impact on physics teachers
Increase the diversity and numbers of physics teachers and students
Improve the pedagogical skills and physics knowledge of teachers at all levels
Increase our understanding of physics learning and of ways to improve teaching effectiveness
The twenty-first century will provide the greatest opportunities and challenges for us as we take an active role in shaping the future. Our success will depend on the commitment, dedication, and continued input of our members and the physics education community. Join us in this journey to enhance the quality and effectiveness of physics education at all levels.

They publish several journals, the American Journal of Physics and The Physics Teacher, focused on slightly different audiences within their society. Frankly, some of their stuff is pretty interesting (in the spring there was a nice paper on the production of polonium in the Manhattan Project, physics included).


Is this a common honors-designation system? At my undergraduate university, one could earn three types of honors that are designated on your diploma:

Departmental Honors, where the requirements are set by the department, usually involving a thesis.
Interdisciplinary Honors, which involved an interdisciplinary curriculum of about 45 credits (nine classes). In my opinion, it was a valuable program.
College Honors, which is what you get when you do both.

I earned College Honors, for both doing a bachelor's thesis and completing the interdisciplinary requirements.

Would graduate schools know what it means if I put "with College Honors" on my resume/application? I assume not, but Latin honors seem to be common enough. Is it worth explaining? Or should I just designate them both and not even bother with the "College Honors" phrasing?

The "College Honors" is definitely not a common distinction. I would also list the Departmental Honors, which is certainly something that is frequently encountered, as well as the Interdisciplinary Honors. You're truthfully representing your credentials, and it will be easier to understand.


Getting a master in math after an econ PhD Ok guys, I know this is a weird question.
I have found that the opposite has been asked many times, however I could not find opinion in how useful would be to get a master in math after completing a phd in econ.
I am at an advanced state in my PhD and I do not want to give up now, because I stil believe I can make it to the end. However, I believe that I will never fully understand some topics without having some intense training in math. So I am considering to successfully complete this path to start a degree in math that could also give me some research ideas for my future career.
What would you say of this atypical question? What are good institutions to learn math (better if linked to good economics department) in Europe?
Thanks in advance for your consideration.

It seems like a very strange route to take, and I'm not sure how it would be received since I've not seen anyone take more math after their PhD in econ.
Did you have differential equations and real analysis before starting your PhD?  If you covered those common bases, you might still gain a few useful things if you go a highly theoretical route, but you've already got most of the math you should need done.
If your interests are more empirical, it definitely does not seem like a good use of time to me.  If your interests are theoretical and you were able to keep up with PhD-level theory in econometrics, macro, and micro, it's probably still not a great use of your time, especially compared to actually getting to work in an econ field.
The best I can say about it is that it probably wouldn't actively hurt anything directly, except for the opportunity cost of publishing economic papers, and it might give you a route into doing more heavy theory.


Are university lawyers usually faculty members or “just” support staff? Many universities will have a Faculty of Law whose academic staff would be largely (or entirely) composed of certified lawyers; I imagine that the same would be true of many of their PhD students.

Similarly, many universities will have dedicated legal teams that assist the university staff with dealing with legal issues (e.g. corporate  compliance issues, patent law, etc).

Would the lawyers in these legal teams typically be composed of staff members and/or postgraduate students from the Faculty of Law, or would they simply be lawyers that have been hired by the university as support staff?

Large or well-funded universities have dedicated general counsel like any other corporate entity, and they function in the same way that corporate general counsel do. Their job is to protect the university's legal interests, which includes things like negotiating with unions, damage control and prevention for legal problems, and defense during litigation, which is often contracted out to a specialist law firm depending on the nature of the litigation. In particular, they will often be on the other side of the table from faculty, so it would be problematic if they were faculty as well.

I suppose technically the office of general counsel is "support staff," but it's a bizarre way to refer to an office that works at the very top of the administrative hierarchy.


Describing figures vs letting figures speak for themselves I'm writing a journal article that involves many comparisons within and across groups. Visually, these comparisons are quite easily understood. However, describing them in text requires the use of long sentences with several acronyms and numerous references back to sub-parts of the figures.

In general is it acceptable in academic writing to simply say a couple of high-level sentences (and maybe point out some nuance that a reader might miss) about a complex figure and allow the reader to absorb the bulk of the information by viewing the figure?

It is evidently true that figures/images can convey things difficult to convey in words (e.g., see Edward Tufte's The Visual Display of Quantitative Information).

On the other hand, the exercise of verbally approximating what may be visually apparent is in itself highly informative in various ways. Among others, your verbal approximation of the visual will partly explain to your readers your own interpretation of it, to which they can add or contrast their own. Or, they might otherwise fail to see in it what you see.

That is, with regard to the latter point, it is often good to "state the obvious", because the notion of "obvious" turns out to be subjective.


Where to define nomenclature in a proposal or dissertation? I am writing my proposal and I am borrowing heavily from one of my publications. The published paper has a Nomenclature section at the very beginning (just after the abstract).

What is the appropriate place for a nomenclature in a proposal/thesis? Or is it more advisable to explain the terms near the place where they are used (considering that if Nomenclature is published on a distant page it would be too much of an effort on the reader's part to scroll down and up again)?

I personally think the biggest consideration is how often the term or symbol is used. If it's used a lot, then a clear definition at the start is probably the best. The reader then knows where to look if they're unsure of the meaning rather than having to find the first place it's used, and it would be ridiculous to keep defining it every time you use it.

For things that are just used once, it may be more readable to define it at the point of use. The definition is only relevant for that little portion, so splitting the definition and use makes things, as you say, too much of an effort for the reader.

The question then is where to draw the line; at what point does a rarely used term become common enough to warrant being included in the nomenclature section? This is, I think, becomes a matter of preference. Personally, if a term were used in more than one section, I'd define it at the start. Though, if it really is only used twice, perhaps an in-place definition and a "recall that we define..." kind of sentence would read more smoothly.


NSF two-ninths salary rule vs. NIH model National Science Foundation (NSF) in US enforces a limit on salary compensation over all grants, often referred to as the two-ninths-rule:

  Summer salary for faculty members on academic-year appointments is
  limited to no more than two-ninths of their regular academic-year
  salary. This limit includes summer salary received from all NSF-funded
  grants.

So, for a 9-mo faculty who can fill up to 3 months of their own summer salary, NSF as the sole source of salary compensation doesn't work no matter how many grants one has.

Compared to the NIH model where there is no such limit, in fact 100% of salary can be recovered in theory via NIH grants, this is a rather strong limit.

What is the motivation of the NSF two-ninths-rule? Why not three-ninths to cover the whole summer salary?

I don't know for sure if this is historically accurate, but the story I've always heard is that the two-ninths rule was an attempt to avoid the vacation issue.  If you take three months of summer salary, then that leaves no time at all for any vacation, since you can't accept summer salary for any time not spent on research.  The fear was that if three months of summer salary were allowed, lots of people would request it (since a 9% salary increase would be tough to resist), but the public would be concerned that many of them were probably cheating and going on holiday with their families for part of that time anyway.  The two-ninths rule minimizes the extent to which the NSF has to deal with this issue, since there's one month reserved for vacation or other activities.

Incidentally, this fits consistently with Bill Barth's answer: solving the vacation problem this way is probably more attractive for an agency that has less money in the first place.


How to assist your home university in evaluating whether classes taken when studying abroad should allow transfer of credit? I am going to be studying for 1 semester in Japan for my computer science degree. This 1 semester will earn me my degree as well as my required internship.
I was already accepted into TU and am in the process of my transfer credits but my advisor at TU is concerned that some of the classes I took here, in the US, don't touch on everything they do over in TU.

How should you compare two courses to help an advisor determine if the courses are similar enough to transfer credits?

Submit the course (or module-) descriptions for the examination department/office.
The target university needs a basis for their decisions to make.

A description of the course containing information about the topic (a syllabus), learning goals and skills taught, the workload and the examination conditions, will help to decide whether a course fits into your major or not and if it can be granted with transfer credits and so on.


How can I secure a solo-authored paper as a PhD student, while working with a supervisor who has reputation of forcing coauthorship? My supervisor has a bad reputation of forcing their name on papers at the final stage of research. The advisor is literally contributing zero or close to zero to my project, nothing more than- or maybe less than- very basic supervision tasks, like giving some comments on a written text.

This is unlikely to change, as the project is already approaching the final stage. How can I protect my work from being "hijacked" by an unfair co-authorship?

Does your superviser deserve an authorship? Check the following:

Have they contributed to the research design, in form of suggesting a topic to investigate, advising on methodology, suggesting literature?
Were they involved in evaluation of results, in form of checking them and contributing an opinion on whether the work is going in the right direction?
Have they contributed to writing a paper, in form of contributing an introduction or abstract, or editing the manuscript?
(*) Have you used any of the facilities or financial streams (e.g. stipendship) funded from your supervisor's research budget?

If any of the above is true, then your superviser may actually deserve an authorship.  You can also check Nature Authorship Guidelines or a similar document in your university.

If you answered no to all of the above, then it is absolutely appropriate for you to publish on your own. Simply use the Authorship Guidelines to politely explain to your supervisor why you believe that they should not be included as an author. You may want to discuss your position with a dedicated unit in your University/Department, such as Research Office or the Head of the Department.

UPD: (*) As many people commented (and I agree), criteria (4) is controversial. In many areas providing funding on its own does not qualify for an authorship (see e.g. Vancouver protocol). However, in many departments it is a norm to always include the Head or Director of the Lab as the last author, and it may not be easy to challenge this agreement for a PhD student, particularly if you benefit from this funding.


Are you unofficially a PhD holder after passing viva voce for PhD? In my university, after passing a viva voce examination, it will take more than 3 months before the university issues an official letter/transcript/certificate to certify that one is officially a PhD holder. Of course, after PhD viva, it will take some time to perform correction as stipulated by examiners. It can be major/minor correction. After a PhD candidate passes viva exam, is she/he unofficially a PhD holder? Considering that one has yet to successfully correct one's thesis as instructed by examiners during viva exam.

At my American university, the process of officially getting a PhD was tiered.  It went something like this:

No claim to being a PhD until after successfully defending.
Some informal claim to being a PhD after successfully defending.  The committee members would usually make this explicit by congratulating the successful defendee with "Dr.".
A weird quasi-official claim when the university's official degree-completion tracking system formally acknowledged that the student has officially met all degree requirements and is scheduled to receive their degree at graduation.
Official claim upon graduation (whether or not attended).
Verifiable official claim once you have the piece of paper, which may be several weeks after graduation if not attended.

Folks I knew were reluctant to claim PhD-status until graduation, but I think that hiring managers in academia and industry tend to find the caveat of not having been through the ceremony to be fairly trivial.  Family and friends are especially unlikely to care about that caveat, except as an excuse to talk about how exciting graduation'll be.


Asking a prof to change my grade I got a B- in my biology course this semester and the day I received this grade I checked my requirements for a specific course I want to take next year and it said the minimum requirement was a B-. However when I checked it again the grade is now a B. I am off by 1 point. Can I ask my professor to change my grade?

As Brian says, professors aren't likely to give you a bonus point just so you can take the next class in the series. After all, there has to be a cut-off somewhere. As an anecdote, I have laughed with multiple graduate students about silly grade-grubbing attempts they're sent.

Most universities let you bypass prerequisites with instructor permission. Since you were so close to the cut-off; and it looks like the cut-off changed in the meanwhile, you might have better luck asking next quarter's professor if you can take her class anyway. In my experience, you might have to register later, which could be difficult if this is a popular course, but I would say you have a better chance with that then getting that 1 point out of the other professor.


Professor blatantly taking course material from internet (other schools) I am TAing for a CS course. The professor I am TAing for, I took the same course with him one year ago. In that semester and this current semester I am TAing, he has been taking lecture slides and simply relabeling the headers with our school name and date. Furthermore, this may be somewhat of a lesser problem, but he is also using material that can be found online from other schools for the exams and homework.

Question is: Is this practice allowed and should I say/do anything about this?

Update: Professor blatantly just told me that it's perfectly fine to do this. I did not want to make a confrontation so I didn't oppose what he said.

What you describe is over the top. However, it is quite common for professors to take material from other courses or textbooks. Preparing a course from scratch is a lot of work and that work is unnecessary if there are already courses online with similar material. Usually, the professor will combine several sources and/or add in some of their own material, rather than straight copying.

The professor should acknowledge the source of the material. I often see course websites list textbooks or similar courses at other universities. Invariably, much of the course material will be sourced from those textbooks and those other courses.

However, you say that your professor is also copying exams from this other course. This is dangerous if a student figures out the source. I think this is actually the bigger problem. This may also explain why the professor may be reluctant to name the source of the material.

TL;DR: The practice is allowed to a certain extent, but it sounds like this case is possibly excessive. In your situation, I would tell the professor that you found similar exams online and are worried that the students will find them too, but I would avoid making any accusation of plagiarism.


Is is possible to study mathematics PHD with another bachelor degree like Business Administration? Is it possible to enrol in a mathematics PhD program with a bachelor degree in Business Administration? Have you heard of someone doing something similar and if yes, how did they do it?

I am a BBA student. I found that I love mathematics after taking some analysis courses and want to keep on studying mathematics and doing research. However, since I didn't really enjoy studying BBA, I have a poor a GPA and I suspect I won't be able to enrol in a competitive mathematics PhD program.

I currently have some background in analysis, including metric space topology, some basic differential manifold, functional analysis, real analysis and of course some other basic math courses.

What is the best way to continue my academic career in mathematics coming from an unrelated field?

The short answer is: "yes, but it won't automatically be easy"

First, every department of every school in every major has a set of preferences - things they like to see in an applicant. This list includes GPA, GRE, sometimes subject-specific GRE, specific coursework, specific reference letters, and the rarely-ever-listed undergraduate research/term papers that lots of people here give great advice about but that I didn't previously know was a 'thing'.

Looking over the admittance pages of prospective programs can give you an idea of this at times. In your case, I looked at a few schools math departments I'm familiar with, and using this one as an example because its not terribly atypical (but you should research your own preferred institutions): University of Wisconsin Mathematics

  1) A GPA of at least 3.0 overall and substantially higher in mathematics courses.

  2) 18 or more credits of mathematics beyond calculus. The 18 credits should include at least one semester of both rigorous analysis
  (sometimes called advanced calculus) and abstract algebra, and
  preferably two semesters. Advanced undergraduate courses in other
  topics further strengthen your application.

  6) A “Supplemental Application Form” is required after submitting your
  online Graduate School application. It is important that you include
  all advanced mathematics courses you have completed, are currently
  enrolled in, or intend to take...

  7) Three letters that address the question of mathematical promise.
  These letters should be from mathematics faculty, or other faculty
  familiar with the demands of graduate work in mathematics...

Now keep in mind that any published outlines are a "wishlist", and they don't automatically toss anyone. But every area you don't fit requires explanation or some other counter-balancing factor. Some programs give a list of x requirements, then say they'll waive 1-2 of them without further explanation needed, etc.

If you are missing all of these, then you need to look at a different program, but you might find no program that's a fit. If this happens, that doesn't mean you can't do something, just that you might have to go about it sideways or backtrack a bit.

If you are missing just a few things, like a course or two, some programs have probation where they'll tentatively admit you on the demand you complete X courses on your first semester and get at least Y GPA, etc.

Alternatively, you might need to make arrangements to take advanced math courses at an undergrad/graduate level. It's harder to get financial aid for this sort of thing (you can't qualify for a Pell grant anymore, etc), but you can still get loans or pay for it outright. If you need this route, you need to talk personally with professors in advance to discuss what your goals are and make any possible arrangement to do extra work, write an academic research paper, etc. You need to find people you can have enough contact with to be willing to go to bat for you in writing strong reference letters if you don't already have math professors who are familiar with your past work. Join math clubs, go to math study labs, volunteer, whatever you can manage.

Before you go running off and doing any of this, however, you should make contact with math faculty at your present school and/or at a target school, and get an opportunity to talk with them about what you want to do and get their advice. Sometimes just showing "mathematical promise" can get a magic wand waived over your application, which maybe you already have - but only someone familiar with what you've done can tell you that. If you have a piece of mathematical "best work" from your most advanced class, bring it with you to such a meeting.

Once you've gotten a few honest appraisals of where you stand, be kind to yourself in looking for programs that will fit YOU, not some imaginary ideal program for someone else.

Finally, one last piece of advice. Keep your mind open to hybrid possibilities. There are whole fields of study you might really like that you aren't aware of, including applied mathematics study offered by business schools, economic fields that emphasize mathematical theory and/or application, etc.

Sometimes we have to try to mold ourselves to fit an existing mold a little better, but sometimes its trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. Talk to people and investigate the possibilities, get a clearer understanding of your relative shape, and seek out openings with geometry congruent to yours. Good luck in your journey!