What is an endowed chair exactly? How does it compare to a “normal” position? US universities have a tendency to name chairs after people. Just to give a few examples from Harvard: Hollis Professor of Divinity (love that title), Steven and Maureen Klinsky Professorship of Practice for Leadership and Progress (too long to fit on business card), Carl H. Pforzheimer, Jr. Professor of Teaching and Learning, etc.

I understand that the people whom the chairs are named after are rich and donated money to the school in the past. What I do not understand is in what aspects it changes the nature of the position. Are these chairs more highly regarded that just being "Professor of Divinity" for example? Are they better paid?

Chaired positions are generally endowed, in that the money provided for the salary, and some other benefits (e.g., a dedicated assistant) or increased research funds comes from the interest on principal donated by the person or people the chair is named after, which is part of the school's overall endowment (UC San Diego has a more broad definition, as does Wikipedia). Being named to a chair is a prestigious award, and in many cases it is a lifetime (or at least, until retirement) position. Some chaired positions are given on a rotating basis (e.g., for five years), but nonetheless it is prestigious to be named to an endowed chair.

While it is not strictly true that professors in chaired positions are paid more (because in most cases pay is negotiable), because universities use a combination of pay and incentives such as an endowed chair to lure highly sought-after candidates, the pay is probably on average higher than the average non-chaired full professor would have at the same institution and department.

Finally, some schools use chairs at the university level (versus the departmental or school level) that they dole out throughout the university. The positions can therefore be used as an enabler for some departments with less money to attract particularly important faculty members that they might not have had an opportunity to attract otherwise.

For a specific example of the policy for endowed chairs at one university (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute), see here.


Should I choose a "Pass" grade instead of a letter grade due to the study disruption during the Covid-19? I understand this question has been asked in this forum. But I still want to have some advice on my case.
I am current a research master student in one of the top universities in Canada. In the last semester, I got two B+. This gives me a GPA of 3.3 which is lower than the PhD admission requirements of 3.5. Now, due to Covid-19, our school allows us to choose to report a Pass in our transcript instead of a letter grade. Students choosing this Pass/Fail option will not have their GPA obtained in this semester counted towards their final GPA. That means if I can obtain a GPA higher than 3.5 in the next semester, I can still satisfy the PhD admission requirements. So should I choose this Pass/Fail option if I am considering the opportunity of apply for PhD programs? Thanks.

You can choose “Pass” if you want but everyone will understand you made this choice to preserve your average, so your file will still look bad admission to a PhD program.
With “Pass” you may technically qualify to apply but I doubt admission into a PhD is simply a matter of meeting the technical requirements. Regardless of what you choose, you need to do better next term, so you can establish that this past term was just a one-off due to COVID.
On a related matter: are you sure you can still choose between “Pass” or a grade?  For most students the window to make that choice closed with or near the end of exams (at the latest).


Should I include non-winning positions in my CV? Recently I applied for a hackathon and joined a team / idea that was very intersting for me both professional-wise and hobby-wise: an autonomous tennis ball picker robot. The whole team worked really hard for the 48 hours non-stop, we built a working prototype, we presented the prototype to mentors and they really liked it, found clubs interested in testing the device. However, we failed to get into finals....

Currently, I'm applying for a University and thinking wether or not I should include it application.

Yes if

there is content relevant to the readers of your application and
if you are able to properly communicate/present/demonstrate such relevance.

My slightly analogous context: I'm including research projects in my CV even though I got graded low.

After a year in industry (finished master's last year; applying PhD's for next year), I've come to realize my accomplishments were not graded.
Even if they were, the grade is not as relevant as much as what the experience says/could say (depends how you present!) to what you could do for your intended job/program application.
If I'm wrong, then I guess I can trim down my CV. The analogy is supposed to be that my low grades is like your not getting into the finals.

Better analogy: Having a great thesis/acting performance but not winning best thesis/acting award in your batch/for the year

I mean gee, had you been born a year earlier or later you could have been in the batch/year where your thesis/acting performance would've been better than the best thesis/acting performance of their batch/for the year.


The Ethics of Preparing for a Course Long Before Actually Taking it I think this is an unspoken question in academia: how do you factor in the effort put forth by a student before taking your class?

I think  the answer to this question has several consequences:

it presents accurate reflection of your teaching,
it presents more accurate reflection of the quality of work of a student

It also addresses a more profound question:

Is good educational outcome measured by grades a product of privilege or a measure of intelligence?

Personal anecdote:

In my undergrad classes, I find for some courses the class will be divided into two camps - one who has done some work outside of the class (the ones who have a background), another who will try to learn the course material as the course progresses.

The results are vastly different. The ones who have done work outside of class will achieve higher grade across the board, are more motivated, ask extremely technical questions in classes, gets all the attention of the professor as the next "rising star", etc., whereas the other students who haven't had as much experience prior coming to class will try his/her hardest with uncertain outcomes and will tend to struggle a great deal more.

From my own observation, a course taught by a lecturer who uses less conventional course material seems to even out the grade much better than a lecturer who uses standard material - since in these cases, the advanced students are less able to predict what will show up on the exams.

This is most significant in computer science classes. Any computer, CS, programming classes will teach things in two folds: practical and theoretical. I find in many of my classes, a portion of the student will have a great deal of knowledge in the former, therefore significantly reducing his/her course load. How easy is it to ace an introduction to programming course if you already have years of experience in the language? These courses will always produce several students who go on doing interesting research or work at some big-name companies, and the lecturer will be praised as being effective at teaching. But it is so obvious to me, that the student - the one who has taken years of programming at middle to high school level, a summer course at another University... - is more advantaged in this area than a student who is just coming in to be acquainted with a field of study.

Hence, what is the ethics of preparing yourself for a course before it begins given such uneven playing field in today's academic setting? Will this be a mark of a motivated student who is genuinely interested to learn a subject or a student who is just trying to get ahead and earn good grades? Why should or shouldn't a student prepare himself for all the courses he will take one or two years down the road?

IMO, there is no ethical problem with students preparing for a course in advance.  As Moriarty notes in their answer, what matters is that the student learns the material, not when or how they learn it.

That said, there are (at least) two actual problems that your question touches upon:

the occasional problem of advanced (or self-taught) students taking beginner-level courses for "easy credits", and
the practical problem of teaching a course for students with a highly variable baseline experience level.

The first one could be considered unethical behavior in some circumstances.  For example, let's say I'm a math major who decides to minor in biology, and the university happens to offer an "introductory math for biologists" course.  If I was unscrupulous enough, and nothing specifically forbade me from doing so, I might be able to take that course and basically just show up for the exam, getting free biology credits for stuff I learned in first-year math.

(In fact, I freely admit to having done something similar myself on occasion.  For example, one of the last courses I took as an undergrad, to make up the credits I needed to graduate, was a first-year "computer literacy" class that basically consisted of learning how to use a web browser, e-mail and a word processor.  As I had already completed a minor in computer science, as well as worked for several years as a full-time software developer, I hardly need to mention I did not find it much of a challenge.  Still, it got me the three extra credit points of "general studies" that I needed.)

It could also be argued that there is no problem: if you consider the credits to be awarded for knowing the material, then I clearly deserve them.  On the other hand, if you consider the credits to be earned for learning something, then I clearly do not (as I already got credited for learning the same material once, back when I first learned it in math class).

More generally, issues like this can occur any time an institute offers multiple introductory-level courses covering essentially the same material (but possibly from a different angle) and does not specifically forbid students from taking more than one of them.  When that happens, a student can effectively learn the material once, but get credited for it n times, where n is the number of such overlapping courses they can find.

The usual solution here is simply to try to find and close any such loopholes.  Some possible methods for doing that include:

explicitly designating certain courses as equivalent to each other, so that a student can only receive credits for one of them, and
restricting certain very basic introductory courses, like the "math for biologists" example I gave above, only to students actually majoring in the target field (here, biology).

Also, if students are going to commit such shenanigans anyway, it can be argued that they should be allowed to demonstrate their competence in a separate exam, so that they don't need to waste time and classroom space, and skew the grade distribution, by actually sitting in a class they don't need.

As for the second problem I mentioned above, i.e. teaching a class where some students already know much more of the material than others, there are several distinct approaches that people may argue, depending on their general teaching philosophies.  My personal suggestion, which I'd consider a "moderate" position, is to take a "triage" approach and mentally divide your students into distinct groups:

The advanced group consists of the students who already know much of the material, and just want to show their competence and get the official certificate for it.  Some may be hoping to learn some interesting new tidbits, but they'll still pass the course even if they learn nothing new at all.
The learning group consists of those students who actually more or less match the intended level of the course: they know the prerequisites reasonably well, and are reasonably capable learners, but don't yet know the material you'll be covering.  In many (but not all) courses, this group will make up the majority of the students, and they're the ones you should adjust your teaching pace for.
The struggling group consists of the students who lack some of the prerequisite knowledge the course assumes, or who are otherwise falling behind the rest of the class.  They'll likely need remedial teaching to have any hope of passing the course.  You should not have many students in this group; if you do, it may be sign that you're going too fast, and some of the students that should be in the "learning" group are falling behind.

It can be a temptation to focus on the "star" students in the advanced group, since they're the best in class, have the most interesting questions (if any), and generally appear to offer the most reward for the least effort.  They're also the ones most likely to end up as future grad students in your field, which makes focusing on them even more tempting.

However, the advanced students are, by definition, not the ones the course is actually intended for, and they're not the ones you're really there to teach.  Rather, your main goal with the advanced students (insofar as they come to class at all, rather than just taking the exam directly) is simply to ensure that they're not bored.  There are several ways you can achieve this, such as:

giving the advanced students additional bonus exercises or projects that go beyond the standard syllabus, or letting them pursue their own side projects;
encouraging the more advanced students to help the less advanced ones;
encouraging students to come see you outside class if they'd like to learn more about something that sparked their interest; and
if you still cannot engage some students in class, letting them skip it if they already know the material.

As for the struggling students, there is an argument to be made that you, ideally, shouldn't have any, and that even a single student falling behind is a sign that you should slow down until they can catch up.  Essentially, this approach amounts to lumping the "learning" and "struggling" groups together, adjusting your pace to the tail end of that combined group, and treating any students who progress faster as "advanced".

While there is some merit to this approach, it can also be taken too far.  Especially in higher education, it is often simply not possible to set the pace by the slowest students in class, and still have enough time to cover all the material in the allotted time.  Instead, as an alternative to simply letting these students fail, it may be more effective to set the in-class pace by the majority of the class, and to focus specific remedial efforts (such as individual tutoring, possibly by some of the more advanced students) on those that need it.

Of course, even this won't always help, and sometimes you may simply have to let a student fail.  In particular, it's important to learn to distinguish students who'd like to learn, but have a hard time doing so, from those who are simply too lazy or disinterested to learn.  The former group can be helped; the latter cannot.


Is a math degree really useless financially? I graduated in December 2018 with a double degree in math and electrical engineering and have applied to various graduate schools in pure math and electrical engineering and have been offered admission to phd programs in pure math and electrical engineering.

During my undergraduate studies, I have heard many academic mathematicians say that a math degree opens many opportunities for you and mathematicians can get any job, ...

On the other hand, I have also heard people saying that a math degree is useless financially and you can not get a decent job with a math degree; you either need to become a school teacher or work at a bank, ...

Now that I am about to start my phd program, although I enjoy math a lot, I do not want to get a phd in math and after four years find that it did not worth it financially and I have to do a not well-paid job. I can not also hope that I will end up in academia as I have heard academic jobs are very hard to get.

So that leaves me to think that if I want to get a well-paid job, I should do a phd in electrical engineering and not math.

I am so confused and I do not know which paths am I supposed to take? do a phd in math or electrical engineering?

Just a personal anecdote, not really an answer, too long for a comment.

I have a master degree in mathematics and now I'm doing physics simulations for visual effects in Hollywood blockbusters. I believe that a math degree gives you a massive upper hand in any field with reasonable amount mathematics in it. However, you have to be interested in that field and study it in your spare time. I studied computer graphics in my spare time and my math background allowed me to comprehend things in computer graphics orders of magnitudes faster and deeper compared to fellow computer science students.

Take it with a grain of salt, master degree is completely different kind of a beast compared to a PhD degree.


Job prospects in case of an unwelcoming mentor A friend of mine, let's call him Jim, is a postdoc in Germany. Jim's contract is ending soon, and he talks to me often about this issue, so I decided to ask here. (Perhaps, this community can provide a piece of advice though I'm not directly involved.)

Jim publishes about one paper per year in a high-rank computer science conference or journal and does some teaching (seminars + teaching assistant for a lecture or teaching assistant in charge of a lecture). Otherwise, he is completely clean (no academic fraud, no convictions).

As far as I understand, Jim failed to integrate himself into the current research lab at a university paying him. (Probably, Jim took way more time than he expected to publish on his old topics unrelated to the activity of the lab and, AFAIK, is still not fully done with it.)  Jim did everything necessary for the project which he was working on in this group and for required teaching; but the project ran out, and now the head of the group seems to try to get rid of Jim as soon as possible. The head is not very welcoming: the head does not finance conference travel despite earlier promises and does not answer e-mails.

So, given the fact that Jim is starting to apply for other positions, what are his chances on the job market in 1st world developed countries (North America, Western Europe, Israel, Australia, Japan, ...) where a good command of English and German is actually sufficient to live? It's not his first postdoc position, and it is not known whether Jim's current mentor (= the head of the lab) would actually send any reference letters for Jim at all when asked. How would Jim approach applying for tenure-track academic positions (or even industrial positions) if it is not known whether any reference letters would be actually sent out? (At certain stages, which is 1.5 till 5 years back, all Jim's previous mentors have confirmed to him that they will send the reference letters, but Jim is not sure whether they would actually send the letters, and Jim seems to have no chance even to find out whether the reference letters have really been sent or not.) What incentives (that Jim could trigger now) could cause a previous mentor to actually send a reference letter rather than simply replying "done" or moving the request to the trash bin? The situation is exacerbated by the fact that Jim promised to never ask for any reference letter from his PhD advisor. (It was a private promise for some private reasons, but still a valid one. Perhaps, Jim overestimated himself in the past or the like.) Even if all the prior mentors (except the PhD advisor and the current one), which are two or three, do actually send reference letters, but the current one is excluded, would it be worth to apply?

Each proper job application for a tenure-track position takes Jim a couple of full working days, so he is not wishing to invest his time into something which is doomed to fail.

Having a strained relationship with his past mentors (both PhD and postdoc) is definitely going to put Jim at a disadvantage on the job market.  But that doesn't mean he has no chance at finding a decent faculty position.  Here's what I would recommend.  This is aimed at looking for faculty positions in the US, where recommendation letters are mandatory and crucial; hiring practices in other countries are different.

Ask directly.  Worrying that the supervisor won't send letters or won't write a strong letter is pointless.  Jim must ask his supervisor directly, in person, face to face, if they are willing to provide a strong letter of recommendation.  He should also make it clear that to simplify their work and preserve his sanity, he will provide a mechanism to track letter requests (see next).  If the supervisor agrees, Jim should immediately send email confirming the agreement.
Track letter requests.  Jim should provide an online spreadsheet (via Google Docs, for example) that lists all the positions Jim has applied to, one per row, with contact information and deadlines, and a column for each reference.  Then references can indicate in their column which letters they have sent and when.  Tracking not only relieves Jim's uncertainty; it also drastically simplifies the job of his references.  It also provides a public shaming mechanism, since Jim and all his references can see who has or hasn't sent which letters.  (This is not just a suggestions for Jim; everyone on the academic job market should do this.)
Use a letter service like https://www.interfolio.com/ or https://academicjobsonline.org/ , which allow applicants to track the status of letter requests, and provide interfaces for references to upload confidential (generic) letters and for departments to retrieve them directly.  Again, this both lowers stress for the applicant and simplifies the work of the references.  Not all departments trust these services—some people prefer to communicate directly with references—so this can't be the only tracking mechanism.  On the other hand, some departments actually require using these services, so Jim may as well use them anyway.
Double-check with departments. If Jim is really worried that his supervisor is lying when he says he's provided the letter, he should ask a few departments to confirm that they have received all their requested letters.  Not all will reply, and some departments may be vague (because they need to keep confidential whether they've requested letters at all, or which of your N references they've asked), but enough will reply that Jim can either rest easy or know for sure that his supervisor is a dishonest jerk.  (In that case, Jim should update the tracking spreadsheet to indicate which letters were "sent" but not actually received.)
Find good references from the research community.  Since Jim already has several years of postdoc experience and a nontrivial publication record ("one paper per year in a high-rank computer science conference or journal"), he is already known in his research community through his work.  At this point in his academic career, most of Jim's references should not be supervisors, coauthors, or other faculty at his previous institutions they should be arms-length experts in his field who can give an independent evaluation of his research record.  Jim should ask for letters from experts who have given him positive feedback in the past, either by citing and building on his work, or by offering supporting comments in person at conferences.  (Ideally, Jim started cultivating these outside experts as potential references when he was still a PhD student, but better late than never.)  Remember that a normal part of asking for references is asking for suggestions for where to apply.
Have more references than required.  Most US departments ask for three recommendation letters.  Under normal circumstances, I'd suggest finding at least four references, so if someone doesn't reply you have a backup.  If Jim is worried that some references won't actually send letters, he should find five.  (That said, some departments only allow applicants to specify three references, or only request letters from the first three of N the applicant provides, so it's important to prioritize.)
Apply broadly. The application process is random; crudely, the most lottery tickets you buy, the more likely you are to win.  Not having a letter from his most recent survey would be a red flag, but that just lowers the chances of any particular application panning out.  Jim can counter that effect by applying to more positions.

  What incentives could cause a previous mentor to actually send a reference letter rather than simply replying "done" or moving the request to the trash bin?

Professional embarrassment.  After all, your other references will know that he agreed to write letters for you.  Being known as a dishonest jerk will not be good for Jim's supervisor's career.

  Each proper job application for a tenure-track position takes Jim a couple of full working days, so he is not wishing to invest his time into something which is doomed to fail.

It really shouldn't take that long, at least for tenure-track positions at US research universities.  Most of the successful faculty applications I see (in 15+ years on my department's hiring committee) are at most minimally tailored to my department, except possibly for the cover letter (which almost nobody reads).  In particular, the CV should be a complete record, and therefore identical for every application except possibly for order: research first for research-focused positions, teaching first for teaching-focused positions.  The research and teaching statements should confidently focus on Jim's accomplishments and vision.  Uploading the documents should only take a few minutes.


Which is more important in determining author order: time spent or results obtained? This is in the field of life sciences, i.e. a field in which the order of authors is not determined randomly but reflects author contributions (whatever that means); in other words, being first author is better than being second, which is better than third etc - except for the very last authors, who are generally the lab heads.

We're publishing a paper and two teammates have a disagreement on the order in which their names should be listed. We basically explored several strategies that were at the time all quite reasonable, so there was really no way to determine if one made more sense than another. We found that testing strategies one by one rigorously (one person per hypothesis to validate/debunk) was the most productive way to move forward. Our paper describes several mechanisms that we demonstrated could work for a certain problem.

Team member A tested several hypotheses, including one of the four that made it to the final paper.

Team member B tested more hypotheses (they were working on the project full-time, as opposed to A), and demonstrated that they were not scalable / valid strategies for our purposes. Interesting, useful for us, but not paper-worthy.

Each one of them has a pretty strong claim for having a better authorship position:

Teammate A designed and 100% tested one of the strategies that did work and that we chose to report in the paper, so their contribution is quite obvious. On the other hand teammate B spent more time on the project, debunked working hypotheses (not publishable but it had to be done at some point) and helped with the validation of other designs that worked - a contribution of 40-50% of the work on two different parts of the project.

Obviously results include a part of chance (picking the correct hypothesis/molecule/group/dataset), but time spent on the project is not a perfect metric either (working smart matters more than working long hours).

Without asking for a definite answer, how do you generally weight the importance of "what the paper shows in the end" vs. "the important but not article-worthy preliminary work"? In other words, how do you measure "contribution"? I would like to come up with a rational and objective way to determine who contributed more significantly - at least by the journal's standards.

In my field, this would clearly be shared (first) authorship.

As for the exact positions, in my experience one of A and B would also have been spending a lot of time as a de facto project lead that determines the course of the project and does most of the writing. In fact, in my field this would almost always be B, unless A somehow has the capabilities of effectively leading multiple projects and delegating vast proportions of the work in those projects.

I don't place a lot of value on happening to find the right solution for a problem. The way you describe this, it seems almost stochastic: A proposed four solutions and got lucky, B proposed more solutions but didn't get lucky. Obviously the situation and value of contributions changes if B could not have found the solution, but A (possibly because of greater experience) could have.

Two other considerations: first, exact position on a paper can have very different values for different people. A first first authorship can be absolutely vital for scientists who are rounding off their PhD or postdoc, whereas scientists who aren't rounding off could also obtain this in a next project. Second, maybe there are ways to even out the author contributions? One way would be to do another project together and flip author positions for that one. Another way would be that the person who doesn't get author precedence can present the work at conferences for the first year. And maybe there are better ideas that someone in your lab can come up with.


How to work effectively with an unpredictable advisor? I'm not sure if many grad students face these struggles, as my advisor is in no way abusive or "bad". In fact, she is extremely nice, but just very unpredictable at times. For instance, the same request or question will elicit a very different response depending on the day, and that's really confusing to navigate. I think predictability is kind of key to any type of managerial work.

In addition, she will also play her cards to get what she want. For instance, the advisor I thought I will have through her actions/words during the rotation period, is different from the advisor I ended up getting (little time to talk about my project now, and doesn't seem to care). This happened again when she was trying to have me stay on longer for a project. I wrote a research proposal, but once she realized I was staying, there was attitude change again. Meetings were post-phoned to the point that we never actually discussed any part of the proposal after two months. Now I'm having second thoughts about the whole thing, but would it seem immature to back out of it now? In general, I can't figure out if this is acceptable behaviour, and if I'm just not learning the best way of handling it.

She is a new professor, new to the job. Sometimes it may help to give her a indication what you would need from her, very diplomatic, very polite, but clear. If she does not follow up on that, consider switching supervisors. It is fine to back out from a supervisor that doesn't do their job well and do not promise to improve. It is your right to know what to expect from a supervision.


When citing in MLA, do you need to cite the same source twice? I have a Works Cited in MLA style. Two of my sources look like this:

http://www.example.com/a/x.html
http://www.example.com/a/y.html#42

Do I need to cite both pages, or do I just cite example.com?

The URL in a reference should lead the reader directly to the material you have used and cited.  Unless example.com has only those two items, you should cite each one.


What to do with spare research topics? A while back I reached the stage where my ideas for research topics/papers exceeded my capacity to personally work on them. As a PostDoc, I tried to head-hunt students or more junior researchers in my area (or at conferences, etc.) to talk with them about the ideas and see if they would be interested in collaborating or co-authoring a paper. This worked well for a while.

But now (more recently) I find that I again have a back-log of promising topics that have exceeded my capacity to even advise/delegate. I have no students to work on them. The ideas are mixed in quality, concreteness, promise, etc. and I'm saving some of the ones I am most interested in for myself or for students. But I know that there are others I will have to neglect (and I often choose the "safer" topics since being in tenure-track, I have a constant hunger for publications).

Now I have a text file on my hard-drive with a list of sketches of ideas so that I remember them. But a lot of the details are left unexpressed in my head; most of the ideas in the text file would be pretty meaningless in their current form without some explanation, further development, context and/or motivation from me. At the same time, I have sufficient experience to know that there are interesting paper/thesis topics in there that I could help develop and/or advise if I had the time/money.

For some of the topics, I have been saying "some day" for too long.

In any case, I cannot imagine I am alone in this. I am sure that various researchers see many potentially promising research topics fall "by the wayside" due to more urgent, day-to-day matters. I sometimes wonder if other professors similarly have lists of research topics that just rot away in a text file somewhere. It would seem like such a waste if this were the case: think about the union of all these text files sitting on local hard-drives! It would seem to be a major flaw in the academic research system if this were prevalent: that the sharing of raw (or perhaps lightly pasteurised) ideas is not properly incentivised by "the system".

The question ...

Assuming I have a surplus of (good) ideas for research topics in my area – that I cannot work on myself and cannot delegate or even find time to actively advise – what should I do with them?

To avoid a loss of generality, a good answer should assume that I'm not  nice: what personal incentive would I have for sharing my ideas in this manner? I don't want to give away my ideas for free. These ideas require development and expression before they can be shared (which is difficult to do "up front"). If I am not incentivised to develop the ideas into a shareable form, the reality is that I will use my precious time to do something else I am incentivised to do.

I believe the most 'formal' way to share these would be to write a survey of the area that your open problems relate to, highlighting each problem. This adds a publication, and anyone who solves one of the problems is likely to cite it. Moreover, if the survey is sufficiently in-depth, it can generate a large number of citations as an introduction to the area.


How to write research proposal without the risk of getting my idea stolen I am applying to some PhD programs this year. For some programs they require a research proposal - and this creates a dilemma for me. The more detailed the proposal is, the higher chance I get into the program but also the higher the risk that my idea is stolen. What can I do in this situation?
Thank you!

Yes, this is a known issue.  What you said is perfectly true -- a vague proposal will probably be rejected, a well elaborated proposal can potentially be stolen.
The situation is very similar with job applications, where applicants are asked to produce a research plan for the next 3 years, and members of the recruitment panel can be more excited with the elements of the proposal than with hiring an applicant. Speaking from personal experience, this puts applicant in a frustrating position.
There is no ideal solution for the applicant. However, the following helps:

Remain active and productive in research as much as possible and try to stay ahead of the crowd in your own field. If it is clear from your proposal that you are the best person who has the right skills to get the project done, then it is more likely that people will want to have you onboard.
Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Apply to several places quickly and move forward with your research at the same time. Even if someone decides to steal your idea, they won't be able to implement and publish it overnight. Use your time effectively and stay ahead of possible competition by moving faster than your competitors.
If possible, try to discuss the proposal informally with your potential supervisor first, and see how interested she or he is, and whether she/he would like to contribute additional ideas or details.


Funded PhD in the UK with a Distinction in MSc and a low undergraduate CGPA I completed my undergraduate degree in engineering at the best university in my country of origin, almost a decade ago. I completed the undergraduate program with a 2.9 CGPA  on a 4.0 GPA scale, which roughly equates to an overall B grade (74.5%). Owing to my very difficult personal circumstances at the time, I had to repeat 6 failed courses and completed my degree in 5 years instead of 4. I later completed a master's degree at a mid-ranking UK university - a former polytechnic, albeit one with a very good history and a good reputation in my subject area - with an overall distinction and an A1 grade in my dissertation. I had the opportunity to start a funded PhD at that university at the time, but I wasn't really interested then.

Since completing my master's program, I've worked in the industry for nearly 8 years. Now, at 35 I would like to apply to a good PhD programme at a top ranked university next year. I'm very passionate about my research topic and  have drafted a very good research proposal. Will my undergraduate record have any bearing on my application?

Yes, but exactly what, won’t be known until you submit the application(s).


What is the minimum time one should spend in a post-doc? Suppose one has been hired for a three-year postdoc.  Three years give sufficient opportunity to get some work done, without moving to a new country every year.  Possibly, an opportunity might arise to move to something permanent before the three years are finished (either in academia, or in industry, or in government research labs, or somewhere on the edge of those).  However, the postdoc supervisor, who has invested time and money in a postdoc in order to get a project done, might be disappointed if the postdoc leaves a job unfinished.

On one extreme, I know someone who has been a postdoc at the current place for 5½ years, and they were a postdoc somewhere else before that.  I suppose spending 8 years in postdocs does not help when applying for permanent positions.  On the other hand, I know someone who has been a postdoc for only seven months or so, and is already applying for a primarily teaching position at a somewhat lesser known university, possibly a position where major post-PhD results are not essential.

What is the minimum one should spend in a postdoc, before even starting to consider applying for possibly permanent positions?  I mean this question broadly; an answer may either be expressed in time (one year) or in results (one major and one minor first-author paper).  Of course, without any significant results, finding a faculty position at a major place will be hard if not impossible.  But the question here is related to the moral obligation to complete some of the task one has been hired to do.

Postdocs are cheap labor. Furthermore, unlike grad students, they show up already fully trained and ready to do productive work. This is all a wonderful deal for the lab that the postdoc is working for.

If a postdoc is applies for a job after 7 months, they will probably still have been in the postdoc position for about a year before they actually leave. This is perfectly reasonable. Tenure-track jobs are so scarce and hard to get that any reasonable supervisor's reaction in this situation should be, "Wow, that's wonderful that you lined up a tenure-track job so quickly!"

In any case, this will presumably come up when the postdoc asks the supervisor for a recommendation for the job. If there needs to be a discussion of how long is long enough, the discussion will happen then.

  Three years give sufficient opportunity to get some work done, without moving to a new country every year.

My perception is that 2 years in a single postdoc used to be standard. It may now be common to do 2 or more postdocs, each of 3 years or more, but that's an expression of market conditions, not of any moral obligation that the postdoc owes to the supervisor.


How to manage an interview by videoconference? I am working in academia in a position that is similar to instructor. The job is great but I am working under a short-term contract system with last-minute renewal notice, so I am trying to move for a more stable position.

Since the positions I am looking for are mostly in other countries, my interviews are held by video-conference. Some allow Skype interviews, but others ask for a "professional" video-conference, with high-quality video, and good and stable internet connections. Basically, they want me to use the video-conference room in my current institution.

I was wondering how people usually manage their organization for this kind of interviews. My question is 2-fold:

Questions

How do institutions feel about letting their employees using their video-conference resources for job prospecting?
How do researchers that are not currently working for an institution find the resources to participate in this kind of interview? High-quality webcams are expensive.

Since I do much of my work by video link, I have some experience with the problems of conducting business over video-conference.

For permission, in universities it will generally be fine as long as you aren't disrupting the work of others.  If there is any rule regulating video, you should be aware of it (e.g., some non-university research institutions don't allow video-conference at all, and make very certain their researchers know).

For quality, I would guess that their actual requirement is not HD, but that they want to be able to read your expression as you talk. Here, the primary limitation is not your camera, but your network connection. The built-in camera for your computer or any cheap webcam will generally produce much higher quality video than you can transmit effectively.  Things to do to ensure a good connection:

Use a wired link (e.g., EtherNet) rather than wireless if possible, as your connection is likely to be better and more stable.
Use headphones and a microphone (cheap earbuds with a built-in mike will do): the headphones will prevent echo from your speakers, and the microphone ensures consistent pickup of your voice.
Different software provides different quality tradeoffs optimal for different connections:

Professional videoconferencing hardware (e.g., PolyCom), is nice if your institution has a room and you can get help using it.  Its learning curve is a pain, and it's not any better quality than...
High-end videoconferencing software (I've had good experience with BlueJeans), provides a fantastic quality connection but has brutal demands for bandwidth and processor power.  If I use it for more than ~2 hours on my laptop, it overheats.  Note that you don't have to buy this software: generally, only the meeting organizer needs to, and you can connect via a web link that they send you.
Skype is good for mid-grade connections: it provides nice video when given a consistently good link, but degrades badly if the link is inconsistent.
Google Hangouts is good for low-grace connections: its video quality is never particularly good, but it will get something through.

The most important thing is the high-bandwidth link: with a good enough link, Skype is generally sufficient within a continent.  For very long distance connections (where the limitation is lag and undersea cables) you may want to use higher grade software. If you can't get access to a place that gives a strong connection, arrange the connection for a time when you are likely to have little competition with others for bandwidth.  Early morning is generally best: during the day work activities consume bandwidth, and in the evening people are watching video.


Is it true that corporations influence the conclusions of research studies or papers? I observe media uses health studies or research and come up with conclusions to influence the consumers today with headlines suitable for few corporations

New study says caffeine can help strengthen memory function

Research shows beer can be good for you

Is it true that some research today are manipulated to suit corporate agenda particularly private funded?
Is there a way to identify commercial research?

There is always a possibility that an Industry funded project (meaning a company is funding it vs. the government) is influenced.  However, in academia, the idea is that peer reviewed work looks at the methodology and results to decide if it makes sense.  There are also different types of 'research'.

In the media 'A new study...' does not necessarily mean academic publication  (in the case of your link, it was).  Anything is possible, and if an upcoming researcher who needs funding tries to find meaning that benefits a company to get more funding later, than yes, it is possible for research to be 'manipulated'.  In the case that it was a company producing the research themselves, such as a coffee company posting its own research, most likely it is biased.  An example is the bing challenge, which says that research shows people choose bing over google, but that was Microsoft's research.
A company can fund academic research that leads to a publication.  In this situation, there is an acknowledgement of who funded the research.  There are often conflict of interest statements that are included in the publication.


I got a provisional acceptance and submitted my clerical revisions almost two months ago. Email the editor? I got a revise and resubmit after a 4-month review in a decent Psychology journal, submitted a revision and, after another 4-month review, got a provisional acceptance with minor and clerical comments to be addressed, and was asked to submit my response within two weeks. I did response within two weeks, which is almost two months ago at this point.

Questions:

Should I email the editor through the submission website?
If so, what would be an appropriate way to frame the email? I had in mind something like:

  Dear ____,

  I am emailing to check on the status of my provisionally accepted manuscript (ID=xxx). Please let me know if there is any further information you need and thank you for your continued attention.

  Best, ____

The question hangs on the meaning of "provisional acceptance." If the reviewers suggested that no further review was required, then the editor should be able to make a decision fairly quickly once the changes have been made and submitted, so two months is probably too long for the subsequent review. However, there is the possibility that the editor sent the paper out for an additional round of reviews, in which case the delay is much more "explainable," but still bordering on too long.

In any case, a polite email to the editor asking about the status of the paper wouldn't be remiss. What you've written is fine.


Is there an alternative to Dean title? Because of different backgrounds in higher education systems, different titles are popularly used for administrative titles in academia such as

  University level - President, Vice Chancellor, Rector, Principal

  Faculty level - Dean only

  Department level - Head, Chair

For leading a faculty, the only common term is Dean. Am I right? or there are other alternatives too?

And more interestingly, the title of Dean is only used for the manager of a faculty, not other positions. Correct me if I'm wrong.

What is the historical meaning of dean, and what is special about this title, which is only used for a specific level in academia.

The title "Dean" is by no means restricted to the leader of a faculty (or college, or other similar unit). For instance, most US universities have a "Dean of Students" who is responsible for student services, discipline, etc. Some have a "Dean of Residential Life" who runs the dorms. My alma mater had a "Dean of Student Activities", popularly known as the "Dean of Fun".


Is there hard evidence that the grant peer review system performs significantly better than random? Funding agencies in academia use peer review to assess the quality of submitted grant proposals and to decide which proposals should be funded. I have some doubts that this system actually works based on the following findings:

A recent study in PNAS "found no agreement among reviewers in
evaluating the same application".
We have by ourselves performed boot strapping on reviews provided
for the same proposal submitted at multiple calls in multiple years
(yes, the guidelines allowed this) and obtained on average almost exactly the overall average acceptance rate of the calls.

My question is now in the opposite direction ... Given that the grant review and panel system is quite costly: is there hard evidence that the grant peer review system provides results significantly better than random?

E.g. Do studies exist where e.g. 50 proposals were funded based on the standard review process and 50 random proposals were funded at the same call and then 5 or 7 years later the number of high profile papers, citations or similar was counted? Or do studies exist were re-evaluations show the same outcome as the original evaluations of proposals?

No such study exists.

You have to realize that the current model of funding research through grants is rather recent. Fifty years ago, research was funded with recurring credits: a lab/researcher got a fixed amount of money each year to do research as they saw fit. Only applied researchers got industrial grants to develop precise new applications, but this wasn't the core of their funding.

The current system arose due to the combination of two factors:

The growing hegemony of the neo-liberal ideology in the 80s-90s and the commodification of society as a whole. According to this ideology, research as a whole is supposedly more efficient (for an ill-defined notion of "efficient") if researchers compete with one another on the global market of research funding. They will "naturally" tend to research what works in order to keep their funding.
Politicians' will to govern research. Research, and especially fundamental research, is a notoriously difficult thing to govern: you never know where an idea might lead, or what new ideas will come up along the way. You don't know what will work and what won't. You don't know what will be applicable and what will remain a nice theoretical idea. Otherwise it wouldn't be research.
But rulers want their word in this: they want to tell their voters that their policies improved lives in a very direct way as a result of such and such decision they took. This is why words like "governance" and "steering" are becoming more and more prevalent in modern academia: administrators are not in the business of just helping researchers carry out their research, they are in the business of ensuring that researchers are researching what they are supposed to. And how do you force someone to do what you want, short of physical violence? Through economical violence.

Of course, this yields absurd situations, such as the fabled year when the French National Research Agency spent more on administration than on research. And such thinking paves the way for short-term research with zero long term goals, and especially not goals reachable in more than five years (the usual length of "long-term" grants). But these decisions are not driven by rational thought; they are driven by ideology.


Being personal in motivational letter I'm starting to prepare my application for scholarships to do MSc in Europe. One of the requirements, of course, is the motivational letter. I was interested: how personal should the essay be? How many hints about your passion in the chosen MSc programme are ideal? I don't want to sound pathetic and unrealistic in my application and will try to convey as realistic motivational goals as possible in the letter. But are there boundaries where being too personal in your statements will be considered a negative thing?

Passion is good, but passion alone does not make a successful student. You also need to talk about your academic achievements and interests in a realistic manner, and emphasise how your qualifications and aims make you a good fit for the particular MSc you're applying to.

Emotive statements which use time honoured clichés such as "I've been interested in physics ever since I took my first trembling steps into the subject" should definitely be avoided.

Academic writing should be crisp and clear and ultimately there is little room for sentiment. If you can convey your motivations in that style your statement will likely be much better received than an incoherent or overly emotional letter.

Note: the answer to this may be somewhat dependent on the local academic culture (you don't specify where in Europe you're applying) but I think it's broadly true that too much emotional writing will have a negative effect.


What is the minimum one can communicate with coauthors What are the minimal communication points with coauthors necessary for peer-review?

I am faced with a slightly hostile and poorly trained group of coauthors (the latter is not their fault: they are MS level engineers from industry). Each communication costs time and misunderstanding. I do have a desire to do things 'correctly', in general, but especially as I suspect that at some point one may write a letter complaining to the editor. I'm hoping to steer this process to happier places, and fewer exchanges seem to be one important component of this.

Upon submission all authors ratified the draft.  Now I have a revise and resubmit. My plan is not to send the comments around (they will be taken as 'we failed' by this group, not accustomed to academic comments). Instead, I will address them and send around the revision with reply.

Does this seem acceptable. is there a way to minimize even more?

I think that, ethically, you have reached the minimum. If their names are to be attached then they need to sign off on the result as published. But it may not be necessary for them to see how the sausage is made. So, I think you are fine in what you suggest.

However, you should expect questions about why you made certain changes and you might, at that point, need to share something of the comments of reviewers that led you to make those changes.

The endless arguments may still occur, but at least you will have an updated version about which to argue, rather than just a lot of disparate comments.


What should I do if I found too many typos after my Ph.D. thesis being approved but before my oral defense in mathematics? I am doing my Ph.D. in mathematics and did not have my thesis carefully proofread before submission (which is definitely a mistake that I wish to correct). My thesis was approved after submission and I am now preparing for the oral defense.

Now as I reread my thesis in detail, I found that there are too many typos (probably more than five per page). Some are negligible, but some are essential. For example, I wrote "<" instead of "less than or equal to") in the conclusion of a proposition. Another example is that I quoted a wrong theorem number in a proof. I even wrote a same lemma with the same proof twice. One referee complains about the misprints in his/her report, but s/he still considers the thesis tolerable as a whole. But now I feel all those careless typos very annoying and they make the thesis much less readable.

Now I am seeking suggestions on what I should do. Should I correct all known typos and give each committee member a copy of the revised thesis on my defense? Is there any other thing that I can do right now?

Talk to your advisor.

When I defended, my committee came back with a number of such corrections to be made. I made them and they signed off. Then the thesis editing office took the document and came back with even more corrections. I made those, and eventually they signed off. Trust me, you aren't the first to deal with this problem, and likely not the first that your advisor has seen.


Is it rude to take all the time allowed to make an offer decision? I've been made an offer for a position that I will likely accept. I've been given a week more time than planned (at my request) to make a decision, which makes it possible to attend a campus interview (already scheduled) for another position, although it probably won't be as good as the already-offered one.

Knowing this, should I just accept offer A? I feel bad taking the full extended time to make a decision that I've pretty much already made privately, although I feel that I can't cancel the campus interview since they already booked the travel accommodations (on the same day I received offer A no less). (And I suppose it could actually be a better offer).

Will it hurt me to take all the time they've given me? I would literally be letting them know maybe 1 or 2 days ahead of the full bracket. I don't want to look like I'm dragging my feet and they've made it clear that they're trying to close it out quickly. My assumption is that they've given me time, so I should use it- but I just don't want to hurt my chances.

The alternative however would be, I suppose, to accept offer A and then attend the campus interview, which sounds worse. Thoughts? Thanks.

Not at all. You should go to the interview, see the competing offer, if you get it, and then decide. Note that you will likely not have time to have either school make a counter offer. Therefore, I would recommend that at the interview you let the school know you have an existing offer and deadline and that they will have to move quickly and at least match the other offer (or whatever it will take to get you there).

If the school that has made the offer asks, just tell them you are waiting to hear from one last place. You could send a preemptive email telling them that, but there really is no need.


How do I choose a lab to rotate in? Normally, graduate students at my university go through three rotations. I've done two and will need to choose a permanent advisor after this next one. So choosing a rotation is similar to choosing an advisor, yet the philosophy can be slightly different.

1) Funding: Does the PI have funding for at least one year? Having that planning time to find other sources of funding without having to TA is indispensable.

2) Choosing a permanent advisor: The purpose of a rotation is to find an advisor and lab I am comfortable working with, as this will lead to a happier and more productive few years of my life.

3) New skills: Doing rotations in multiple labs will give me perspective. I should be learning different skills from each rotation.

4) Research interests: I should find a lab with research interests that align to mine. I don't want to be stuck working in a field I don't enjoy for the next X years.

5) Prestige: An advisor with strong industry connections can leverage those connections to help me break into industry or finding funding for my startup. A recommendation from a professor famous in your field can be my ticket to a tenure-track position.

How should I reconcile these different points? I'm a bioinformatics grad, if that makes a difference.

I would focus on choosing an advisor and a project as your priorities. These will be the two most important decisions you make as a graduate student. The project you pick will be your preoccupation for the next five or so years, and your advisor will be one of the most important figures in your career. New skills and funding are secondary to these, and the issue of prestige almost shouldn't enter into your decision at all.

In particular, I would actually argue that it's not just choosing an advisor; it's choosing an advisor and a group. You will almost certainly be spending more time with your fellow group members than with your advisor. Therefore, you need to make sure that you can get along with both your advisor as well as your future colleagues. A miserable working environment is not worth the trouble, if another viable option is available.

Also, make sure that the project you want to work on interests you; it'll drive you to accomplish more, and you'll be better motivated to make it your own (which is what you need to do to succeed as a graduate student).


Funny 5th option in multiple choice exam? I came across a multiple choice exam paper where the professor had included a funny fifth option in almost every question. There was also a bonus question at the end, where students can earn 0.5 extra points for writing their own humorous multiple choice question.
It was the final examination of a bachelor-level course, though I have no reason to believe that the professor does not do the same in master-level exam papers as well.
For example, the fifth option for one of the questions was, “I don’t know, but a vanilla latte would be perfect right now.” Another one was, “Come one man, stop it with these lame jokes.” On a question regarding why someone might have a conditioned taste aversion to sushi, the fifth option was, “They certainly did not try sushi from [popular local sushi place].”
The exam papers I saw were those of students who had done well in the exam, and they seemed to appreciate the humor, since they provided their own funny question at the end for the extra 0.5 points. However, I did not get the chance to see the rest of the papers.
Also, the questions did not cause any disruption during the exam itself. No student was visibly laughing or trying to communicate with another student.
On the one hand, I myself find this hilarious and it seems others, including students, find it too. It might help lighten up the mood and ease anxiety during the exam.
However, I am afraid that it might be a distraction, especially since it was not a single joke but a running joke throughout most of the questions in the 33-question exam. Students might lose time reading these responses, or they may feel that the professor is belittling what is otherwise an important and serious exam for them. Is this, perhaps, unprofessional?

That is hard for us to determine. This could be a legitimate way to help students relax during the exam. The fact that the professor includes this at a fixed spot at the end of each question, that this seems to be an established tradition with students expecting this and being encouraged to participate in it, points in that direction.
On the other hand attempts at humor directed towards a large number of people in a context where you cannot easily defuse misunderstandings is risky.
So based on the information you have given us, it could be either.


Are keynote talks being purchased? I recently listened to a talk given by Brian Lunduke about problems that GNU/Linux are currently facing. In it (roughly 26m48s into the video) he mentions that keynote presentation time slots are being purchased by companies at GNU/Linux conferences. That is, companies are paying the conferences in order to get to be keynote speakers at said conferences.

This made me think, does this kind of thing happen in the academic world too? Are there serious conferences (that is, not the type of conferences we so often get spam emails about) where some or all of the keynote talks have been chosen due to some company/organisation/person paying the conference money in order to get their person to speak there? If so, is this disclosed to the conference participants in any reasonable way?

Some conferences exchange corporate sponsorship for various perks. Those perks may include a keynote speaking slot. Thus,

This kind of thing happens in academia.
Perhaps more so at serious conferences, because those conferences are more attractive to sponsors.

Perks may be advertised, e.g., on web pages soliciting sponsorship. Hence,

This may be disclosed to conference participants.
But, possibly not in a reasonable manner, since participants would need to discover sponsorship perks.

Some perks may be privately negotiated, without disclosure to conference participants.


University making unreasonable demands with regards to external undergraduate research opportunity Here's my situation: I'm a fourth-year undergraduate at an Asian university, and next semester, I'll be hoping to conducting research in order to publish a senior undergraduate thesis. Now, since my university doesn't really possess the facilities for research in the field I'm interested in, I applied to a lab in a university in the United States, and I've been accepted in and told that I can join up in February. It's a fantastic opportunity for me to gain relevant experience in a field I'm interested in, I can help out in a lab environment conducive for research in the field, and along the way, I can get my thesis done under a really brilliant professor as well. That's the good part.

The bad part is, I spoke to one of my university deans (the one in charge of coordinating senior undergraduate theses) earlier about this opportunity and my intentions to spend the next semester at that research lab, saying that this a fairly niche field, I'll be gaining a lot by spending a semester there and that I'll still be publishing my thesis here in my university.

He says that the new policy of the university administration is that they're unwilling to permit students to go out of the university and spend a semester abroad, and the reason behind this is that it's unfair for something like this to benefit just one student, and it has to help other students as well for them to sign off on something like this. The dean wants a formal understanding between the research lab and the faculty at my university, stating that the professor at the research lab would be willing to take qualified students from my university in upcoming semesters to work in his lab. There is apparently to be no communication between me and the professor in all this, and any potential trip of mine is to be entirely determined by my faculty.

Now, I get where the dean is coming from, considering it from the university's perspective. But opportunities like this don't come around very often, and I took immense efforts to obtain it. Why should my potential achievements be determined by how much they benefit other students? It's a bit like saying, if you want a job, everyone has to get a job as well.

More importantly, how could I possibly get the professor at the research lab to agree to this 'formal understanding'? He does not take undergraduate students very regularly in his lab, and to suddenly impose this proposal on him, would almost certainly make him hesitate about allowing me to spend a semester at his lab, all due to no fault of my own. How could he possibly agree to taking in other students in the future, when he doesn't know my university very well and the type of students in it?

At the same time, I don't want to antagonize the administration at my university either. What do I do, and where do I go from here?

You need to sell this as an exception to their policy in terms of benefiting the college and it’s students. Be as positive as possible with all of this. Talk about the great opportunity you found and how it will benefit your education, further learning and your career. Make a big list of pros for why this opportunity is great for your education and for you but don’t mention cons. Not for the opportunity or for the college research. Don’t make a direct comparison. “Aboard is better because [reasons the college research sucks].” will not go over will. Stick to the positive moral high ground. Think in terms of this is right thing to do and tell them why.

Now that you have a better opportunity, you need to convince them to allow it. Try to find anything unique to your situation that can be used as grounds to make a case for an exception. Sounds like research opportunities are scarce at the college in your field. Push that point or anything else unique. What would happen if the college research opportunity fell through or was delayed? It’s understandable to cultivate options to not miss anything in terms of your education. An exception in your case doesn't make it something that needs to be repeated for other students. Stress that point. You are presenting a unique, one time exception. Letting you go aboard allows them to build up better research opportunities while not having improvise opportunities as the need arises.

You mentioned being in niche-field. It’s difficult for the college to give the same level of focus much less research opportunities as a more mainstream career. This makes it harder for you to find an opportunity at the college or aboard. Letting you go can benefit other students. By letting you go aboard another student has a college research opportunity.

Reach out to your professor first. If they support you, it will be much easier with him/her on board.


Accepting and then Declining Grad School Admissions Offer I've applied to a 5 grad schools for Engineering Management and I'm yet to receive the decisions from 4 schools.

One of the schools has offered me admissions as well as a scholarship offer. However, I've the deadline to respond to this in about another week's time. This school is my 5th choice among the 5 schools. Can I accept the offer now and then later decline it if I get into any of the other schools?

Or should I ask for a date extension as to when I can accept or decline their offer?

Can I accept the offer now and then later decline it if I get into any of the other schools? Or should I ask for a date extension as to when I can accept or decline their offer?

Asking for an extension is better, since that doesn't mislead (whereas accepting and then declining does).


Is it possible to obtain a bachelor's degree by passing some test to prove equivalent knowledge rather than attending a university? Is it possible to obtain a bachelor's degree without attending a university? I'm talking about passing some kind of test or series of tests to prove my knowledge. I'm not asking about buying a fake degree or anything related to that. Is there a name for this type of procedure/way of obtaining a degree? Is it practiced in the US? If yes, is it possible for non-US citizens to pass these tests? If not, are there any countries that practice something like this?

In general, no, it is not possible to get a bachelor's degree from an accredited university in the US purely through examinations.

It is possible to get course credits that can partially satisfy graduation requirements through tests such as those administered as part of the Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate programs. However, these normally tend to be restricted to satisfying general education requirements, rather than the in-depth major requirements.


should I include offer letter from a different institution in my application for a faculty position I have a offer letter from a very well-known group in my field for a postdoc position. The proposed starting date would be early next year.
However, I am currently also applying for a faculty (assistant professor) position at a different institution.

Should I mention this offer in my application for the faculty position (on cv or cover letter) and/or include the official offer letter?

update:

there is another sublety for one application. One faculty position I consider requires experience abroad (i.e. not in the same country) of at least 1 year. I only have 6 months but the postdoc offer would be abroad giving me the 1 year total if I take it before starting the faculty position. Should I then mention the offer?

my field is health and medical sciences

I think that it would be unwise to include a copy of an offer in another application.

But whether you inform them of the existence of an offer is a bit more subtle. I doubt that anyone will rush to hire you just because you have another offer. They will evaluate you on other things as usual. So, at best, mentioning the offer initially gets you nothing.

However, later in the process if you need a decision and they are delaying making it, you can let them know that you have a deadline. Whether that helps or hurts is also subtle. Whether it is wise, or not depends on the nature of any relationship you have been able to build with them. In the absence of any relationship, it might hurt more than help. It is easy to just cross you off the list unless they are very interested and have few other interesting applicants.


I think a colleague deserves authorship but my PI doesn't agree I'm an undergrad student working at a large research hospital over the summer. My research has been making very good progress; my PI has implied that we are likely to ultimately publish it.
My abstract was selected for a prestigious oral presentation (fewer than 10% of [not exclusively undergrad] students were selected), but something doesn't sit right with me about the authorship she suggested.

My PI added a few authors who never actually contributed, but she hoped would. At least one of them still hasn't. This didn't bother me but is starting to because a student who has put a lot of work in is being excluded.

This grad student conducted and scored the neuropsychological assessments for most of my participants, and those scores are key for my research question and results. The student works in a lab that collaborates closely with mine. I suggested that she should be given authorship, but my PI told me that she should not be. After sending my abstract to the list of collaborators, one of them even asked me why the grad student student was not asked to be an author.

Since this is a niche field that I likely want to work in, I am worried about creating resentment. I know that this is ultimately just a summer research project, but if it goes further and becomes published I would not feel right with my exclusion. It just doesn't sit right.

My question is two-fold:

(a) Is it worthwhile to ask that the student be given authorship? The PI of the other lab is notoriously abrasive, and I wonder if my PI wants to avoid giving her too many footholds in this project. I don't want to stick my head into institutional politics. Does this student even deserve authorship?

(b) How do I approach this subject with my PI? She is a very nice person and I don't usually feel intimidated by her, but I'm keenly aware of my position as an undergraduate researcher at the bottom of the academic ladder.

Thanks.

This is an extremely sensitive issue that must be handled with care. Although no decision can be stated black or white, there are a few things you ought to keep in mind before making it.

The decision you make depends on your morals, survival and comfort.

Assuming X to be the contributor in question whose name is being excluded from the author list in the first place, let's first review through the possible options you have:

  Discuss this issue a little deeper with your PI.  Inquire about the guidelines of authorship on her point of view (as suggested by @FábioDias). Ask why should be a contributor's name be omitted while a non-contributor be included, in a diplomatic way of course.

This option could worth a try as you wouldn't be directly opposing the choice made by your PI depending on how diplomatic you are in your conversation. Try to understand the rationale behind her decision. Her experiences may clarify your views on what an author is to be. Though this may make you a little uncomfortable by asking this, choosing this option shows that you value your morals and keep you at a relatively good term with your PI too.

  Discuss this covertly with X's PI. State the situation and let the two PIs come to a conclusion. Or, discuss this with another trusted faculty member of the same institution.

The covert part might not always work out right. This could backfire on you quite badly if the other abrasive PI do not agree with your condition of anonymity or if your PI comes to know of this by other means.

  Try to strongly convince your PI to include X's name in the author list of the paper. If not, go against your PI and submit the paper with the list of authors you choose (provided you are the corresponding author).

By doing this you are really staging a protest here. The next objective would be then find a different PI who matches your ideals. Frankly, I don't know of many prospective PIs who would welcome rebels. You may have to endure quite a long cold war. By choosing this option you are making a point that your value your morals far more than the survival in the institution.

  Tell your PI that you would not submit unless X's name be included.

Now, this does seem rebellious too but not as strong as option 3. Ultimately you may even have your paper published even without your own name in it (a very unlikely event).

  Just do as your PI instructed and ignore that any of this had happened.  You don't include X's name and publish the paper.

This is the safest option if you want your rapport with your PI to be smooth in the future. Choose this if your survival weighs over your moral in this case. How much discomfort you feet in the end about yourself depends on your mindset.

There may be more options to this, but at any case, think through this carefully and make a decision based on what matters to you the most.


Do other countries have a oral exam system similar to French “colles”? The French classes prépas system includes, during the first two years of undergraduate (post-baccalaureate) education, a series of regular oral exams, known as colles. Basically: every week during your first two years, you have two oral exams, each lasting one hour, with one teacher examining two or three students, each using a blackboard. A science student would typically have math and chemistry on week A, then physics and another topic (engineering, foreign language, …) on week B. This system prepares students for national competitive exams after their second year, which includes both written and oral components.

Now, whenever I have to explain that system to a foreign colleague, I have to do it from the start (as above) because I do not know any other similar system they might know (especially, I don't know of any equivalent or similar system in the US). Is there one?

The correct answer to this question is either yes or no. To answer yes one would simply need to provide a single example of another country with an oral exam system similar to the French system. To answer no we would need confirmation that no other country uses a similar system. To start the alphabetical list:

United Kingdom: Undergraduate students at the top universities tend to begin their studies immediately following their A-Level examinations which do not have a substantial oral component.
United States of America: Undergraduate students at the top universities tend to begin their studies immediately following their high school/secondary education. Admission is based upon performance throughout high school and standardize test neither of which have a substantial oral component.


Asking Thesis examiner for guidance I am currently writing my undergraduate final year thesis. It happens so that I have to consult papers written by my thesis examiner on a particular topic. My question is is it appropriate to seek clarification from him on parts which I'm unsure of in his paper even though he is my examiner? I tried asking my supervisor first but he is unsure about it as well as this is not within his area of expertise. (I need some results from other branches to prove something.)

This is perfectly acceptable.

Caveats:
I would be wary about asking questions you should know the answer to.
I would also avoid anything that might be interpreted as a criticism. I know this sounds obvious but its an easy mistake to make. If you are not a tiny bit careful, "Please clarify X" can easily be read as "X wasn't clear".

If your advisor isn't clear you're covered that it's not a 'trivial' or stupid question.
If you are careful about how you word the question, you shouldn't be in any danger of offending anyone. Explaining things can be tricky and if you are outside the immediate field, it doesn't look bad for anyone that you didn't follow.

Conversely not asking could end up reflecting badly on you. He will in all likelihood: understand the issue, see how it applies to your situation, and will be interested in your response/use of his results. If you don't follow it will probably be clear. If on top of that you missed (what he will see as) an easy step to rectify the situation - ask, exactly as you suggest - he may well see it in a negative light.

Finally if for some nuanced reason - and I really can't think what this would be - there was a reason he wouldn't be happy to discuss this with you: if you ask in a way that doesn't demand or expect an answer no harm will have been done.


Research after the bachelor's degree has ended but before applying to Master's program Background: I'm planning to attend graduate school for CS at a school (UT Austin) where state residents pay significantly less tuition. Therefore, I will move to the city where the university is 16 months in advance of applying. I am planning on first applying to a Master's program to gain research experience and boost my credentials.

I want to do research with a certain professor at this university before applying to the Master's program.

Question: What can a non-enrolled student with only a bachelor's degree do to improve his/her chances of being able to do research with a professor to boost the student's resume for graduate admissions?

I.e., replicate his important research, try to publish in his area of research, use my university email so it's less likely to be treated as spam, have a professor I'm doing research with beforehand reach out (while continuing research with this professor), etc?

Edit: Well, I've been trying to get undergrad research as a distance learning student right now and I haven't gotten any response back yet. I wonder if it'll be even harder after I graduate.

Contact the professor and ask (politely!).

Nobody ever explained to me how you applied for a doctorate until after I found out my undergrad results and people started suggesting I should think about it, so I approached a few of the departmental lecturers whose work I liked, explained that I was interested in working with them and asked if there was any way I could get experience in their group. One of them turned out to have some short-term funding and paid for me to work with the group for a year as long as I did two days a week of general group jobs. During the year I was able to get to know the group, contribute to papers and apply for doctoral funding (which was successful).

So, from personal experience of being in a similar situation, it's worth asking. This took place in the UK about (ahem) 20 years ago, but unpaid or self-funded 'placements' are common in other countries too. Since you have a clear aim (a specific project or area that you want to strengthen your CV in, for a defined period) and it doesn't sound like there is a specific structure in place to facilitate this, then I'd give it a go.


How can I quickly learn advanced math concepts for my PhD in engineering? I am a PhD student majoring in Medical Engineering. My interest in Math is high, but my knowledge isn't. I have just a bit of knowledge in Calculus, Linear Algebra and a little Statistics (just can do mean, median and mode). When I entered my PhD, I was really surprised at the complexity of the concepts we were expected to know, like SLAM, Green's Theorem, Cholesky factorization, etc.
How can I catch up? The time constraint is really short (2 months), and I want to really understand all the concepts to the point where I can derive them. However, if I am stuck, I don't want to see the answer since it makes me feel depressed and that makes me realize that I really lack in fundamentals.
I really like Mathematics, but after seeing a lot of Math problems on YouTube where I cannot even get close to the solution, I am questioning whether I am fit for Engineering or not.

The truth is: There is no magic bullet. You didn't learn engineering in two months, and you won't learn math in two months.
If there are specific mathematical concepts you need for your work, you can of course select books from that area. If self-study is not fast enough, you can also consider paying a tutor to walk you through material. But short of that, mathematics is like any other field and language: It requires years or studying and practice to become fluent and productive in.


Was I wrong to rebutt unjustified rewiewer comments in the review? Recently submitted a manuscript which got a decision of Reject & Resubmit, i.e. the editor invited a resubmission provided we can address the reviewer's comments. In my previous experience, all my manuscripts were always accepted after a resubmission was invited, so I thought the editors basically use this type of decision to give themselves a little more leverage.

One reviewer's comments were very negative, but unjustifiably so. For example, he/she stated that the "experimental treatments" weren't independent, while our study was purely observational and didn't include any experimental manipulation. The comments looked like they were made by someone who didn't bother to put any thought into the review and had a poor understanding of statistics (our study is loosely in the field of ecology/conservation).

We rebutted these comments firmly, but politely. The other comments, including those made by the second reviewers, were minor and were addressed by revising or clarifying the text in certain places.

We also explicitly drew attention to the issue with one reviewer's comments in the cover letter accompanying the resubmission. We stated that we carefully considered these comments, but they were unjustified, and again explained why.

This resubmission was rejected outright very quickly, within a week. The editor acknowledged the revision did improve the manuscript, but still rejected citing the standard "our acceptance threshold is very high" etc.

It is the first time my invited resubmission was rejected, and I can't help wondering whether the firm response to the reviewer's comments was the cause.

It's fine to push back against reviewer comments, but it can be a bit of a delicate dance to do so.

First, I would suggest you take reviewer comments that are unjustified to mean that you didn't do a good enough job explaining what you did. Although it's possible the reviewer was simply sloppy in reading your paper, a lot of people are going to sloppily read your paper: give them as few ways to get it wrong as possible by being extremely clear. Communication is between the reader and the writer: it isn't only the reader's fault if the reader gets it wrong. You can apologize for your role in the miscommunication and do better in the revision.

Second, I would suggest whenever you plan to push back against large parts of an individual review, rather than just a modest misconception or two, have a less-involved person that you trust to give honest feedback review your remarks. Sometimes a coauthor with a smaller contribution is sufficient (i.e., not the primary or senior author, who may feel most personally involved in the work), other times it may be helpful to reach out to someone else outside the authorship group. Ask them explicitly whether they think your response is sufficiently polite. Ask them to play the role of that reviewer or the editor. Additionally, give yourself a bit of time to sleep on both the reviewer comments and your response, at least a day or two and maybe a week or two. Personally, I sometimes write my angry/snarky response in a private document for myself to "get it all out", spend a couple hours complaining to people close to me about how worthless peer review is, and then come back to the original comments later and start working on real responses to what turns out to be helpful criticism. You can skip the first two parts of that if you want, but the last part is crucial.

Third, make sure you aren't really missing something in the comments you think are unjustified. Your question here is vague, so I am only guessing, but you say:

  he/she stated that the "experimental treatments" weren't independent, while our study was purely observational and didn't include any experimental manipulation

If you responded to the first part of that comment and say "this comment doesn't apply because our study was purely observational" I would, as the editor, probably reject your paper. The real, important comment there is the lack of independence, which is often a critical weakness in an observational study. It may be that you interpreted your data in a way that implies an experiment has taken place, when it hasn't, and that makes the reviewer's comment very very relevant, even if they misused the word "experiment." Be careful that you haven't used causal language, that you have done field-appropriate comparisons between any groupings you made in your observations, etc.

Finally, it's quite possible for you to do everything "right" and still be rejected. For a more selective journal, especially, an editor may reject if there is insufficient support from the reviewers, even if you are able to refute some of the criticisms. They are looking for papers that the reviewers agree are excellent, and it's possible that observational work is simply not a good fit for this journal.


Academic Writing other than Publication for Grad School Admission I've graduated from a Chemical Engineering department and I am planning to apply for a Master's degree. I wasn't involved in research that produced a publication when I was an undergrad. Is there any other option for academic writing that I can use to strengthen my application?

When you apply to a Ph.D. or research-based Master's degree program, we often look to see how much prior experience you have with the academic research process. This includes successfully working on research alongside a faculty advisor, and when possible producing the oral conference presentations and co-authoring the scholarship (publications) that document the findings.

When faculty evaluate graduate school applicants, we are excited when we see someone who already has experience with the research process that is fundamental to graduate school and when our peers (applicant's former advisors) can recommend her based on her performance. Producing publications is an incredibly important part of the research process, so it is obviously best when someone has seen work through to that finish line. We also understand that this sometimes just doesn't happen for undergraduate researchers for a variety of reasons.

While it is also helpful for us to simply see examples of your writing, this is not really why we value the publications of an applicant. Don't be too worried if you have not yet worked on research leading to publications; you still may be considered a high-potential applicant. Be sure to impress with clear and cogent writing in your Statement of Purpose, on your resume, on your linked webpage/blog, etc. Good luck!


Can you teach in higher education with a master's degree? I have a Bachelor's degree in journalism, and I'm starting a Master's degree program next year.  I'd like to teach in a university - is it possible to do so with only a Master's?

In the unedited post, you mentioned portuguese, so I'll take a chance and guess brazilian. It is statistically likely, you don't seem to be from portugal, but that still leaves portuguese speaking african countries...

Considering public universities in/near SP, RJ, MG, the whole south and some capitals, you won't even be able to apply, they require PhDs all around, with high competition. In the federal universities farthest away from these centers (like AP, RO, RR) a masters would be enough in most cases. These openings are probably available even with the recession, not many candidates willing to relocate, and, without PhD, the salary will be kinda low... (~ 4k BRL)

On the other hand, if you go to the private universities, yes, totally. With the exception to some of the most prestigious (like PUC, Mackenzie, etc), that require PhDs.  In the smaller ones, most of the professors do not even have masters. Low pay, no research and tons of courses tho...

If you combine both and consider a small private university farthest away from the economic centers, they might not even consider you, saying that you are overqualified....


Does every paper in mathematics have Zbl and MR? I need to insert the Zbl and MR of papers given in the reference of my paper. I can't find Zbl of some the papers. for example the paper On Inverse Eigenvalue Problems for Two Kinds of Special Banded Matrices. I search in the https://zbmath.org/ database to find Zbl but it returns no result, I also search inhttps://mathscinet.ams.org/mrlookup to find the MR.

Thanks

Your paper is MR 3628846.

MR and Zbmath don't index every paper in mathematics.  Each one has a list of specific journals that they index; these lists are extensive but not exhaustive.  New journals are sometimes added, and journals can be dropped if they cease publishing regularly or don't keep their quality up.  However, MathSciNet at least does index the journal where your paper appeared (I didn't check Zbmath).

Both services operate mainly by subscription (usually institutional subscriptions).  As you've found, they do offer limited searching to non-subscribers (e.g. the MR Lookup service) but it is, well, limited, and it is not unusual to have trouble finding a paper through the free searches.  The full subscription version offers much more powerful searching.  In this case, however, when I pasted the paper's title into the "title" field of MR Lookup, it returned the paper right away, so I am not sure why you were having trouble.


Would successive rejections of different papers by the same journal lower the probability of acceptance of the next submission to the same journal? I have tried to submit some of my papers on unrelated topics to a journal and gotten rejected, either desk rejection or rejection after peer review, by the journal. Recently I worked out a new paper and would like to submit it to this journal again.

The reasons for rejections have never been elementary ones, say "poor English" or "of poor quality" or something like these (I know all these reasons from my peers). For most of the time parlance such as "the results are not significant enough to warrant publication in ..." is the reason.

Then I would like to know: Does my records in that journal significantly affect the viewpoints of the editors on my current submission?

My guess about the situation is that your prior rejections will not significantly affect the editors' opinions on your new submission.

However, the fact of your prior repeated rejections is evidence that you are misjudging the suitability of your papers for that journal, either the aptness of the topic(s), or the level and quality. Thus, if I had to wager, I'd bet that you'll be rejected again... not because you were rejected before, but because the factors in play that led to your prior rejections will most likely manifest themselves in the present case.

So, really, you should get more-specific advice from an advisor or mentor about appropriate venue(s) for your papers, as well as possibly critiques of the writing style.


I like my supervisor but not how he does things; What do I do? I've already got a little experience doing self-led research but not in doing setup for the domain in which I work. I really enjoy talking with my supervisor about actual research topics, but I don't enjoy the workflow he suggests.

For example, there is a particular software development toolkit I've been told† to use, but it's constructed in such an unorthodox way as to be unusable outside of a certain development environment in a very specific way (in Eclipse IDE) and isn't compatible with development conventions which are nearly ten years old (Maven). I only found this out when it was too late and have had to jury-rig everything as I go, and now, due to having thrown together a bunch of weird stuff together without testing it properly (having been given the green light by my supervisor, respecting his decision that it would work fine), I've spent six months collecting data which is messed up to the point of being unusable. My supervisor was also surprised, admitting that he didn't expect any sort of problem like that (which is why he recommended throwing the said things together).

I like and respect my supervisor but can't help but feel the whole project has gone sour thanks to "just doing it the simple way" which has turned out to be unbelievably complicated and now it's very likely I spent all that effort for nothing. What can I do when I respect my supervisor's research advice but don't like doing things the way he does? — What kind of "workflow" can I form where I take his research advice but still do things "my" way... or at least to know what implementation advice I should take with a grain of salt? Obviously it works well for him, so I feel even more disillusioned that I'm the one with all these problems. I feel that just saying "no, your software doesn't work" would not be constructive, because it does seem to work... for him.

† Being more sure of the nature of the working relationships at the department, I now feel that I could have politely declined at the time without offending said person as long as I was confident and produced results.

First, research doesn't come with a specification with all details ironed out.  In most cases, many things are undefined and unknown; hence, it is called research.  We could change direction at any time, especially when we realize there is a better problem or the problem at hand is rubbish.  Consequently, the code in academia is pretty bad, poorly designed, and ad-hoc as compared to what you find in the industry; although codes in the industry can be one bowl of spaghetti too.

On your question, think about the problems at hand.  Try to plan them out as best as you can.  Collect evidence to justify the strength and weakness of a given tool/solution.   Bring these pieces of evidence to your supervisor.  If he/she is rational, he/she will either side with you or give you better reasons to not go a certain way.