texts: When no program is available in your country and all attempts to join foreign ones failed

texts:
Here's my problem. I'm a high-school student, from Africa, I will now have completed my last year there; However, the only choice available to me, in my country, are either engineering schools or medical schools. But my interests lie elsewhere, since I want to become a theoretical physicist, and that's obviously not possible with these two options. I've looked at foreign programs, in particular, undergraduate programs. I know beforehand that getting full scholarships is extremely difficult, but I thought that it would be a good idea to at least try. According to my limited knowledge on the exact procedures that are a necessity to get into a foreign university (either the US, or the UK, I didn't look yet at other possibilities), but one should make an application before applying for a scholarship. And to do so, one has to fit certain requirements, amongst whom are a set of standarized tests, the SAT/A Levels. I've spent nearly 5 months, going to the British and US councils, asking many institutions, but none offered the possibility to take either of these tests.

I now have exactly zero idea on how to proceed, which kind of gets depressing, and I'm worried that with the advance of my age, I may not reach my goal.

(Sorry in advance if this question possibly violates Academia.SE policies, but in case it gets closed, I ask the interested persons who want to provide some help [even an infenitesimal one] to send me an email which you can find in my profile)


texts: Why don't graduate math texts have solutions to their exercises?

texts:
I study mathematics and sometimes I have seen book that contains problems but not their solutions. Why are there no solutions available anywhere?

For example, the books I have read are:

Neukirch: Algebraic number theory,
Lang: Algebra,
Liu: Algebraic geometry and arithmetic curves.


texts: Can I use downloaded PDF English Language Course Books for teaching my students?

texts: I am an English language teacher about to start private online teaching.  A friend pointed me to the academia website as it provides old editions of English File student course books to download for free.  Can I simply download them and ask my students to download them and then run classes using them?  I'm assuming that there must be copyright laws prohibiting this, but then why would the books be available for free download?


texts: Does PhD subject area matter if one will research in multiple areas later?

texts:
Since the purpose of a PhD is to learn proper research skills, which should be applicable to any subject area, and since people can publish in subject areas unrelated to their dissertation, does it really matter which subject one chooses to research for their PhD?

Clearly, there are issues of motivation (if someone gets bored, it will be difficult to put in the effort required to complete the program) but if someone is interested in education/pedagogy, finance, leadership, and other areas, does the initial research area matter?

If someone gets a PhD in education/pedagogy and later wants to do more research in the area of finance, will the fact that the PhD was done in a different area introduce problems later?


texts: How important is it to cite the URL in bibliographies?

texts:
We use MHRA Author-Date for citations, and the information about MHRA Author-Date online is usually contradictory and unhelpful. The guide I've always referred to from my university only specifies including a URL for electronic journals, as so:

But realistically, every journal I access will be online. I don't have print copies of the ones I need. Is it important to include a URL for every journal I access? I almost never see URLs given in real academic papers, so I'm trying to determine whether this is something I should include in my own work.

I haven't previously been penalised for not including URLs, but I'd like to know the general consensus on when you should include URLs in citations.


texts: Is it possible to become an independent researcher with a PhD degree in Mechanical Engineering

texts:
Dear Fellow Researchers,

I got my PhD degree in Mechanical Engineering from a EU university some time ago. I've got a good cv in terms of publications, peer-review work, participation in R&D projects, conferences, etc.

I think I've got some good ideas for research and development projects. However, in a Post-Doctoral position, I am very likely to be working on already approved projects, not my own ones.

So my question is: Is it possible to become an independent researcher?
All I need is to be able to apply for research funding. Is it possible? I can create a company or whatever is needed to get an affiliation, if that is needed.

What funding organizations would accept proposals in the field of Mechanical Engineering for those not currently working at a University/Research Centre? I am looking for EU funding organizations, but I am willing to accept those in the USA/CA/AU.

Any help appreciated,
Best Regards,
King Baboon


texts: Prospective supervisor stopped replying me before the application deadline

texts:
A professor agreed on helping me with applying for a postdoctoral fellowship.
However, after I wrote the application materials and send to him, he stopped replying to me. It is really just several days before the deadline now. And I started to feel frustrated. I don't know what I have possibly done wrong.
Just thinking that I had already ask my professors for writing recommendations and I had devoted much time in proposing and writing the applications. I really don't want to waste them.
Should I make a phone call to ask is there anything wrong?
What would you suggest me to do?

Thanks!!


texts: Effect of a guest semester in graduate school admissions in Mathematics?

texts:
I go to an Asian undergraduate school. It is probably the third best place to do undergraduate mathematics in my country. Which means it is basically unknown to graduate admissions committees in top 6 schools in the US. Still, alumni of my school have gone to Chicago, Michigan, Maryland, UCLA, Northwestern etc. There is another school in my country. This is very well known abroad and their alumni have gone in the best of graduate programs. There is an exchange program between this and my school. I can do a semester or two in this school in my 4th year (Mine is 5 year integrated BS-MS course.)

However I am unsure how graduate schools - especially top 6 - would view this.

I have some evidence that this won't have a drastic effect on my application.

The other school also has a MSc program in Math. Every year few people get top grades in that. But no one of them get good PhD positions. Apparently only BSc graduates get amazing offers.

If I take the most advanced graduate courses in two semesters in that school will I be comparable to their BSc graduates who go to top programs and how would faculty there view this ?


texts: What level of knowledge and expertise is usually expected from someone just entering a PhD in computer science?

texts: If someone has bad grades and limited programming experience, can they afford to rely on their first year of coursework to come up to speed with the field? Or is it a better idea to take some time off before starting your PhD and improve your skills?


texts: Is it better to use reference letters that show variety, or two letters from the same job that better fit the program I'm applying to?

texts:
I am an undergraduate student getting ready to apply for graduate school in a few months.  I have worked in two jobs in Physics (my desired field), one in experimental and one theoretical.  At each job I have at least two people willing to provide reference letters, and I believe all of them would be good references.

Many of the graduate application websites indicated that 2 (or more) letters of reference are required.

When I apply to one of these programs is it better to double down and use 2 letters that apply to the same program (ie, use 2 references from experimental group when applying to an experimental graduate program)?  Or would it be better to have a bit of variety (ie, one letter from each group, regardless of whether I am applying to experimental or theoretical)?

I'm leaning towards the variety, because I think that two letters from the same job would end up having the said the same thing, whereas the variety gives the university an idea of my breadth of knowledge.


texts: Supervisor partially putting themselves as first author even though I've done most of the work and written most of the paper

texts:
I've completed a project in computational physics. 100% of the code and running of the code completed by me and the introduction, theory and code description in the paper written by me. Results section written by supervisor with some feedback from me.

When we put the latex together I was listed as first author on the paper, since, as my supervisor stated, I did 95% of the work. However, when the paper was submitted my supervisor listed themselves as first and corresponding author in the online submission fields (I was still first in the author list of the submitted paper - ie. in the actual latex document).

When I pointed this out to the supervisor they denied it, so I logged in to the journal account and sent a screen grab showing the status, They said that they must have made a mistake and would correct later when resubmitting (flagged for some missing documents).

Later on I got an email from my supervisor stating that they had submitted the documents but 'forgotten' to correct the author status but not to worry because I'm listed first in the submitted latex paper.

I'm not sure what to think here. Perhaps my supervisor is correct and it will make no difference (since I'm listed first in the latex paper) and is just winding me up. Either that or not I feel that I need to push back here, somehow without damaging the relationship.

Addition: I think perhaps the author list inputted in the online fields may be used for citations but the paper itself will have me as first author. So perhaps my supervisor wants their name to be that cited?


texts: Move Mendeley's Database to Another Computer

texts:
How can I transfer a mendeley database (including attached PDF files) from a computer to an another one which does not has access to the internet?

Thnaks

Edit:

This software requires log-in via your internet-based account in its first run, and as i found, it uses sqllite for database handling, and requires some tricks when moving the database from one computer to another. But, as you have logged-in, for next times there is no need to enter username & password.


texts: Should I include my thesis supervisor as an author for new derived work?

texts:
I would like to make a variation of one question already answered here.

I have also submitted my Master thesis manuscript to the university library and I have verified that there is no conflict of interest if I publish a summarized version in a journal (in fact, the university urge me to do so to gain visibility). The thesis was based on a previous paper I have published along with my supervisor and one colleague. For that paper  I didn't participate in the creation of the algorithm because my role was testing and finishing paper's drafting. How ever, during the thesis, I added original algorithms to cover some existent deficiencies and the supervisor merely limited himself to check typographical errors and confirm the quality of the results.

One of the thesis evaluation committee's member suggested me to improve the quality of the evaluation parameters by using a state-of-the-art method I didn't consider before, so I am thinking to add the new method (and the obtained results) to the submission of the next paper.

Since I finished the Master program (some months ago) I haven't mentioned to my supervisor that I am considering to make a new submission, in fact, he is involved with new master candidates and projects, and I am working full-time in industry. Should I still mention him the idea of submiting a new paper or adding him as a contributor?

Note: the first paper was published while I was working as a lab assistant in university A, and I completed the thesis in university B. University A's legal office was fine to let me continue with my thesis as long as I were using a different implementation on a different language (which I did), so I don't see any problem on that aspect. My thesis supervisor is still a professor in both universities.


texts: How to abbreviate the name of a university when there is no official abbreviation?

texts: Given that I must address a university by abbreviation, say call the University of X simply X, for some given X, and that there is no official abbreviation for the name of this university, what is a safe strategy to call this university?


texts: Do any British universities still offer degree registration from afar to those who study alone, without tuition?

texts:
Forty years ago, London University was still offering degree registration to "external" students, who might be living anywhere in the world. To prepare themselves for the London exams, many studied at local institutions; but it was also acceptable for external students not to study at any institution but to study "privately". Some of these "private" students had private tutors, while others studied wholly on their own, without any tuition, and after being registered for the required period of time they presented themselves in a London or London-accredited examination room and sat the exam papers. Fees were paid both for registration and examination. For many decades, the availability of degree examinations to private students was considered one of the special features of London University.

I am not asking for recommendations, but are there any British universities nowadays that register and examine students who study wholly on their own?

Note that I am not asking about degrees by "distance learning" in which coursework is required and tuition bought from and given by the degree-awarding institution, or by an institution accredited by it, although it is possible that the kind of degree registration I am asking about might be considered a sub-category of distance learning.


texts: Where can I find a data set on trust in the Internet?

texts:
I looked everywhere for a data set on trust in the Internet of things and I found nothing...

The articles I read didn't mention the data set used or the data set was not a public one.

I even emailed two publishers for the data set and they didn't help me.


texts: Professor says he won't report my cheating if I admit it in writing. Is it a trap?

texts:
I cheated on a homework assignment. The professor found out. I am afraid of what is going to happen. I know I should face the consequences. I am thinking about just withdrawing from my PhD program now, before his complaint gets to the dean.

He said that he would not report if I write an email admitting it and saying that I would never do it again. But this seems a way to get me admitting it with proof. I already admitted in front of him. I don’t know why he needs an email saying that.

Should I provide this e-mail? Is it a trap?


texts:
I'm midway through a PhD in Physics in the United States. In my short time in academia so far, I've had several distinct kinds of collaborations. I've collaborated with peers who are working on understanding a new area together, with folks in other department who are doing applied work, and of course with my advisor.
Each collaboration has had its own unique structure. For example, in some of the applied work, my collaborators were interested in learning more about the details of my area, and in others my collaborators were just interested in getting results from me to plug in to their work. In some of the work with peers, each of us handled a distinct aspect of the work (and we understood little of the each other's aspect); in others, we worked together on the same problems and batted ideas back and forth.
Many of the collaborations have had the same kind of issue for me, though. Sometimes I feel like my collaborators owe me a certain amount of attention. (For simplicity, please consider that the collaborator is at the same level of seniority as me.) For example, once I was on the verge of a "breakthrough" and talking through it with someone would have made a big difference, but my collaborator didn't want to engage. For another example, once I was very confused about a particular question in an applied collaborator's area that was relevant to our project and they brushed me off when I asked for help.
Almost every collaboration I've had would have been improved in my eyes if my collaborators were more generous with each other. However, I know that there must be a line. The famous Hardy-Littlewood rules have an Axiom 2 which states that "There was no obligation to reply, or even to read, any letter one sent to the other". Clearly, other established researchers could feel differently than me.
My question is intended to elicit responses which flesh out the role of a collaborator, with a particular eye towards interactions with others on the team. When a researcher (student or established) agrees to be a collaborator with someone, what responsibilities are implicit in that?


texts: Where to upload a reprint (post-print) of my publication?

texts:
I used to self-archive papers on my homepage in the institute where I was doing phd. I just noticed that my homepage and the reprints were removed -- that's normal, I'm not working in that institute anymore.

I can legally self-archive these papers. For example, J. Appl. Cryst. allows authors to post reprints

  on their own personal website, on their employer's website/repository
  and on free public servers in their subject area.

What are the best "free public servers" to upload electronic reprints?
(IIUC arXiv is for pre-prints rather than post-prints).


texts: How to automatically link LaTeX .bib references to a set of pdf full-text articles?

texts:
I have a huge collection of PDFs of research papers. Many of these have valuable annotations. I also have a huge .bib file containing citations for these and many other works. Is there a reference manager software where I could import the .bib file and the collection of PDFs and somehow the entries in the .bib file could be magically linked to the corresponding PDFs? I would then like to use that tool to access my PDFs (of research papers).
I think this was a feature request for mendeley long back
http://feedback.mendeley.com/forums/4941-general/suggestions/80946-automatically-find-pdfs-link-them-to-imported-me .
As of today, I don't think that it has been implemented.
I tried Quiqqa (http://www.qiqqa.com/) , but had no luck.


texts:
The Von Humboldt model of a university came about in the early 1800's. Von Humboldt's thought that the fundamental purpose of the university was to promote scientific inquiry and to unify teaching and research. This idea implies, of course, that the purpose of a university is to create new knowledge

However, a previous SE question touches upon the idea that the initial goal of a university was not to discover new knowledge (as was Humboldt's view) but to transmit older knowledge.

With these ideas as context, where exactly were scientific advancements pursued prior to the Von Humboldt model?


texts: Can I use my university email address for job applications?

texts:
I just started a postdoc position in England, but I have a personal problem with the place. I want to apply for another postdoc position in other cities.

Am I officially allowed to use the university email to contact other professors for finding possible postdoc position? Because, it is not an official use related to my job, but personal.

I wish to use my university email, as it can attract more attention, as I am already working in England. Many Indians send email to professors, and they do not read them carefully.


texts: Is it less valuable to participate in a paper with a lot of co-authors?

texts:
My question is specific to computer science area since in departments like medicine and physics, good quality work usually is a result of big team of researchers.

Not arguing that publish or perish is a fact in academia, I believe there might be some nuances that make an adacemician more or less valuable in terms of preferrability, credibility and reputability.

Publishing quality papers is always a big plus. However, suppose that there are two papers (call them A and B) where A's significance is 8/10 with seven authors whereas B's significance is 6/10 with two authors. And suppose that two people (call them X and Y) have 20 publications each.
X has a lot of instances of A in their CV, and Y has a lot of instances of B.

Assuming that every other parameter is identical (their references, their universities, their field of studies, etc.), which one is more credible? Which one's reference is more valuable? And which one of them is closer to get a the only position in a university, if applied simultanously?


texts: How to interpret "I think you should apply broadly" from a prospective PhD supervisor?

texts:
What does it mean, that a professor says: "I think it would be great to have you at X university, and your suggested dissertation topic is a great idea, But, I think you should apply broadly, not just to my university" ?
I mean, does that imply he's really into accepting you? Is there any hidden subtext here?


texts:
I'm currently writing my thesis in computer science. My work contains a large amount of equations to do with linear algebra, data transformations and calculus. On receiving feedback on my first draft from my supervisor, he has told me that I am reusing symbols all over the place. So I am going back over things, but I'm finding that I'm running out of both English and Greek characters and I'm having to constantly search back through the text to see if the symbol I want to use has already been defined. For example:

Take two vectors X and Y with lengths m and n respectively.

All of these symbols have previously been used. So my question is, once a symbol has been defined once, can it not be reused for the whole thesis, and how then should I deal with this problem.

Thanks.


texts: How many major revisions are allowed when publishing with Elsevier?

texts:
I submitted my paper to one of the Elsevier journals in the field of molecular biology and evolution, I've got one major revision back; I fixed the comments, and sent it back to the journal.

It is still "under review" for 1.5 months.

What I want to know is

Is it possible that this review comes out with another major revision?
how many major revisions can I get?
what are usually the time frames for the second round of reviews?


texts: I recently saw in an ad that an Italian university invites applications to "Senior researchers (RTD-b, tenure track)." What are RTD-b positions? Since they are said to be tenure track, I guess they correspond to assistant professors in the US system? Are RTD-b position holders expected to do independent research and advise PhD students as assistant professors do? How much teaching load do they usually have? What is their career path after getting tenured?


texts: my first authorship paper from my PhD was changed at last minute to a co-authorship... is it gonna affect in any way my career?

texts:
I recently finished my PhD in Developmental Biology in the US, but I left a couple of experiments completed prior to finishing the paper. (This paper was developed during the course of my PhD and has had numerous changes).

I have since finished my PhD and my supervisor started to take my paper and made decisions on it. He never once asked me for my Drosophila collection, and we never ever discussed the paper and how we could finish it.  I became depressed as he treated like I am stupid, even though the paper was almost done and it was worthy of a high-impact journal... He never seemed to trust in my capabilities.

I have since realised that he found a new grad student to finish those experiments (that I could perfectly have done faster and in a much shorter time)... and now (almost a year later) my paper was submitted. Unfortunately, he decided to make the other PhD student the second first co-author of my paper.

I would like to hear some opinions as I don't know what to do.
Is this going to impact my future career?
I also don't understand how someone that knows deep inside that I am the first author of a paper can do this?


texts: How to reference studies mentioned in a paper without having to read the original papers?

texts: I'm review the literature at the moment. Now I'm reading a paper that mention other studies. How can I reference them without reading the original papers?


texts: Can someone become a doctor or work in health sector by completing a PhD degree in Philosophy in Medicine?

texts:
three-year Ph.D. in Philosophy, in association with Philosophy & Medicine Project

If someone completes this Ph.D. degree, can he either become a doctor or work in a hospital/clinic or health sector?
I mean, is there any option/possibility/potential?


texts:
I obtained a PhD in Microbiology. I have some papers and a competitive CV. I would like to continue in Academia or to try industry.

Is the normal path to find a postdoc job in naturejobs.com? I'm overwhelmed by the high number of jobs that are being offered, I just need one!


texts: Must I reference resources for definitions I express with my own words?

texts: I am writing a master thesis. When must I cite a resource I used ? Most of the time, I read a definition in a given book and express it in my own words: must I mention the book in question for this particular case ?


texts:
As you can read on Wikipedia,

  Goodreads is an Amazon company and "social cataloging" website founded
  in December 2006 and launched in January 2007 by Otis Chandler, a
  software engineer and entrepreneur, and Elizabeth Chandler. The
  website allows individuals to freely search Goodreads' extensive
  user-populated database of books, annotations, and reviews. Users can
  sign up and register books to generate library catalogs and reading
  lists. [...] On the Goodreads website, users can add books to their
  personal bookshelves, rate and review books, see what their friends
  are reading, participate in discussion boards and groups on a variety
  of topics, and get suggestions for future reading choices based on
  their reviews of previously read books.

My question is:

  Is there a scholarly alternative to Goodreads, that is, a website
  where you can shelf papers, journal articles, scholarly websites, and
  preprints as well as books?


texts: How to gracefully exit my postdoc position with 1 year left in contract

texts: This is my 2nd year in the lab with 1 year remaining in the contract. The PI is a nice guy and well-funded, but he has completely shifted his focus to his business and clinic trials. For example, I just waited a month for him to start revising my manuscript. I'm unable to get any instructions or ideas from him.  Now I've finished the only paper and have no promising project in hand, I want to quit and find a new postdoc. But I don't know how to ask my PI for a reference letter. What should I do to avoid burning the bridge? I think he even expects me to extend the contract for another 2 years. I don't have any job offer yet, but I feel like I should tell my PI before sending out resumes.


texts: Does it make sense to publish papers/ theses online?

texts:
I've left academia for business some time ago. However, it occurred to me that I could publish some of my old final papers/ theses online as online books.

I have all the copyrights.

The theses are good and I could probably publish the most recent ones in "traditional" publishing houses, but with my new job, I don't really have time for several rounds of corrections and re-writing of old papers.

These are papers with implications for the practice and on topics "general public" may find interesting. What I mean in this post is, obviously, not "scientific publishing" online, but non-fiction publications directed at general public.

My goal is to earn a bit with the texts. I don't really need a list of publications for my current career, although it's never a bad thing to have some publications I guess, so if the publishing "channel" is not completely ridiculous it's even better.

Have you had any experience with self-publishing online? Does it make sense? Or is it useless work?

Edit I don't see much point in discussing whether the papers are interesting/ valuable/ up-to-date or not and I'm a bit surprised that this topic has been raised at all. (Because I would expect a bit more scepticism concerning making assumptions on details not mentioned in the initial post from academics). Instead, I would find it interesting to hear from someone who actually has had some experience with self-publishing their work/ academic work online. That's the point of my post.


texts: Can a reviewer suggest literature for improving the language?

texts:
I am working on my PhD now for 1.5 years and was recently asked by my supervisor to assist him with a review. The reviewed paper was also written by a non-native speaker.

For my first publication I bought a book on English writing skills for research papers, which was very helpful for me.

Can I suggest this book to the author of the paper I got for review, so he can improve his English? I do not want to critize him, only to give him an advice I also give my colleagues.
I am not sure if this exceeds my responsibility.


texts: Once I accepted a postdoc offer with "A", is it ok to accept an invitation to present with group "B"?

texts:
Details are very important here:

I interviewed for postdoc positions at 2 labs (same university), and received offers from both.

I accepted the offer from lab "A", and when I declined the offer from "B", the PI told me that they were sorry about my decision, and that they would still like to invite me make a presentation for their lab. I thanked him for the invitation and agreed to make the presentation.

The two groups ("A" and "B") do not interact (they work on different fields), so this is essentially a matter of etiquette.

Is it ok if I make the aforementioned presentation now that I started my appointment with "A"? Should I inform the PI of "A" that I will go present with group "B"? Or should I just decline the invitation to present?


texts: Are there examples of classes with students publishing their reports instead of just turning them into TA & Professor?

texts: Am interested in learning more about student publishing. Is there a list of courses where students are publishing their work instead of just turning them into their TA and professor?


texts: What If the announcement for a Tenure-Track position in a research-intensive university does not request a research statement?

texts: If a TT position is announced in  a medical-related field in a research-intensive university, and they request to apply using 1) a letter of interest and 2) a CV (No research statement is required). They say the candidate's time would be divided between research 60%, teaching 20%, and service 20%. Would you still submit a research statement or would you just include in the letter of interest more details about your current and future research (this might require making the letter little longer ~3 pages)?


texts:
I have recently submitted a project proposal for the final project of one of my graduate courses.

The unit lecturer who marked my proposal is in his 70s and he has once stated in class that he's an engineer for so long that he knows everything better than us and there is very little that we can outsmart him. (Maybe not exactly with these words but something very similar.) Although I am not very comfortable with the way he said it, he is not entirely wrong as he is a well-known professor with a lot of experience.

He marked me down in 2 sections and his comments are quite controversial.

The 1st section is the historical background of the product I have proposed. He is the history himself I give him that but my writing was based on a research and I didn't made up a random historical background. I even cited the books I have used while writing that section. The books that I have used are highly reputable in my field of study.

The 2nd section I got marked down is about the assumptions I made to simplify the design while running computer simulations. Mid/small scaled robot arms often use "servo" motors and these motors are capable of rotating 180 degrees and some can be modified to rotate 360 degrees. I have got several datasheets to verify this information. Yet, the lecturer commented "All servo motors rotate 360 degrees." which is clearly not the case.

I will email him to respond his comments but I sometimes have trouble with expressing my ideas without being annoying/impolite and hence I need your advice on how to structure my email. I don't want him to get annoyed and start picking up on me in the upcoming submissions.

I am a person who gets motivated by the marks I receive. At the beginning I was very excited about this project and the way my proposal was marked discouraged me. I don't think it received the mark I have deserved. Consequently,  I don't feel motivated anymore. Some of the proposal (from other students) are marked by the unit TA and he is a very fair guy. Although both the unit lecturer and the TA mark based on the same marking rubric, I bet I could get 10 more points if TA was marking me.


texts: Is it possible for an undergraduate to get involved in an independent research project unrelated to his/her concentration?

texts:
Assume that I am an computer science undergraduate, and I am interested in how studying distractions influence exam scores in the long run, i.e. do you gain a tolerance by studying with distractions eventually?

If I had done significant investigation in this area and found that there were no previous research on such a matter, is it possible for me to get this project started, although I have no experience in the related field (in this particular example, cognitive sciences)?

If so, how?


texts: How can I assess the quality of a paper outside my field?

texts:
As per the title, I would like to determine whether a paper cited by a student comes from a reputable source or not, given that the paper's content lies outside my field. My first thought was to check the journal's website, as well as doing a Google Scholar search to see whether papers in other reputable journals cite papers from this one.

The particular case I am concerned with is a Psychology paper, appearing in AllPsych Journal [sic]. All the journal's webpage says is that:

  The educational articles and papers published in AllPsych Journal are written by mental health professionals, psychology students, psychology instructors, and other authors outside the field of psychology. *   They represent problems, solutions, and suggestions about everyday life and its relation to psychology.  For submission consideration, please contact us via our feedback form.

This seems dubious to me, but nonetheless, a Google Scholar search suggests that some reputable looking publications have cited works appearing in this journal.

I suppose I have two questions then:

Are there any other techniques I can use to assess the quality of journals outside my field for this purpose. Ideally these should take relatively little time.
Is this specific journal considered reputable in psychology?


texts: politely refusing authorship opportunity?

texts: I (a grad student) first-authored a paper with my ex-PI and some colleagues. The paper was rejected from a journal. Meanwhile, this ex-PI also bullied me, did something else that was hurtful, and did not provide helpful feedback on the paper.  The ex-PI is now asking if I want to re-submit.  Can I politely refuse? If so, how?


texts: Is it acceptable to ask for course notes ahead of time?

texts:
I am taking a course in Computer Science next semester (it is currently a vacation period for my university) and I would like to email my future lecturer and ask them for the set of course notes for this course (and ask if they have any suggestions for further reading on the topic) so that I may read them ahead of time as I'm quite interested at the moment to learn more about the topic.

Would this be viewed in any way as me giving myself an unfair advantage (specifically as I am asking for the course notes which will contain content yet to be taught in the course), or could it be viewed negatively by my future lecturer?


texts: General considerations about sharing referee reports

texts:
I have occasionally noticed that an author chooses to share publicly referee reports from a journal, usually because they are feeling aggrieved about a rejection. I also know that now and then people do share reports with (a few) close colleagues or friends.

What is generally considered good/bad conduct regarding sharing reports? I would hesitate to share my reports widely, mainly because I associate that behavior with cranks (as it seems to be cranks who publish them) and  would worry that it might come across as sour grapes and unprofessional.

Are there any clearer guidelines or reasons why we should keep the reports private? Is it considered a breach of confidence of the anonymous referee? Speaking generally, the reports are obviously a vital part of our scientific process, so it is strange that they so rarely see the light of day. Are there arguments within e.g. the open science movement to make all reviews publicly available?


texts:
I came across an advertisement for a postdoc position at a US school. While I have a PhD from a (different) US school, currently I am in India (my home country). I had contacted the PI to check with her to see if visa support is available for this position. She replied saying that she will support my visa if the fit is right. She also gave me a small problem to work on and asked me to return my solutions in a week. I did. It's been two weeks since and I haven't heard anything back.

While I realize that there could be any number of reasons for not replying (such as she's busy, or no longer interested or waiting for more people to apply), a simple reply confirming the receipt of my solutions would help.

If anybody has any ideas as to what to make of this situation, please do share.


texts: Paper with a spelling mistake in author affiliation in publication

texts: I published a paper late 2016. Recently I noticed that the published manuscript has  a typo error in one of the authors affiliation. But it got indexed correctly on all databases under that author. Will it be good to contact the journal now to rectify the mistake or should I not care about that much as anyway it got indexed correctly? If I contact the journal almost after an year, will it affect the reputation of the authors? Also one of the student is going to use this paper  for his PhD thesis. Considering this fact should, what is the best strategy to handle this ? Any recommendations?


texts: Do presentations given during interviews count as invited talks?

texts: I am in the process of interviewing for faculty positions and trying to keep my CV up to date as I go.  Should I include research (or teaching) presentations given during on-campus interviews as invited talks? Or are they considered just a part of the interview process and better left off the CV?


texts: Problem in citation link in Google scholar

texts:
I have uploaded a paper in eprint site. In my Google scholar, the citation  of my paper is addressed by the semanticscholar.org site.

My problem is that, I have revised my paper in eprint site, but in Google scholar, researchers can not access to this revision of paper, since semanticscholar.org did not update my paper to the new revision of paper. I contacted with the support system of semanticscholar.org, but after one month no change is happen. Moreover, when I search the title of paper in my Google scholar,   Google just present the semanticscholar link of my paper and dose not show its eprint link.

My Question: Is there a way to add the paper in my Google scholar with the its eprint link.

Thanks for any suggestions.


texts: Need advice on options for strong recommendations to Top CS programs

texts:
I am considering applying to competitive PhD programs this year, but I am not certain who/how to ask for strong recommendation letters. I am not even sure the following experiences will yield strong recommendations or if they indicate that I am unfit for the programs.
I have the following people in mind already:

A mentor I did a research internship with at a top CS school in a very well-known CS lab (PI with h-index 100+). During the internship, I think I did great work in the computer vision/deep learning space, considering it was my first experience in that, and we came close to finishing in 2 months and potentially publishing. After this, however, it went kind of downhill. I couldn't commit to finishing because I started school, but I essentially said I would but never kept my word, several times. Surely, this wouldn't look good. I still feel this mentor is supportive of me, but I don't know how the following experiences after that summer will impact my recommendation.

A professor at my school who I worked with briefly, also in the AI/ML space. I haven't published with them, but they are very committed to my success, were willing to take me in as a PhD student in their lab, and I feel confident they will give me a strong recommendation. They publish yearly and their lab is growing. h-index ~30s

I am only not certain of who to ask for the 3rd recommendation.
I have these options:
3-1) Renown researchers from an internship experience from freshman year at an Ivy League school. This was more using applied CS for the biological sciences, but these researchers are very well known. They've published in Nature, etc. Thing is, I don't think I left a particularly strong impression on them as a freshman. I didn't contribute anything extraordinary and even when I asked to extend the work into the year, I sensed they were a bit hesitant about it. One of these researchers did, however, provide me a recommendation for one of the future internships I got. This was years ago, and I have not been in touch with them since.
3-2) Manager/co-worker from my industry research internship. This was 2 years back. This manager essentially made it known to me that I was a stronger software engineer than a researcher. Neither the manager nor the co-worker are particularly well-known research scientists, but the company itself is. The work was in the NLP/AI space.
3-3) Another CS professor who was supposed to be doing joint work with me and 1) but never really got around to it. This person is Dean of the department at my former university now, but considering we never worked closely together, he wouldn't have much to comment on other than to iterate the work I did with 1). h-index ~30s
Out of the options for the 3rd recommendation, 3-1, 3-2, and 3-3 -- who should I ask? After all of this, I'm pretty much not sure if I should even pursue PhD, but I don't know if that's my impostor syndrome talking. I graduated with a 3.9, a great CV, and all these great research experiences. I am an underrepresented minority and my school wasn't particularly well known.
Any advice would be much appreciated


texts: Primary Investigator gets really nervous around me?

texts: My new Primary Investigator, who is well respected in her field, gets really nervous when talking to me for some reason. We are the same gender and both married so it's not a problem of that sort... This does not seem to happen with any other student, who she has a really good relationship with, but when talking to me, sometimes (not all the time) she really fumbles for words. This then makes me start to get nervous and our interactions sometimes become awkward. How should I improve our relationship so I can communicate effectively with my advisor?


texts: is it okay for a paper to be in conference proceedings but not on IEEE Xplore?

texts:
A conference says on its call for papers website that: "papers will be part of the Conference Proceedings (if the authors wish to do so), but they will not be uploaded to IEEE Xplore." -- What does this mean exactly? If I agree for it to be in the proceedings then will I be able to find it using the ISBN of the conference? Will it have a DOI (I highly doubt, but still wanted to know)?

Thank you in advance. I appreciate your time and consideration.


texts: Pursuing a Second Master's Degree(Part Time) : pros and cons

texts:
I am currently working in a manufacturing company as a software developer and have just completed my masters in control and automation in 2011 with my bachelors in "Electrical and Electronics". My main reason for doing my first masters is to change to my domain from IT where I was working as a programmer for 1.5 yrs. Now I am thinking of doing a second master's degree in mechatronics, because I am short of some knowledge in the electrical and automation field which I think is must for me to become an expert in the factory automation field.

Even though I feel it will be helpful for my personal career and reputation.
I find some doubts whether a person having a double degree is welcomed in the job market or not. Also Frankly, In my opinion, I used to think that who are having many degrees as people who run away from real-world jobs and are not as competent as those who have years of experience. Another thing is I also want to do MBA after 5 or 6 years. So, can someone tell me what are the pros and cons of having multiple degrees?


texts: Is it common to buy a gift for a supervisor when he invited me to a dinner?

texts:
I am an international student. I have just started my master degree in Canada and I have been invited to a group dinner by my supervisor.
This situation and culture are quite new to me; I have not had this experience before. How should I act? Should I buy a gift or something?
 And if so, what sort of gift seems appropriate?


texts:
I'm a student who, due to circumstances beyond my control, is having to take a gap year.
I want this gap year to be productive, however! And would love to engage in citizen science projects/activities. However, given where I live, the citizen science projects and open-lab type spaces are non-existent.

Could I perhaps:

  Read a bunch of research papers on a common topic and synthesise a review paper? Do journals publish review papers written by non-academics/amateurs?
  I certainly enjoy reading review papers: What sorts of criteria are review papers assessed on for publishing? (I assume that the style and format and referencing follow their preference/convention is a necessity for publishing. But what else?)

In doing so, I'd learn about a topic, how to write a review paper and perhaps being published could be an advantage when I look for research internships in the future?

Does anyone have any other potential endeavours to suggest?
I've already shadowed & volunteered in hospitals & performed a few lab experiments. I'm currently looking for something that I could do to genuinely contribute to science and use this gap year as a learning experience.

Thank you!
jxs


texts:
I am looking for a co-supervisor to assist me during my research journey based on online / remote supervision.
Does anyone knows how I can make an ad or search for such a thing?

I would prefer to find him myself and to avoid my supervisor assistant since I know that he would not be helpful to do so.

Do you know nay website that I can find some ?


texts:
What is the idea behind giving a student a grade? It might sound like a funny question but I'm serious.

I ask because in my previous question about disputing a mark, it's hard for me to decide how many marks and how much effort I should put into having a mark changed. If the purpose of going to school is to learn (something presumably you don't already know) then how do marks fit into the equation?

Given some of the answers and comments on the question I'm curious, how did this mentality that marks are non-negotiable arise? There seems to be the belief the prof has a totalitarian rule over the students. This doesn't make sense, especially considering how commercialized some schools have become. In any other area of business if a client pays (e.g. a student pays tuition) and is dissatisfied or has a concern about a service, then the company would work with them and either explain or change some part of the contract. How is it with teachers they get away with simply saying "that's the right mark"? (I know that's rather a facetious example but hopefully the point is clear). I'm certainly not suggesting one can or should be able to buy grades: rather I meant in business there seems to be a certain level of diplomacy which doesn't exist between students and teachers. For example in the question linked to it was mentioned that even if the wording to a question is vague, if there had been examples in class of a similar question then it should be known what is being asked for. This wouldn't happen in business. If a client said they wanted x, they're not going to pay for y; conversely if they had asked for x and wanted y, they're not going to sue the company.

It may be relevant to note that where I go to school, costs quite a bit of money (and it's a public university).

After reading this several months latter, I hope my tone didn't come across as too harsh.


texts:
Does anyone know how long the peer review process usually takes in the human-computer interaction journal (http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/hhci20/current)?
I couldn't find any information in their website


texts: What to do when you do not get an answer after 1 year

texts:
I am in the situation where I submitted an article 1 year and 4 months ago. I already asked to editors about the status nearly five months ago and they replied they are still waiting for the referee answer and that they were going to ask to expedite the process.

I didn’t receive other news since them, and I don’t know if it will be time to contact them again. Would it be considered impolite? What is your suggestion?


texts: What images published in arXiv papers can I include in my education material?

texts:
I am going to give a course at my company and I'm looking online for images that I can use in my education material.

Since many of the most interesting images suitable for this education exist in papers published on arXiv, how do I know which of the images found in arXiv papers I can use and which I can't? How do I know how these images are licenced?

I often see images published in arXiv papers that are later used in presentations given by other people and/or republished in other's research papers, sometimes without any credit given to the creators of the images and almost always without a link to any license (in fact I can't remember ever seeing such a link, but maybe I have just not paid attention). Under what circumstances is that okay?

A related question is, how does fair use come into all of this since we're talking about education material?


texts: How can I do better research when the experimental design is lacking?

texts:
I would like to do first-class research. However, how do I actually accomplish that when my supervisors design not-so-great experiments and I don't have the resources to do more independent work?

In many fields (e.g. psychology, neuroscience), graduate students work in a group (i.e. lab) studying topics that their advisor finds interesting. Each student might have their own thesis topic, but all of the work is focused on the same big question or general research topic.

Typically the data collection is mostly dictated by the senior researchers, as it is very expensive. Once it is collected, the lab might spend several years analyzing it, especially in bigger projects. This means that the potential of a project is mostly determined by the experimental design. If there is something wrong with it, not much can be done afterwards and the results must still be published.

So what can a young researcher do in these fields if the experimental designs (decided on by the advisor or other senior researchers) are lacking? Especially if I have done most of what I think is possible post-hoc (e.g. with the statistics)?


texts: Should I put a disclaimer on the first page of my thesis after making some corrections which are not allowed by the university?

texts:
My university doesn't let me make any corrections to my PhD thesis manuscript after defending it because all the members of the jury signed that no corrections are necessary. Not even typos.
My supervisor is insisting I make the corrections we mentioned during my defense because he finds them necessary and to leave a few copies in the lab's library.
However, since this is not technically allowed. I'm thinking of putting a disclaimer on the first page, something like: "This is a private copy".


texts: What to do when I think a published paper displays academic misconduct?

texts:
In a paper published recently in a math journal, the main result is presented as being new, but in fact it is not new, and I'm sure that the authors knew this before submitting the paper.  I have informed the journal editor who handled this paper, who told me he would forward my message to the managing editor.  I have not heard anything since then.  What else can (or should) I do?

For what it's worth, I am a tenured professor.

In more detail, there was a previous paper [A] which proved a certain result (1).  The proof given in [A] actually proves a stronger result (2) which has a messy statement, and notes that (2) implies (1) (where (1) has a simple statement).  The main result (3) of the recent paper [B] implies (1), but is implied by (2).  Moreover, the proof in [B] is identical to the proof in [A] (and the authors of [B] say this in their paper), except that the proof in [B] uses a stronger auxiliary result at one step.  So the authors of [B] must have been aware of the stronger result (2) proved in [A], but they do not mention (2) in their paper, and certainly do not mention that their main result follows immediately from (2).  To me, this shows that the authors of [B] published their paper under false pretenses, by intentionally misrepresenting prior work.  In addition, the auxiliary result mentioned above is presented as a new result in [B], even though it has been published several times and also the authors of [B] were fully aware of this fact, since they had written previous papers citing an essentially identical result from a paper [C].  Even beyond this, the paper [C] contains a result which is stronger than (1), (2), or (3), although the authors of [B] do not mention this.

If people think I am overreacting, I would be happy to hear this.  It's possible that my views of proper academic behavior are not standard ones.  I don't have a fully articulated philosophy about these things, I just feel like the authors did something wrong and should not benefit from doing it.

Added later: The situation has been resolved.  The journal's editor informed me that, after inspecting the documentation I sent him, he has decided to require the authors to withdraw their paper from the journal.  I don't know the logistics of this, but to me it seems like the appropriate outcome.


texts: Why are conference papers so important in computer science (CS)?

texts:
From my understanding many CS conferences are highly selective and the papers are peer-reviewed. The CS field also seems to publish traditional journal articles. I do not understand the difference between the two and in particular I am curious about the advantages of having two different publication streams. The type of things I am curious about are:

What is the difference between a paper published in a top CS conference and a top specialist journal?
Is one more prestigious than another and if so how do they line up?
Why not just publish conference papers as a special issues of a journal?


texts: Should I ask for permission to write an expository post about someone else's research?

texts:
I am a math PhD student in North America about to enter my second year. Last week I attended a conference and was interested in a research presentation by a professor at another school. The presentation was about some of his current (unpublished) methods and results to attack a problem in combinatorics. I am thinking of writing an expository post about his talk in my personal blog.

Question: Should I contact the professor to ask for permission to write about his research? My concern is that he hasn't published the results and so might not want to put them in public yet. I have seen people writing expository posts about talks or papers that they read or hear about (for example here), but I'm not sure if they need permission from the original author(s) to do so.


texts: What is the meaning of "Complete and Send Review" in Elsevier journal under History tab

texts: What is the meaning of the "Complete and Send Review" status in the History tab of an Elsevier journal?


texts: Can I ask potential advisor what topics he is currently most interested in? I am looking for a topic at the moment, so I'm still searching, and there is one advisor who I'd like to work with. His general topic is also what I want to do in my PhD, but I don't know yet what the exact topic might be. I thought of asking him what he is most interested in at the moment, and see if there might be a fit, or will this shine a bad light on me and my interests?


texts: Link which explains how to format a letter to Nature

texts:
I need to write a letter to Nature and a friend of mine said that Nature wants the Author to follow a very precise format.

He said that the explanation of the structure of the format is an example of a letter in which: there were different colours for the different sections, it also explained what to write in each section and which words use/don't use etc

Does anybody know the link where I can find such information?


texts: Reneging a postdoctoral offer from Canada due to Canadian work permit delays

texts:
I was recently working as a postdoctoral researcher in the United States. My supervisor was in close collaboration with another professor in Canada and therefore I expressed interest in joining the team in Canada with which both professors responded positively.

I should mention here that I am a foreigner to both countries. Therefore, I had to apply for a work permit to move to Canada from the US. In addition, I require a full-job to remain in valid status in the US.

I applied for a Canadian work permit based on the job offer as early as I could---which was only three weeks before the tentative start date on the official letter. The processing times estimate on the Canadian website for such a process were two weeks at the time. Happily, I resigned from my US job to finalize my move and get ready for the visa.

Unfortunately, the visa has not yet arrived for another 4 weeks and my US status will expire soon unless I'm hired immediately. Therefore, I applied for a local postdoc position and received another offer. My previous supervisor in the US would not be able to re-hire me immediately and the current offer is the best option so far.

My question is as follows: I understand the resigning was a mistake in the first place. However, Is it justifiable, professionally and ethically, to accept another position in the US?  The position in Canada is ideal to me, but unfortunately, I have to commit to the US position for about a year if I sign.


texts: Is it possible to restart a PhD due to issues with supervisor (and should I do it)?

texts:
I am a PhD student in Europe and I am in the state of permanent crisis because of my PhD supervisor. He is a very nice person, who is very active with public engagement, very successful at grant applications and all that. But the problem is, it turns out he does not know the subject. Now I realize this is a very arrogant thing to say. However, for a very long time I refused to believe it and thought that there was some problem with me. Now all evidence (corroborated by others) shows that he really is incompetent. He somehow manages to pull it off, getting on other people's papers and so on.

The fact that this takes place in Europe is significant: I had to choose someone from the start of my PhD and the time is extremely limited. Also, I am not sure, but I have an impression that you will not be able to get funded, if you quit your PhD and start over. Is this so? Also, there is a very small number of people doing similar things around and none in the same institution. Additionally, it seems very likely, that no one would support a rebellion (i.e. switching a supervisor), because of politics.

I have a very good track record, I finished at a top American university with very high grades, and most importantly I do want to do research. So this situation makes me very unhappy. I can't see any way out, but maybe there is someone who can? I will consider changing the field somewhat (but not too radically) and starting over, but it seems like the funding will most definitely not be available. Or maybe it will?


texts: Received no confirmation from editor of article receipt

texts: I submitted an article to an academic journal about a week ago (not through a website but directly to an editor's email) but received no confirmation of receipt.  What is proper protocol -- time wise etc. -- for sending a followup email asking for confirmation of receipt?


texts: Is it ok to ask ex-dissertation supervisor for any future funded phds

texts:
Following a computer science degree I would love to follow a phd research.
The problem is that all funded phds that are advertised from the specific university do not meet my desired criteria, i.e. research projects that target the  improvement of the quality of life of vulnerable groups of people.

I know that my ex bachelor dissertation supervisor used do research and observe researches of my desired criteria.

Would it be ok asking him through email whether such oportunities exist? Or would that be just a waste of his time?


texts: In Sweden, can a supervisor ask his PhD student to provide a private future work list of his thesis?

texts:
Recently, I faced a new academic phenomenon that a high level researcher informed me about. I am writing a potential reasoning of the phenomenon:

From a legal point of view, PhD is similar to a transaction in which a PhD student produces an innovative content for the University and, in return, the University will give the student a PhD degree. Thus, it may be concluded that whatever the student produces in these years in direction of his thesis is for University.
Moreover, one of the important aspects of a successful research is the potential growth that a research can have (future work). A part of the future work is written inside the thesis; however, many times this part is not such detailed.

Now, suppose that a supervisor wants to take advantage of the future potency of work of the PhD student for the future PhD students of the same University (assuming that the University has the intellectual property of whatever he has produced in direction of his thesis).
In this regard, the supervisor may decide to ask him provide a detailed future work list with explanations as a private/inter-lab document so that the next students follow this direction.
Is this request legal (based on the Swedish regulations) from a supervisor to his student?


texts: How do I ask professors to give feedback on my online articles that are based on their work?

texts:
I am working on a website that contains a list of free courses. My aim is to promote our field (semidefinite programming).
Each course consists of a number of articles.
Each article is built using different resources (books, posts, talks). Those resources are listed in each article.
I strongly believe that participation could improve the work.
For each article, I want to send emails to the professors whose works were used and ask them to give a read the article, check and suggest small improvements if necessary. I will not ask them to write. The participation could be done by mail, github or comments on the website. I will also keep a list of all the participants as a reward to every person who agreed to help (I am trying to find another way to be grateful to participation but).
However, I don't want to feel spammy. Any suggestions on doing that in a good way?
PS: my work is not sponsored by any organization.


texts: What are the incentives for universities to recruit athletic student

texts:
Is there any special incentive for universities to have many athletic students? I am speaking based on my personal observation on North American universities.

I often hear that universities look for students that are "well-rounded", but I do not believe that alone explains the numerous special early offers given to athletic students. This phenomenon, combined with some acknowledged cynicism, led me to this question.


texts:
I recently moved from an undeveloped country to Europe, and I am currently a PhD student.

In my hometown, the education system is very bad, and almost everyone with some patience can get any degree. However, things do not work like this in Europe.

I have always been a bad student, and I suck at exams (both written and oral). Although I am capable of presenting my own work in an understandable fashion, when it comes to study on some topic -- that is not very related to my field of study, and learn that topic thoroughly, I fail.

Unlike the education system in my country, here, the tolerance for mediocre mistakes is close to zero. And I do make mistakes very often given limited time to evaluate my own statements/claims/proofs. My exam paper is always a mess compared to my technical reports. Because I get to write the report over on over again with an access to every term, definition, and counterexample.

Back in my country, I was the one-eyed king in the land of blind. Extraordinary researcher, and very good student. Here, everyone has both eyes with eagle vision. My research skills obviously do not shine, and if you consider my studentship, I am just a dead duck.

I do love to conduct research, and not only looking at its butt when it walks by. However, I am pretty doubtful if I can be a good scientist given my current achievements in the courses I take.

Should I go with the philosophy

  a fault confessed is half

or should I go with

  finish what you have started

based on your experiences?


texts: How can you identify which are the strongest PhD programs in particular subfields?

texts:
I'm an undergraduate student (United States) majoring in X, applying to PhD programs with a research focus in subfields Y and Z.

I conjecture that the best universities for Y and the best universities for Z are not necessarily the same, and I want to narrow down my PhD applications to universities that are known for one or both of these subfields.

None of the professors at my university's X department do much research in either Y or Z, and they seem to not have the greatest idea where I should apply - I usually get generic answers like Prestigious University U, which may or may not be what I'm looking for.

The other concern is that I've taken a few graduate classes regarding Y and Z, but in no way am I fluent in the fields, nor have I done direct research in these fields. As such, it would be difficult for me to attempt to read research papers about Y and Z to try to back out which universities produce the best work.

How might I go about finding the strongest programs in Y and Z?


texts: Can I ask a postdocter candidate to write a recommendation letter for applying to graduate school

texts: I'm working in a lab as an undergraduate worker. Can I ask one of my lab member who is a postdocter candidate for a recommendation letter?


texts: What is a "good" PhD dropout rate, and how would we know?

texts:
In a few questions/answers on here (e.g., here), passing reference has been made to the difficulty of determining a good/acceptable/healthy dropout rate for a PhD program.  However, I haven't seen any questions directly asking how this question is or can be addressed.  In practice, it seems this question must come up.  If a lot of students drop out of a program, the faculty (not to mention the other students) must begin to wonder if something is awry.

The difficulty, of course, is that an ideal dropout rate is probably neither 0% nor 100%.  (If no one drops out, the program is likely to be too easy; if everyone drops out, the program is probably too challenging.)  How do departments/schools deal with this question in practice?  How do they distinguish between "good" dropouts (where the faculty and student agree dropping out is best for all concerned and there is no ill will) and "bad" dropouts (where the dropout is due to burnout, a harsh environment, lack of funding, etc.), and track those outcomes over time?  How do they avoid self-protective rationalizations (e.g., "our program can't be too/hard easy" based on review of the program content rather than the dropout rates)?  Are there established ways of looking at the dropout pattern and evaluating it?

As a sort of side note, I'd be interested in hard data on dropout rates.  Although there are numerous popular-press articles and blogs lamenting the dropout rates, the only concrete data I've been able to find is this slideshow and a few other things that seem to be drawing on the same data.  (It's rather surprising that there is so much discussion of the "problem" with so little discussion of how to decide whether it's actually a problem or not.  There seem to be many articles saying "the dropout rate is so horribly high!" and very few saying why it's considered high, and what would be considered low or normal.)

Just to clarify: I recognize that the dropout rate is not the only meaningful assessment of a program's health or quality.  My question is not "How do you decide everythig about a program based just on the dropout rate?"  My question is "How do you decide what the dropout rate is telling you about the health and quality of the program?"  You will of course combine that information with other kinds of assessments of the program.


texts: What are the pros and cons of publishing a new unpublished idea in a poster session in a leading conference?

texts:
I worked on an idea and got new results. I came across a very prestigious conference that calls for poster abstracts. I sent mine and it was accepted for a poster presentation.
Should I present it there or it is better to publish it as a paper first?
What are the pros and cons of submitting my idea as a poster?
Also, I want to mention that I worked on the idea independently without a supervisor which was the main motive for me to send the idea in the poster session.
What advice would you give me also?
Thanks


texts: As a new faculty member, how do I avoid the Peter Principle?

texts:
Quoth the Wikipedia:

"The Peter Principle is a proposition that states that the members of an organization where promotion is based on achievement, success, and merit will eventually be promoted beyond their level of ability. The principle is commonly phrased, 'Employees tend to rise to their level of incompetence.'"

In academia, we have a tendency to promote brilliant and productive young researchers (e.g., grad students and postdocs) into positions with a large management component (i.e., assistant professors who must run a research group).  God willing, I will get promoted.  But during my PhD,

I was not trained as a manager!

The conventional wisdom is: it doesn't matter!  No professor ever took management training, and, hey, everything "works out" in the end.  The main problem I have with that statement are the quotes around "works out."  I have seen friends suffer through horrible, painful, sad grad school experiences as a result of having advisors who are brilliant researchers and terrible managers.  Likewise, the advisor suffers because she/he is investing time/energy/money in a student that doesn't produce anything.  So my question is

Q: How do I avoid becoming a terrible manager?

In particular, what kinds of activities have you seen successful leaders of large-ish research groups engage in?  Did they take training specifically targeted at managing groups?  Read certain books?  Talk about it a lot with senior colleagues?  Make lots of posts on academia.stackexchange?  Or did they really all just fly by the seat of their pants, and let natural selection take its course?

Thanks!


texts: Reference citations sequence for "Crescent Classification"

texts:
Kindly can one guide me about crescent classification in references citation.
I have received a review that is following

  "for instance in the sequence of citations [5], [7] and [6], which must
  be changed to cope to a crescent classification"

I have searched through the google but couldn't find any solution or knowledge about it.

Thanks.


texts: If I proposed my PhD this year (but have not defended) can I say that I graduated this year?

texts:
I am in a PhD program, and all I need to do is defend.  There is still a little more work I need to do before this, but my degree is essentially finished. I have totally completed all other requirements (classes, qualifying exams, proposals, publications, etc).

In my field (engineering)  it is common to immediately begin applying for jobs after the proposal.  So, after many interviews, I was offered a job.  They want me to start ASAP.  I am thinking this will push my PhD defense back 1 to 1.5 years.

Anyways, on my resume, linkedin, etc I would rather say me PhD was 2009 - 2015 (6 years) than 2009 - 2016/2017.  (7-8 years).  Would it be acceptable to state that this year (2015) is my graduation year?  I feel I'm selling myself short is I state 2016 or 2017 as my graduation year.


texts: Email to potential advisor after submitting an application

texts:
I applied to graduate school in US about two months ago and I am still waiting for my result. I was thinking may be it is a good idea to email my potential advisor again and asked them whether they have looked at my application or what is the status of my application?

Can you please tell me how to start this email? How should I politely ask about status of my application?


texts: Am I breaking some kind of rule if I'm adding the arxiv link to the bibitem for an article that's published in a journal? I thought obviously not until I noticed that (link to arxiv) and (page number in journal) are quite mutually exclusive.


texts: Do refreshments attract audience to seminars?

texts: In academia, is there evidence that including phrases such as "refreshments provided" in a seminar announcement increases the average attendance (even slightly)?


texts: Junior academic jobs in the time of COVID-19

texts:
During these unprecedented times, it is quite hard to predict whether any recently advertised academic jobs will be still available next fall, as some countries might enforce social distancing or lockdown for a whole year. Still, many conferences are cancelled or delayed this year, thus getting papers published harder, alongside with academic path progression. I guess that we should be trying to get journal papers accepted instead...

Given that I am at the end of a fixed term assistant professor position (looking possibly forward for an open term/tenure track one), I'm asking if it will be possible that universities will still be hiring new APs when they might be asked to close until further notice (e.g, UK). Is it still possible that some degrees will convert all of their modules  into on-line classes (e.g., for Computer Science), thus allowing universities to get the same number of students they expected in the following academic year? This is still a relevant question - I think -, as the hiring of new junior accademic staff goes hand in hand with an expected increased amount of students on campus. Do you have any insight on this, or do you think that it is too early to make any possible educated guess?

Thanks a lot for your suggestions.


texts: How to index a Google Scholar article and its author in Google itself as well

texts:
I have published an article on Google Scholar back in 2018. Although it can be found by searching my name (the author) or the title of the article in Google Scholar, it cannot be found in Google.com
While entering some authors in Google results in something like this:

I get neither "Scholarly articles for" nor do I even end up with a result from Google Scholar in the list at all. How can I make Google index this for me?


texts: Is it necessary to customize letters of recommendation with recipient names?

texts:
I am concerned to the fact that how a professor whom I am asking to write an LOR, will change the name of the person every time before sending? I am applying to like 100 different persons for the position of postdoc. Does it really matter that it should be addressed appropriately (name basis)?

I am working in the interdisciplinary field of materials chemistry, nanotechnology, environmental remediation, physical and theoretical chemistry.


texts: Structuring two first authors equal contribution in computer science publication

texts:
Sorry if this is a naive question. We tried finding guidelines, but have failed to find concrete advice.

There are N authors (where N>2) in our publication. Two authors have equal contribution. We are aware of the custom of putting an asterisk and writing a footnote about equal contribution.

However, while arranging the names of authors with equal contribution, how should they be arranged – alphabetically by last name? For instance, if the names are John Foe and Jane Doe, should they be arranged alphabetically by last name: Jane Doe*, John Foe*?


texts: What is considered as the time since PhD degree granted?

texts:
In certain postdoc positions, the eligibility criteria says, "candidate's PhD has received their PhD within last 4 years."
So, if I defended on December 2019 and got my degree (convocation) on May 2020. Started postdoc from June 2020. So will my 4 years from now will be calculated on the basis of May 2020 or December 2019?


texts: I discovered a mistake in my application after being accepted to a master's program. What should I do? Will my offer be rescinded?

texts:
I have been accepted to Duke for the MS in ECE program for Fall 2021.
I just checked my proof of application and there has been an error. It lists my minor as "Economics" whereas I have no such minor.
I have not deliberately tried to falsify my education, I think it could've been a human error on my part (I wanted to specify minor as Electronics since it only mentioned Electrical Engineering as the major). I only saw this right now, and I didn't catch the mistake when I first submitted the application or I would've contacted the admissions team right then. I was able to view this from my "proof of application" which is for personal use only.
I have been accepted to a STEM MS and I don't see how not having an Economics minor should change anything.
Duke's my first choice, I don't know what to do.
Should I email said university about the error? I don't think I made the mistake. Will they rescind my application?


texts: How will returning to your PhD advisor as a post-doc affect future career options in academia?

texts:
I am currently in a joint teaching/research post-doctoral position at a university that is different than where I obtained my PhD.  There may be an opportunity in the future for me to return to my old PhD advisor and be hired on as a post-doc once my tenure is up here.  I don't really NEED the job as I have decent job security teaching where I currently am.  It will, however, keep the door open for sustaining good research, publishing, and gaining grant-writing skills... the latter being something that my current post-doc advisor has never offered me...  And yes, personally I would like to go back and work for them again (for a variety of professional related reasons).

I understand this will be a lateral move at best but I am trying to gain sufficient understanding on how this will affect future career options in academia.  I've been told that this type of situation can cause people to simply overlook you when applying for faculty positions at higher-ranked schools.  I'm not really interested in joining some "Top 50" research university either but I'm not willing to join a pure undergraduate research program just yet either.

Please advise.


texts: Should I tell a colleague that he's serving as an editor for a predatory journal?

texts:
A colleague of mine, who I regard scientifically, just invited me to submit an article to a special issue of a journal which I consider predatory.
I consider this journal predatory because its publisher released several journals that are considered predatory in my scientific community (bioinformatics), and also for some details like the super-fast review and acceptance process.
The last article this journal published, for example, has the following review and acceptance times listed:

Submission: 12th September 2020
Revision: 23th October 2020
Acceptance: 28th October 2020
Publication online: 29th October 2020

This aspect is very suspicious to me.
What should I do now?
Should I tell him that I think the journal is predatory?
In this case, he might get offended, and this situation might compromise our future relationship. Like, he might not want to collaborate with me anymore in the future.
But if I say nothing, the scam could go on...


texts:
Do I expand abbreviations at their first use per section or per paper?

This is an IEEE publication, but I haven't come across any specific instructions.


texts: Should I address my GPA declination in my personal statement?

texts:
Basically, my last two years GPA is much lower than my first two years: I got almost straight 4.0 in first two years but my junior year is a mess (one semester is 2.7) and my last semester GPA pump up a little with 3.5. I think the main reason is that I feel depressed with the over-packed schedule (I took 7 courses with a job in lab in the semester of 2.7) and slow progress of research. But, should I mention those in my personal statement?

I am triple majored in CS, Econ, and Math. I am planning to apply for Master degree in CS.

Thanks in advance.


texts:
I just started a STEM PhD before last christmas and whilst things are going okay, I still feel like I'm not good enough and don't deserve the opportunity. I guess it's some form of imposter syndrome but it's driving me to become irrationally attached to my work because I lack confidence that it's good enough to impress my supervisor.
I consistently overwork myself and as a result my personal life is suffering- I even feel bad about taking weekends off. None of what I do feels like it's good enough and I constantly feel like a failure- I have a presentation in the next few weeks to present my project progress and I'm dreading it.
How do I ditch this mentality?


texts: Doctoral Advising: No Available, Appropriate Chairs

texts:
I work at a regional university in the United States. Several years ago (before I arrived) our department admitted five years of doctoral students (approximately 50 students) as general admits to a distance doctoral program without assigning chairs.

Now those students are reaching comps and the dissertation. Four faculty left in the last year which is stressing our already over-capacity workloads.

Many students are interested in topics for which we have no faculty experts. We are going to hire a new faculty cohort in the next five years but there is no guarantee those faculty interests will match our students’.

Are faculty obligated to work with and graduate students we did not admit?

Is there a precedent for such a situation?


texts: To what extent should a reader be required to read a paper to understand a chapter?

texts:
I am doing a master thesis and have more or less written my report. My supervisor has from time to time read my paper and from the feedback I get she wants to be able to skip to a later chapter and read it without necessarily reading exactly everything else before. This seems a bit odd to me, but I have not thought about it before as the papers I've read I read from the introduction and onwards.

My outline is introduction, related work, method, results, discussion, conclusion.

So, to what extent should I expect/force a reader to read previous chapters that are relevant but not critical for understanding the paper? Should the method chapter be written in a way that you don't have to read the related work and introduction chapter? Should you be able to skip to the results and discussion and understand them without reading the method chapter?


texts: What to do when professor is not responding to emails or calls and his action is required to commence a masters thesis?

texts:
I'm planning to start my master thesis soon. It will be an external thesis in a company.
As this kind of thesis is not very common in German universities, I need to find a professor to supervise me during the whole semester.

Luckily, a professor agreed to supervise me and advised me to meet with one of his PhD students to discuss my task, whether it meets all requirements.
We met the following day. Afterwards, I sent my professor an email to arrange a meeting to clarify some things and get his final OK.
As he hadn't responded for about a week, I sent a reminder. This time he answered, we met and discussed more things. He even suggested to call my boss to clarify my task, so that I don't need to "liaise" between them.
After talking to my boss, I sent my professor another email with times, my boss is available for the call.
This email remained unanswered for another week, as well. I wasn't sure how to react, so I contacted my professor's secretary. She told me to send him another reminder, also she would talk to him.
He answered me a few days later and promised, to call my boss during the following 2 days.
Unfortunately, he didn't.

I'm in an awkward situation now. My boss asks me regularly about my professor, because I can't officially start my thesis before we have his OK. I'm waiting for about a month now.
The phone call between them wouldn't last more than 10 minutes and all the little issues about my thesis would be resolved.
His secretary said, this behaviour is very uncommon. Also, I never had any problems with this particular professor.


texts: Is taking a method explanation from books and papers considered plagiarism?

texts:
I have been reading a few Q/A about plagiarism, but I still have a doubt about the use of books and papers to explain the method I am applying in my thesis.

I mixed up the infos I found in a book and in a paper to explain the method (because some parts where better explained in the book and some others in the paper), of course I cited them at the beginning and I put them in the bibliography. Is this considered plagiarism since I am not using "my words" to explain it?

EDIT to be clearer: I am not doing copying and paste: I am following the same flow of ideas to present the method, some parts where omitted in the paper, therefore I had to rely on the book to take care of every aspect

And at the beginning I wrote:"the method is fully explained here [1][2] and it is here reported for completeness


texts: What can a student do if he has problems with homework problems that he is unable to solve?

texts:
In university courses, is it possible or good habit to ask help for homework exercises one can't solve? I mean, someone might think it is cheating but on the other hand, should a student be stuck in some particular problem for days?

The course I take is about version control on git and there are questions in an online system. One question has six different true/false questions, where one can choose on different alternatives. The system has informed me that my answer is incorrect; however, it does not explain why my answer is incorrect, and I'm not able to figure that out by myself.


texts: How to prevent too many students from making appointments to meet with you when you put "Office Hours: ..., or by appointment" on the syllabus?

texts:
In the past I have included the following statement on my syllabus:

  Office Hours: Mon 1-2pm, Weds 3-5pm, or by appointment

However, I am beginning to get too many requests for appointments. Appointments are really inefficient. They waste both of our time trying to schedule them, and with multiple appointments per week in addition to office hours, even holding them takes a lot of time away from research. How do you accommodate students who can't make your office hours without devoting too much time to this task?

I thought about setting up a class message board where they can ask each other and answer each other's questions - anonymously if they wish - (I can also answer questions on the message board) and put on the syllabus "All content related questions should be posed in class, on the message board or in office hours. I do not reply to questions about content via email. Please schedule an appointment to meet with me if you are having difficulty getting a question answered after trying the above options"

Some Background: I'm a graduate student lecturer. I teach 2 sections of calculus, so about 60 students. Since classes are small (~30), there are about 10 lecturers (some are faculty and some are grad students with masters degrees) and we all have office hours. Mine tend to be very crowded, about 5-10 students showing up (some from other sections). I tell my students to go to other instructor's office hours, but they say they aren't as helpful.


texts: Can I get an admission for a mathematics masters program with only an acceptable GRE subject score and an unrelated bachelors degree?

texts:
I have a degree in Civil Engineering and I want to continue my studies in the field of mathematics. I think the only option that I have to enhance my application is to take the GRE mathematics subject test. If I can get a good score, will I have a chance to get an admission in a top university?
Thanks.


texts: multiple authors format for saving space

texts:
I am submitting the final version for an ACM sponsored conference and I am dubious about what would be the correct format to include multiple authors (with multiple I mean more than tree). The ACM template has the following author heading:

in which I need to add another author, but If I do that in a new line (apart that the Word template moves horrible to the left side) then I will be out of the limits of pages that the conference established.

I would like to know, and maybe it sounds like a silly question if I can do the following:

The four authors belong to the same institution, and the only thing that changes is the email. Any help?

Thanks


texts:
There is a new trend on some Universities (in engineering and science majors), that professors show lecture slides over a video projector on the screen instead of writing on the chalkboard. They enter the hall, stay two hours totally passive before the students and read the slides aloud without explaining it. I even have had a mathematics course, in which the professor read the slides like a textbook without explaining them on the board or working examples.

Are you also affected? Which method do you think is more effective? What are the advantages and disadvantages of each? (I myself believe the chalkboard is much more effective.)


texts: Can analyzing data from an existing public online database be considered orginal work?

texts:
I wish you all a Merry Christmas. I have a question but found no solution to it using the search function.
I would like to ask whether summarizing and analyzing data from an existing online database could be considered original work? The database is freely accessible and it does not require registration. Data is completely anonymous. I can give an example:
Let us assume there is a database that contains information about the food quality at hospitals. People can upload their experience to a database without providing names / identifiable information. I would like to analyze the data and summarize it to answer basic questions (e.g. if people were satisfied with the food quality in hospitals in 2020 based on the ratings).
So I am not referring to a situation where one needs to register, e.g.:
Using public profile data from website for research
My field is medicine.


texts: What questions do prospective advisors ask during first meeting?

texts:
I'm in a PhD program and I'm preparing myself to meet a prospective advisor for the first time. I want to know what questions do they usually ask students in their first meeting? What do they expect? I've looked at the following discussions and they were helpful but did not answer my question completely.

How do I impress my prospective grad advisor? (first meeting)

Etiquette for an initial meeting with a prospective advisor: What is expected of the student?


texts: How to edit name on existing publications after a name change?

texts: Assume that I publish many papers in many journals and someday I changed the family name (my last name). How can I edit that where my papers have been published? and is it easy process?


texts:
Could I submit a (Math) paper in a journal (i.e. ArXiv or Annals of mathematics) as an independent researcher (not associated with any university)?

What is the process to submit a paper without affiliation?


texts: How do I tell if the content of an academic conference is available?

texts:
A post on an official site gives Abstract Details about a presentation.

However I didn't see a link to see or buy the full content.

How do I tell if the content of this presentation is available?


texts: time management for applications: apply more or apply better?

texts:
I am a postdoc applying for tenure-track assistant professorship positions. I am writing one application per day and have less time that positions to apply for: some job offers expire before I am able to submit. Recently, the templates of my application files (cv, research statement, teaching statement, cover letter) have been proof-read by a native English speaker, and some blatantly embarrassing errors have been found and corrected.

It would take me 1-2 full days to correct about 7 applications which have already been uploaded to the human-resources sites of various institutions but which are still editable. What's better: invest time into one or two new applications or correct errors in the old ones?


texts: How to deal with fear of failure as a PhD student?

texts:
I am working on a mathematical topic  that is basically my own concoction. I have days where even the simplest thing takes ages to do and I realize that's because, deep down, I am terrified that things might not work out. This is in different way: I am scared my topic might not be novel enough, appreciated etc. ; I am also scared that checking parts of proofs will reveal catastrophic mistakes.

I rationally realize that this is part of the game and I do my best to take mistakes I find as good news that my work is improving, but at times I am just paralyzed and unable to do things.

I am also bothered by the presence of colleagues in my office, afraid they might judge my work (and at the same time going to a hidden place in the library helps a little but is also very annoying and uncomfortable).

I am sure this must be, to a different degree, experienced by many PhD students.

What are some strategies to fight fear as you work?

Note that I realize there really is a deeper confidence issue and I am already seeking help for that. I'd be happy to hear considerations on the possibility of therapy or counseling and how it worked for you as well as day to day tips and strategies.


texts: Listing expected graduation GPA along with current GPA for grad admission of senior undergraduate

texts:
I am a senior undegraduate CS student who is interested in applying for a good grad school (current GPA 3.76/4.00, distinguished in engineering competitions, written a lot of code, has 2 papers - one before university and is currently working on multiple research projects).

I am now filling in the application form of some particularly demanding grad schools (e.g. Stanford, MIT) and I am faced with the following dilemma:

I have some remaining courses to pass (since I have not completed the 10 semesters that are required) until the end of this year. Moreover, I have not defended my thesis yet (although I have almost completed it).
My thesis counts for 20% of the grade (and it is almost impossible to get a grade different than 4.0/4.0) and all the courses (passed and ongoing) count for the rest 80%. Having this in mind and being optimistic enough, I suspect that my finishing grade will be about 3.8/4.0.

I am finalizing my SOP and CV and I am faced with the following question:

  Should I list my expectation for a finishing grade along with the current GPA that is on my official transcript?

My problem is that on the one side, I feel not being fair to myself since it is a feasible goal and the overall work I have done is not directly depicted in my current transcript. On the other, I am afraid that I may get a conditional offer like "maximize your graduation GPA" and in a semester which I am currently doing research and, personally, optimizing course grades is my primary objective.

I would like to hear advice, especially incidents of (if they exist) of such offers, as well as experience from other students who were in this quandary.
Would that really count given my academic profile?


texts: How do I find the standing of a journal or conference for an academic CV?

texts:
I'm writing an academic CV for a PhD application and they have asked for the standing of journals or conferences of published articles.

  Research publications

  Include articles published or accepted for publication (with the three most significant marked with an asterisk).  Please specify the publication details, your contribution as an author to multi-authored publications, plus the standing of the journal or conference.

I'm really not sure what they are looking for or how to express this. Is it the impact factor of the journal? And what about conference proceedings which don't have impact factors?


texts: Is it a good idea to email a potential grad adviser a modified motivation essay after I have submitted my application?

texts: I am applying for a master's program in electrical engineering/applied physics. After I submitted my motivational essay, I felt that I could have talked more about my experience. Is it a good idea to email my potential adviser a modified essay?


texts: Do scholars blog or only prefer to publish papers?

texts: Are there scholars who blogs independently their thoughts not over papers? If so, which platform do they use?