texts: Will experience in related fields help me get into my "dream" graduate program as a non-traditional student with some failures in my past?

texts:
If wanting to end up in a specific graduate program at one university, but having had failures along early paths, like college dropouts, mediocre to good GPA and GRE, having become an adult/unconventional student, how can one still end up in the specific program of dreams? Would it help to collect experiences in neighbouring fields if the direct, focused approach fails? When should one just give up the dream of getting into a specific program, or even the whole field of studies?

Let's take scientific, non-engineering astronomy as example. If wanting to be admitted to a Master's and/or PhD program at a specific R1 level university, how would it be seen if having a thorough vocational industry education in optics manufacturing, an internship in electronics, astronomy as a hobby with serious nightly observing programs and submitted results, a half finished college degree in physics and a full degree in geology? Does a patchwork such as in this example have any advantage if having the bad luck of not having been able to succeed in first college attempts and thus being 10 to 15 years older than a typical college student?


texts: Submitted humanities PhD applications (US) but concerned with potentially wrong documents submitted

texts:
I recently applied to a few PhD programs in the US. Perhaps because of my drowsiness due to working late, I wasn't paying full attention when I was checking my documents (statements of purpose, personal history statements, writing samples) for the last time prior to final submission. I only thought of the possibility that I might have accidentally swapped some documents after submitting my applications.
The reason why I am even concerned at all is: I didn't name my documents with the schools I'm applying to; I only placed them into folders named after the schools. There is program/department but not school information on the heading of each of my documents, so if I had submitted something wrong, people might be able to notice through the heading. I have tried to email/call two schools' admissions, but I have not received any helpful responses or, in one case, any response at all. The schools that I'm trying to contact don't provide application proofs through their online portals; in other words, I can't directly check what I have submitted.
My question is, would committees contact you if they notice there might have been a swapping mistake in your applications? If not likely, should I keep on contacting the admissions despite having received no response?
Thank you for your time and interest!


texts: Editor-in-chief sent an email to resubmit my manuscript

texts:
I've submitted an article to an Elsevier-based journal and after one month,
an email has been received from Editor-in-chief stating: "Please upload figures separately from manuscript and resubmit it as soon as possible".

What does the email mean?

What will occur after resubmission?


texts: PhD thesis - Where to put description of history of applied method?

texts:
I am writing my PhD thesis within the natural sciences (ecology), following the typical structure of introduction, literature review, material & methods, results, discussion, conclusion.

For some of my analyses I am using a method which was developed about 90 years ago and has become the "standard" method in my field. I'd like to outline the origin and development of that method, along with some downsides that have become obvious in the past decades (and which I am trying to overcome by extending the method).

Is it appropriate to do so within the methods section (instead of just having a plain description of the methods I have applied)? Or would I rather include that in an extra chapter in the literature review (where I am so far rather focussing on describing the existing knowledge rather than methods)? Or even put it in the introduction?


texts: Repeating courses and doing enriched courses as extras to help boost a torpedo'd GPA (math programs)

texts:
So here is my conundrum. I am in my last year of my undergraduate degree which is a specialist in math and economics. In the early years of my program I was having a out school issues that I didn't think were affecting my performance but in the end did. I am in the process of getting good grades in thisnlast year in my courses, but regardless of me getting A+'s across the board I would still not have brought my GPA up enough to apply to any masters programs. During my studies I took a few math courses that were beyond my mathematical maturity at the time of the courses and as such got poor marks in them. This was due to my over eagerness to want to learn advanced concepts without respecting the process one needs to take to get there. As such I have been taking those intermediary courses now and they are going better.

I have a large desire to go to grad-school so I have been trying to think of ways to improve any faint hopes that I could somehow turn things around and I was wondering how the following strategy would affect my cause:

Graduate(well the formality part anyways) but then come back and repeat the advanced courses I did poorly in and on top of that do the other advanced courses that I have not taken obtaining good marks in these, then applying the following year. My question is how would this appear on an application? It won't affect my GPA directly, but it would illustrate that I have excelled within this set of courses of a higher level. Of course this would have to go with doing well on the GRE and anything else as well. Thoughts or advice?


texts: What makes a standout profile for applying to a top-ten ranked CS masters in the US?

texts:
I'm currently an undergrad student, will complete it next 3 months, I was thinking that, what makes an undergrad profile different and stand out of crowd?

To be more specific: what does it take for an applicant for a Masters in Computer Science, for top 10 ranked departments in the United States.

What is it that an undergrad must do which will elevate his/her profile. Is research or publications expected from undergrads?


texts: How to engage a large class? Teaching strategies that have worked for you

texts:
I am a PhD student and will be teaching my first class in the fall. I would like to have an engaging class. Meaning that I would rather not just stand at the front of the class and lecture the entire time. I have had some teaching experience with smaller class sizes (up to 20) but am not sure how to handle a larger class (enrolment of 80+).

For smaller classes, I have used: in class discussions, games, breaking out into small groups, student-led discussions/debates. I feel these would not work for a large class.

What are your tried and true methods and ideas for engaging a larger class?

My class is a 3rd year class, expected enrolment of 80, and I will have access to an iClicker.

Added notes based on comments:

The class I am teaching is Adult Development and Aging
Based in Canada
I will have one teaching assistant (TA), with about 70 hours


texts: Is there more prestige publishing in a special or regular issue?

texts:
Bit of a random thought, as publishing in either is good of course. I do not intend to demean anyone who has published in special issues.

I can think of pros and cons from one to the other:

Special issues may get more exposure from people searching within a collection. However, these tend to be offered through invitation, which often or not, the submitted paper may less likely be rejected. This means the quality has a potential to be of lower standard.

Regular issues in this instance may be harder to get accepted, especially in high impact journals, as many researchers will try to submit their work to the journal. Would this mean some people view special issues from invitations as a "free paper"? Where publications in regular issues may be more "genuine"?


texts: "Computers & Security" journal latex template?

texts:
The following links explains the "Guide for Authors" for the "Computers & Security" journal:

https://www.elsevier.com/journals/computers-and-security/0167-4048/guide-for-authors

However, I cannot find a latex template for this journal. Does it mean that I can write the paper in any template format ?

Here is an example of a paper that is published in Computers & Security" journal. However, I need a latex template:

Example Paper in PDF


texts: Are PhD students still employed by the University after their scholarships/fellowships have ended but they have not officially received their PhD?

texts:
Is being employed by a university during a PhD tied to receiving a salary/stipend/scholarship? Or am I considered an employee until I am awarded the PhD degree?

Because for the state I am considered unemployed, however I have finished my thesis but I am waiting for the PhD defense, so I think technically I am still considered affiliated with the University. I need to know this because I am filling paperwork for another job, and they want to know if I am currently employed or not. It seems a gray area situation.


texts: Is it acceptable to compare your experimental results with the claimed results from another paper?

texts:
Consider a scenario where one (say Mr. X) has implemented a method for solving a problem, experimented it on a dataset D and obtained significant results. The obtained results seem to be better than a set of results published in a paper P in a reputable journal J which solves the same problem experimented on D by some another author.

Mr. X decides to cite P and directly compare the claimed results published in it with his own.

The question is how much necessary (in the perspective of a reviewer) is it for Mr. X to reproduce the results published in P by himself if he is to publish in

a) the same publisher as journal J?
b) a totally different journal publisher?

Most importantly, what would be the case if J is an IEEE journal?


texts: Courses expected to take before graduation

texts: I am applying to PhD programs in pure mathematics and many programs ask for a list of courses that I have taken. Some of them also say that we should include courses expected to be done in winter 2018, so I include a topic course which I plan to do in winter 2018. However, I find it to be an extremely hard course and I might end up not taking it. Will this cause a problem?


texts: Include websites in literature review section of paper?

texts:
I am writing an APA style literature review synthesis paper for a class. This week we are working on the Literature Review section of the paper, including statistics found from the articles we are reviewing. I will be citing and reference websites such as HHS.gov (for information on HIPAA) and Merriam Webster's Online Dictionary for a definition. My question is, do I write a paragraph about these websites in the Literature Review section of my paper?
I hope this isn't too confusing. I've emailed my instructor 3 times, but she is not understanding what I am asking.


texts:
How can I help a friend who is working on a doctoral thesis since about 10 years?

It seems to me that achieving a doctoral degree is close to impossible at that point. I am sure that there is no actual progress on the thesis out of a lack of motivation and too little motivation to try something else.

He evades questions about the thesis, but at least tries to pretend that work progresses, if slowly.
I think there is no gain in helping him in the short term. By that I mean that currently my friend seems to be happy enough, and it does not feel like he just pretends to be. Also, he gets financial support from his family.

But my judgement might be off, since I only know him since about five years, and I heard an other opinion stating that he changed significantly. Also, when I try to put myself in my friends position, I would likely be devastated to the core. But try as I might, I don't think that I could repress my problems and veil them to the outside for long.

Putting that aside, I suppose that he will suffer social and financial insecurity in the long term, when his parents will not support him any more. So in this respect, it seems to be a good idea for him to get a job, except that he would need to face that he failed at his academic career to a larger extend. Even though it seems to be a rational choice to me, assuming that I manage to convince him to apply for a job, it might have psychological repercussions and damage our friendship.

Nonetheless, I would still like to push him to get a job if it can be done. So instead of asking about other options or more insight; Do I have a chance to nudge him into getting a job and if so how can it be done?

There is no fail-safe formula or instant solution to this problem, but if you have advice apart from the actual question please leave a comment/link.


texts:
For an interim (or tenure!) review, are their guidelines in place for choosing "neutral" referees, if asked?

Obviously choosing the PhD advisor (and probably postdoc advisor) is a no-no, but are there other things to take into consideration? For instance:

How important is the standing of the referee?
How well should the referee know the candidate?
If someone is working in an inherently multidisciplinary area, how should the referees be selected? According to the "home department" of the candidate, or are other criteria more important?


texts:
I  am writing a  journal paper and I am the main and first author. The author bio section of that journal has only 100 words and we are 6 authors in total. The word limit is very short to describe the research area of each author. Will it be a good strategy to only include the first author description and research area in the author bio ( with the consent of other co-authors )?  Will it look good in general from the reader perspective?

I also looked into some papers from the journal. Some have only the main author description And some papers have the research group description. The authors in my paper are not from the same research group and hence we don't have the same research focus expect the research presented in this article. So not sure what is a good strategy to handle this


texts: Should I review differently when the review itself will be public?

texts: Some journals, such as many of the EGU Copernicus publications, publish the initial manuscript and the (anonymous) peer reviews and author replies along with the full manuscript.  When reviewing for such a journal, should I review any differently than when I write a review for a classical journal where only the editor and authors should be expected to ever see the review?


texts:
all.
I am currently studying Electrical engineering in master course at one of good German universities.
I would like to study in the US for my PhD course, but have some questions about the application.

Unlike other countries' master courses, in Germany, the master course is just a full of course work(approximately 60 CP course work, 30 for Internship, 30 for Thesis). In this system, it is hard, almost impossible, to write a thesis or have a research records before PhD application period. Isn't it negatively evaluated by US universities?
As known, PhD in US universities doesn't require MSc degree, and takes 5 years in average. If I enter into one of universities with MSc degree, is the period of the PhD course shortened to 3 years?

Thank you for your advice in advance.


texts: How much money do universities pay to access datasets?

texts:
Is there any research/study/survey that tried to quantify how much money universities / academic research labs pay to access data sets?

For example, in the United States, many hospitals as well as health insurance companies charge universities to access patient data.

Another example: in natural language processing, many datasets (including some very commonly used datasets) are sold by the Linguistic Data Consortium.

I am mostly interested in the United States and the field of computer science.


texts: Associate adjunct professor to Assistant adjunct professor in USA

texts: Is it possible that an Associate adjunct professor becomes  assistant adjunct professor in USA university within same department of that university?


texts: Should I not apply to a PhD program when a Potential Advisor gives me a generic response?

texts:
I have been sending emails to potential advisors for PhD programs, and the responses have varied from, You have an impressive CV, and I strongly encourage you to apply, to lets discuss future projects over skype.

The "lets discuss projects over skype" is a no brainer. But the "impressive CV" response seems a bit generic, and am wondering if he wants me to apply just to have more applications? So finally, I have these questions:

If you are a potential PhD advisor, what kind of responses do you give students that you MOST want to apply to the program? Do you ever say, please don't apply here? Does this vary depending on the ranking of the institution? I tend to get the generic ones from higher ranked programs and the more personal ones from lower ranked programs.

Also, For people who have applied to Phd programs, What kinds of responses did you get and what was the outcome of your application there?

The primary motivation for this question is because there are many departments I wish to apply to, but realize applying to 20 programs would take up too much time.

Anyway, thanks for taking a look at my questions.


texts:
I am currently writing my PhD thesis and several times I cite various ISO standards. I am unsure what the correct way to format the bibliography entry for such documents is.

Currently I am doing something like:

  ISO (1997). ISO 4287 Geometrical Product Specifications (GPS) – Surface texture: Profile
  method – Terms, definitions and surface texture parameters.

I'm using an author-year style so the entries normally look like

  Author (year) Title, Journal/publisher

Is there a better way to format this?


texts: Difference between the problem a paper is trying to solve and primary research questions it tries to answer?

texts:
If a paper takes up an approach to solve a problem, isn't that what makes up the primary research questions it is trying to address? I have been assigned to read a paper and answer a couple of questions based on it. One of the questions is to identify the problem the paper is trying to solve, and another question asks about the primary research questions it answers. I am confused as to what's the difference between these two.

Edit:

The paper is from the domain of artificial intelligence. The problem domain it belongs to is concerned with natural language processing. This domain poses a lot of problems, the paper just picked up one of them and I get that that's the "problem" it is trying to solve. How is a primary research question different from this?


texts: Is it recommended/allowable to get a Master's degree that is not directly related to my bachelor's degree?

texts: I have a bachelor's degree in English but I am thinking of getting a Master's on distance learning.


texts: Is there any API service to retrieve abstract of a journal article?

texts: There are some API services to give title, citation and authors of an article by its DOI. I wonder if there is a service to provide abstract of a journal article by providing its DOI.


texts: Submitting more than three letters of recommendation to a math PhD program

texts: I will likely be applying for PhD programs in mathematics. Several of the schools I intend to apply to state that they require ‘a minimum of 3 letters’. Presently, I have three solid letters from well known professors in my current institution, as well as a fourth letter from a professor from a different institution, with whom I’ve conducted research. Is it acceptable if I send four letters to these programs? Will it have any sizable positive/negative impact on the application? My main reason for sending the fourth letter, is because I feel it would highlight a specific research experience, and add credibility. Thanks!


texts: should I present solution ideas in a cover letter?

texts:
I am in the process of applying for following doctoral studies in Computer Science, already communicated by one professor in charge of a research group and he asked me to write a cover letter. I have been reading into the literature about the research that they are doing, and I think I have figured a technique/algorithm that might be useful for what they are doing. The question that I have is that if I should stated in my cover letter that maybe for solving problem X that the research group is studying, they should apply technique Y and explain it why; should I put that? Or will it sound too confident to do that? (or maybe to ignorant, if I fail in my assumptions)

Thanks


texts: Replying to potential professor about my position

texts: I sent an email to  Professor A sometimes ago and he has recently showed his interest in my work and replied my email. He is asking about what is my research plan for my future. At the moment I am a postdoc in another country and I am looking for a postdoc position with respect to my research goal. In this respect, I have recently  applied for a postdoc position such that the result of accepted candidate will be announced soon (probably next week). My question is: Is it necessary to write about this details ( my recent application for postdoc position) in my replying email to Professor A?


texts: Host Institution - Marie-Curie individual fellowship

texts:
I am planning to apply for a Marie-Curie individual fellowship. Should I be already a Postdoctoral Fellow at a particular University, which will also be the host Institution? In other words, could I assign a host Institution and in case that I receive the fellowship, I can then start working on it?

thank you


texts: Can publishing good peer reviewed scientific articles be seen as a part of good academic record?

texts: I have this doubt inside my mind after graduating from my master's program. Can publishing high IF scientific articles be seen as a good academic record during masters. And will it be considered by the top world-class educational institutes to be a good academic record apart from having good marks in masters? I am asking this question as I wish to apply for technical masters and the scholarships for the same at world-class institutes.


texts: How can I find out which universities allow a sandwich (stapler) PhD thesis?

texts:
Following on from What is a "Sandwich thesis"? , is there an easy way to find out which departments at which universities will allow a sandwich thesis (aka a stapler thesis, portfolio thesis, three-paper thesis, thesis by portfolio of publications, thesis by publication, article thesis or compilation thesis)?

That is to say, universities that explicitly allow PhDs theses that consist of a collection of published or in-press articles, possibly topped and tailed by an introduction and summary? It is, to my knowledge, quite rare in the UK - does it perhaps tend to be a country-specific thing?

I accept that it will depend on the supervisor's approval too, but that's a secondary issue: the supervisor can't allow a stapler thesis if the university/department does not. My question is about identifying eligible departments.


texts: Unethical policy of ETS's ScoreSelect option

texts:
I am faced with a dilemma after seeing questions like this in online graduate school applications:

enter image description here

I feel that ETS has been seriously unethical in their advertisement of the ScoreSelect option of score reporting.

I took an ETS GRE subject test last April as a junior. As a junior, I had no experience with the online graduate school applications that I do now. I took this exam with no preparation under the assumption that "ETS has the ScoreSelect option, so since I am fortunate enough to have the money to take this test, I ought to take it to have the most exposure I am. After all, with the ScoreSelect option, the schools I apply to won't see my score on this test."

Now that I have begun the online applications for graduate programs, I've become aware that many schools require

not only a self reporting of one's scores within fill-in boxes in the online application as well as

the scores sent directly from ETS,

but also the PDF that ETS provides called the Score Report.

This Score Report contains ALL of a test taker's scores. This document completely negates ETS's mission with the ScoreSelect option of score reporting, and moreover, for ETS to not mention this alongside any advertisement of the ScoreSelect option is seriously unethical. In fact, (having taken some form of an ETS GRE test 4 times I have heard this spoken verbatim 4 times) after testing a GRE exam and outlining the process of canceling one's score, ETS proctors urge test takers to "serious consider one's options before opting to cancel one's scores. With ETS's ScoreSelect option you have the option to only report those scores that you wish to report to graduate schools."

The fact that many top tier graduate schools require the score report, ETS is not displaying their ScoreSelect option in an informed way. If ETS does not make the option available to users to make a custom score report PDF, then they have treated a great many test takers who have this issue very unethically. Particularly, ETS has wronged me in not informing me of this score report policy before registering for a test with little to no preparation, which I did specifically under the umbrella of comfort that the ScoreSelect option provided.
In not allowing a customization of a customer's score report, ETS has rendered any positive aspects of the ScoreSelect option invalid for those of us who are applying to school's who feature questions like this in their applications.

Can anyone recommend a solution?

EDIT:
Here is the document in question (redacted):
enter image description here

EDIT2: enter image description here


texts: Computer Science, MEng or BSci + MSc in the UK?

texts:
In Spain, it is fundamental to do the first 3 years of bachelor and the last two years of master to get a job, so I find very difficult to understand the UK system. I am currently enrolled in Computer Science and I have to find out whether I want to do MEng or BSci.

For what I understand:

with BSci I can later do a master MSci for a total of 4 years
with MEng I can in the fourth year choose master courses but MEng is considered undergrad course

The M in front of Eng is really confusing. I don't want to go into research but I would like to get a greater insight of Artificial intelligence and Big Data, thing that I could do either way choosing MEng or BSc+MSc.

What is the difference between MEng and MSc in the industry? Given that I will spend 4 years any way, should I invest my time in MEng or Msc?


texts: Who get rebuttal in conference submission?

texts: When a conference has a date for Rebuttal, does this mean they send the reviews to all submitted papers including accepted papers? Or is it just sent to borderline/rejected papers?


texts: Can faculty do research during a labor strike?

texts:
At an institution where the faculty are unionized, I imagine that they could, in principle, go on strike. Presumably this would involve a halt to all teaching and service activities.

But what about research?

I see many potential problems here:

Many faculty have obligations to federal or other funding agencies that cannot be lightly set aside.
Some experiments may run for years and even a few days' interruption
could be disastrous.
Grant deadlines could be missed, again potentially causing devastating interruptions in a research program.
How far would a prohibition on research go? Is sitting and reading papers in your living room considered to be crossing the picket lines?

I'm sure others can think of other problems.

Frankly, I don't want anyone telling me when or where I can work and if a faculty union is going to do that, I'd be very reluctant to participate. I would hate to be caught in the untenable position where I must either be a scab, or I must stop thinking about the work that is so central to my life's purpose. I'd be very interested in hearing any insights that those at unionized schools might have.


texts: Is it possible to add a co-author in conference paper?

texts: I presented an abstract in an international conference. Now the conference has already announced news about publishing articles in proceeding of the conference. At this point, i would like to know whether it is possible to add a co-author to my manuscript before sending to the journal? It is worth noting that the co-author has already proposed some ideas to add them to my paper.


texts: I am looking for international master degrees which are offered in 2 different countries. For example first year in Singapore and second year in Brasil. How can I find such universities or programs? Is there a big database for such schools?


texts: Maximum number of citations per sentence?

texts: I'm working on a literature review for a masters thesis in the sciences, and I have a ton of sources that cover the topic.  Many specific points are covered ad nauseam, and many similar ideas can be cited multiple times.  My question is how many is acceptable?  Is there a general rule for citing sources per sentence/idea?  Does more look better?  Basically, is there a limit?


texts: Proper "notice period" for resigning a tenure track position?

texts:
My apologies in advance if this is a duplicate. I did search a bit about this before posting here.

This is related to my previous posts so, briefly: I want to leave my current position and I have another offer that I will eventually accept (not finished negotiating). I won't be able to "officially" drop the hammer for at least 1-2 weeks (negotiating, getting the offer, signing it, etc.). I teach one absolutely essential course in the fall (a core course in a graduate program) and no one else is qualified to teach it but me.

My question: In a tenure track position, what is the minimal notice period for leaving? This is not a question about "what my department would like" or how to optimize my standing with the department after leaving. This is a question about professionalism-- specifically what is the minimal notice period where the department members couldn't justifiably go around calling my conduct unprofessional. (I couldn't create a "professionalism" tag, so I tagged this with "etiquette")

Clearly, leaving one week before the semester is too late. Giving 2 years notice is probably more than enough. The answer must be somewhere in between. In my own case, I am contemplating delivering the news in around two weeks (so, over three months before classes begin).

Edit: (1) This is related to a previous question I asked

I want to leave my tenure track position before fall. I have great prospects but no new position "locked up": when should I break the news?

But I think it is still distinct. That question raised the issue of whether to inform my department before having a definite offer, in the interest of giving them enough time to plan. This question is about the standards of professionalism in resignation notice (analogous to the conventional two weeks in many non-academic jobs).

(2) Our contracts are year-to-year (August through April) with guaranteed renewal before tenure review. There are no specific terms written there about resignation periods. I could just fail to renew my contract (this issue would arise in about two months) but, still, the question is whether this is meets the standards of professionalism in academia, not whether it's "legal".


texts: How to substantiate the claim that something is not known?

texts:
I am writing a master's thesis (in Number Theory) and there are multiple places where I need to claim that something is not yet known. Since I am not an expert (and even if I were) I would like to reference some more authoritative source than myself or, say, Wikipedia.

For example, consider the following statement:

  In 1980 Schmidt proved that [some property holds]. No other necessary or sufficient conditions are currently known, though.

For the first sentence I can cite Schmidt's original paper, but how can I substantiate the second claim?


texts: What is a common way to tell if an academic is "above average," or outstanding in their field? Is their h-index (Hirsh index) one of them?

texts:
If one claimed that a particular scholar was "above average" or "noted" in their field, is there any good metric by which to support or deny such a claim?

Is there a generally accepted way to indicate that a particular professor or scholar is outstanding, or above average, in their field? I understand there are certain indicators, such as chairs, endowments, prizes, etc. But these don't really seem to help to compare one scholar to another, except in a sort of gross, simple count way (i.e. one professor has had more chairs than another)

Is it theoretically possible to create a "ranking" of professors in their fields, by some metric? Could their h-index serve as such a metric?


texts: How to give a short talk at big math conference (section talk)?

texts:
Context:
Very big math conferences are often structured in the following way: there are key note speakers, but also sections on more specific topics, as well as satellite workshops on quite narrow subjects. This question is about the second type of talk. Due to the size of such conferences, the talks maybe rather short (20min, 30min).
Such sections (Algebra, Topology, Geometry, Probability theory, etc.) are still very broad. The organizers might make an effort to group similar talks together within different daily sessions, but it should be taken into account that many conference participants will follow all daily sessions of one section.
Question:

How to approach such a short talk?
How to find a good balance between bringing the own results across to the broader audience without having to spend all of the talk explaining background, and saying something interesting to experts?

It seems find that in a typical 1h seminar talk it is easier to provide something for everybody: listeners who have not seen the basic constructions of the topic, and experts of the field.


texts:
Often while teaching (Engineering) it is convenient to illustrate a concept by a figure / photo / sketch etc. which is pre-existing in literature: perhaps another book, or vendor document or a code or a presentation etc. Now, of course it is possible in theory to attribute every such instance and I do where I can.
But I was just wondering if a lack of attribution would be considered Plagiarism in this context?
My point is that most definitions of Plagiarism (e.g. see below a definition from Wikipedia) have a crucial element of "representation of another author's as one's own original work"

Plagiarism is the representation of another author's language,
thoughts, ideas, or expressions as one's own original work

Assuming I am abundantly clear that the presentation or talk is NOT original work (to the extent that I can add a disclaimer on every presentation and maybe each slide) doesn't that obviate any issues with Plagiarism?
Another definition of Plagiarism lists out five defining elements one of which is:

....In a situation in which there is a legitimate expectation of
original authorship

Would classroom teaching (to undergrads) be a situation where there's is a legitimate expectation of original authorship?
More generally, this is not about stealing anyone's credit but about ease of informal discourse. e.g. If in every conversation I had with people if I had to mention the source of every idea or point I was making it would add a lot of drudgery.
To rephrase: In informal context like teaching notes or slides how essential is it to attribute every sketch, drawing, photo etc.
Often it is implicit that the work is not original. e.g if I am comparing a feature of two bridge designs using photos there's no way anyone could even confuse them to be my original work. In many cases the original creator is not clear and could be found out but would take additional digging around.
I just imagine there's a tradeoff between scrupulous attribution versus clarity of communication and efficiency of creating teaching content.
PS. I suppose copyright should not be an issue due to the "Classroom Use Exemption"


texts: Is it reasonable to ask candidates to create a profile on Google Scholar?

texts:
I was in the evaluation committee for the adjunct lecturers this year, and it was a complete nightmare. There were over thirty candidates and many of them didn't have an account on Google Scholar, which made tracking their impact really hard, due to name collisions etc.

My question is would it be a reasonable requirement to force the candidates to create a Google Scholar account, so that we can easily track their publication/citation record and impact?

My hesitation is that it would require them to give away private information to a third-party company, and some people wouldn't like to be forced to do it, or even raise legal issues.


texts: Does a 90 ECTS Masters hurt your chances of PhD?

texts: Given that 120 ECTS Masters exist will opting for a 90 ECTS Masters program, part-time (taught & research) in Computer Science, greatly hinder your chances of securing a funded PhD position in a country which is not your home country? (I am an EU national and would apply in EU countries as well as Norway, UK, Canada, USA & Australia).


texts: On obtaining references from people who don't know me in person but have cited my work

texts:
I'll be applying for a few academic positions (both postdoc and permanent positions in Western Europe.) I've done my PhD in pure math (from the US) and subsequent postdocs mainly in use of machine learning in medical imaging and also partly in statistical machine learning (all were in Western Europe.)
I wrote to my PhD advisor regarding the above, who is familiar with my doctoral (pure math) work but isn't familiar with my recent work. While he'll still send the recommendations, he advised me that I should contact people who cited my work and ask them to see if they can write a recommendation.
I don't doubt my advisor's opinion, and I've deep respect for him as a mathematician, but the only thing that I'm asking myself is that if the above strategy will work outside pure math. While I was applying for pure math postdocs back in the day, it did work. But will it work for applied areas like medical imaging or statistical machine learning?
Thank you in advance!


texts:
What is the difference between the two journals (MAA Monthly and AMS Bulletin)? Are they basically for the same thing?
I am considering writing a nice exposition to summarize some of my recent work. My results are closely related and should be of interest to a wide audience, but are currently spread across several papers in specialized journals.
Is there any difference in the expected level of technicality, or demand for formal proofs? In the article I would not want to give standard proofs, but only explain the key ideas and show how the results contribute to a broader theory.
Finally, what is the effect of having an article published in one of these journals? Will it be worth my efforts?


texts:
In mathematics, is it common to put the final grade of your PhD on your academic CV, for example for

your personal website
funding/grant applications
short research stay applications
postdoc applications
tenure track applications
etc.

There seem to be more standards for deciding final grades than there are universities, and some universities are more committed to stopping grade inflation than others. (Whether grades at the PhD level are a good idea is a can of worms I don't wish to open.)

If one should only show off "good" grades, is there a common cut-off? For example, the German system uses the following grades (approximate descriptions in parentheses)

summa cum laude ("with distinction")
magna cum laude ("very good")
cum laude ("good")
rite ("pass")


texts: How can one compare a postdoc position in Europe and USA?

texts:
I am an EU citizen, and 27 years old. I completed my Bachelor's and Master's in Electrical Engineering in the UK, now finishing up my PhD (in EE as well) in the USA.

I am currently applying for postdoc positions everywhere (EU and USA). I have, for the most part, adapted to life in the USA over the four years that I've been here. However, I am motivated by the idea of doing a postdoc in Europe, partly because I believe the overall culture there suits my personality more, and partly because all of my family is there too. I also want to experience the European way of conducting research (since a Master's in the UK didn't really involve all that much research).

My question is: now that I am still in the USA, and can get a work permit for 2 or so years easily, I am thinking that it would be a good chance to stay a bit longer and experience a postdoc here instead.

In general, I am quite adaptable and I don't have too many set expectations. I just want to conduct interesting research and have a somewhat decent social life to keep some sort of a balance. Money is not really an issue. Also, although I do not like to plan too much into the future (because you never really know what happens), I guess being considerate of the opportunities/prospects a position can offer in the future is healthy.

Given this information, what do you are the pros and cons of Europe vs. USA for a postdoc? Answers to this question probably require some over-generalizing, so I apologize in advance for that.


texts: Entering into PhD program after having dropped out of bachelor's

texts:
When I was 23, I quit my computer science undergraduate studies at USC with only one semester worth of units left and a low (less than 3.0) GPA due to personal reasons.  I just turned 30 and have rekindled a desire to pursue research in computational neuroscience.  Is there any realistic hope of eventually getting into a PhD program and pursuing a career in academia, or is it too much of a long shot given my personal circumstances and the job market?

Basically, what I want to know is, if I were to finish my BS, kick ass in a master's program (applied mathematics), and have great GRE scores, would that overcome my abysmal undergraduate record and gap in years away from school?

The biggest obstacle in my view is getting into a terminal master's program with my undergraduate record.  If I were to get into a 1-year terminal master's program in mathematics at a sub-par university and do great, would I have a chance at a higher ranked university for my PhD?


texts: For how long afterwards can you publish papers based on field research?

texts:
In 2010 I did field research for my Masters Thesis in International Peace & Conflict Resolution (i.e. multi-disciplinary social science and international relations) in Bolivia interviewing indigenous judges. The interviews focused on the structure & function of their indigenous judicial system and its relationship of the state system. After graduation, I had wanted to publish a version of my thesis but never got around to it. After a while, I assumed too many years had passed for any of it to still be relevant to publish but then I was reading an anthropology methodology book that mentioned how anthropologists will publish papers based on notes from field work for years after finishing the field work.

I still have all my notes and recorded interviews. Could I still publish a paper in a journal based on 10 year old field research?

(Note: I haven't decided on a specific social science field I'd want to publish but does it make a difference? I am also not a academic associated with any university.)


texts: Anxiety and depression about the future of my PhD study

texts:
I did my master in one lab and am continuing my PhD here. My advisor asked me to do some research that he doesn't know, and is also beyond the domain of my current major. I have no other choices so I did some work in my master. Because I haven't gotten any professional advice on that kind of research, I am very unsatisfied with my previous work, but I graduated anyway.

Now I am becoming a new PhD student in the same department and same lab. And I'm facing the PhD qualifying exam. I've always been thinking about doing something new so that I can pass the qualifying exam. But since my advisor is still asking me to do the same kind of research and he's still not providing any professional help, I made very little progress.

Now the PhD qualifying exam is impending. On the one hand, I need to continue my research, which is still very hopeless; on the other hand, I have to review some class materials to prepare for the exams. And I'm still taking a class.

I feel so overwhelmed and am currently very anxious and depressed. Sometimes when my mood is very bad, I start to hate my advisor deep in my mind. My advisor wanted me to do that kind of research simply because he thinks that is interesting, but he actually does not know much about it because that is beyond his research area. Worse still, he is the kind of professor who forbids collaborations even among his own group.

Because the research he asked me to do is beyond my previous experience, I have to go slowly solely by myself. I have to take relevant classes and read papers that I usually find hopeless to understand. (Now it's much better, I can understand most of the papers.) What I found was that usually it took me a lot of time only to figure out that the way I was thinking simply didn't work. As a result, I wasted so much time in this way. I mean, I was just a master student before, should I master student be required to do that kind of things?

Now my confidence is running out. I basically achieved nothing in my master, and it will be very hard for me to even pass the PhD qualifying exam. Because the exam is impending, changing advisor is almost impossible, partly because my advisor will be the one who at least has power in determining whether I should pass or not.  Also, it is very hard to find a new advisor in my current university, both because of the environment of the department culture and my previous achievements on research.

Yes, everything is bad about me, but that's where I am. Any advice on helping me to get out my current dilemma will be appreciated.


texts: Accepting a graduate offer of admission and then turning it down

texts:
I was offered admission into a graduate physics program in February. I was given 21 days  within which to accept the offer and pay the admission deposit.

Now I was sent an email from the program offering me a prestigious university scholarship to motivate me to accept the offer of admission. I had not yet received any other offer of admission, so out of desperation, I accepted the offer of admission and paid the admission deposit.

Now, if I am offered admission into any of the upper grade universities I applied to, I will write to the graduate program director from the former program and politely mention that I cannot enroll in their program because the upper grade university is a better fit for me.

Will this cause a serious problem for me, i.e., in terms of my future academic career and the graduate program director's denial to let me go?


texts: What happens if a reviewer withdraws himself from peer review process?

texts:
I submitted my manuscript to one of the journal of frontiers groups, It has been 3 months now since the submission, in the first round of the peer review process,  One reviewer gave me minor revision and the second reviewer asked me to do some extensive revision in my manuscript, I complied with the both reviewers and gave them the best answers i could,  to the questions raised by them and resubmitted revised version of my manuscript but after the first round, one reviewer endorsed my manuscript for the publication but the second reviewer withdrew himself from the peer review process and his status shows as an inactive in the interactive review forum.

I mailed the editor and ask him how the editorial staff will handle my manuscript but didn’t get any response him.

Has anyone here suffered with a similar dilemma, what usually happens in situations like these, frontiers guidelines mention that they need endorsement from 2 reviewers in order for editor to make a final decision.

What do editors do in such a situation, do they invite another reviewer?


texts: Which is more valued, first authorship articles or the number of articles produced?

texts:
What is more important in academia (bioinformatics, computational biology) for a person when he/she has already completed their PhD:

Number of first authorship articles he/she has
Number of published articles (he/she may or may not be the first author)

I wanted to know what do post-doc positions value more, the quality (only first author journals/conferences) or quantity(more number of journals/conferences, with/without first authorship)


texts: How brief I should be when contacting a professor for a PhD position for the first time?

texts:
I happened to find a PhD project that would align with my past experience really well. I would like to contact the professor responsible for the project. How brief should I be in my first email?

In addition to introducing myself and referring to the position, I would like to ask at least two questions about the project, and mention that I have been working on a similar project.

Is that enough? How would I finish the email then in a proper way? Just something like

  If you are not too busy, I hope you could discuss the matter further. Attached is my CV.

or something entirely else?

I have a very good publication record, have received big prizes, lot of experience, etc. in my pocket but I guess I should not repeat that in the email, since it is in the CV?


texts: Is it bad practice to cite MSc dissertations?

texts:
While searching for references on a certain class of problems I came across a well-written master's dissertation. It did not contain much in terms of new results, but  it did a good job of explaining what happens in the important papers in the field (or so I believe). This was helpful - my interest in that class of problems is that it's adjecent to the problem I'm writting about, so it's important for me for context and historical reasons, but it's not a subject I want to research in much depth; having read the dissertation and a introductions to some of the relevant papers, I feel I know as much as I need to know. I should also mention that some of the relevant papers are in French, so I was very grateful that someone explained in English what their gist is. I also feel that what I read in the published papers is enough to reasonably write all that I need to write in the introduction, but having looked through the dissertaition certainly helped me orient myself.

Now, my dillema is: Should I cite the dissertation? It is not generally seen as a requirement to cite expository materials on a subject, so I don't think I have to. But I also feel that it would perhaps be nice to cite it: it acknowledges that I benefited from reading it, and it helps potential readers who might become interested in the subject. If it was a published survey article, I would definitely cite it. On the other hand, this is a piece of writting that didn't go through the usual peer review process, and that was almost by definiton written by a rather inexperienced mathematician. I'm worried including the citation could annoy some readers, and possibly the dissertaion's authour.

What is the best course of action in a case like this?


texts: I will be starting graduate school next semester in mathematics and I have no idea how I am going to fare. My goal for this summer and I am slowly making progress is to go over topics in real analysis, topology and algebra. I am also doing an individual study in multivariable calculus which also covers analysis and linear algebra as well. My big question, which is very broad is, how does one prepare for the quals?


texts: Is it ethical to cite a reviewer's papers even if they are rather irrelevant?

texts:
We have just received reviews on a paper, and in reading through one of the "borderline" reviews, I recognized that the "voice" of the review sounded like a researcher I associated with at a conference a few years ago. In particular, they use a certain terms in parts of their review customary to this researcher's homeland. I checked the review committee, and this individual is indeed listed. Upon reading further, they suggest some past work which may be useful -- one of which I recognized as this researcher's work (we have some overlap in our fields).

I have not reached out to this researcher, nor have I shared my suspicions with any co-authors. This researcher and I socialized in a group setting a few years back, but have had no subsequent contact besides being in the same circles on some social media.

While the paper this researcher authored is tangentially related, it is not one that I would consider particularly relevant in our discussion. However, being quite certain of this reviewer's identity, it is tempting to "play up" the relevance of that paper in the hopes of swaying the reviewer.

My question: Is this ethical? I do not have any concrete evidence of this reviewer's identity (nor will I ever look for it), but the fact that I feel compelled to respond in a way different than I would otherwise has my alarm bells going off.

Reworded bonus question: If I believe I've discerned the identity of a reviewer, should I report that to the PC?

Note: This question is intended to be about my conduct, not the reviewer's. I do not believe the reviewer has done anything unethical.


texts: Should I do a Master's degree if I am already employed in the field?

texts:
I am very torn about whether to take the plunge to do a Master's degree. I graduated a few years ago with  BSc in Maths which I didn't particularly enjoy, only the statistics and programming courses. I then got a job at a big technology company in their R&D department doing research and applications of data science. I thoroughly enjoy the work I do but I am also interested in developing my skills further. I want to gain a deeper understanding of artificial intelligence and am also interested in spatial data science. I am not sure whether I should continue in this role or at a different company and learn on the job or invest some time and money into full-time education. I am also not sure whether in the future with only an undergraduate degree I would be able to progress in my field.
I am also concerned about age, whether it's wise to go back to university at 25.


texts: What year do you give for results, arxiv or journal year?

texts:
When giving a talk, if something is past ~1990, there's only the journal publication year to give to the audience. When something has only an arxiv year, then that's clearly the appropriate year. However, sometimes things take a long time to get published (refereeing and/or backlogs) and end up making things become anachronistic. One can now have a result that was posted in 2014, then published in 2016, while another paper is posted and published in 2015 that generalizes the paper in 2014.

How do you give coherent and consistent choice of dates in a talk that are clear to the audience? Is there a guideline of which year to cite?

(I'm in mathematics if that is relevant.)


texts: Some possible ways to respond to a student complaining about not having enough time on exam

texts: A student emailed me after a recent exam, complaining about not having enough time to finish the exam. Out of all the students, most managed to finish within 2/3 of the provided time. I wonder what might be some possible ways to respond to this kind of complaint. (This is my first time teaching a class of my own -- I only TA'd before, so I've never had to deal with this type of issue in the past).


texts: Shared office is messy to the point that I can't do any work, how to proceed?

texts:
Four months in my postdoc and I feel the mess, up to the point that I can't further do any, any work in my office. Nothing. My passion, bioinformatics, is gone.

An office with 12 students where just 8 should be, and plenty of disorganised stuff, people coming in and out, chatting, not very clean... I would say it's more similar to a bar than to a real work office. Almost all them work on the bench, so they come and go to the computer frequently.

I've been promised to get a new place in a 5 students office in about a month, but this has already a delay of 2 months since I should have moved there like 2 months ago. This is the reason to be in a limit situation.

What to do? My mentor knows almost nothing about this. He knows I'm waiting for the new place but thinks I'm doing well, when this is far from true.

I work in bioinformatics but seems my mentor thinks this is like kid games. I feel homeless moving through libraries trying to go ahead with my work.


texts: Are technical news websites acceptable as references in the introduction or motivation section?

texts:
So far I only use papers from ieee, nature, or other research publications.

My supervisor suggested me to write more in motivational background part.

I found tech news website like eejournal.com and semiengineering.com provides more general, more business-related, stories for general audiences.

Can I use them as reference in introduction/motivation part of my master thesis?

My personal opinion is we cannot use them.
But I do not know where I can get papers about e.g. cost analysis in CMOS scaling and next gen lithography, or why we need new memory devices like memristor.


texts: Former professor wants an update to write a recommendation letter, should I include a bad grade?

texts:
I studied physics and computer science as an undergrad, got a master's in computer science, and now am applying for a second master's in engineering physics. So, I have emailed one of my old physics professors for a recommendation letter.  He agreed to write one, but has requested more information to do so seeing as though I haven't been in touch since I went to grad school. He didn't specify any particular items, but another letter writer has requested my statement of purpose draft, coursework/research highlights, resume, and unofficial transcripts, so I'm assuming he'd appreciate the same. Because he is from a different school and department and hence unfamiliar with their curriculum, I was planning to send a list of my grad school classes and grades with descriptions included rather than the unofficial transcript which only includes the course number and a brief, generic title.

I'm happy to oblige, except for one thing: I failed a class in grad school.  This is explained by a medical situation at the time; I took the next semester off, it is since resolved, I did well in all my classes afterwards, etc. - it is a non-issue now.

My question is, should I include this black mark when I send him materials? It is not something that affected any of my work in undergrad and will not affect anything in the future, so I'd think it's not really relevant. I'd rather not tell yet another person about how I failed a class, especially someone who I haven't talked to in a while and have asked to write good things about me.


texts: What to do when graduate admissions haven't gone well?

texts:
OK, here is the deal:

I am a computer science student in Turkey graduating this June. I have applied to PhD programs in the US to work in computer architecture. I have a decent bachelor's degree, and my college is reasonably respected. Before admissions, I contacted some professors, and they seemed very interested in my background. During admissions, I was interviewed by some other professors. However, it turned out that there was only one offer with a scholarship, which I decided not to accept. (You may ask why I didn't opt for that one, the response may make the issue personal. But at least I can say that I didn't waste a resource that can be used by someone more enthusiastic about it.)

Now, I am in the middle of nowhere. The opportunity to work in computer architecture in my country is really small. During my bachelor's studies, I took all computer architecture related courses, even graduate ones. Plus, I almost missed all the graduate program admissions in Europe (with scholarships).

What do you think are my options? My idea is to get into a graduate program and be an academic.

I may start a master's degree in my country, but the area most professors teach that most relates to my studies is embedded systems. In fact, I doubt whether this may take me away from my intentions.
I can reapply during spring term admissions. (I have been told that these admissions are way more selective than during the fall term and this brings extra financial cost.)
I may work in the industry for a year, then reapply. (But how about my new profile for admissions? Plus, who wants someone, who is probably leaving soon, to hire?)

So I need some serious advice.

Here is some information about me: I have 3.6 overall and 3.85 major GPA. 6 different people have written references for me.


texts: What can I do if one coauthor tries to prevent a journal paper from being published?

texts:
I was a PhD student and was supervised by one bad supervisor. Our relationship broke up at the time when I tried to graduate. After a "fighting", I successfully graduated. But I left 10 unpublished paper to him. I had no time to publish these paper before I graduate. I put my supervisor's name there because he was my supervisor. I didn't really contribute to the paper.

I'm sure the 10 paper can be published as high quality journal paper because I'm currently working as a staff in another University. I've published a lot paper expect for those 10 so I know what paper can be published. But as the coauthor, my ex-supervisor "refused" to publish these paper. He always told me he needed to have a look, and nothing else happened. Every time I contact him, he would propose some unreasonable questions or tell me to wait for some time to put off the publication and no reply at all after that. It has been 2 years up to now. None of my 10 paper has been submitted yet. He obviously doesn't need the paper as a professor, but I need them desperately as a new lecture.

I've waited for 2 years for the first out of the 10 paper to be submitted. I couldn't wait for 20 years for the 10 paper to be submitted. He doesn't say he want to delete his name from this paper but I have sufficient reason to believe that he doesn't want me to publish these paper. He warned me that I couldn't submit the paper without his agreement otherwise he would withdraw the paper. My question is can I kick him out from the coauthor list and publish the paper by myself? Or is there any other suggestion say contacting the University about this situation to solve the problem?

I'm quite annoying as if I couldn't get rid of him even after I graduate and got my own position. Can anyone help please. Thank you in advance!


texts: Should items in a bibliography be translated into English or left in their original languages?

texts: I'm working on a bibliography. Most of the items on the list are Chinese language sources. I have translated the majority of them into English but I'm wondering if this is the correct way of going about it. The readers of the piece are highly unlikely to be able to read Chinese. Should I leave them in the source language or translate them into a language that the readers will be able to understand?


texts: What should you do if you find a few sentences of verbatim plagiarism in the literature review of published PhD thesis?

texts:
I am a Ph.D. candidate. Here I have a question, and I really want to hear what you would suggest.

Recently I did some literature studies, and I read a researcher's Ph.D. dissertation. She is kinda a pioneer in my research area, therefore I read her dissertation really carefully. However, I found that in the literature review chapter of her dissertation, there are parts of verbatim plagiarism. They are not blatant paragraph-to-paragraph copy and paste. They are just around four or five sentences, which are directly copied from other journals.

Her dissertation is around 300 pages with 8 chapters. I would say this dissertation is a high-quality dissertation. Besides these two tiny parts that are susceptible to plagiarism, it is really perfect.

I just wonder: what would you guys do? From my side, I don't want to report this to anybody at all, because I believe this might just an innocent mistake or something like that. Honestly, these two parts of verbatim plagiarism may account even less than 0.0001% of that dissertation.


texts: Link IEEE Xplore article with its arXiv version in Google Scholar

texts:
After submitting a paper, I uploaded it on arXiv, to give it immediate visibility.
After a few months (more than six months), the article has been accepted and finally published on IEEE Xplore. However, Google Scholar only shows the arXiv version, without pointing to the IEEE one.

How can I manually make Scholar recognize the presence of the published paper?


texts: Peer assessments critical of nervous speakers: better to redact or send as-is?

texts:
In the projects of one of my courses, I have asked the students to provide peer assessments of the presentations (recorded as videos) of other groups. Peer evaluations is something I have introduced recently: with classes online I wanted to find a way to encourage students to watch the presentations of other groups. Groups have 4–5 members. The evaluations are anonymous and are shared with the evaluated group in full. In general the system has worked well, with perhaps one exception ...
As part of the peer assessment, a number of categories were provided. One of these related to the quality of the presentation. I've noted that in a number of cases, the students have commented about the lack of confidence of a specific speaker affecting the overall presentation quality. In certain cases there are several comments about the lack of confidence of a particular speaker affecting the quality of the presentation; in some cases the comment clearly indicates which speaker is referred to.
As the professor of the course, I personally would not comment on such issues as I also have (had) my own demons regarding public speaking, and I think such a comment might be counterproductive in terms of knocking a student's confidence; in general I would try to be positive in such situations based on the personal experience that generous comments helped my own confidence.
I'm wondering if I should edit these peer assessments to "censor" such comments about students who are nervous when speaking. On the one hand, it feels a bit harsh to criticise someone for something they find difficult to control, and I worry about a student being troubled by such comments. On the other hand, I dislike the idea of censoring honest feedback; the categories are associated with grades, and removing such comments might make the grade seem unfair; also perhaps I also misjudge the situation and such feedback can be constructive in a way?
My question is about whether or not such comments are constructive, and if not, would it be justifiable and/or wise to remove or censor them in the peer assessments?
(I have also thought about changing the comment so that it is not clear which speaker is being spoken about, but with such small groups I think it will be clear in any case.)


texts: How to boost academic profile for Master's application

texts:
I want to apply for a Master's degree program in Robotics at some top schools in Europe and America. However, I feel my current profile is not strong enough to get into a top school and I am looking for ways to boost my profile and increase my chances. More specifically, I graduated with a GPA of 4.06/5.00 (which is relatively low) and I have read that most top would not even consider one's application if one doesn't have a very high GPA to start with except one can show strength in other parts of the application like the GRE score, statement of purpose, letters of recommendation, research publications etc. For example at ETH (one of the schools I am considering), it is rumored that one has to be in the 99th percentile to get in.

Although I haven't written the GRE yet, I hope to score 330+ and I also hope to write a convincing purpose statement. However, for the recommendations, I have only two lecturers (yes, not professors) who know me very well and I am sure they would write good recommendations for me but they are not majorly in the field of Robotics so this may not be a huge plus (Not sure about this, any clarifications would help). Also, I do not have any research publications. To improve my profile, below are some of the steps I am taking/considering taking:

1. Online courses in robotics, machine learning algorithms etc.
2. Looking for a Professor at my local University who is active in the field of Robotics to work with
3. Looking for a job at a Robotics company to gain experience
4. Taking my undergraduate project (a UAV) a step further and publishing my work etc.

As for [1], there seems to be a slight difference of opinion in the answers I have gotten on this site as to how much impact this may have but the consensus is that the impact is minimal.

I included [2] because some schools ask for three recommendation letters and I currently have only two reccommenders. Additionally, I want to know, how eager are Professors to work with people who are no longer students of the University? Does anyone have experience with working with a Professor while maintaining an a full-time job? How tasking is it?

In [4], by a step further, I mean making the platform an autonomous one as it is currently remote piloted, and then publishing the work.

What I want to know is, with my list above, am I heading in the right direction? Which of these (or any others that I haven't listed) are likely to have the biggest impact on my profile?

Just a small consideration, I have a short time (about 5 months) between now and most schools' application deadlines, so I need to make this boost within that period.


texts: Can I pay for an exam greater than A-level in the UK?

texts:
I know that in the United Kingdom I can sit examinations equivalent to GCSE/A-levels without actually doing the years required in a school or other institution.

I want to know if there are other exams that I can sit that are considered higher than A-levels and I am given a certified certificate of qualification, without spending time in any institution, all that is necessary is to arrange payment for this exam at a centre. And if I pass then I receive the qualification.


texts: Letter to a potential PhD supervisor (mathematics)

texts:
I am finishing my Master's in mathematics in Germany and I'd like to apply for a PhD in Europe, preferably in the UK. Most departments recommend that students get in touch with potential supervisors prior to submitting a formal application. I am a little nervous about it and I would appreciate advice regarding the following:

(1) Some people say it's advantageous to mention interest in specific papers published by a given professor. But I'm not sure how applicable this is to mathematics. To be honest, I haven't read a single paper by most of the people I'd like to apply to. (Reading and understanding a math paper takes a long time, so I think it's rather normal.) Is it OK just to say, for example, "I've seen you have published a lot of papers on non-linear PDEs, which is an area I'd like to do research in", or does this sound too generic?

(2) Is it OK to mention that my Master thesis supervisor or lecturer at my university recommended a given professor to me as a potential PhD advisor (they know each other), or does this sound somewhat awkward/patronising?

(3) How long should my email be? Is about 300 words too long?

(4) What should a first email accomplish? Should I just introduce myself and express interest? Or should I ask some specific questions about a potential research project straightaway?

I will really appreciate your advice, especially from academic mathematicians. I think one of the problems is that I find it a bit hard to see how the situation looks from the perspective of the potential supervisor. Do they get hundreds of such emails every year and just get annoyed when they get another one? Do they want the applicants to be very specific from the start, or is it better to first introduce oneself and see if they are at all interested before asking more specific questions about a research project, etc.?


texts: What do "AE", "EO", and "PROD" stand for in a journal submission system?

texts: What do "AE", "EO", "PROD" stand for in the manuscript status in journal submission systems like ScholarOne?


texts: What are the advantages of serving as an examiner for a MSc or PhD thesis?

texts:
As an early career researcher, I am curious to know the advantages of being an external or internal examiner for a thesis. How does it help you in your career? Since you are not being paid for the time you put into the task, I believe there has to be some other good reasons why you should do it. Does it count as service (to the research community) when you apply for tenure?
Or, is it a selfless job?


texts: Why might my tutors from several years ago not respond to my email request for a meeting?

texts:
It has been 3 years since I contacted my former school tutors.
During the past few days in New Year, I wrote 7 emails to them (with contents as shown below), but I have received only one reply.

  Dear XXX, Happy New Year. My name is XXX, and then year of graduation,
  student ID... During the xxx course, I had learnt... I hope you can
  arrange a time for a meeting with me... closing greeting Kitty

I am thinking if my tutors have marked my email as spams.


texts: Theorists facing tenure track faculty interviews

texts: The faculty interview is based on the context of a department stressing on industry interaction. When asked about how to buy lab equipments and find funding, may a theorist answer the search committee that he/she does theory work mostly and therefore doesn't need much money or experiment facilities to start up? Anyway, these questions are hard for the present graduate students and postdoc applicants to answer, as they have no chance to be exposed to these things.


texts: What to teach first: theory or practice?

texts:
The educational system in which I have studied focuses on teaching the theory/abstract theoretical courses before the applications.

For example, I spent the first 1-2 years of a 5-year engineering program only studying Mathematics, Physics and other basic courses before even getting any hint what the applied problems we will eventually try to solve are. In terms of tools, I first learned and programmed the individual methods and then I used "real-life" software for the first time.

Now, having seen applications, I look back to my basic courses and I think "that abstract topic was actually much simpler than I originally thought!".
It feels like I was just stupid to not be able to fully understand or get interested enough into the abstract topics.

I would feel much better if my university has made me first work on some easy applications, trying to understand the context, the difficulties and the possibilities, then dive into theory and then have the advanced applications that require advanced theory. A kind of "iterative model". I understand that this would probably take more time.

However, I see that university education keeps being like this in the universities I have studied into (Greece and Germany). Strong theory first, applications later. Traditional, "sequential" model.

Does my "iterative model" observation, as a student, make sense from a teaching perspective? What is the current situation and trend in more "progressive" educational systems? If it is not already applied, why not?


texts:
I am trying to implement an algorithm given in a paper. I have some questions which I would like to clear out since implementation requires complete clarity on all the concepts/algorithms/arguments introduced the paper. I have contacted the authors of the paper multiple times(5-6 times) through mail but I do not receive any response and it's been close to a month now.

I would like to know if there is any forum/website in which a reader of a research paper can submit questions that he/she faces while reading it, which is also subscribed by the authors of the paper and authors of papers citing that in their reference section.

P.S.: This question may seem to be duplicate of:
Whom to discuss research papers with?

But in my case, I am not from academia and do not have any advisor/mentor sort of person to discuss paper with.


texts: Footnotes: is there any 'rule' on how to use them?

texts:
I am writing my Msc thesis and I would like to know if it is ok to use footnotes and if there are rules about using them (maybe related to the text format or other issues about the style, for example, should I use numbers or letters?)  And are there guidelines about what should not be put as footnote?

Sorry if this might sound as a silly question, but since it is a thesis and not a book (therefore the aim is presenting results and not teaching people) I do not what it to look presumptuous


texts: Can a UK University prevent you from graduating due to an outstanding library fine?

texts:
I study in the UK. I just received an email from the academic registrar of my university regarding my forthcoming graduation ceremony.

Contained within the email was this disclaimer:

  Please ensure that you have paid any outstanding study related fees and charges to the University no later than 16:00 (BST) Thursday 16 June 2016 (this includes library fines). If you do not do this, I regret that you will cease to be eligible to graduate this summer.

I have an outstanding library fine of £0.15 which of course I intend to pay but it seems far fetched to me that an academic institution would withhold a degree costing at anywhere between £21,000 to £100,000 due to an outstanding payment of up to £10 (the fine limit after which you cannot withdraw any more books). As I understand it, this stipulation is not confined to my university.

Could I be prevented from graduating due to a trivial fine? Has this kind of rule ever been enforced by a university? Is it legal?


texts: I dropped out of my masters degree a year ago and am being threatened by my college that they will blacklist me

texts:
I took a masters a couple of years ago and dropped out because my supervisors weren't helpful, were demotivating (told me they could do my research in two months and asked why I hadn't finished mine), and I also didn't have the money to finish it. I called the university when I got the email of my maximum time to finish my research is ending (asking if I'd like to extend) and I confirmed to them I didn't want to continue and they said okay.

So, I thought I paid full previously but apparently I had some debt left over, which they didn't bother telling me the whole year after dropping out.

One of the finance admin called today to tell me to pay $650 in 48 hours, and threatened to blacklist me if I didn't.

I legit dropped out because of money issues and instead of telling me to pay a little bit monthly, they just dropped the bomb on me like that. No, I don't have the money now, so I'm most probably going to be blacklisted.

So my question is, what happens if my university blacklists me? Does that mean I cannot pay after I'm blacklisted and I'm blacklisted forever? Does that mean I can't apply to other (cheaper) universities? I asked the lady just now and she just laughed and say that's up to the university and I shouldn't ask.


texts: Is there a standard for translating grades across Erasmus universities?

texts:
I've just finished my Erasmus period in the Netherlands. I'm still waiting for one result from my guest academy, then the Transcript of Record will reach my home university and, somehow, the results will be translated from Netherlands marks to Italian marks.

Is there an Erasmus standard on how to predictably translate results between ranking systems?


texts: I am going to present my thesis in the next week. I am in a confusion what I should present in the final defence (1 hour). How much into detail I should go. I have successfully given my pre-synposis. I am currently thinking about the thesis defence. To me it appears I should focus on my work rather than talking about others work. I have been told that in the defence there will be few members from other discipline. Taking this thing into consideration I think I should first convey the high level idea and then go into the detail. So that everyone in the panel have idea about my work.


texts: Getting a funding position as a foreign MSc student in Finland

texts: I got an admission for a master’s programme in data science at the University of Helsinki, Finland. However, because I am from Asia, I don’t get a tuition-fee remission. Is it possible for an international MSc student to find a funding position as a teaching assistant or research assistant in the beginning?


texts: Is it appropriate to e-mail a researcher asking about progress on a follow-up paper?

texts:
Recently, I saw an online presentation by a researcher and professor regarding a series of recently published papers. At the end, she mentioned she was working on a follow-up paper, regarding such and such... I have checked for it, and it has still not been published.

Perhaps it was a dead-end, and abandoned. Would it be appropriate to ask the professor about the progess made, and whether it has been abandoned, or when it will be published?


texts: Research proposal for a pre-defined PhD topic

texts: A school that I am applying has a list of available topics, along with their descriptions, which I can choose from. I already select one topic which matches my interest and background, I also contact a professor who will supervise on that topic and he encourages me to go for it. However, as the application process, I need to write a research proposal. It makes me confused as the topic and research description are already defined. I can add some comments on the topic and then relate my background to it, but it will be a personal statement instead of research proposal. So, I wonder in other universities, what students are expected to write in their research proposals when they select a pre-defined topics.


texts: About putting affiliation on a paper or not

texts:
I see that there are many questions on whether putting/putting how many affiliation(s) on a paper. My situation does not quite fit into all the existing questions, so I am posting my question here.
First of all I am currently working as a part-time lecturer at two different colleges in the same city. I am writing my paper on my own, and neither of them has support for my research (besides having access to some database of my field and access to journal papers). I am not sure if I should put any of the colleges I am currently working at as affiliations. The reasons of my concern are

The number of courses I teach at these two colleges vary from semester to semester. I expect in some semester I would not have any course to teach at one or even both of the colleges. This means in some coming semesters I may not affiliate with these colleges (for example the summer semester).

I would prefer to put the university I obtained my PhD degree as the affiliation, and write something like "Alumni of XXX University". But I have not seen this before in any paper, and I am not sure if this is the norm.

I do not object writing myself as independent scholar, but I probably will use the email of the university I obtained my PhD degree in this case. But then I would think why don't I do 2. in above.

Sometimes I think submitting a paper to a journal by a university email address is better than personal email address in the sense that the editor will take it slightly more seriously.


texts: How many self-cites to other works are too many in my paper?

texts:
Currently I am writing a paper which is related to my previous work. However, there are several publications that I would like to cite from it. I do not want the new manuscript to feel like a easy-self-citing paper, so I wonder which is the limit of self-citation.

Of course, the self-cites correspond to different works, some of them poorly correlated with the others.


texts: Can I use the sealed TOEFL score report I receive from ETS as an official score report

texts: ETS sends a score report to me after each TOEFL exam in a sealed envelope. And since I already have online access to my scores, I would like to know if I can use the sealed score report as an official score report, would it be considered official by universities? Or only test scores sent by ETS directly to the university are considered official.


texts: How should I take a potential PhD supervisor's age into account, when planning to follow PhD with habilitation?

texts:
I plan to apply for PhD in Finance/Statistics next semester, and hence searched for potential supervisors.

An issue I have is that many interesting candidates are above age 60, and in Germany Professors retire at 65, such that a subsequent post-doc/habilitation would most likely require a different supervisor after PhD. One Professor just started his position at age 40, but so he has not many notable publications and I am unsure whether he might change university soon (he just changed it from another 4 years position).

Could someone advise me on the importance of age for selecting a PhD supervisor in context of a long-term future academic career?

The time for PhD would be 4-5 years, and PostDoc/Habilitation/AssociateProf usually again 4-6 years, with goal of potentially becoming Full Professor in Finance/Statistics.


texts: Rushing a paper to be published vs. taking the time and having a preprint by the time of PhD applications

texts:
I'm a second semester MSCS student who's looking to apply to PhD programs in the US and Canada this coming applications round.

My field is machine learning, and with graduate applications already being very competitive, I understand that my field is in some kind of hype bubble right now and it's particularly competitive. I hear stories about applicants who have perfect scores and stellar research experience getting rejected from schools.

Although I personally think it's a bit unreasonable to expect master's students to have a first-authored paper by the time of application, it is what it is. And this is what led me to wonder.

I'm working on a research project right now, and my original plan was to submit the paper to a conference on June 1st. That's only about a month away, and my project's still a bit far away from completion. It's a little unrealistic to have a high-quality paper ready by then considering this isn't the only thing I'm working on (other research projects, lab responsibilities, classes, etc.) and so should I just focus on taking more time to raise the quality of my research and having at most a preprint by the time I apply, or is it still worth it to have an official conference publication?

Obviously, this is all under the assumption that my submission even gets accepted. My personal values and principles regarding research itself tell me to do the former (i.e. take my time), but I guess I feel like I'm in a time frame where it seems that having one more line on my CV would help.

There's probably not a right or wrong answer, but I was hoping someone with more experience and insight compared to me would be able to provide some tips or thoughts. Thanks!


texts: postdoc with professor that I had email exchanging for PhD

texts: 3 years before I exchanged email with a professor for Ph.D program. He sent me several links including the process of his university for PhD and some useful links, in the meanwhile I also contacted to another professor in another country. I selected the second option to continue my PhD. Now I completed my PhD. Is it ethical to send email and ask the first professor for postdoc position?


texts:
Due to some family conditions during my undergrad days, I could not focus completely on my studies. As a result, I have a mediocre GPA (2.7-3.0). In order to overcome this, I have decided to enroll for an online terminal MS CS program which I intend to complete within 1.5 years.

Provided that I am able to excel in the online course, is it possible that I can leverage the degree to get admissions to a top 10 MS program in computer science with thesis option?


texts: Coming from Europe, can I work while doing a Master Thesis in USA?

texts:
I understand this question is not strictly academic, but what I hope to find here is some feedback from someone who already had similar experience.

I live and study Electronics Engineering in Parma, a small town in northern Italy. I'm considering to move in order to get my Master Thesis done.
Now, as far as I understand, in USA the masters are somewhat different from what we have here in Europe. To the point that "Master Thesis" is not even a thing there, in fact I'm not able to find proposals online.

That said, I have friends who have done "gradated level" work there and validated it as a thesis back in Europe. So let's just assume I can get a place somewhere and be able to go there.

I immediately understand I will have to pay for my staying and the chances to get a salary are really narrow.

So, as per the title: can I work there (like weekend jobs) while studying?

Any help would be appreciated.


texts: I get overwhelmed while self studying courses. What can I do when I can't sit in classes anymore?

texts:
I am learning a new numerical modeling technique (molecular dynamics) that requires learning graduate level maths and physics concepts. I am learning from youTube videos and books. However, I am getting all overwhelmed and am retaining nothing.
I am feeling disappointed because I am not able to grasp the subject that is very important for my postdoc success. My entire postdoc contract is based on the assumption that I can learn this in 6 months and produce results in the next 6 months.
I cannot sit through classes as postdocs are not allowed to do so in my university. I have access to online materials only.
I am feeling super stressed out and overwhelmed. Any advice?


texts: What should I ask my potential Ph.D advisor in advance, before actually signing a contract?

texts:
I'm currently applying for a Ph.D in Germany. Next week I'm sitting down with my potential Ph.D advisor to have a talk about the program.

Currently I'm collecting questions about things like

teaching duties included?
working hours
what's the salary?
vacation?
budget for conferences?

I think I'm missing some important stuff.

My real question is: What should I ask my potential Ph.D advisor in advance, before actually signing a contract / starting?

(The question What questions should one ask to the former/current students of a professor before deciding whether to do PhD under him/her? is related, but I feel it doesn't fit my situation)


texts: Are academic papers required to have specific sections

texts: I've seen that academic papers tend to have the sections Abstract, Introduction, Material and Methods, Results, Acknowledgements, and Literature Cited.  My question is if I wanted to publish an academic paper would it need to have these specific sections or could I have a different set of sections from the ones mentioned depending on the contents of my paper?


texts:
I am applying for faculty positions in a country outside the country I am currently a postdoc in (USA). My visa restrictions make it difficult traveling outside of the US for interviews.

Is it possible to get a faculty position from a skype interview alone?


texts: Is having access to past exams cheating and, if yes, could it be proven just by a good grade?

texts:
I studied for three weeks straight for an exam because I was really anxious to pass it with a high grade, while everyone else didn’t study much. Now the problem is, I had access to the exam from the previous year because someone gave it to me. I don’t know where this person got this exam, but I think it was made public after he completed his exam. The thing is I don’t know if I was allowed to have them or not.

Now the exam is over and I didn’t receive my grade while everyone else received it. The average grade for the exam is approximately 50%. Now my professor wants me to see him in his office about the exam, but doesn’t tell me why. The only explanation I can think of would be cheating. My guess is that I scored way higher than everyone else and now I’m kind of panicking.

It’s also important to note that on the exam, half of the questions were very similar as the one from previous year and that no material was allowed during the exam, so I could not have looked at it while doing the exam. Also, I have a high GPA, so it’s not implausible for me to have good grades.

Do you think I could get in trouble for having access to past exams even if there’s no way someone could know I had access to them? And is it really considered cheating?

UPDATE:  Thanks everyone for sharing their thoughts on the answer. I'm writing this answer to give some feedback. So I met with my professor this morning and I admitted having the exam from a previous year. I went with honesty, because I thought that it was the best way to go. The professor was happy about my honesty and he just asked me to elaborate some answer which I did. He saw that I knew my theory well and he didn't punish me further for it.


texts: Where can I apply for an internship in the renewable energy sector in India?

texts: I have recently completed my undergraduate studies in Mechanical Engineering and I am looking for research/intern opportunities in India in the renewable Energy field. The issue is that I do not have any prior experience in this field. Am I asking for too much or is there a chance for me?


texts:
If admins allow me I would like to put a link, https://www.nature.com/nnano/journal/v11/n9/full/nnano.2016.180.html
as a example, I dont know how to cite it since this is not really paper and it is not signed by any author.
Also I took a lot of from it. Can I say: According to NN editorial?and than put quotation mark? is it same as citing a book?


texts: Former PhD supervisor faked results and submitted a corrigendum two years after publication

texts:
During my PhD studies, I published a journal article (one of total four) in a prestigious journal of my field. I gave my codes to my PhD supervisor, but he messed up things in the lab and lost it (I also didn’t care and lost, for I am pursuing different directions).

Two years after publication, my PhD advisor wanted to commercialize my PhD work and wanted me to develop the codes again without willing to credit me for my efforts. I found his emails harassing, malicious and blackmailing and stopped responding him by directing his emails to spam folder.

Out of desperation, he himself developed some codes and submitted a corrigendum in which he clearly tried to push an agenda to suit his commercialization efforts (I know what I am talking, believe me on this). This included falsifying earlier findings just because he didn’t understand my work and cannot implement it and thus, presented an alternate algorithm which clearly is inferior. From my experience with that algorithm, I know from his description of implementation in the corrigendum that the results he presented are clearly made-up.
My PhD advisor has basically faked results in a corrigendum to suit his commercialization efforts.

What are my options ?

Can I convey it to the journal ? (I have already conveyed to the journal that this corrigendum is submitted without my approval.)
Can I offer my ex advisor to re-implement but giving me the due credit?
What should I do?


texts: Are there any language requirements for citizen applicants with low English skills?

texts:
I see from a university website that "if you are not a citizen of one of the following countries..." [a list of countries], "you will need to take the TOEFL before enrolling."  (USA is not on the list, but I presume that's irrelevant).  My friend is a US citizen originally from a different country, and her conversational English is passable, but she absolutely would not pass the TOEFL.

In most schools, could she walk in without the test, because she's (lately) obtained her US citizenship?


texts: Are spelling and/or grammar mistakes a cause for submitting Errata?

texts:
During my studies I've read a number of published articles where spelling mistakes have somehow squeaked through the review process. For example, I have found a paper with a section entitled Turbulance Model when the title should be Turbulence Model. I would love to be able to submit an errata if I knew it was going to be a one or two line email, but I don't know of anyone else who does this. Will editors be annoyed with little corrections like this? Surely there isn't a need to bother the corresponding Author with such a matter, is there?

To be clear, I am only thinking of cases like the example I've given; a clear spelling mistake or a missing word. I wouldn't start arguing with an author/editor over wording issues or other gray areas.


texts:
Is there any open database(s) that offer access to Bachelor or Masters level final papers? Especially interested in top universities and computer science related papers.
The thing is that other day I browsed through BA level papers defended in my university and many of them seemed to be a little too trivial. I'd like to see what is quality of papers produced by those who attend top universities.