texts: Is endowing a professorship less effective in a lower-ranked university than in a higher-ranked one?

texts:
This is a follow-up question to What does it take for a lower-ranked university to compete with a top-ranked one?.

Wolfgang Bangerth's answer says that "Faculty will generally only go to places where there are also good students, and the best students go where they can historically expect to get an excellent education." Does this mean that if I want to endow a professorial chair, and I want the endowed professor to produce world-class research, I should do so at a top-ranked university instead of a lower-ranked one? The argument being that, to produce world-class research, one presumably needs top faculty, top students, and money. The endowment covers the money aspect, but there's still faculty & students, and if those gravitate towards top universities then it would presumably also make more sense to endow a chair at a top university.

If the answer is "yes", top universities such as Harvard and Oxford already have billions of dollars in endowment. Is there any way out of this rich-get-richer situation? (I'll ask this as a separate question if it is unrelated to the present one).


texts: I notice that when someone asks about GPA, they usually mean an undergraduate GPA.  Is there GPA for a masters degree or MBA?  If not, how a student's performance is measured (in UK and US)?


texts: What to keep and what to say in a 5 minutes power point presentation?

texts:
I have a power point presentation in front of our Head regarding my research and achievements. Time limit is 4 minutes presentation and 1 minute discussion. I am wondering what to keep in the PPT?

I have now prepared with 5 slides:- an Title slide, Introduction, Ongoing Research, Achievements.

Should I keep a  Title slide? If I keep it, then how much seconds should I take and what to say in the Title slide.

What to say and how to finish up the ongoing research in 1-2 slides in a couple of minutes?

Can you please suggest?


texts: LaTeX itemize options: are they allowed to use in a master thesis?

texts:
In my Master thesis, I used this:

\begin{itemize}[label=\ding{167}]
\item Access Windows XM from Ubuntu Server
\item List the directories contents of Windows XP
\end{itemize}

The output is:

My question: must I avoid the use of  such beautiful things when writing my thesis or is it a normal thing to do ?


texts:
We do need a Whiteboard in our new Meeting room. The question popped up, whether it makes sense to buy a digital whiteboard. We present mostly our results, sometimes we discuss something and and do use Flip-charts to draw something. However, we are not sure if a digital whiteboard would be beneficial in such a setting.

What is your experience with such a device ? Do you use it mostly for teaching or also for classical presentations ? Does it enable more lively discussions ? How much time and training does it need to use it in an efficient way ?


texts:
I have two options for my masters thesis  (theoretical physics), Professors A and B. A is senior and globally renowned. B is very junior but appears to be making a strong impact in the field.

When it comes to applying for PhD positions, how important is my supervisor? I'm aware that A giving me a strong letter of recommendation will carry much more weight than B, but I think I'm slightly more interested in B's work. Also, B has told me that if the project is successful it will almost definitely result in a publication. A is not so sure.

A and B are actually part of the same group. Best case scenario would be having the two of them as joint supervisors. Let's assume that isn't an option and I must choose.


texts: Strength or Existence of letters of recommendation do depend on the intent right?

texts:
Related to:

How should I ask for letters of recommendation whose strength is dependent on intended program?

So I found out that one of the professors recommended a junior coursemate for an internship even though that coursemate got a 1.0 (0.0 is the lowest, and 4.0 is a the highest with 1.0 being the lowest passing mark) in the class.

Letters of recommendation do depend on the intended program right? If I were leaving math completely for say law or business I'm going to have a higher chance of having a recommendation letter and even higher strength of recommendation letter compared to applying for a PhD program in math right?


texts: How should I insist to be the first author?

texts:
First, some context. I'm a MSc student and I'm going to defend my thesis soon. The current plan is to submit the results of the thesis in two conferences: a less relevant result, which I'll call A, and a more relevant one, which I'll call B. So far so good, but here's the (typical) problem: who gets to be the first author? Me or my advisor?
Other answers to similar problems recommend a dialogue approach. I've already tried this, where I've written an email manifesting my interest in being the first author and why. The answer was that I could the the first author on result A, but he'd likely be the one in result B. Honestly, based on what I've read, I think my contributions for the work are weighty enough to justify my stance, and I'll try to persuade my adviser to change his point of view. Thus, my question is not whether or not I should talk to him (I already know I will) but how to make him change is view of the situation.
Below are some reasons why I think I should be considered the first author. Feel free to comment them or even disagree. If at the end of this there is strong evidence on why I should be just a co-author, I'll have no problem in changing my mind. Also, this pertains the result B, since there is not any contention about result A.

The paper will be an "enhanced" version of my thesis. What I mean is that the work will be basically the same, but with some extra simulations for which I didn't have time to complete by the thesis deadline.

As a consequence of 1., the text was written by me. However, my adviser has read it and provided feedback. The writing on the paper might have more contributions on his part, but most of the writing will still be me.

His argument is that the idea and the preparatory work came from his side. To be clear, he provided the topic (for which I applied and was accepted) and already had some literature review done. Also, some other previous theses were meant to provide results for this one (e.g. building of a database, or the study of a certain phenomenon). In the end, I used the database and cited some general results. However, most studies were in a non-applicable range for my work, so I had to devise an alternative (the result A that I mentioned above).

I can see where his argument comes from. That being said, it is also true that I significantly expanded his initial literature review and provided most of the work. He provided the initial setup and possibles issues, and gave me some tips and guidelines throughout the work (meetings normally twice a month, and sometimes emails in between), but never a definite solution. From there, I'd consider his feedback, research some more and try to provide closure to open questions. Some of these were pointed by him, some by me during the work. All the simulation work and required inputs (except the database mentioned in 3.) was either done by me or adapted from other sources (third party).

Of course he had a part to play here. I probably wouldn't be finishing my thesis on this specific topic if it weren't for him. That being said, I feel like that's what an adviser should do. His guidance was important, and I'm not trying to neglect that, but is it really enough to warrant him the first author spot?

Another important aspect to mention is that currently, we're on amiable terms and I'd like to keep it that way (as much as possible). Partly because it is always good to foster connections, but also because I haven't defended my thesis yet and he'll be on the jury. If this publication makes it through, this might be an important step in starting my career, so I want to fight some more.
Also, neither of us is having an imposing speech. What I mean by that is that nothing is set in stone, and there's still room for changes. At least, that was the idea I got from his speech patterns.
Disclaimer: Some journals do order authors by name. If this was the case, I wouldn't even be asking this question. However, the conference/journal we're targeting clearly distinguishes between first and second author.


texts: How can faculty best telegraph work-life balance challenges under COVID to our administration?

texts:
Work-life balance is more challenging for faculty than ever under COVID-19.  What are equitable, privacy sensitive ways to telegraph needs at the individual level?  What are acceptable accommodations to suggest?
To be clear, I am looking for strategies for individuals. If you are underwater from the fallout of this pandemic, it is hard to even join the cause, much less organize. In comments directly below can be found exemplars of the viewpoints these individuals are up against: they are dead weight, complaining, or not team players.
This is a unique year in which to attempt to find solutions: administrative members are distributed, and unofficial channels of communication are often not operational. The unofficial conversations that used to help resolve these kinds of situations are more difficult. Further, faculty and administration vary widely in their interpretation of the current crisis.
This was highlighted for me when a tenured faculty member in a recent meeting was pushed by a dissenting faculty member to point out that she was the vulnerable member in her family, due to obesity, and so could not be physically on campus.  No one wanted that moment to happen, and yet it did.
There is, simultaneously, a call to step up and come back to campus, often explicitly.
https://president.ufl.edu/updates/2020/07/in-person-classes.html
Regardless of academic rank many are responding to personal challenges ranging from lack of child or elder care, to personal COVID-19 high-risk status, to more exotic things which are more difficult to categorize. My international students are trapped in their home countries, visa-less. Impact is everywhere, and even a faculty member with no 'traditional categories' of difficulty might well be under water. At the same time, universities are making hard choices and cutting positions or asking more, sometimes both.
The impact is clear. My own unit has lost a number of our best people, who have left for the relative certainty and balance of industry, or simply left to focus on the complexity of their own lives. Anecdotally, more women than men have left. I am in the US, where things are admittedly presently a bit more extreme, but I think that this question can generalize across university systems in many countries.
It is my belief that one major lack is a good way for individuals in need to communicate their need. For many reason, they may hesitate. This problem extends up the chain: my dean and provost are both high risk, and both working in the office.
So, what are equitable, privacy sensitive ways to telegraph needs at the individual level?  What are acceptable accommodations to suggest? How do we address the untenable state of work-life balance in academia under covid-19?
Aside, that is, from leaving.
UPDATE: I have moved to an industry position, sacrificing my academic 'family' for the health and well-being of myself and my family. I have valued the contributions of this community in my academic life, a chapter I now close.


texts:
I teach masters level engineering students. I have observed that computer usage skills are slowly and constantly degrading among my students from year to year. Has anybody else observed this kind of effect?

What could I realistically do to combat this problem? I do understand that even if its not my job to do so I need to address the problems somehow. Unfortunately I am getting a bit frustrated to teach students how to graph a function, or numerically find the local minima etc. when i should be talking about formulating multibody dynamics for example.

How do I check that this isn't just a bias that I have somehow accumulated during the years of teaching? I am aware of the it was better in my youth bias. Frankly i dont believe i was much better in most aspects. But I sure knew how to use my computer.


texts: Is it possible to get an ISSN number for an online journal from an other country?

texts:
We are a group of international graduates in the process of launching an open access e-journal and we are now facing the different technical steps. Our based country has an ISSN national center, however we wonder if it is possible to get an ISSN from an other country (european or north american) even without being physically based there.

Thanks in advance for your answers


texts: Avoiding "Zoom bombing" in virtual conferences and seminars

texts:
With travel restricted by the COVID-19 pandemic, many academics are organizing online seminars and conferences as a substitute for regular in-person university seminars, colloquia, and research conferences.

In real life, seminars are usually open to anyone who wants to drop in, and every attendee can be seen and heard and may ask questions.  So an obvious approach is to organize the event using video meeting software such as Zoom, and simply post the link on a public website so that any interested person can participate.  However, this also opens the event to "Zoom bombers", random people who just want to disrupt the proceedings with annoying or offensive video / audio / text chat - such abuse has unfortunately become very common in public Zoom meetings.

What best practices exist to keep such an event as open as possible to legitimate participants, and let them interact with each other and the speaker in a reasonable way, while reducing the risk of disruption and abuse?

What are the pros and cons of these strategies?

Strategies could be general, or involve specific features of certain software.

Some strategies I've thought of, and their drawbacks:

Create a password for the meeting.  Then the question is, to whom should the organizer give the password?  If they only give it to people they know, it excludes people who might be interested but whom they happen not to know.  If they distribute it to large mailing lists of interested academics, it raises the chance that it will fall into the wrong hands.
Offer to share the password by email upon request.  This requires extra time from the organizer to respond to those emails, and to manually verify the credentials of each requester.
Require a nominal registration fee, as real-life conferences often do.  This requires setting up an online payment system, which can be a lot of work, and may exclude people who are only casually interested, or who don't have funding, or who work in less wealthy parts of the world.  It may also involve the organizer in a lot of bureaucracy with their university as to how the fees will be managed and spent.
Use a "waiting room" feature, where participants must be approved immediately before joining.  However, as far as I know, the host only sees the participant's name.  If they see an unfamiliar name, how can they tell whether it is a troll, or a legitimate researcher whom they just happen not to know?  Conversely, I don't think there is anything to stop a troll from masquerading under the name of a famous academic.

I am wondering if people have thought of better solutions, that are specifically appropriate to academia.  Such strategies might take advantage of specific features of the academic community, e.g. to authenticate genuine researchers (.edu addresses? accounts on preprint servers? ORCid IDs?).  Answers could also address the pros and cons of such strategies as they apply to academia in particular, and how well they fit with people's existing expectations for academic conferences.


texts: What is the difference between personal statement and statement of purpose?

texts: I am planning to apply for a Ph.D. program in the USA. Some universities ask for personal statement whereas some for a statement of purpose. What is the main difference?


texts: How to list "Visiting Student" on my CV?

texts:
As a soon-to-graduate undergraduate student that is on his hunt for a M.Sc. program, I am making sure my CV is up to date.

I would like to highlight the fact that I have attended a nearby university as a "visiting student" and have successfully completed two courses at this institution while still holding a full time student (normal course load) status at my home institution. I had one of the courses credited at my home institution and did not bother with the second. This second course was simply for my own interest and would not have helped me achieve any graduation requirements at my home institution.

My question is two fold:

Is this fact worth highlighting in my CV, considering the limited (and precious) real-estate in the two page CV format?
If so, what would be the best way to present it?

Possible formats that I have considered (should I mention it):

1.

  Education

  XXXX - YYYY: University of Somewhere, B.Sc. (Major in interesting subject, minor in cool subject)

  Also completed heavy coursework in awesome subject. Visiting student to University of Elsewhere during academic year ZZZZ - ZZZZ + 1

2.

  Education

  XXXX - YYYY: University of Somewhere, B.Sc. (Major in interesting subject, minor in cool subject)

  Also completed heavy coursework in awesome subject.

  ZZZZ - ZZZZ + 1: University of Elsewhere, Visiting Student

  Completed N credits: SCI101 and ART102

In my (naive) opinion, I would believe that this sort of "academic diversity" would be favourably viewed by someone looking at my CV.

Some would also say that, in my case, University of Elsewhere has a better reputation and name recognition then my home institution. Should this be considered as a valid reason to give it more space on my CV?


texts: What are the best ways to find an external thesis examiner?

texts:
My supervisor is too busy to find an external examiner for my PhD thesis, so the job will probably fall to me. I know all the academics who may potentially be an internal examiner, but I don't know any academics outside of my own institution. To be honest, I do not know where to begin.

My area is computer science, but it overlaps with medicinal fields as well. There are presumably any number of people who would have some expertise in some part of my research, but very few who would cover all of them.

I feel that cold calling academics who are some way related to my research (maybe ones that I am citing in my thesis) asking if they will become my external examiner is a particularly poor strategy, but it is the only one that is apparent to me at the moment.


texts: Write a reminder about a possible undergraduate project

texts:
I am currently doing some research for choosing a topic for my M.Sc. thesis.

A week ago I sent an email to an external professor (I mean, not one in my University) asking about whether we could discuss about the topic I chose. The mail was (I believe) properly structured - not spammy and personally tailored on the prof, citing some works on the topic I took a look on, explaining my motivations on why I would like to study this topic, maybe a bit lengthy but not that much and divided in paragraphs - yet I had no answer.

For what I know it seems that this is not necessarily a "no" and a common suggestion is to write a reminder.

Now, I would really like to work on this topic and taking contact with this professor would be a great chance for me, especially in order to continue my studies with a PhD. At the same time, this professor is quite important and maybe he just doesn't care too much about a M.Sc. thesis, so I was thinking to write a reminder asking, in short, if he could send me the contact of one of his PhD/postdoc students that may be interested in helping me with my work.

My question is: is this considered a bad etiquette? writing first to a prof and then rolling back to one of his students...may sound like I underestimated his position or I am just not motivated enough.
In case, how could I structure the message? It seems to me that "if you are too busy" is a bad way to start (sounds like I don't know whether the professor has anything to do or that he could be doing nothing). Also "I know you are very busy but..." sounds bad (but what? but I don't care? but I think it is more important to stop and talk with me?). So what could be a polite way to go for it?


texts: Concern about possible conflicts between research sharing policies

texts:
Funders, publishers, institutions and others are increasingly moving towards policies that are aimed at sharing research.

The degree of openness — and other stipulations in those policies — vary quite considerably, so some sort of conflict between policies of a researcher's institution, funder and publisher or between those of collaborators is to be expected.

How much should a researcher be worried about these sorts of conflicts?  Are there examples where sharing policies that differ have turned out to conflict in a way that actually inhibits the sharing that they were intended to enable?

This question was originally posted on the Open Science SE private beta, due to be closed tomorrow.


texts: Do universities mind study delay when reviewing your application?

texts:
I have been getting good grades for the last 1.5 years for my bachelor (physics), therefore I have been considering applying to a more renowned university for my masters.

Lately, I have also put more work in my honours programme because I really, really enjoy it - and I want to keep putting my time in it. However, the last couple of months I have noticed that is quite stressful to maintain my standards for grades while also putting time in honours, friends, fraternity, girlfriend, ... - it is so stressful I get really bad headaches when I do not relax enough.

Therefore, I am considering to follow one course less per quartile so I have more time to do other stuff, but can still maintain the grades. This means I will take 3.5 years to complete my bachelor, compared to the normal 3 years it takes.

Thus, my question; do universities take into account your study delay when reviewing your application?


texts: Should I refer to myself as a PhD candidate or a researcher as an author of a paper?

texts:
My paper was accepted in a reputed journal. As I have to submit an author biography, I was wondering whether I should refer to myself as a PhD candidate or better say a researcher?
I feel that a paper authored by a PhD candidate may not receive the same attention since some people would see students as not that competent yet.


texts:
I am a PG graduate working in an engineering college as an assistant professor. Currently I have got one and half year of experience in teaching.

How to become a reviewer for an engineering journal? Do I need to pay money for that? Or by publishing paper in that journal can I become a reviewer?


texts: How to cite "obvious" things or make them credible?

texts:
I'm writing my thesis and I want to emphasize that the importance of energy, especially electrical energy, has increased tremendously and we are living in an information era which is fueled by electrical energy.

How would I make this sound credible?


texts: Students not engaged at all - despite the efforts of their instructor

texts:
My institution moved all courses online this term. I spent a great amount of efforts:

Pre-recording 3 hours of lectures (accompanied by 2% weekly asynchronous quizzes on Moodle)
Holding two 1.5 hours of live Q&A sessions weekly on Zoom

However, the attendance of the Q&A sessions have been embarrassingly low (less than 30 out of 320 students). Although students attempt to follow the weekly lecture videos, the vast majority of them only do so about 1 or 2 days before the weekly quizzes are due.
Nonetheless, students simply just complain about the workload in general (not just because of this course, but for the accumulated required screen time from all other courses).
The end-or-semester course evaluation will start soon. While I am confident that I have done all I could have creating quality learning materials, I am pessimistic about that the majority of students might just put very negative comments just because they are not happy about all courses moved online, not because of my teaching quality.
Is this something I shall expect in this very difficulty time? To me, it is just unfair to receive evaluation from students who mostly do not even engage in the content in the first place.
Let me know how you folks think?


texts: Is just after your PhD a good time to switch your research area?

texts:
I am finishing my PhD soon. The area in which I pursued my PhD is very challenging as I was only able to publish couple of papers even after spending many years. I want to switch into other research are due these reasons

to attract more students
to be comfortable to do research (along with teaching, I should be able to do research)

Even though I like the research I am doing right now, I seem to be isolated in my university. If ten students join my university for a PhD, hardly one student takes this area. My research area is not like machine learning or deep learning etc, so researchers of my domain are also not that much interested in my work.

The thing is I can work different research area but: Is this the right time? I am heading to a post-doc and learning a new area will probably take several months. Although my switch is not 180 degree, I am still worried.


texts: When to take military service when applying for graduate school?

texts:
I'm an undergraduate student with two regular semesters left before graduating. I am required to serve in the Military and have two options regarding the timing of my service.

I can go into army before graduating. After serving for two year I would return for one semester, graduate, and then apply for graduate school.
I can graduate first and then go into the army.

The differences between two choices above are:

Applying as a undergrad student or not.
If I choose the latter one, I can audit graduate classes at my university.

And now I have to decide. Is there any difference between applying as an undergraduate and with bachelor's degree if there's some gap year?


texts: To what extent should I mention unpleasant undergraduate experience in a graduate school statement of purpose? (pure math)

texts:
I have not enjoyed my undergraduate math program, primarily because it is not challenging enough - not enough advanced courses offered, too few research opportunities, classes are just not at the level I feel they should be for junior-senior math majors. I am choosing to apply to grad schools (pure math) which I know have elite and challenging programs. I do not want to spend 5 years repeating this undergraduate experience. In the statement of purpose one is asked to explain why they are applying to the particular program. Should I mention this desire to have a more challenging, competitive environment, as compared to the undergraduate program, as a reason? I do have other substantial things I will write about, but I'm wondering if I should also mention this, as it is one of the main motivations I have for applying to the programs I am applying to.
Thanks.


texts: Should I index all the specific terms which are included in appendix?

texts:
I am writing my master thesis (Mathematics field) and I would like to know if I should index all the specific terms which are included in appendix.

Is it necessary?


texts: Can an international student gain admission to medical school in the USA?

texts:
I have been an international student in the US for quite a few years now (since 11th grade, 4 years to be exact), and I have always been interested in studying medicine in order to become a doctor. Since I am currently a college junior I feel the need to start preparing for the MCAT and Grad school. Alas, med school for international student in the US is pretty much impossible, every institution I've looked up required at least having the green card.

My question is, can I realistically aspire to become a doctor studying in the states as an international student ? or will I categorically need a green card ?

Is there a way designed for someone involved in my academic pursuits to get a green card (excluding the lottery due to statistics)? I've heard of program such as the DREAM act?


texts: How should I present my work to my advisor?

texts:
I am a master student, working on something on my own. One day I came up a new definition (My field is mathematics) of something. I am not sure if it is publishable or not (Not even sure if it works). So I decided to present my work to my thesis advisor to a look first (His field is related to my work).
But the question arises, should I finish my work first (This includes the background introduction, comparison with other definition, etc), or I just present my rough idea first (After all, it is just a definition, I just need to explain why it works)?
For the first approach, it sounds reasonable, but it may take longer time for my advisor to read, and may not worth the effort if it is not publishable. For second approach, it is quick, and the result is not worth trying, I can work on something else. The drawback is my advisor may not understand what I am doing.


texts: Can anyone provide insight on a Master's student struggling with research?

texts:
I just finished my first year of my Master's program in Atmospheric Sciences, and during this time I was a teaching assistant. Now that the summer has arrived, I'm starting as a research assistant with my advisor at the university I'm enrolled at, as well as a research assistant with a government organization. I'm currently working at this government organization, but I'm still getting paid equally between my two advisors.

Getting to the point, my research is a bit ambiguous at the moment. My advisor from my university doesn't have a clear project for me to work on, and my other advisor has provided some insight into what I can work on, but it isn't much better. I'm worried that the summer will be unproductive, and my chances of graduating on time (2 years total for me degree) will be put into jeopardy. Can anyone offer advice/insight into this? It would be greatly appreciated.


texts: Is it difficult to get admission to a phd in stem cell biology in Europe?

texts:
I am looking for a phd position in stem cell biology and have been trying very hard for the last 6 months in Germany or any European country. I have  tried to contact many professors via mail but have nothing by way of a good response.
I have a good academic record and score.

Can anyone please help me out how to best proceed or where I may be lacking in my method so far?


texts: Are there any area in arxiv without requiring endorsement?

texts: Are there any areas in arxiv to post without endorsement?


texts:
TL:DR version: I took some Coursera courses, I want to know how many credits they are worth by the institution backing it up (as well as how many credits a semester they offer, preferably, in the semester they offer that course).

Full version: I know title may be a little confusing so I will clarify.
I am applying for a Master's Degree program, and the pre-requisites include mathematical knowledge. I am an MD, so math is not a big part of my undergraduate program, however I work as a developer, and there I apply mathematical principles. For this course I need to prove my knowledge on the subjects of Probability and Statistics, Linear Algebra and Calculus so I contacted the institution and they told me I could study those subjects online via Coursera. I chose my courses and I am currently studying them.

However application period has already started, and as part of pre-requisites I gotta fill a form, and some fields are about ECTs in the already mentioned subjects. I asked the institution via email how would I fill these, and they told me I can specify the course duration (in hours) and also how many credits (hours) a semester is offered in that institution, in order for them to know how many credits (ECTs) are they worth.

In this situacion, how could I know could I know how many credits a course is worth in the institution that backs up that course in Coursera? and how could I know how many credits a semester it is worth?

Specific courses are (feel free to suggest better alternatives, since I don't have to complete them due the deadline, rather I have to compromise to take them):

Linear Algebra (Matrix algebra): https://www.coursera.org/learn/matrix-algebra-engineers

The three courses in this program (calculus, linear algebra): https://www.coursera.org/learn/linear-algebra-machine-learning

Probability and Statistics: https://www.coursera.org/learn/probability-statistics?


texts: What is the equivalent degree of MPhil in the American education system?

texts:
I am applying to some universities for a Ph.D. degree, and I have to list all the degrees I have earned or am expected to earn. One of such degrees is Mphil. However, it is not listed in the drop-down menu of options.

There are three options that I think could fit--'Other Doctoral(not Phd)', 'Other Doctorate', and 'Other Master'. Which one would be the correct option? 'Other Master'? Since Mphil stands for master of philosophy?


texts: Low undergrad GPA, how should I inform a tenure track faculty job search committee?

texts: I have a mediocre (3.3) GPA in undergrad due to illness (legit - I had to take a medical leave and was hospitalized), but I have great grades from my graduate institution.  I worry that search committees will not look highly upon my application.  As I would like to apply for these positions, so how should I tell the search committee why I did poorly in undergrad?


texts: Is it possible to have a career in academia and not be confident in their field of research?

texts:
I thought getting a PhD in my mechanical engineering field would lead in gaining confidence in the field. However, it became other way round. I am far less confident on my skills and knowledge than I was when I started my PhD.
I am well published in my research field, I have decent theoretical knowledge about my field. However, I am not confident. I often hesitate with my answer, even though I know I am right.
I get afraid before starting a new project and technique even though I am sure that I can acquire new skillsets easily.
Self doubts is a recurring theme during all research endeavors. When I feel low confidence, I also start to regret my decisions to be in academia and pursue masters and PhD.
Does anyone else get this feeling? How to cope up? Can I find a place in academia with this issue?


texts: Phone contact after no response from scientific collaborator?

texts: I have a scientific collaboration with a senior scientist from a University in Europe. He agreed to work with me on the project and our roles were defined in the process(only supervision and minimal interaction from his side and active contribution from my side). Emails were received regularly from his side till December 22nd (prior to the holidays). After the holidays (on January 8th) I sent him the work that we agreed upon and he has to verify my conclusions and let me know whether I can proceed forward.  Yesterday I emailed him  inquiring whether his busy schedule has prevented him from responding to my document. Should I assume there is no further interest from his side or can I call him to find out what his thought process is ?


texts: Is it acceptable to email the author of a paper that you cannot follow?

texts:
I am reading a paper that I find very hard to follow.

This is partially due to my lack of experience in the subfield, but also I think because the paper is unclearly written.

Is it acceptable for me to email the writer of the paper, and ask for explanations of basic concepts in the paper? i.e. I would ask for things that I think could have been explained more clearly.


texts: Does being an older PhD applicant for U.S. universities mean there is less chance to be accepted with funding?

texts:
I have heard this idea many times.

So, is there any truth to it?

Does an older applicant, say, 10 years older than the typical undergraduate, with equally impressive qualifications, get accepted to PhD positions in American universities without funding?

If so, what is the reasoning behind this decision?

If this idea has some truth to it, wouldn't it be age discrimination?


texts: Does applying for a Masters at a school when also applying for a PhD look bad?

texts: I want to go to graduate school for a PhD, but as a safety I'm also considering applying to master programs in the same or related field, if my undergraduate credentials are not strong enough for top programs. Would applying to the masters program where I am also applying for a PhD send the wrong message to the school though, that I'm not sure if I want to do this for a full PhD or not? Or do they understand that people apply to masters program as a back up for if someone's PhD applications don't go well?


texts: How to deal with a supervisor who doesn't care research and students?

texts: I'm in the social science discipline. This is the fourth year of my PhD. I'm in the process of writing up my dissertation. However, my supervisor is very lay back. He doesn't care much about my research. On average, it took 2 weeks for me to receive his feedback, but, sometimes, his feedback was not constructive. He often forgot what he said before and contradicted himself. I am very emotionally stressed. I hope to defend my thesis successfully and soon, but I don't see that happening. Any idea about how should I deal with him?


texts: Applying for PHD programs in FLORIDA. I have a question about legal questions?

texts:
On an application form for PhD programs in Florida, they ask:

"Have you recieved disciplinary action?"
"Have you ever been arrested for, been convicted of, or entered a plea of "guilty" or "nolo contendre" (No contest) to a crime (excluding traffic offenses not involving death or serious bodily injury), or been adjudicated or required to register as a sex offender?

My friend that is asking was arrested for DUI (driving under the influence) with serious body injury. She is not sure if that is a Traffic Offense or a Criminal Offense.

Has anyone else experienced, or have good information pertaining to this question?


texts: How to answer question about funding a project

texts:
On some project grant applications, one gets a question on something along the lines of: "If you are unsuccessful in your application for this funding round, how do you plan on funding this project?"

How should I answer this? Seems like some kind of catch-out question.


texts: I am going to apply for a Postdoc position which starts six month later. I am a postdoc in institute A and have new grant in institute B to start in upcoming month. Can I put this position and grant in my CV? Since I have not started that yet.


texts: Should I ask my supervisor before adding a spin to the project I was assigned, or go ahead and try to make it work?

texts:
I am a volunteer intern (funds are frozen for uni research assistants due to the pandemic) on a CV/ML project. Awhile back, I was assigned to detect and label moving objects in a video. After doing extensive research, I figured out that predicting, rather than only detecting their movement would be more precise and better in the long run.
I have done tons of research and came up with an approach toward it, and I am fully committed to this now.
The project was assigned by one of my supervisor's PhD students and I haven't spoken to my actual supervisor all summer.
Should I: (a) go ahead with the project and send him my final work when I come up with a viable solution and potentially the abstract for the paper,
(b) email him and ask him if I can move forward with this approach.
Either way, the idea I have and this area is super interesting and has research potential. If he said no, I'd probably explore it independently anyways. Only labeling the data also isn't useful experience for me, as I want to go to grad school. I was told research assistants you shouldn't be afraid to advocate  for what they want, and this is an area I am highly interested in - and I believe it will still benefit them.


texts: I changed a word from a source, how do I cite it correctly?

texts:
I'm writing an analytical summary on Meditation II of Descartes from the compendium we have been given at school. We have been told to use this as our main source. Nevertheless, there is this specific part in section 12 of that meditation which I don't quite agree with:

  [...] something extended, flexible and movable.

As per Marleen Rozemond in Descartes' Dualism [Source] in page 93, this is a poor translation.

The reason I looked this up was because the word didn't quite fit the context, and then I saw other people had translated it as mutable, which is also a correct translation for the french/latin word.

Complaining about the poor translation in the summary makes little sense to me, as it's not part of the context, and I have a limitation of 600 words to care about. Nevertheless, I am citing from the source of a document which uses the "movable" word instead of the "mutable" word.

How should I approach this? Should I make a postdata explaining why I have done what I did?

For reference, I am using the APA referencing style.


texts: Formatting of images for publication with Matlab

texts: I'm currently working on my first publication and heard from a colleague that the images must have precisely the same font size as the article's font. She told me that Origin could adjust this. Unfortunately, she works with Origin and I with Matlab, so that she cannot tell me how I can set this up with Matlab. Can someone give me a tip or an excellent workflow to create pictures that can be published with Matlab?


texts: Asking for extension in submission of revision

texts:
I submitted a paper to one of Elsevier journals. It got major revision and the submission time given to me was two months. Now the time is very near (10 days) and I think I cannot complete all changes to be incorporated. I asked for extension in due date of submission through editorial system using my login. Even after 4 days, there is no response. I am confused what should I do?
Is the deadline really hard and if I submit after a week or so, it will be rejected?


texts: How important are recommendation letters when applying to a PhD in Germany?

texts:
I am planning on applying to a PhD in engineering in Germany (either by contacting a group, which I will prioritize, or through a normal application at the graduate school).
The problem I currently face is finding good referees (by good, I mean respectable h-indices, for example).
For those acquainted with German academia: How much weight is put on the recommendation letters and, more importantly, the referrers when reviewing an application for a PhD position (more, or less, than in the US)?
For instance, if you had to rank these factors:

Letters of recommendation
Transcripts
Publications/internships
Statement of purpose

Where would the letters of recommendation be positioned?


texts: How to cite or refer to programming codes in a non Computer Science Master's Thesis?

texts:
I am writing my Thesis in finance field and I am using Machine learning methods. Therefore, I wrote many Python and R scripts for collecting data, cleaning it and applying some statstics.

should I reference my own code that I wrote? if yes can you please tell me how?
should I reference all the libraries that I've used during my work?

Thanks


texts: How to describe a previous uncompleted PhD on postdoc applications?

texts:
I am currently completing a PhD studentship, and I'm aiming to complete by the end of the year. After this, I'm looking for a postdoc position in academia or industry. At the moment I'm working on my CV and applications.

One thing I'm unsure about is how to describe my previous research experience. Specifically, I previously (around 11 years ago) took part in a PhD program, but unfortunately did not complete it.

My question is, how should I describe that time period (4 years) on the CV / applications?

Be honest, call it a PhD studentship, but don't list it on my completed education/qualifications (the implication being that it wasn't completed).
Give a vague position title (e.g. 'scientist') - not technically untrue - and be prepared to answer questions in the interview about what that actually means.
Give a specific position title (e.g. RA) - less honest, but less likely to invite questions.

Which approach would be best? I would prefer not to have to highlight this with potential employers, if possible, but I also don't want to be dishonest on my applications. As a potential employer, which would be the lesser of the evils to you? Would you be more likely to throw out a CV at the shortlisting stage based on a historic uncompleted PhD?

For context, I have other research experience and fairly extensive lab skills. I also have various outputs including (mostly middle authorship) papers, talks and posters and have won competitive prizes and travel awards. I will also hope to publish at least one first author original research paper on my PhD work.


texts: How acceptable are the outputs of automatic LaTeX converters for journals with LaTeX requirement?

texts:
Is there anybody there, who uses this combination as the pipeline of document production in his/her work? IF so what are the common bugs/imperfection that one should expect.

From a latex-noob point of view, it seems faster and easier to work(collaborate) on a paper in Microsoft Word (For months) and then use a plugin or some other quick converter to make it into a latex on the last week(ideally a day) if there exist a smooth conversion tool to get to .tex format?

a reliable/acceptable converting should address the journal template/format, tables, table of content, footnotes, margins, figures, equations and bibliography. Is there a bulletproof conversion out there, and if not why?


texts: Too much review time and the related actions

texts: We have submitted an article in a finance journal ( ABDC rank A) more than one year ago. After around 6 months they sent us the review of two reviewers where one reviewer reject the paper with few correction suggestions and another gave relatively good comments with additional correction suggestions. Hence the editor asked for revise and resubmission and also mention that if we comply with the reviewer's comments, he will personally read that article. Accordingly, we revise and resubmit that paper. It has been 7 months since our resubmission and they still do not give any feedback. Since I am a Ph.D. student, such a long review process is hurting my Ph.D. process. Can anyone suggest me what should be my action in this regard? Should I send the editor an email? If the editor does not respond even after that email, should I withdraw that paper from that journal?


texts: Why can Oxford or Dublin (Trinity College) graduates be admitted to the equivalent Cambridge degree?

texts:
What links Cambridge with Trinity College Dublin? I know

Oxford and Cambridge are frequently lumped together as Oxbridge,

Oxford and Cambridge each have a college called "Trinity College".

Degrees under Statute B II 2 | Student Registry

Under Statute B II 2, the M.A. degree may be conferred on Heads and Fellows of Colleges, University officers, and senior staff of the University Press or Cambridge Assessment if they are not already Cambridge graduates. Graduates of the Universities of Oxford or Dublin (Trinity College) may be admitted to the equivalent Cambridge degree instead of the M.A.
Degrees under Statute B II 2 are full degrees conferring the same rights as the equivalent degrees by examination, i.e. permanent membership of the Senate with its associated privileges and entitlement to submit work for other degrees such as the Ph.D. under Special Regulations or for Higher Doctorates such as the Litt.D. or Sc.D. They are not titular ‘honorary degrees’ (which are awarded by a different process).


texts: How much theory should be given in article?

texts:
I have created a software and the assisting methodology for its application to some kinetic studies. I used a lot of theory. E.g., I used kinetic model, reactor model, data analysis (about 7 methods to analyse the results totally). Now I have prepared an article where I report this methodology and demonstrate the results of its application.

How much theory should I include into the article? Can I only refer to other publications/books for the models/methods proposed earlier?

I have seen many publications where a part of theory is taken out from the main text to appendices (example with 5 appendices). In some journals appendices are not included into the article (supplementary, accessible online-only). Is it a good solution to include some theory in appendices? If yes, how many appendices would be OK (i.e., would the reader like the article with 7 appendices? As for me, I do not have anything against many appendices).


texts: Does it make sense to pay tuition fees for a PhD degree?

texts:
Some Ph.D. programs charge tuition fees. Others are competitive.
Does a Ph.D. done by paying tuition fees have the same gravity as a Ph.D. done on stipend when it comes to an academic career?
When does it really make any sense to pursue a Ph.D. by paying tuition fees?


texts: Getting back into academia after years in industry

texts:
What aspects of one's resume will a faculty hiring committee care about for a candidate who was gone from academia for a decade, but has done good research during that time, including publishing a few papers?

I have always been told that if you get out of academia, getting back in is really challenging. After a postdoc, I spent 11 years in industry and consulting work. I worked on a lot of research topics in that time, but they produced only a couple of papers. I'm currently clearing out my publishing pipeline, and should be able to get a few single-author papers out of that, given a year or two of work. If I apply for a position at a top academic institution after getting those papers published, realistically how hard will the "gap" in my academic work be scrutinized by the hiring committee?


texts: Is there any concept of working paper in science and engineering?

texts: I have come across working papers in economics. I have seen 'papers in progress' listed on some researchers website but have never seen the idea of working paper as is common in economics. Just curious if this is practiced in some sub branch or was used at some point of time in history.


texts: Negotiating 1-year delay to my Assistant Professor Offer

texts: Recently I was offered an assistant professor position at a major R1 university. My problem is that I need to stay one more year in my home country due to Fulbright 2-year home residency requirement. I will apply for a waiver but just in case I'd like to negotiate the possibility of one year later start date. The department head is aware that there might be some delays due to legal issues, but I did not want to bring these procedures before signing the contract. It is my dream job at my dream college and I can be of a good asset to the department. How do you think I should approach negotiating and communicating this situation in a respective manner? Thanks!


texts: What should I do if the first author wants me to write the whole paper?

texts:
I have finished three years of work in a Ph.D. program. I've published one conference paper as sole author, and have recently sent out another paper to a prestigious conference.

I started a project last October with a professor who does not have anything to do with my dissertation. He asked me early on to do a lot of work so I asked him who is the first author, and he said he would be. I've already written the full literature review for this journal paper, and came up with the framework by myself. He has only advised me on it.

Now, I have a clear idea about my dissertation, and I have to write my proposal and defend it this fall. So, the work with this professor is rather burdensome to me right now. So far, he has not worked on it at all. I've written six or seven out of the 15 pages of the journal paper. The main thing left is data analysis. He wants me to do the data analysis and write it up as well, and recently he also asked me to write introduction of the paper. At this point, I thought, he wants me to write the whole paper, which he can edit at the last moment and become first author.

Since this paper does not have anything to do with my dissertation, I do not want to work with this paper anymore. I told him I am busy with my own research, it seems like that he will wait until I finish writing the paper.

What should I do? I do not want to cut the relationship but he is asking too much which I think is unethical. Any strategic advice will be appreciated.

UPDATE:
I talked to the professor and said there must have been misunderstanding about the responsibilities as a second author in my part and as a first author in his part. I said that I understood that writing literature review will meet the responsibility as a second author.

His brief comment on the e-mail was that he wrote a conference paper already, and this journal paper (that I'm working on) is a developed version of the conference paper. So, he did the major work already for the conference paper that is why he is the first author. And he stated that I am supposed to write a literature review and to do the data analysis for this journal paper.

OK. He has integrity in his position. I remember that he said something like this when we started this paper 10 months ago. But the problem was that his position was not re-enforced again, and the lit review I've done took off to a different terain. That means, I did a lot of creative interpretation of the framework. (Sorry, to technical folks. This is social science study using business management theories. The upfront literature review is very significant. My dissertation uses machine learning and NLP stuff. yes, this paper is unrelated with my dissertation).

Anyway, the reason I'm writing this update is to provide the professor's perspective that I've got to learn recently. So the major lesson I've learn through this experience is to keep reinforcing (in emails) about my understanding of my and his responsibilities on this project.


texts: Should a young professor avoid using dating apps?

texts:
I am a recent PhD graduate in mathematics, and I will be starting a tenure-track position this fall at a small liberal arts college in a northern US city.

My graduate degree was completed at a large university in a college town, and I made occasional use of dating apps during my time there.  They were only mildly useful at best, but they facilitated interaction with people outside my normal social circle, which I enjoyed.

My instinct tells me that I should avoid such apps in my new position, but I'd like to seek outside opinions.  I already have some of my own ideas, but what are some potential pitfalls of maintaining dating app profiles?  Should I simply refrain from using them?  Would anyone in my department or administration have a problem with me using them if they knew?

Since it might matter, I am a 27-year-old male, and my new city is home to about 100,000 people.

Note: I am well-aware that dating students at my university is a bad idea.  (For what it's worth, I am not interested in meeting people more than three or four years younger than me anyway.)  I'm looking for advice that goes beyond some of the more obvious points.


texts: When does the co-authorship line end for a PI's data

texts:
As I understand it, in the engineering field, the person who has research money and/or a project that leads to the collection of data, is put on research papers that directly use that data.  I guess the most common of this is for PHD students whose advisors funding or project is the reason they have data.

I am curious about when this ends in regards to collaboration.  If one person gets a project and funding and collaborates with a different lab/department/professor/researcher and through this, gives a portion of the funding to that person or place, what is the convention for authorship?  Does the PI of the project go on all papers that use the data, or only papers they directly do with their own staff/students?


texts: How is the "special aptitude for in-depth independent scientific work" proven if the professor candidate does not have a doctorate?

texts:
My PhD is almost finished (writing last paper of the cumulative dissertation) and I have applied for a full W2 professorship at a German university of applied sciences .

I have been invited by the appointment committee to give a lecture. However, I was informed that I would only be shortlisted if I can demonstrate a “special aptitude for in-depth independent scientific work” (German: “besondere Befähigung zu vertiefter selbstständiger wissenschaftlicher Arbeit”). It is required by all German higher education laws (e.g. §25 NHG).
The request was made by HR relayed through the committee as far as I can tell.
(I am a German citizen, so this is not visa-related.)

How do I show this without a doctorate? My list of publications is comparatively extensive for a doctoral candidate.


texts: Why would an academic write a textbook for free?

texts:
Recently, I became aware of a Java programming textbook
Introduction to Programming Using Java, Seventh Edition
which is to my surprise, free as in:

  The most recent version of this book is always available, at no charge, for downloading and for on-line use.

Question: Why would the author (David J. Eck) make this textbook free?

I have found that almost always,
authors of academic textbooks prefer to make money
from sales of their textbooks,
rather than writing a textbook which is available freely without cost.
(I don't have any statistics to back up this assertion.
However, throughout my undergrad and my PhD studies,
in about 95% of the courses which I took,
the prescribed textbook was published by an academic publisher such as
McGraw-Hill, Pearson or Springer.)

Closely related question:
Massimo Ortolano
claims in this comment that most authors would not be able to make much money
from sales of academic textbooks they have written.
Can someone give me an estimated amount of earnings per textbook sold?


texts: What is a cv including the marks obtained in BSc and MSc?

texts: I don't know if they are asking my GPA or a list of grades and courses. Yes, I am applying somewhere where they asked for a "CV including the marks obtained in BSc and MSc".


texts: Professor stopped responding to emails suddenly. What should I do?

texts: I am an MS student in France. It is commonplace here to seek out professors from other universities or scientists at research centres to do the MS thesis under them, which is usually during the final semester. So, I reached out to a professor at a US university to carry out my thesis under him. I attached a motivation letter, CV and transcript with the initial email. I also mentioned that I have a scholarship and will not require funding. I heard back on the same day from him and he thanked me for my interest in his research. He said he would like to know a bit more about what I am proposing and went on to ask me about the duration of my thesis, the thesis requirements from my university and what I planned to do following graduation. He ended the email saying he was looking forward to our discussion. I responded to the email within two hours but he never replied. I waited a week to send him another email but he did not respond to that as well. It has been one week since. I do not know what to make of the situation. Is it appropriate to send him another email after a week? I don't understand why he would lose interest all of a sudden when he already had a chance to not respond after looking at my CV?


texts: Asking for recommendation letter before beginning internship

texts:
I will be going for my undergraduate thesis under a professor (at a different institute than my home university) in May 2018. I will work with him from May - December 2018. I plan to apply to graduate school (for my masters) for fall 2019, so applications will be done around November 2018.

Since some professors have different policies of writing recommendations for students (for some 6 months is a short time of work to write a good letter, some have other conditions), I am thinking about asking the professor whether he would be willing to write recommendation letters for my applications during November, provided of course he is satisfied with my work.

I thought this would be better to get out of the way beforehand, so that he will know that I am willing to do substantial work during this time, and am willing to take on as much work as he feels is necessary to do before he can write a strong recommendation letter. This will also help me strategise for graduate school admissions and prevent me from being put on the spot if he refuses to write a recommendation in November.

Is this (asking about recommendation beforehand) a standard practice? I feel he shouldn't mind because I am trying to cover all my bases and plan for my future. I feel it will be better for the both of us if we agree on all such conditions beforehand.


texts: Writing a "recommendation letter" for a supervisor from a student?

texts:
As a thank you to my thesis supervisor, I would like to write some sort of letter expressing my gratitude for the work he has done for me.

I was wondering if students ever write letters in such a way that they can be used by professors as a sort of "reference" letter when applying for jobs or teaching grants. For reference, my supervisor is a Senior Lecturer at a university in the Australian system. Would a letter like this be appreciated? What should it look like?


texts: Exam requires self-imposing a time limit: what should I do when others are likely to use more time?

texts:
I am enrolled in an upper level STEM class.
My teacher has recently announced that we have a "downloadable" midterm. The midterm is not officially timed, and we have a week to submit it, and there is no way the teacher can track how much time we have used. Now, in class and in a clarification request, it was stated that we have a total time to "work on it" for 3 hours tops, even though we can "look at it" for longer.
I have no clue how to deal with this. A good number of my (normally obsessive/honor code) friends have already told me that they will use more time than what is officially allowed to work on the exam. Based on the sample I've conducted with the people in my year in the class, I would say its highly likely at least 50% are planning on using more time than allowed.
Ngl [not going to lie], I've had to deal with "other people using more than they should be" for at least two of my classes (all of which are online) this semester and I don't want to deal with it in a third. I'm frustrated.
Is there anything I can do?

Solutions I consider:

Students protesting — I don't think anyone is being obsessive about
this mess apart from me.

Confronting the teacher myself — for one thing, I'm not sure if I
am liked by this person (LOL) but I'm guessing if I say "yo there
are students planning on cheating", this person will simply send out
an email stating "don't cheat" to the class.

Notes:

The people in the class of my year already know about all this mess of a situation because I discussed the strange rules in our group chat, so I suspect if the professor sends out an email I can be immediately linked as "the person who prompted the kerfuffle".  also I'll be known as the rat. I don't care too much about my reputation, but nonetheless this isn't super pleasant. I probably shouldn't have done this, I see now that it is kind of coming back to bite.

Certain details have been changed or obfuscated to avoid identification.

I'm estimating likelihood of cheating based on an informal "poll" I gave in a high-effort group chat; to get a picture of this group, its a bunch of overachieving underclassmen who I don't think would ever cheat in normal circumstances. I have evidence of intention to cheat, I am not willing to submit it to my teacher.

What I would hope from my teacher would be that the "time cap" of 3 hours would be removed; this obviously is going to get violated anyway.

I specifically asked the professor whether we "must not" spend more than 3 hours on the test; he confirmed that 3 hours is a hard limit.

The class is graded on a curve.

What I'm probably gonna do:
I don't think I should contact the professor directly, mostly because I think this person doesn't like me that much. I think my solution is just going to be to email this person anonymously and express that I have concretely seen evidence of people intending to cheat, though I'm not ratting out any fellow students, and I'll request that the time limit is lifted.


texts: Expiration of accreditation of the program

texts: In the university Master degree transcript, if it is written that accreditation of program is valid until Jan 10, 2016, then what does that imply?


texts: What does an optimal grading distribution look like?

texts:
Researchers on education must have thought about this, so I hope to find some directions here. Suppose that I am grading students on a scale from 1 to 10. If I have no prior knowledge of the ability of the students but have obtained their test scores (let's say from 1 to 100).

Suppose these test scores have only ordinal meaning. A student with a higher score can be said to have achieved better mastery of the course but having double the score does not mean that one has achieved double as much as another student. We may also assume that a (statistically speaking) large number of students representative of the student population took the exam.

What should be the optimal grading distribution?

We may also assume that the grading distribution/scale should achieve two goals: a) it should be informative about student's grasp of the material, b) it should incentivize students to study the material.

Regarding a) from an information theory perspective, we may want to maximize the information (entropy) of the grade distribution. Thus, we would choose a scale which yields a uniform distribution. However, in practice most teachers implement distributions which are peaked. What is the motivation behind this?


texts: Does a low acceptance rate imply quality?

texts: I am presenting a paper in a conference with a 20% acceptance rate. However the conference is just 3 years old and does not figure in the tiered rating system for conferences in my field Computer Science (that some universities use) . Recently I found out that another reputed international conference (that figures in the conference rankings) has almost double the acceptance rate. Did I make the right choice. How should I evaluate conferences in the future??


texts: In a research paper, is it acceptable to include expletives in the results of a text analysis?

texts: Currently, I am doing a research paper and as a result from my text analysis, I found a record which contains a (*UCK) word. Is it ethical if I submit it as it is to a conference? Hereby in the image (in the third record)


texts: Drifting away from the "boring" slide in the conference

texts:
I am not a fan of heavy/text-infested slides and hope my audience also second my opinion. I did resort to the healthy image-text ratio in most of the slides and am relying on my speaking skills during my first presentation! In this context, how should he/she adapt himself to suit the interest of audience,dynamically? If I realize that a couple of sides have turned out to be cumbersome or "boring"**, how should I seamlessly switch over to the next section and regain the lost interest.

**boring = Many example slides are available as follows :

Example 1 :Slide which talks about the approach of simulation, when actually results of the simulation are the "meat" of the talk.
Example 2(The first few slides of the talk)

Hypothetical Talk : Thumbdrives have changed the world, Jan 2003
Motivation Slide, 1 : End of the road for Floppy Disks(3 Bullets)
Motivation Slide, 2 : The Storage Roadmap(Image), the arise of the
PenDrive(3 Bullets)
The News Slide,   3 : Ascend,ManDisk and Watergate 3 News Clippings + 3 Images
The Cool Feature, 4 : Pendrives = 1K X Floppy Disks, they are Reusable CDs
Paper Starts    , 5 : How I used the cool features efficiently to build something
even cooler?


texts:
I just received the following comment from an Elsevier editor "The manuscript does not reach the required quality standard of this journal.". To my mind say just that or nothing is pretty much the same considering the minimum requirements for data openness and transparency.
there is already a good explanation of the submission process here:
what does the typical workflow of a journal look like
However, as an automated process, is prone to flaws as well as to improvements.
And does not explain in detail the received comment stated above.
Any thoughts on deciphering the comment stated above are greatly appreciated.
thank you
EDIT:
When I posted this question I forgot to add an essential and relevant fact to this conversion, which is: many and many scientific researchers don't have the opportunity to develop their research works in a team or even do it collaboratively. They have to rely on themselves to present their findings and defend their thesis. And everyone here is acquainted with the syndrome of  "tunnel effect" when writing. So having someone, that can give a small contribution to unlocking someone else research writing, I see as a welcoming behavior that can only benefit the scientific community at the individual level.


texts: Master's at Undergrad University Then Pursue PhD Elsewhere

texts: My university has a 5 year BS/MS degree for mathematical sciences and I am graduating a year early, so I can do the BS/MS in only 4 years. I am considering applying to PhD programs at other universities after I complete my MS. Do PhD programs want students right out of undergrad? Or will I be at an advantage showing that I can take grad courses (assuming I do well)


texts: Is a self-taught person allowed to compete with other in a prize like Nobel Prize, Field Medal, etc?

texts:
If a person studies and/or does experiments at his/her own home or laboratory because of some reasons, is he/she still allowed to compete with others to get a prize like Nobel Prize, Field Medal, etc?

More precisely, from the beginning he/she never gets educations from formal institutions (schools, colleges, universities).


texts: Is it crazy for a PhD student to pay open access fees out of pocket?

texts:
I was preparing to submit a manuscript to a journal when I made a fatal realization: the journal publishes everything as open access and the author(s)/institution/funding agency must cover the cost ($500). This was a solo side project that I undertook on my own time with no co-authors nor outside funding. I was not expecting to publish this as open access as I was unaware of this policy. In fact, when I initially targeted this journal I thought that some articles were open access and others were not. Upon further inspection this is not the case. I'm clearly at fault for not being diligent enough about the journal's policies.

Now this situation would not be such a big deal except that

I'm a third year doctoral student and will be on the job market soon (I need pubs ASAP!);
I was planning on submitting this article and subsequently switching my focus to the dissertation;
It would take a significant re-work to tailor this paper to another journal as it is somewhat niche: the journal focuses on software publications across a range of disciplines, requires a fairly specific format, and limits articles to 3,000 words or fewer (note: I am not in a traditional STEM field, so I feel that my options for target journals are quite limited).

Am I crazy for wanting to just submit the paper and pay the open access fee out of pocket? $500 does not seem exorbitant compared to other journals' fees. Unrelated to my current situation, a few weeks ago I spoke with my advisor about creative ways to fund open access, but he stated that our university does not have options for funding - this must come through grants. It doesn't seem right asking him to cover the fees as he was not involved in the project and is not a co-author.

In this question, @ff524 suggests seeking funding through PLOS or a fee waiver through the journal/publisher. Other questions on Academia SE result in answers suggesting that authors request funds through the university, library, etc. When is it appropriate to ask for a waiver and/or seek funding from an outside source? Prior to submission, during submission, or after a paper is accepted? It seems like a massive waste of time to seek funding from multiple sources only to have a paper be rejected outright. At the same time, it would seem like withholding relevant information to wait until after a paper is accepted to ask for a fee waiver.


texts: Is it possible to upload expository papers to arXiv?

texts: I would like to know if arXiv allows authors to upload expository papers (for example, a paper in which the author explains a specific topic). If this is the case, how should those papers be written? And will they be automatically moved to the General Mathematics section?


texts:
I am a biostatistics postdoctoral student. I recently participated in a coding festival and our work was published in F1000Research (https://f1000research.com/).

In your opinion, should I include this publication in my CV along with more typical peer-reviewed papers? Similarly, what are the pros and cons of adding this to my CV?

Thank you for sharing your thoughts!


texts: Acknowledgment and authors in article based on PhD thesis

texts:
A friend of mine finished his PhD and joined our group, on a project closely related to his PhD work. After three months, we submitted an article which includes significant  amount of work from his thesis and also the work done the last three months in our group.

But his PhD supervisor got angry and said he can not add any other author except himself and he demanded that the acknowledgment should only be based on funding information which he will provide.

The article includes some experimental work which was conducted by my friend after joining our group. We offered the professor to add his and our both funding acknowledgment, but he did not agree.

Is he right in his demands?

Moreover, my friend said his supervisor rejected the publication draft by saying it’s not worthy to be published.


texts: Can one get a second Master's degree in a related field (biochemistry, bioinformatics)?

texts: If one has already got a Master’s degree in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, can he/she apply to the Masters’ Program in Bioinformatics at another university in another country?


texts: Any tips for preventing perfectionism when it comes to notetaking?

texts:
This is a slightly seperate question from before.
I was curious on hearing any tips from the community regarding: Preventing perfectionism when it comes to notetaking?
It can be trying to make the notes look perfect (aesthetically + information-wise it troubles me not understanding a couple of key points after having written a bunch of notes down and I'm reviewing them).
I don't do color-coding and doodles, but I like underlining key parts of my notes a bit too much.
I feel like it's all about having this nice condensed packet of beautifully written notes for future review, which is wrong. I know some people will address how this is not a good way to get information in my brain and I agree you should address that, but also please address the perfectionism aspect of my notes because I will still have to take notes in life anyways and that is why I'm asking this question
This is tied to preventing perfectionism in general I guess too.
Note: I wouldn't say I have OCD as I'm not at that level in other aspects of life or to an extent in academics, but still it is a 'perfectionist attitude' or 'minimalistic, beautiful notes', etc


texts: Confusing article status for journals of American Mathematical Society: "reviewing" AND "being handled by an editor"

texts:
The web page of my article in the AMS editorial system for some three months says "Article status: Reviewing" and in the next line "Your paper is being handled by an editor". I find this confusing as the "reviewing" status appears to suggest that the article is with the referee(s) rather than with the editor but this in turn seems to contradict the line "Your paper is being handled by an editor".

Could someone with enough experience with AMS journals please explain how should one interpret the combination of "Article status: Reviewing" and the line "Your paper is being handled by an editor" at the article page?
More broadly, which are the possible article statuses in the AMS editorial system?

Many thanks in advance.


texts: Finding a self-funded research internship for summer (international student) - any strategies?

texts:
I have read several questions for this topic, and haven't found one which is comprehensive enough for me and has all this factors that are unique to my case. I have won a special grant from an educational fund and now I can do a self-funded research internship in US. I am a third year undergraduate student majoring in Electrical and Computer Engineering. The biggest struggle to date is to find a good lab and professor to work with. The process of looking up labs and researchers is time-consuming, and my emails rarely get responses. If you can kindly describe some strategies that might help me accelerate the process.

By the way, I want to do research in Computer Vision and/or AI and human interaction. If you have any suggestions for labs or professors, who are doing interesting and relevant work in these fields, can you please write them down?

Additionally, I wanted to ask whether it is acceptable to call professor's office and ask to read my emails, if they do not respond. Will it be considered rude?


texts: What is the meaning of 'under review' after making a minor revision?

texts: Last week I received a minor revision decision letter from a journal's editor. I made revisions in accordance with the reviewers' comments and resubmit the manuscript to the ScholarOne system. And now the status still is 'under review'. I wonder whether it means the resubmitted manuscript is now reviewed by external reviewers, or by the editors.


texts: Three month delay in reviewing the revision of paper, Editor doesn't even answer the email

texts:
I've submitted a paper in an ISI journal, i.e. in Taylor and Francis. The first submission date of the manuscript was 30-May-2014. We received the first revision result on 27-July-2014. Hopefully, the result of reviewing our paper was optimistic as the paper status was accept with change; we had only some minor comments. We submitted the answer of revision on 15 Aug. They didn't reply our revision yet.

So, I've sent an e-mail to the  Editor in chief, but he didn't even reply our email.
The handling editor identity is not available for us. What is your proposal in this case?


texts: What is (S’73-M’76-SM’81-F’87) in author biography?

texts:
What does (S’73-M’76-SM’81-F’87) mean in author biography. I am writing a paper and the format given for author biography also include a must fill entry: (S’73-M’76-SM’81-F’87). I tried to Google it and I can see many similar entries in authors biographies in published papers.

Can someone please help me about how to fill up the field (S’73-M’76-SM’81-F’87) for myself?


texts: How does your institution credit a department's support of, and participation in, interdisciplinary programs?

texts:
In these lean economic times, traditional majors are in danger of being cut if they cannot keep up their numbers (at least in many small liberal arts colleges). Simultaneously, interdisciplinary programs and majors requiring the substantial support of traditional disciplines may be a way to diversify an institution's student base.

Assuming that departments are generally not healthiest as purely "service departments", it behooves us to find ways to support the traditional majors while encouraging vigorous participation in the development of interdisciplinary programs.

My question is this:

  How does your institution handle the "major count" problem for departments contributing substantially to interdisciplinary programs and yet want to retain their traditional major? A bit more specifically, if major X is interdisciplinary, but requires substantial contribution from several upper-level (content near the level of major) courses from traditional department Y, at your institution how is Y credited its support of X in a way that preserves the major of department Y? I am interested in specific policies regarding everything from faculty load to administrative assessment of the health of a department.

Broadly, I am asking about administrative resource allocation policies that maximize diversity in the sense of preserving the identities of traditional disciplines while encouraging truly interdisciplinary efforts.

Apologies if this question is rough. I am certainly willing to sharpen it, if needed.


texts: how to share to mention/publish large datasets?

texts:
When writting an article with outputs (by outputs I mean a big dataset created), how do you share them?

Do you ask the readers to contact the main author? Should I pput them in a university website?


texts: How to evaluate the quality of a conference that has a high ERA ranking, but whose organizer has a lot of negative reviews online?

texts:
In Australia we follow something known as the ERA ranking, when submitting papers to journals and conferences. My lab stresses publication in venues which are graded as only A or A(star), as per this system ( ERA-A increases possibilities of funding). In the area of biomedical engineering there is a specific conference which I found is ranked as ERA-A. Not a lot of international biomedical conferences are ERA A-ranked.

The problem is I found a lot of negative reviews about the conference organizers online and therefore am skeptical about sending my paper there. Yet, I also know that an ERA-A rank publication very early in my doctoral program can make a good impact on the committee, when my doctoral assessment review comes up later this year. Moreover, this will release some pressure/tension in terms of the doctoral review and I could go on to work on larger targets without worrying about the doctoral assessment ( since it would be considered good progress if I can show an ERA-A paper in the first year of my program).

However much I try, I have failed to understand how this conference gets a top australian rank, when there are so many negative things said online about these conference organizers. One possibility, is that this particular conference is the only one which may be famous. The other is a lot australian academics might have been ranking it as ERA-A. But if so, why only Australia? What does the rest of the world say? The third possibility is that the online reviews are dubious claims made to malign the organisation.

How to evaluate the quality of a conference like this?


texts: How to correct errors in proofs of an accepted paper

texts:
I have a paper which has accepted in a journal published by Springer.

Today I have received the proofs from the production team. After checking the proofs carefully, we have detected some typos and minor errors in equations and data. To correct them we must change something in some equations and values of the parameters and these corrections do not effect to the results of the papers. On other words, the paper is still exact with the corrections.

My question is that what should I do to make the corrections?


texts: Student asks TA if his result (figure) is correct

texts:
I'm TAing a class that uses Piazza (an online student forum), in addition to the traditional office hours. A student made a (private) post, where he uploaded a MATLAB figure and asked whether it is correct. The figure is what the first question of the homework assignment asks for.

Am I supposed to tell him whether his answer is correct/wrong? Especially over an online forum?

I don't think so, because that would be giving out the solution. How do I reply without sounding "mean"? Do I tell him to come to office hours instead?

(It's my first time TAing ever...)


texts: What is the best approach to fix the date in a weekly seminar/colloquium with the potential speakers by email

texts:
I am organizing a weekly seminar (at specific day of every week) at our department. We will have 12 talks for the next coming semester. We have a list of n potential people for these talks (suggested by seminar committee). It is clear that not every people on this list can actually deliver a talk (for time restrain or personal reasons), so n should be larger than 12.

The invitation is done by sending an email to the potential persons, asking if he/she is interested to give a talk. We don't necessarily have a phone number of these people.

What is the best approach to propose the date of seminars to the interested people by email?

If I list all the available 12 dates to the first person who replies positively, he/she may not quickly select the desired date and asking to answer quickly may be sometimes uncomfortable. If I have his/her phone number I immediately call him/her for fixing the date, but some people don't like to share their personal phone numbers, also office public phone numbers are not always working (once I almost spent the whole working day to call someone at his office but nobody was there). Also while I am waiting for someone to select his date, it is difficult to propose the same dates to another person as both may select the same date.


texts: Proposing research as Ph.D. thesis in Sweden

texts:
I am a geography M.Sc. and I want to study Ph.D. in Sweden. I wrote a research proposal about a computer program which simulates some spatiotemporal situations. I have done some underlying logic and calculations too.

The problem is many many Ph.D. programs in Sweden are announced with special conditions. They demand that you work on a specific question or problem chosen by the authorities. But I want to work on my idea since I think it is so needed in geography.

Since in my country situations are completely different I am wondering: What's the solution?


texts: Which libraries are included in the Scopus citation database?

texts:
Is there a list of libraries which are included in the Scopus database?

I am working in the field of Human Computer Interaction and searching for a list of included libraries (e.g. ACM, AIS and so on).


texts: Existence of regional bias in peer review and how to deal with it

texts:
Background information:
Field: Neuroscience;
Country: India

Premise:
I am a graduate student. I have not published many articles. Over the past 5 or so years, I have been hearing from colleagues, my advisor, and other professors from my University that it is really difficult to publish in respectable journals in the field as there is a lot of resistance in seeing a good paper from a developing country. Until recently, I was skeptical of such opinions.

Current situation:
The past couple of papers that we have submitted have come back with really sparse reviews. In fact for two of our papers, we only got one peer-review which had nothing much to say except for a brief summary of the paper and a small point here and there (in fact addressing those two points wouldn't even have required a major revision; really small points). However, the editors were prompt to reject the paper saying the review(s) were not enthusiastic. [Note: I am okay with the idea that our work may have had flaws and that it could be made better; the question is not really about the review that we have received]

Question: Looking at these couple of experiences along with hearing similar experiences from several other colleagues/faculties, I am wondering if there is any truth to some sort of racial/regional bias in the peer review process. Specifically:

Is there concrete evidence out there to suggest that such discrimination at peer-review happens?
How can we deal with this kind of problems (for example, potentially submitting to journals that follow double blind reviews, etc.)

Related questions/answers:

https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/105219/115072
https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/629/115072
What prevents reviewers from providing biased and very negative reviews?


texts: Personal cover letter for visa application for TV-L 13 PhD Position

texts: I have been offered a Ph.D. position with a TV-L13 (50%) salary. I am in the process of applying for an employment visa (as I am a non-EU citizen). The work contract provided by the university is for a part-time scientific associate. I am unsure of what exactly to write in the personal cover letter (explaining the exact purpose and duration of the stay) for the visa application. Should I write about both the part-time scientific associate position and Ph.D. or only about the part-time scientific associate position?


texts:
I have already written a teaching statement for a faculty position as assistant professor.

I have three questions:

What is the right tense of teaching statement? (present tense or future)
Must I sign the statement of teaching like "best regards" etc? How should I put my name in statement of teaching? I mean is there any template for that?
In the last paragraph I put some words on the position that I am applying for, about the university and etc, is that Okay to keep this paragraph?


texts: How much a statement of purpose can help with PhD admission?

texts: If I can write a convincing Statement of purpose which conveys why I choose the PhD program and show that I am well-prepared for the field, will it save other parts of my application? I read somewhere said that SOP is not as important as GPA and test scores.


texts: Usage of Videos or Images from Youtube/ Google-images as data source

texts: I'm working on a deep neural network research application Does usage of youtube videos or google images as data source cause a sharing-data, ethical, copyright or commercial problem? The aim of the usage of these data is only academic research. Maybe we can neglect google-images because of there are many free image data set. But we need youtube videos because of time and cost. Instead of sharing data in the article, is sufficient to write: "this study uses top 10(or more) search results for keyword search on youtube/google". There are lots of machine learning examples that learn from google like https://www.pyimagesearch.com/2017/12/04/how-to-create-a-deep-learning-dataset-using-google-images/


texts: Should list my advisor as an author on a paper I wrote alone?

texts:
As a part of my PhD project, I wrote a paper. When my supervisor read it, she said “it is perfect and complete, go ahead and publish it yourself because I cannot contribute more to it”. She really meant it and tried to do me a favor.

However, I still think it can be more beneficial for my future to have her name on my paper. Should I insist to have her as a coauthor or it might be useful in the future to have all the credits of a good paper?


texts: What to do when you spot a paper on arXiv with the same essential material as yours?

texts:
What do you do when you've sent a paper on your fancy new algorithm to a conference, and before the conference has replied to you, you spot a newly submitted paper on arXiv on the same algorithm?
Possible reactions I can imagine:

You immediately submit your work to arXiv and/or open-source your code to "prove" you were working on it too (or at least as much as that might be worth at this point)

You just wait and see if the conference accepts it (but then what?)

You withdraw your paper entirely -- you "lost"

You totally ignore it -- it's not "official" until it's peer-reviewed, so you might still be "first"

Furthermore, who typically gets credit if:

Your paper is accepted, and is first to be published outside of arXiv

Your paper is declined, and is not first to be published outside of arXiv

Update
I'm reading the other group's paper more carefully (I'd only had a chance to glance at it yesterday, and was alarmed because several of the key words and concepts were exactly the same as ours), and it seems like they might not have discovered the same algorithm after all -- it's difficult for me to tell because their notation and terminology varies considerably from ours, but there's a chance that we've found different algorithms, even though several key concepts are the same. I'll continue looking into it, but just thought I'd mention this to add more context. At least now I'm a little bit more hopeful.


texts: How to verify academic history and degree?

texts:
TL;DR: How does one verify the academic credentials (degree earned, date of graduation) of an individual without their permission or knowledge.

I'm trying to verify the academic history and degree of an individual. I'm new to verifying academic histories and achievements, so understanding the process and responses below would be very helpful to me (and likely others in the same situation).

The individual states he attended University Maryland University College (UMUC) form 1992 to 1995, and earned a MBA degree. Its public information and published in his Linkedin profile.

I attempted to verify though UMUC's alumni services. The alumni service did not respond to my emails or calls. Next, I called the registrar at the University and they instructed me to go to degreeverify.org. degreeverify.org directed me to the National Student Clearinghouse.

I placed an order for the verification with the National Student Clearinghouse. It cost me 10 or 20 dollars. I received a "Thank you" email from them and an email address to use in the future (degreeverify@studentclearinghouse.org).

I believe I am getting a run-around from National Student Clearinghouse. After a few days, I sent an email to degreeverify@studentclearinghouse.org requesting the results. National Student Clearinghouse responded back "The verification results you received came directly from the school and they based their research on the information you provided in your initial request":

I have not received results or an answer from UMUC or National Student Clearinghouse. Additionally, the National Student Clearinghouse stated I should "fax or email a copy of the students transcripts or diploma for verification [sic]". That's what I paid National Student Clearinghouse to do!

I used National Student Clearinghouse's website "Contact Us" page to request their phone number so I could speak with someone. In addition, I made the same request via email. I have not received a reply to the request for their telephone number!

I'm new to verifying academic histories and achievements, and I surely don't understand the run-around I am getting from UMUC and National Student Clearinghouse. My questions are:

Why won't UMUC provide me with a Yes/No answer to the Verify operation?
Why won't National Student Clearinghouse provide me with a Yes/No answer to the Verify operation?
Why won't National Student Clearinghouse provide me with a telephone number to speak with them?
Is this run-around typical for folks who verify academic history and degree?
Do I have any additional options to to verify the academic history and degree?

I'm beginning to wonder if National Student Clearinghouse is a legitimate service. I know National Student Clearinghouse is not BBB accredited. I discovered that after the run-around began.

Thanks in advance.


texts:
I am working on a honours thesis and have developed a Fortran library that I would like to cite in it.

In some places they suggest to quote the documentation of the project but this is something I plan to do in the future and isn't done yet. The only documentation I have right now is the README file and the code itself.

What would be an acceptable way of directing a reader to my work on Github?

(bonus) Is there a BibTeX way to do it?


texts: Can a high school student involved in a college credit program get an arXiv endorsement?

texts:
I'm 16, homeschooled, and I am taking dual credit at LoneStar. If I wanted to write a paper, unlikely, but I've toyed with the idea, would I be able to get a suitable endorsement from a mathematics teacher at LoneStar? I was considering submitting on arXiv.

My guess would be no, but I don't know much about how this works, so I'd be interested to learn more.


texts:
I’m moving to a new university and setting up a lab. Unlike some US universities, the consensus is not to use your surname as the name of the lab but have a descriptive name (e.g., “this area” Lab). So, I’ll have to setup a new website under my new university domain, “brand” my lab (logo, etc.) and add some standard material (course material, people in the lab, recent publications and preprints, news, recruitment info, etc.).

Until now, most of this data I had in my own personal website NameSurname.com because my previous university did not provide for lab subdomains.

Do I keep both websites? Do I redirect my personal one to the lab or do I redirect the lab to my personal?
If I keep both of them, how do I differentiate the material? What goes on each?
What are the pros and cons of having a lab with a generic name and me as director or putting everything under my own name?


texts:
I am about to leave my university in the UK, however I still have access to services for the next few months.
For some background, I initially did my BSc(Hons) at another institution, worked in industry, and then returned to this university to do a master's degree and then the first year of a PhD programme with a full scholarship which I decided not to finish.
Is there a good place to get a list of things that I should do before I leave? I have already spoken to the careers department so I get a list of current jobs in my field, and they have also helped me with both a CV and a Cover Letter for when I apply to new jobs.