texts: Applying to Math PhD programs with an math degree completed online

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Before I start, I apologize in advance for dumping my neuroses on this community.

So I finished a BA in mathematics online from penn state with a 4.0 GPA (some of the courses I finished were in topology, abstract algebra, real and complex analysis). Through work I've worked on a number of research papers and a few projects that we collaborated on with some engineers to produce software.

I know that I want to pursue a phd in mathematics, specifically in algebraic topology, but I'm concerned about whether I would be considered competitive for a PhD program. I have strong recommendations from my boss at work, a fellow researcher, and one of my professors that I managed to maintain contact with throughout the online program.

I guess ultimately what I'm asking is, if everything else is equal, does an online graduate have the same chance as traditional graduate? Sorry if this isn't clearer.


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I use CSL to manage my bibliography entries. However, I do not know how what category to choose for a computer science book (e.g. on artificial intelligence).
I think that neither "engineering" nor "math" fits and I would certainly be too vague using "science".
Is it possible to add a custom category to CSL (in that case computer science)? If so is it a good practice to do so or is there a standard alternative way?


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I was rejected from all of my top choice schools and am still waiting to hear back from my other schools. The top two being Southern Methodist University and Baylor University. Honestly, I feel horrid about myself and know that my GRE Subject (Math) exam was terrible, but know that everything else about my application was very strong.

My advisor has told me that I should retake the exams and apply again which makes me take a year off of school. I graduate May 2019 with my Masters in math so I would apply again in Fall 2019 and hear back Spring 2020.

I am wanting advice on how I should view these rejections because at the moment I am extremely sad about it. Additionally, how do schools view students reapplying after a rejection?


texts: Is there any country that does not use English for publishing?

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In my country, all the literature and medium of instruction, pertaining to research, is in English only.
Due to less proficiency of earlier generations in English and several other linguistic reasons, comprehension of research literature is difficult for current generation(s).
I am wondering whether there is any country that does not use English and uses its own language for publishing all its scientific literature?


texts: Question about ethics and possible misappropriation of research funds

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I am working for a professor who started out recently. Most new professors get start-up funding from the department which helps them pay for their first students. Right now I am working in the lab with another PhD candidate; both of us have been funded by departmental funds until now.

The PhD is working on a project which has no funding. I am working on a corporate-funded project for my thesis.  Now I am the PI for this project internally. So I did the whole project as my thesis and I was listed as the PI on consent form (approved by my university IRB) when I carried out the final testing of my product with the corporate sponsor.

Here is where things turn shady. When I carried out my testing, we paid the participants through my research funds (the account number for the project is listed on some departmental documents that I had to sign to get cheques for test participants). In my GRA contract, it was specified that my funding was coming from the departmental account and when the PhD candidate showed me their contract, it was getting funded from my project account (the stipend account number was my project account number and I have confirmed this with a student departmental assistant). Their stipend was coming from my project funds.

I spoke with few other people in the department, and came to know that when the department gives seed funding to new professors, there is a limit in stipend they can give.  So to give the PhD student more funding, my advisor is using my research funds (for which I am PI) to pay this stipend and thus is getting double my stipend.   I am still getting funded by the department, so I get a lot less.

Screwed-up thing is this project is highly successful as I did a lot of hard work and I am not getting any financial incentive. In fact, it's all going to the other researcher who is nowhere involved in this project. The sponsor is giving my advisor funding for a second phase next month and also offered me a full-time job at their corporation. I should probably mention that I don't have a good relationship with my advisor and we fought multiple times in past due to some other issues but the PhD candidate gets along very well. They are like  family friends and have  very good social interactions.

I am graduating this December, so it probably won't matter anyway, but is this ethical? Can I speak with my department chair about this? I had asked my advisor multiple times to increase my stipend but they said they cannot. The questions is not about money — it's more about betrayal by your own advisor who you trust to be fair.

I still have the copy of the departmental documents used to order cheques for testing showing my account project number and a copy of the PhD candidate's contract.


texts: Solliciting letter of recommendation from student for tenure paquet

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A colleague of mine in a US institution included letters from some of his (undergraduate) research assistants in his tenure packet.
I was wondering

If such practice was common,
What should the letter contains,
When was the optimal time to ask for it (e.g., as soon as the collaboration terminates, as close to the submission of said packet as possible).

This site has numerous (good) questions about student asking professor, but I couldn't find any about professor asking student.


texts: Is graduating early from college or transferring to another college fine if I took all the upper level courses?

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I'm currently a sophomore at a small liberal arts college. I want to get into one of physics PhD programs with faculties renowned for quantum gravity. I'm majoring in math and physics, and since both departments in my college are small, I will have taken all the upper-level courses in math and physics until the next semester. My major GPA in physics is 4.0, and my GRE physics score is 990, but I will have no math or physics course to take after the next semester. There aren't much research opportunities here. The only research opportunity is available during summer (which is experimental physics, but I'm mainly interested in hep-th). All REUs are not available for international students. (However, there are a few programs available for int'l students, such as Caltech SURF.)

Which of the following choices would be the best?

Graduating early (3 yrs), going to physics PhD program, and saving $>60k. If I don't get into programs of my choice, I will either stay in the college, in the program until the end, or (hopefully) transferring to them after getting non-terminal Master's degree if I will have a compelling reason.
Transferring to a high ranked research university for advanced/grad-level physics courses and for more research opportunities
Staying for 4 yrs in the current institution


texts:
Prompted by discussion in this post on Meta.MathOverflow.net I got interested in comparing usage of tags from MathOverflow to submissions in the respective disciplines of arXiv. (Vide a similar idea of language popularity, GitHub vs StackOverflow (or one from 2015).) Moreover, as people often use their real names on MO, it may be interesting to check the overlap of mathematicians.

The question is, how to get such data?

There is arXiv API, but for bulk downloads of metadata they recommend Open Archives Initiative (OAI). Yet, as I see, it can query one article at a time, and one needs to know its id. So without knowing arXiv ids beforehand, it turns into a guessing game.

There are some plots in arXiv usage statistics, yet I don't see this exact data.

Also, one can get total submission to math from links in Mathematics -> Article statistics by year, but it misses the splitting into subdisciplines.


texts: Presenting an expository paper that has already been accepted by a magazine

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I am an undergraduate student in mathematics and recently I have written an expository elementary paper that got accepted by a magazine (I wouldn't call it a journal, because it mainly focuses on olympiad-type questions, not on reseach) aimed at high school students (in case it is relevant, my paper presents some advanced tools that may come in handy when dealing with olympiad problems and then goes on to actually show some applications to such problems).
Now, my university organises a conference for undergrads where we are encouraged to present papers that contain interesting ideas (they specify that the results needn't be original and they also needn't be research level, they just want to encourage undergrads to do some kind of research). I would like to make sure that, given these conditions, it is ethical to submit my paper to this conference. Of course, I will definitely mention that my work is going to be published in that magazine. I don't see any problem with this, but I am young and unexperienced, this is why I want to make sure that I am not doing something bad. I am not even sure that my question is fit for this forum, because I am talking about an expository paper, not a research paper, but this place seems to be the best place to ask my question.
EDIT: I forgot to state this, but I will definitely let the editors of that magazine know about me wanting to present the paper to that conference, I just want to make sure that from an academic viewpoint this looks all right.


texts: How can I ask author to send me his simulation result?

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I am working on my research paper. I read a paper that is related to my works. But I cannot reproduce the results. The information provided in the paper is not sufficient for me. How can I ask him to share his simulation works with me.
Is there any specific email format for that?


texts: Can I share my results published results/research on my personal website or Medium blog post?

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Is it OK to share my results on Medium blog post or my personal website when I have signed a copyright form with IEEE or IET?

In the paper submission, I only shared the method and results. But I want to share the exact codes that I used to produce the result. Will it violate the copyright?

The second question is if I publish my result on my blog post before submitting my paper, will it cause any trouble with the reviewers or reviewing process?


texts: How to publish an [La]TeXified version of an old typewritten book in mathematics?

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I am considering to [La]TeXify an old typewritten book in mathematics. The book contains a lot of mathematical formulae and figures, but it was typed just before the [La]TeX age: its content is very interesting but it is very painful to read, very unfortunately.
Grossly I am thinking of hacking an OCR output to get a LaTeX version of the book: it would be a kind of update of the typing and/or a repackaging of the content. I am wondering whether there is any Journal or something where such work can be accepted.
Any hint is welcome.


texts: Ratio of applicants to jobs for engineering professor or assistant professor

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Where can I find statistics for jobs to applicant ratios for engineering professorships or assistant professorships?

The reason I'm asking this is I'm thinking this might be the best metric to determine whether become a professor in an engineering field is "easier" (greater probability of being hired) than a humanities related field.

If the ratio I requested isn't a useful statistic, I am also open to other metrics.


texts: How to publish two sequential research papers non-chronologically?

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I am in an engineering field in which conferences are roughly grouped in two types: theoretical conferences with fundamental concepts and related stuff (for instance, algorithms), and application-oriented where people present practical things (e.g. a use-case). These complement each other well, and many researchers attend both.

I am finishing a part of my research which is both fundamental and practical. I have developed a theoretical research result (formulas, algorithms), and I have used it for a practical purpose developing a use-case. Although they are connected, these can be seen as separate work, and two papers can be published out of it.

My problem is that the two conferences of my preference are scheduled in an unfortunate sequence: the practical conference comes three months before the theoretical, and its deadline for submission is also roughly three months earlier.

It means that if I write the practical paper which uses the theoretical knowledge before the one that introduces it and describes it, I cannot refer to the (unpublished) theory, and the subsequent theoretical paper may lose its value. If I tone down the theory and immediately jump to the practical part, the reviewers may ask questions. It's like writing a paper about results of testing a medication, before the medication was introduced.

The field is big enough that I am not worried about a person from the audience asking "Hey, haven't you presented this three months ago on that conference?". I am focusing on how to write the papers in a proper manner.

Is there a way to write these two papers in a non-chronological way?

My current idea is to just tone down the theory in the practical paper (summarise it in one paragraph), and to cite it as unpublished work, or as work under submission (although the paper will not be submitted or even written at that point). And then to extend the story in the theoretical paper which is dedicated only to it.


texts: Manuscript in pipeline, corresponding author between jobs

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What happens to manuscripts needing revision while the corresponding author is between academic jobs?

Not every academic will always find a new position seamlessly after the previous one. For example, PhD students may still have papers in the pipeline after finishing their PhD, before finding a post-doc. What do academics do when a manuscript needs revision under such conditions? Note that I'm exclusively thinking of people who do aim to remain in academia; if people leave academia, the situation is different in any case.

Some alternatives I can think of:

Wait until one has a new position. This implies a considerable delay, possibly meaning resubmitting a manuscript needed only minor revisions.
Make another co-author corresponding author.
Finish it in their own time. This might have practical issues; for example, they will have no affiliation and might not even have an academic e-mail address (depending on how quickly the previous institution removes accounts).

There may be other alternatives that I'm not thinking of.

What are peoples' experiences about this?


texts: (Soft question?) Sharing knowledge to students, what are the limits?

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I am an undergraduate lecturer. I have been bothered by this question lately.

I never and never want to claim that what I know, or even what I discover, is mine. Also, things that I discover, small or huge, more likely have been discovered before by someone, but of course I never claim that I am the first one to discover them, and I hope I will not in the future too, no matter how huge it is.

I really want to share what I know/discover to as many people as possible, especially my students, and I won't make them pay me for that, since I've been paid enough and they have paid more than how much I can imagine to the university.

What I know or discover usually is based on the books that I bought and read. The books are protected by the law of course, but then I know students can't afford them, a situation which may (usually) lead them to pirate stuffs. I make and share notes of the books, but what's the difference? Sure I put them in my own words, but still the notes are based on the books. This is just an example with books. Papers, products, etc are different, but the "sharing limit" works similar, perhaps?

The problem is, then, I am a bit afraid of this law about filesharing, copyright, IP, or something like that, which makes me think that we do have limits in order to freely educate students. I just feel that does not sound right.

What are your opinions about this situation of a teacher/lecturer? Will there always be people who "buy" knowledge/products and share them freely and in medium or slowly reaching larger scale, without claiming anything or making money of it? I feel like the limit of sharing exists and exists strongly and hard to break. :/


texts: Postdoctoral job search: mixed applications

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As I'm currently pursuing an academic job search (in parallel to the industry one), which includes potential postdoctoral positions, I would appreciate some clarifications on the following aspect.

Mixed applications. At some institutions/departments (usually, large), I see multiple positions that I think I would fit well. Perhaps, one is the best, but, considering the tight competition, I consider it as a luxury to apply to a single position per institution. Important: unlike that question, this particular one is concerned with a situation, where multiple positions, which I consider, constitute a mixture of postdoctoral and staff [with some teaching- and/or research-related support component] positions.

Question: 1) assuming that the other positions are also quite interesting (and they are), is it a good idea to apply to all of them or apply to several in groups (of one or more) of decreasing excitement or stick to the most interesting or valuable? 2) do applications for teaching- or research-related staff positions jeopardize the ones for postdoctoral positions (or junior faculty ones, for that matter)?

Note: My field is Information Systems, a discipline, which can be considered as a sub-domain of Management Science, which, in turn, is a social sciences discipline.

UPDATE (clarification). This question is not an exact duplicate of the suggested question, even though they are very close. The question you're referring to, covers only a subset of my question's scenarios. For example, it doesn't cover one of my real cases, where there are several postdoc positions within the same department (lab) - no junior faculty positions there.


texts: PhD in Cryptography after Master's in Pure Mathematics

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I have done my Master's in Pure Mathematics.However as we had learnt Cryptography in our Master's Course ,I have developed an inclination towards it.

I have started liking coding theory in Cryptography. I like to write programs.
But I have seen that most  people in Cryptography are from Computer Science background.Should I do PhD in this subject as I am liking it now?

However I am unable to understand is there any prospect of that subject specially since I am a student of Pure Mathematics background.

Will I be able to get a job if I don't remain in Pure Mathematics anymore and start writing codes which are more inclined towards Computer Science.

I am puzzled.Please help me if there is any future of my liking.


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I am having students complete a presentation as a group project. Each student's grade will have two components: an instructor grade, from me, and a group grade from their group.

The group grade is calculated as the sum of five elements, each graded out of five, for a maximum of 25 points from each member of the group. Each student's 'group grade' is then calculated as the average of scores from the group.

The problem I have is that some of the groups have 4 students, some 5, and some 6. This means that weight of the score for students in larger groups is less than for those in smaller groups.

I plan to compensate for this by weighting the instructor grade more heavily. But as I think about it, even this doesn't cancel out the discrepancy.

How can I weight, or adjust, my grading scheme to make sure it's as fair as possible?


texts: A student in my course does well on exams, but doesn't do the homework: Go easy on them, or make them "pay the price?"

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I have a student in my course that does well on the exams, and his answers to the exam questions show a deep understanding of the material. However, this student has not been handing in the assigned homeworks and has a missed a few lab assignments, as well. I've been told by other faculty that he has a job which keeps him up late, and have noticed that he struggles to stay awake at times during the class.

Depending on how he fares on a project worth a large portion of his grade, and the final exam, the missed homeworks/labs could cause his grade to be below a C, which is the required grade that a student must receive if they are to advance to the second, more advanced course [and, a C grade is also needed to get credit for the course; otherwise, the student will need to retake it again on the next offering, which isn't until two semesters from now]. Further, this student is a senior, so a D grade would be a major setback for him.

For those of you who have been in this situation before as an instructor, my question:

  Have you ever passed/failed a student like the one described above? If so, do you regret your decision? Why or why not?


texts: Do I have to disclose all academic history?

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I'd like to go back to school for a BS in Physics but most universities don't admit students who already hold degrees.
My first time around I was not academically mature and only pulled a 3.0 for my first BS in Mathematics.

If I rebuilt some class history through a community college and then try to transfer to a full university can I avoid telling them I have a degree?

And are there consequences for trying to hide that information?

I would try a different method but the options seem extremely limited for someone holding a bachelors who wants a second bachelors and can't get up and move to a university that allows it.


texts: How can a non-native English speaker get assistance in publishing a manuscript in English?

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I am not a native English speaker, and I am writing a paper in English (maths) with the aim of getting published in a peer reviewed journal. If I write the manuscript myself, the poor grammar would prevent it from being accepted. If I give the manuscript to a native-English speaking expert in my area of maths, they may steal my ideas. If I give the manuscript to an expert just in English, they  won't be able to fully help because they won't understand the ideas comprehensively.

Would someone please guide me how to solve this situation?


texts:
My field is theoretical cosmology. I use the arXiv to find virtually every paper I read. Most preprints are updated with their peer-reviewed, published versions so I don't have concerns about their scientific legitimacy. However, when I've had to work on assignments or projects in other fields or subfields for courses at university I find myself constantly running into journal paywalls, which is very frustrating. For this reason I want to know why the arXiv's system of free access preprints is not more widely used.

In this answer it is stated that

  Compared with other fields, mathematics and physics are anomalous in making heavy use of the arXiv, with physics even more so than mathematics.

This tallies with my experience. The answer then goes on to say

  Things are trickier in other fields, because many of the advantages depend on network effects. If nobody in your field pays attention to a server, it's not conventional, and it counts for little or nothing regarding priority, then there's less reason to post to it (although it still has some value).

Is this the only reason that some fields don't post preprints on arXiv? Should we expect to see more fields publishing on arXiv in the future as the word gets around?


texts: Is a combined BS/MS in math a good idea for pursuit of PhD?

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If I want to continue mathematics into a PhD program, would doing a bachelor's and master's combined program be a good idea? Would I be required to retake some graduate courses in the PhD program? This would add only one year to my degree from my current uni as opposed to the two from doing a BS and MS separately.

A bit of background information: I am a dual enrollment US student who has completed two years worth of college courses, and so I'll be entering as a freshman with junior standing taking upper division undergrad math courses. Thus, a standalone BS would take me only two years, leaving me to graduate at age 20. Is this too young to start applying to grad school?

Also, I plan to do an undergrad thesis; is one year of familiarizing myself with the faculty too little to choose an adviser? I'm not even sure which math I would want to write about. Will three semesters of intro analysis and intro algebra grad courses be enough to decide on the thesis for my fourth semester?


texts: Background check before employment offer

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What's the standard procedure in University jobs when it comes to "background checks"?
Do they call my current employer or is it limited to a "criminal background check"?

Edit: tenure track job in the US


texts: Citation of a book chapter that was put online

texts: I am trying to cite, using the ACS format, https://www.intechopen.com/books/cancer-causing-substances/heavy-metals-and-cancer, but I don't know whether it is considered a book or ebook chapter. How am I supposed to tell them apart? The link is under "books" on the website, but seeing as it is online, wouldn't it be considered an ebook? If I cite it as a book, it'll be pretty weird for me to include a link and the date accessed, won't it?


texts: Should I quit my average interesting long-term contract for a 12 months interesting postdoc in photovoltaics experimental physics ?

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[I am French, so my english is not perfect ...]

2 years later I graduated from my Ph.D. in experimental nuclear physics. That was a nice time however tough sometimes.
Then I was unemployed for about 16 months as I could not find a postdoc in the field. Maybe I "missed" something, but some friend of mine had the same trouble too.
After those 16 months I was finally contacted by a company to perform maintenance on a nuclear computation code (fixing bugs, solving users troubles ...). I have been doing it for a year now, and I must say it is not very interesting. Seems that I was bad luck as every two year the code has to go through complex changes which implies boring things to do for the person doing my job (producing reports and so on). But I think the problem is more profund than that, I am just not found of doing bug fixing, answering people who kept telling me than things do not work, and of course, I won't do physics in this job (according to my predecessors who stayed 4 years) even if is related to it.

I don't feel like I will earn the Nobel Prize one day, as I know I am not a genius, but I am very interested in physics and I feel quite depressed not doing it anymore for a living.

Now, I have an opportunity for a postdoctorate in spectoscopy on solar materials. It seems complex but also very interesting. The salary will be a bit less than what I earn today.

I don't have a family right now (not even a gf) and have a bit of money left.

Do you think I shoud jump on this postdoc ? Seems so cool but I am afraid having troubles to find a job afterwards, even if the solar energy field (and more generaly surface spectroscopic experiment) is more trendy than the nuclear one.

All opinions are welcome, thanks a lot !


texts: Why do we sign an agreement to adhere to the United States Constitution, before teaching at the college level?

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In some parts of the US, why do we sign an agreement to adhere to the United States Constitution, before being hired to teach college level courses?

I asked the human resources lady about what happens if I don't sign the agreement, and she said I wouldn't be hired.

I don't think signing such an agreement is necessary to work in industry; so why is it necessary for employment in academia?


texts: How to check international academic credentials/degrees?

texts: What is the most efficient way of checking the academic degrees of an international pool of job-seekers? The tough thing is that many graduated from institution of non-English speaking countries.


texts: Undergrad research with friends; one of them does nothing

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About halfway through last semester, my professor asked me to do research under her with a group of people I had been friends with since freshman year. Dream come true! These are all people I already like working with, it's research in a field we are all interested in, we already spend a lot of time together, etc. The best part is, we all benefit professionally from this! Perfect!

My only concern now is that one of my friends just doesn't do anything for the project except show up to the meetings. It causes me a lot of heartache because I am close friends with this person, and I want to see him succeed. I've talked to him about it before, he hasn't given me any reason. I've told him ways he could contribute, he just never does.

On another level, it makes me upset because this is an opportunity I imagine many people would love to have. It's not fair to other people interested in research that this person may end up piggy-backing his way to a publication! If I weren't on this project, I know I would be upset.

Any suggestions for how to handle this unfortunate situation?

(Also, if there's any way to make this anonymous, that would be nice, too... I'm not interested in one of my colleagues seeing this)


texts:
I am writing a commentary paper in Animal Conservation magazine. I have a hard time to find out a reference manager that will produce the right citing style

I read for their guidelines to authors:

  Journal titles should be abbreviated in accordance with the Zoological Record Serial Sources, published annually by BIOSIS.

Is Zoological Record Serial Sources a citing style?

I am usually using Mendeley (and have little experience with citing style) but I can't find any citing style for animal conservation nor for Zoological Record Serial Sources.

Can you help me to find a way to automatically format my list of references to the correct citing style?

As an example. Can you cite this paper to the right citing style


texts: What are the advantages for submitting my paper to demo or doctoral symposium sessions of conferences

texts: Several conferences feature demo sessions and doctoral symposia. Besides publishing these in the conferences' proceedings do these two offer advantages? What is the additional value of these two types over normal conference papers especially in computer science?


texts: Should I abandon an open math problem, if it hasn't been actively studied since the mid-1980s?

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There is an open math problem that I am interested in. There was a lot of progress in fully working out the problem in low-dimensions and progress towards sub-problems of the main question up until the 1980s, but it seems that the research activity has mostly stopped since then.  Newer papers just essentially reiterate previous results.

A pretty well-known professor in my department also published a few papers on this problem in the mid-80s, so I reached out to him and told him that my thesis adviser and I are currently studying this problem.  He confirms that his work on the problem is very old, so I'm guessing he hasn't done anything newer with the problem since his last papers.

The problem itself is known to be quickly intractable for higher dimensions, say, for n>5.

I'm taking his words as an indication that there is not much interest in this problem, and that I should probably abandon it and find another problem to work on, for my master's thesis.

Am I making the correct interpretation of this professor's remark?

Should I still stick with the problem, even though it might be true that it is not currently being actively studied?


texts: To what extent similar remarks from the same author can appear in different papers?

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I came across this situation that seems not immediately obvious as regards the "line" for self-plagiarism.

Suppose I have two papers on two related problems such that merging the two papers is not an option. It seems important to draw some remarks, which may just be qualitative descriptions in a novel way but which may be helpful in clarifying concerned things in the nonempty intersection. By nature of the problems the intended remarks would be similar to a certain extent. In this case, do I have to deliberately make them look sufficiently different? Otherwise, do I have to cite the remarks I made? I would love to know the predecessors's wisdom about this matter. Thank you.


texts: Lost my passion and interest in what I used to love

texts:
Story: Great MSc Computer Science student lost interest in what he used to love

------ PAST ------

Since I was a kid, I was really passionate about the things I love. I was always ahead of my schoolmates and always prepared in advance for the material. Simply to say, I loved learning new things.

When I got into high school puberty hit me and I kind of get out of track in the first two years, but I hit hard in next two years excelling with GPA 5/5 (I was put in class of highly competitive students). Last year of high school, I did find something that gave me hard dopamine spikes, and that was programming. Just in 1 year, I earned 3rd place on State Competition and manage to get to National Olympiad. I also attended competitions of physics and mathematics. I loved the thrill of the challenge.

Took Bachelor of Computer Science, though I learned hard only the subjects that I love. I was great student (top 10 in my area) and I successfully finished it with a GPA of 4.5/5. Meanwhile, I found high interest in Artificial Intelligence and subfield of Machine Learning. I did AI courses online from Stanford, Coursera etc., since I started my bachelor studies (4 years ago) and I really liked that area. I finished my diploma thesis related to pattern recognition and my bachelors in record time.

----- RECENT ----

But after finishing bachelors everything changed. Seems like I was worn out, burned and unmotivated. I got programming job that was paid good but I hated. I completely lost my interest in programming. My driving force just dissipated in air.

Now, I got really good scholarship that got me in one of the top research universities in Europe. Still, my interests in AI dropped to 0. Seems like nothing is challenge now and I don't feel the dopamine spikes that I felt when I was discovering the field (which was novelty for me). Obviously my GPA is not good because of this (even though there are easy subjects that I've already have lot of pre-knowledge but still no motivation to learn them). I am now in my second semester of my studies. I took job as research assistant still don't feel motivated at all.

----MY OWN OPINION ----

From knowing myself I would say that I only thing that makes me motivated is learning new stuff from new fields. Whenever I learn something from one field I easily get bored and switch to something new. I put my whole effort and strength to learn it (when I am motivated). I could not specialize in one thing because of this and I am angry on myself.

I never suffered from depression, I always sleep 7-8h, eat regularly, love to go to the gym, love reading books. I was taking some supplements on my own thinking that I'm suffering from depression but without any help.

Please write here your opinion and advice, I would really appreciate hearing it.

Thanks a lot in advance.


texts: Necessity of MoU for researcher exchange or collaboration

texts:
In my research institute, there is a fair amount of discussion around wanting to collaborate or create exchanges with other labs, especially outside of the country (we are in Asia).  From myself and a few other researchers, we have connections to labs in the US from graduate school and previous research.

On my own initiative, I exchanged interns and research assistants between my lab and one in the states.  It was specific on the people we had, such that a student interning in my lab would benefit from going to the lab in the states and vice versa, as we worked on a common project.

The higher-ups want to make some "official" exchange, which may be some asian culture at play.  From this, the conversations are always around signing a memorandum of understanding (MoU).  For the exchange I worked on, we had specific people and specific goal, so a general Lab to Lab MoU did not seem as relevant as a mutual agreement of what the purpose of the exchange was.

My question is, how important or useful is an MoU, are there pros and cons to this?  I don't think it has any legal weight, so does anyone have experience with this type of collaboration and see why it is necessary in an overall scale?  Is signing an MoU the only way for an institute to call an exchange 'official'?


texts: Is creating fully functional software considered to be a quasi experiment?

texts:
I'm sorry if this is a bit subjective, but I really don't know where to find the truth.

In my hometown, lecturers usually will only approve research in computer science & information system where the result is new software.  The goal is creating a software that can be used directly by business.  Usually, research that can't be 'seen' and used directly will be rejected and considered useless.

As in my university, lecturers said that creating new software is a type of research called a quasi experiment. Students are expected to perform the following activities: gathering requirements, designing UML models, and implementing the source code.  In the seminar (final exam), lecturers will ask a lot about business process and customer satisfaction.  No maths.  Most questions are subjective and hard to prove.

Is it true that creating a fully functional software or web site like this is a kind of quasi-experimental research?


texts: Question on rationale behind doubled "Int. Math. Res. Not. IMRN" journal name

texts:
I am not sure this forum is the right place for this question, but I'm pretty sure it would quickly be closed at MathOverflow.

There is a well-known mathematics journal called "International Mathematics Research Notices", published by OUP.  It's almost invariably cited as "Int. Math. Res. Not. IMRN" [sic] or similar, which has always struck me as oddly redundant.  The curious ubiquity of the abbreviation is doubtless due to the fact that MathSciNet provides references in that format: "JOURNAL = {Int. Math. Res. Not. IMRN}".

On the other hand, Worldcat has many listings for the journal, some of which have the double IMRN, and some of which don't.  As far as I can tell, the journal's page doesn't specify a preferred abbreviated form.

Another possibly relevant factor is that the journal is usually referred to be this initialism: people call it "IMRN" in ordinary conversation, which isn't the case for any other journals I can think of, JAMS perhaps excepted if you count pronouncing it (and nobody writes "J. Am. Math. Soc. JAMS").

The question: why does MathSciNet double the journal name, and should I be doing the same?  (Perhaps the underlying question is: who decides on official journal abbreviations?)


texts: Computer science degree vs. post-bachelor computer science certificate

texts:
My background:  I'm currently 1 year out of my undergrad in psychology and I currently have a job working on a educational grant project at a university.  I've lost some interest in the field of psychology as a whole and I'm considering going back to school for computer science.  When I expressed this interest to an adviser at my old school she mentioned that I might be interested in a post bachelor comp sci certificate.  The certificate is 30 credits and can probably be done in about half the time that another bachelors could be completed in.  I asked her if any of the graduates of the certificate program had had any trouble getting into graduate school with said degree and she said no.  However, I believe there is probably more to this than she let on considering that it is her job to promote this program.

Question:  I'm wondering if anyone has any experience with these type of certificates?  I know that I will have a more complete computer science education with an undergrad but I'm wondering if it is completely necessary.  All said and done I would like to get a masters in computer science because it seems like the smart career move.  Will I be limiting my job potential by only having a certificate and a bachelors in an unrelated field?  Is graduate school really possible with just a certificate?  My dream job would be working for a company in research and development for human to computer interfaces.  I also have a fleeting passion for gaming and music production, but I consider these to be more hobbies than serious career interests.


texts: What kind of opportunities exist in the industry for someone with a Ph.D in theoretical CS?

texts:
I'm curious to know what kind of choices does someone with a recent Ph.D in theoretical CS have, in the industrial research labs, and how to find out about existing opportunities. In particular, I'm looking for:

Links to sites where such opportunities are listed, if something like that exists.
Information regarding the scope of working on pure theoretical topics in industrial labs, which tend to be product-oriented IMHO.

It would be really great if anyone working in an industrial lab would share his experience (which lab, what kind of work you do etc), even if he/she may not be working on theoretical CS (or CS at all!).


texts: Should I ask for a recommendation from a professor in a different field?

texts:
I'm an undergraduate senior and will soon be applying for competitive PhD programs in computer science in the US/Canada. I already have three CS professors whom I have good relationships with (as a student, TA, and RA) as my recommenders. However, I also have a music professor whom I worked closely with on a purely music research in my first two years in college. The paper from that research has been accepted to a journal but not published yet.
Some universities allow up to five recommendation letters. So, should I ask my music professor to be my fourth recommender? If so, what should I ask them to highlight in the letter?


texts: Two months to go on my masters programme and I want to drop out what should I do?

texts:
I've been struggling with my MSc in political science since the start of the programme. The programme isn't what I expected. And I did a undergraduate degree in finance and already hold an offer from a top financial services firm. I now have two months to finish my dissertation and I want to quit.

I hated my programme with a passion. and I had 0 political knowledge before I applied so I've been struggling since day 1. I've already failed two modules which I'll have to resit after November. I failed because I didn't understand the content. These two modules were about advanced quantitative research and EU politics. And I jumped in with no foundamental knowledge whatsoever. Moreover, with work and professional exams which I will have to study for, I won't have time to study for the resits.

I also hate my dissertation topic. I addressed this issue with my two supervisors but they didn't seem to think it was a concern. Again I came up with the topic with very little background knowledge and without knowing it's actually not something I'd like to do.

I've been trying to re concentrate on my dissertation for a week with no success. The more I read for my dissertation, the more I dislike it.

I've already contacted my firm and my school to discuss any potential consequences of dropping out and I'm still waiting for a response. I don't want to quit but I struggle to continue. It's affected my life severely and I have pre existing depression for years which my school knows about.
Please give me advice


texts: How can a PhD student defend their correct ideas or claims to their supervisor?

texts:
I am a PhD student who works in theory. Too many times, I have to defend my ideas or claims in front of my supervisor. I have failed to do so in the past and it worries me.
Please note that I am only interested in defending correct ideas, not wrong ones.

Some of the things I have tried are:

Doubt every line which I read.
Try to prove each term clearly in front of him.
Go over the material at least two times.

These kind of things are not working.

My research supervisor has told me that I need to defend my ideas and claims. There have been many times where he asked me to change something about the idea; I did it; and then he asked me why I changed it.

Question: How to defend your correct ideas or claims in front of your supervisor?

Edit : Many times I have tried to defend a wrong idea and there were some times in which I have changed my right idea ( based upon his feedback) and after I changed my idea he told me "your original idea was right, why did you change it?". How to deal with this situation also?


texts: Directly contacting a referee of my paper

texts:
A few months ago, I submitted a paper to a journal, and received a "can be published if such-and-such issues are addressed properly". I know who one of the reviewers (the one that wrote the most helpful review, in fact) is, largely because he decided to reveal his name in the review. In a couple of weeks, I'll happen to be in the vicinity of his university (this is serendipitous; I had already planned this trip before I knew he would be one of the reviewers).

Is it acceptable to contact him, tell him I'm the author of that paper he reviewed, and ask him if he has time for a meeting to discuss how I am addressing his comments? I have no shame in admitting that I am considering doing this to ensure that he is happy with my amendments to the paper, which in turn should make the second round of reviewing go more smoothly.


texts: What questions to expect from Skype chat with potential supervisor for a Masters in Neuroscience?

texts:
I am applying to a Canadian University for a Master in Neuroscience. I have contacted a professor and asked for a place at his laboratory even though he only accepts PhD and post-doctorate students. However, he said that he accepted me as his student but wanted to have a skype meeting for us to get to know each other.

I am a medical doctor and his area of expertise is more philosophy-oriented. I am not an expert in this area. My questions are:

Will I be expected to have a well established research proposal even though I am a master student?
Are master students expected to have solid knowledge in the supervisor area even though they have a very different background?
What are some questions a master student can expect from a skype meeting with his/her possible advisor?


texts: With editor status changes to Submitted to Journal After 5 weeks

texts: May I please ask what does this mean. I submitted a manuscript to an Elsevier journal, for 5 weeks it had "with editor" status, now it has changed to "Submitted to Journal". What does this mean?


texts: What is the usual process for forming a business partnership with a university lab?

texts:
I'm the co-founder of a small US-based startup.  As an applied research company, we'd like to form a partnership with my a certain laboratory in my alma mater that would involve the following:

Joint research projects in fundamental and applied science.
Joint grant-writing for said projects
Our partial funding of the laboratory
Collaboration with other departments

Patent and publication ownership will have to be negotiated and is outside of the scope of this question.

Beyond piquing the interest of the lab's director, what is the usual process for formalizing such partnerships with the university?


texts: Do my articles published in local newspapers count as publications?

texts: I'm applying to Columbia's journalism school and it asked me if I have any publications. Since I worked as a reporter before for the local newspaper, and I did write a few headline stories, I thought this might help my journalism application. But since they're nor academic, I'm not sure if I should put down my news articles as "publications."


texts: Criteria for choosing undergraduate school to prepare for graduate study: "focus on undergrads" & "extensive rigorous curriculum" mutually exclusive?

texts:
I'm trying to figure out which undergraduate colleges are most conducive to graduate school applications, but it seems to me that (with few notable exceptions) my two main criteria that lead to this sort of success are mutually exclusive. Are there any schools in the U.S. that have both an extensive mathematical curriculum and a focus on their undergraduates?

Schools known for being strong in math (such as MIT, Harvard, and Stanford), seem to be very heavily focused on their graduates, with comparatively less attention payed to their undergrads. I'd like to avoid classes taught be TAs and be able to learn from and get to know my professors, both for the improved learning experience and the improved graduate school recommendations that will inevitably eventually result. Perhaps even more importantly, it seems that research as an undergraduate tends to improve students' chances at graduate schools; thus, colleges that have significant research at the undergraduate level are most appealing.

However, schools with the above desirable criterion tend to be less mathematically rigorous, especially in pure math. I've found a handful of schools that will even keep a math major occupied for a whole four years if they've taken only introductory multi-variable calculus, linear algebra, and differential equations. I don't want to have to sacrifice an education for attention -- I also want to go to a school considered highly for graduate school that has extensive course options.

Is the first criterion a fair voting system and the second a dictator? Is there any intersection of the above specifications? My own rudimentary research suggests a few options, but these hardly make a list even the best students can expect to be comfortable applying to.

I want to make sure I have the best options for graduate school in the future, both in being a qualified applicant with the opportunity for stellar recommendations and in having learned the extensive mathematics required to give me a head start for future research.


texts: Patent vs Research paper for a top university admission?

texts:
I am working as software developer in a company. I had filed one patent and published one research paper. I want to apply for Master's in a top university (like NUS at Singapore or German universities) next year. I am working on some new IOT projects and deep learning ideas. What is more beneficial to get admission in Master's at a top university:
A Patent or a research paper on an idea/project?


texts: How is an online article referenced if there is no obvious author?

texts:
The referencing style I am using for online newspaper articles is thus:

Karlsen, T.-K. (2013) For scouts, the South American youth tournament is hard slog, not high life. Guardian [Online] 28 January. Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2013/mar/28/scout-south-american-youth-championship-football [Accessed on 28/03/2013]

But how do I reference an article with no obvious author? For example, this is posted on the news website Balkan Insight, but has no author. So far I've been including Balkan Insight where the author name is, but also where the publication name is - i.e. where 'Karlsen' and 'Guardian' are in the previous example. And putting the in-text reference as Balkan Insight (2013).


texts: Is there a proper format to cite open source software?

texts:
In my research I used a lot python libraries that I need to cite, I wonder if there is an accepted format for citing open-source software?

Do I just put them together with all other references? Do I create two separate references sections: "Article References", "Software References"? Or maybe there is another way to do it?

Just to be clear, I think I am good with the format of the citation itself, it is given here, but I am not sure where do I put those citations in a paper.


texts: Why C*-algebras is not as popular as other area of pure mathematics?

texts:
I am applying for graduate school in pure mathematics and I recently got very interested in C*-algebra.

I am definitely wrong but I get the feeling that C*-algebras is not as popular as other areas of pure mathematics like number theory, analysis, algebraic geometry, etc. It also seems that most top ranked universities like MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Princeton, etc do not have any active research group in C*-algebras.

If my observations is right, then what is the reason? Is it because C*-algebra is harder than other areas of pure mathematics or is it because it is still a young area of pure mathematics?

Given that I am interested in C*-algebras and most top ranked universities are not active in this area, where can I apply? Also, will doing graduate work in C*-algebras instead other more popular areas of pure mathematics have a negative effect on my academic career?


texts: How do I deal with colleagues/advisers who aren't responsive to e-mails?

texts: I've had some frustrating situations with a colleague who will say that they will do something but then never do it. Is there a way to "encourage" him/her to respond more promptly? I take it as a sign of incompetence. I do sometimes follow up with a reminder but this colleague is not somebody I can rely on.


texts: When should I send the so-called “inquiry email”?

texts:
I’ve heard that, prior to applying, undergraduates sometimes express interest to faculty members of graduate schools via email. I know that this is most often done (fairly?) close to the time of application, however, I still have a year before applying (graduating June 2021).

Is it unheard of for students to contact faculty a year before applying so they can establish some sort of research relationship? By “research relationship”, I mean something akin to typical undergraduate mathematics research (though with a professor at another institution), however diluted it may become due to distance. I’m interested in hearing how feasible this is!


texts: Should I have a fourth recommender in PhD Application

texts: Due to some technical issues, it took me a couple of weeks to hear back from one of my potential recommendation writers for my Business PhD application.  I reached out to other reviewers in the interim and have filled all of my required slots.  I just heard back from the first person, and I am wondering if I should add a fourth letter for a few schools.  I think this professor can add some unique perspective since I traveled with her for a two week immersion elective and the experience informed the topics I would like to research.  Will the additional  perspective be helpful?  Or will a fourth letter just indicate that I didn't pay attention to the requirements or was worried about the strength about my other letters?


texts: Dress Code for Online MBA Bi-Annual Residency Requirement?

texts:
I'm a new student in the inaugural class of an online MBA program at at large public university (25k undergrad, 8k graduate students). There is a bi-annual in person residency requirement and the dress code communicated to us is business casual. I work in operations management in the space industry and my daily dress code is jeans and t-shirt; some even rock shorts but I think thats a bit bold. I previously worked in a suit and tie everyday office and I'll take the jeans any day.

My question is should I bend the knee and wear khakis and a long-sleeve button up? Or should I wear what is comfortable ans representative of the industry I come from? Is jeans and a polo slumming it too much?


texts: Using a data set collected against the terms of service of a company?

texts:
Many entities (companies, websites) clearly state on their terms of service that data collection is not allowed. For example many websites don't allow scraping.

I plan to collect data and then publish a paper using them. I will state how I collected them.

Can my paper be denied if I do the above?

Note: This is not about possible legal consequences. I am simply asking if my paper will be published or not.


texts: Is Excel-generated chart acceptable for publication?

texts: I have always wondered, why it seems I have never seen people using excel-generated charts for publishing. Is excel considered less professional/not serious?  Say I have a time-series like this. What could have other chart making platforms do better (that excel cannot) to improve it? The dimension (boundary) of the chart?


texts: How do I filter out bad students from tutoring?

texts:
I'm a grad student and I do some tutoring on the side for money. It's a sweet gig and I do like helping people learn. However I have had plenty bad experiences tutoring. Usually the really bad things (people wanting me to cheat, not paying, etc.) usually are pretty obvious right away.

However what I have a hard time with are students who simply don't progress at all. Like don't study, come completely unprepared and are just frustrating and awful to deal with. It can take a few weeks to become apparent and honestly by that point I would feel guilty dropping them, especially if they're friendly.

How do I weed out students before it gets to that point? How do I find if a student will actually study, come prepared, etc. It's a waste of my time and their money to have me repeat definitions to them an hour a week, week after week.


texts: Choosing the title of a paper: are provocative titles better?

texts:
I am currently working on a paper that challenges some long-standing practices within my field, but am questioning how to title the paper. Basically, the old view in the research field is "we do Y instead of better method X, because X takes too long." We show that X is usually just as fast as Y, and often is actually faster.

Given the fact that we're taking what could be a "controversial" stance, does it make sense to put the controversial idea directly in the title, or should it be saved for the abstract.

Basically, the question is if a "traditional" title, such as:

  Using New Method X to Improve Solving Problem Y

is preferable to directly mentioning the issue in the title:

  Using New Method X Makes Assumption Z Obsolete.

Or is finding a title that suggests superiority without questioning relevance a satisfactory compromise?


texts: How to automatically extract submitted/accepted dates of many journal papers?

texts:
I am doing a research of the processing times of papers published in journals in my field. I have noticed that the metrics that the journals advertise (e.g. the Elsevier journal insights) do not correspond to my experience, nor to the recently published papers, so I wanted to make my own survey. (My guess is that they take into account papers which are immediately rejected by the editor without being sent to a review, so the average looks quite favourable. I am more interested in the average time of the papers which are actually accepted.)

I plan to cover all recently (last 12 months) published papers in 10-20 journals of different publishers (e.g. Elsevier, T&F, Wiley), which will result in hundreds of papers. Basically, I will take the date when the paper was submitted, accepted, and published online, and calculate the average per journal.

Is there a way to automatically extract this information?


texts: Choosing between two post-docs where one is with my PhD advisor

texts:
I am currently a post-doc researcher for two-months at a department (say A). I also graduated with my PhD from the same dept. The post-doc is not funded with any project but with department money and I am expected (pushed) to bring funding from industry partners as soon as possible.

I recently got another post-doc offer where they already have project funding. The place is closer to my home, but I have heard some poor remarks about PI. The project is also well-aligned with my PhD work.

My question/confusion is as follows: my PhD supervisor at department A, who works remotely, insists that I should not leave the current position. She is a great person and I loved working with her. I have also heard that it will not be good on my CV to switch post-doc so quickly (just after 2 months).

Does anyone have experience regarding this? Is it really true that switching positions will look bad on CV?

Many thanks everyone in advance.


texts: Interpretation of "GRE subject test is required, but your application will be considered anyway"

texts:
In the US, many PhD programs require applications to submit the results of one of the GRE subject tests. For example, almost every (serious) PhD program in mathematics that I've seen requires it. However, when looking at the admissions webpage of some programs, there sometimes seems to be some kind of grey area when it comes to the subject test.

For example, on Harvard's webpage for the mathematics PhD program, it is written that:

  The Department requires all applicants to submit GRE Mathematics Subject Test scores. Applicants should check on the ETS website for test dates in their area to insure the scores will be submitted before the application deadline.

So far so good, and if they left it at that, the message would seem to be: "you have to submit the GRE subject test, otherwise your application will be incomplete and rejected outright". However, it goes on to say:

  While the admissions committee reviews all applications submitted by the deadline, missing math subject test scores are one less data point available to evaluate the application. Depending on the applicant pool and the strength of the application materials, the missing subject test scores may put the application at a disadvantage.

How should one interpret this? Does it mean:

"We thank you for the $105 donation, but your application lacks critical information and will almost certainly be rejected"; or
"Your application will be considered, provided it somehow demonstrates that you have a sufficiently strong mathematics background to succeed in our program"?

One one hand, it seems possible that they would want to "consider" applications without the GRE subject test, in that they receive the admission fee and that they can discard the application with very little time and effort (after all, they said the GRE was necessary). On the other hand, it seems silly that Harvard should reject an applicant who, by all accounts, seems to be this generation's Terence Tao, for the simple reason that he did not take the GRE subject test.


texts: How to score class participation, correcting for natural outspokenness?

texts:
When my students ask questions and participate in discussion, class is more thoughtful, more fun, and more effective. I encourage their participation by checking in with them regularly, and making sure that they have time to speak and that they get a respectful hearing. Still, perhaps half of them never say a word. It seems like being in our mutual interest to get them to speak in class.

Because of these positive effects, like other teachers I have tried to encourage participation by making it part of the grading rubric. Some measures assess students' class presence within a particular timeframe, but this is hard to distinguish from attendance. More subtle is to give credit for speech, by filtering and counting contributions, whether online or in person. The speech measure is confounded by the fact that some students are happy to talk all the time while some never even want to. Without rewarding loudmouths or penalizing shy international students, what are best practices in scoring class participation?


texts: Explicit request for collaboration/support in publications

texts:
If I am publishing a conference paper and/or journal article which is about an ongoing, larger project, is it acceptable or even heard of to not only announce expected future work but also to explicitly request collaboration/support regarding said future work? — since the quality of my work (and the work of many others) is directly influenced by the amount and quality of the data available to work with, I would like to polish a framework which I use to collect data for a particular phenomenon of interest into one which is even more easily set-up and executed than it is now. Of course, this could also be then used for other people to easily collect the same sort of data... and so it would be nice if other parties interested in the work did so and we ended up pooling our data together.

I haven't seen this sort of implicit "I only have so much time to run experiments so it'd be totally awesome if you guys did it too", so I'm not sure if it's just not done that commonly or if it's not "a thing" at all.


texts:
I am 33. I live in the US. I am a neither a US citizen, nor a green card holder. I have worked in various jobs as a research assistant (physics, biology, economics) usually involving programming, mathematics or statistics.  As a newly minted undergraduate, I didn't really have much confidence in myself and I completely ruled out graduate school as pointless.  I didn't think of myself as smart enough.  I drifted into working in labs, because those are some of the easiest ones for which one can get a work permit in the US as a non-American.

Having worked in academia for a while now, I've had a chance to leap into various fields and help build solutions to complex problems.  I think I have literally gone as far as I can go researching in academia with no higher degree.  I work at one of the top universities in the world.  (If you looked at US News rankings or the Academic Ranking of World Universities, it's in the top 5.)

Lately, I've been thinking about applying for graduate school.  I do have a few papers in various fields.  I'm thinking of a PhD in either pure mathematics, applied mathematics, statistics or computer science.

I see two big minuses to applying to graduate school:

Most people applying are more than a decade younger than I am.  (Alas, more than a few gray hairs have made an appearance in recent years.)
Perhaps my achievements would look good for someone younger, but partially my achievements are the result of a long career rather than any special brilliance. So, I wonder how my record will be perceived.  I did take GRE and I scored 800 quantitative, 800 verbal and a 5 on the essay.  (I would most likely have to do a GRE subject test depending on what field I ultimately decided.)

Please advise on how accomplished, but older candidates, are viewed in the graduate school application process.


texts: Help and opinions about difficult PhD choice

texts:
I would like to share my situation, as I really need to have opinions from people in the academia or people who had similar doubts in the past. I am totally confused about starting a PhD, I have multiple variables fighting and I would like to get thoughts on this.

To introduce the situation: I have a MSc in Environmental Sciences with top grades, and a huge interest for a very specific, competitive, low-founded research topic (topic A). Something I wrote my MSc thesis on and I am totally passioned about, and something I dream to build an academic career on.
I tried for months to get a PhD into this research field, applying to general PhD calls throughout the whole Europe, as no specific ones on the topic were published. Every time, I got accepted in the program, also when the selection was competitive, but I found no supervisors working on topic A or available to invest funding on topic A (“You need to finance your own research”).
During this tiring and time-consuming process, I have not started a proper job, I have been giving financial and personal instability to my girlfriend, whit all the related consequences, and I have been in the worst stress moments of my life. After some months of this torture, I was resigned to give up because of the lack of possibilities. Two choices were left: finding a “normal” (non-academic) job and spending the rest of my life doing something “stable” which I don’t like, or starting a PhD on another topic. I gave myself one last chance, and I decided to apply for an advertised PhD on topic B, a topic which I don’t feel involved with, but “still better than a normal job”.
I passed the first selection step for PhD B, and I will have the personal interview on Feb 21st. I am likely to win the position. My girlfriend is happy, they would give me a lot of money and she likes location B.
BUT suddenly, a few days ago, I received an email from a friend with a freshly published PhD position on topic A, in a university in a location A on the other side of Europe. My heart stopped, I think I had a shock. I don’t know how to explain it to you, the probability for a position on that specific topic to come out were so small that this seemed to me more like a miracle. The required skills were perfectly aligned with my abilities. It was simply my position, it was me.
I immediately applied, and I wrote an email to the supervisor introducing myself and explaining my passion. I got a reply after one week, saying “your general background sounds good, you can express your passion in the cover letter”. Good. Maybe.
Now, I am totally stuck with my life. The deadline for applications for topic A is Feb 15th, and the position is starting in May. This means the selection process could take until April. But I will probably get the offer about topic B at the beginning of March. I have no time and money left to look for other possibilities, I need stability somewhere for some years. I would like to bang my head against the wall.

Possibility 1: I accept PhD B and I move all my life to location B. If they offer me PhD A, I say no for the sake of honesty towards supervisor B.

Possibility 2: I accept PhD B and I move to location B. If they offer me PhD A, I move again after one month, feeling extremely dishonest towards supervisor B and guilty towards my girlfriend to always make her life stressing for my own selfishness.

Possibility 3: I refuse PhD B with the hope to get PhD A. I don’t get PhD A. I start a normal job, end of the story.

Possibility 4: I refuse PhD B with the hope to get PhD A. I get PhD A. Ideal option. The point is here I have actually no idea of my possibilities to get PhD A. I am really a perfect candidate, but I expect a lot of people to apply, and I have learnt through experience that some positions are just assigned from the beginning, for example. Furthermore, I don’t want to annoy supervisor A with other emails.

What would you do in my situation? I need advices, thoughts, insults and everything you consider useful.
Thanks in advance.

Nebbiolo


texts: How to handle peer evaluations in two person team assignments?

texts:
I am teaching a course in which the students complete two group activities.  For these activities, I require the students to submit a peer assessment.  I planned to use a procedure I had experienced as an undergraduate.

The assessment requires you distribute 100 points between your team members (not yourself). Each students points are totaled and are multiplied as a percentage with the student's team grade to give an individual grade on the assignment.

This process makes sense for teams of at least 3 members. How can I generalize this method to 2 person teams? Is this evaluation fair for small teams (2 or 3 people)?


texts: Why would a "poorly written" paper get a reject and resubmit decision rather than major revision?

texts:
Recently, I got a reject and resubmit decision from a reputed mathematics journal. I received two referee reports: the first referee suggested improving the presentation, with no recommendation of accepting or rejecting my paper. The second referee also suggested improving the presentation, and pointed out some mistakes to correct and gave a recommendation to fix the errors and resubmit.

The editor's comment was:

  The paper is poorly written. Therefore, I suggest to rewrite the paper according to the suggestions of the referees and then to resubmit.

Could anybody explain me why the decision was reject and resubmit  rather than major revision? Under what circumstances might editors make such a decision?


texts: Can I affiliate with a university and use its IRB to do self-funded research part-time?

texts:
I am a social scientist about to finish my PhD program, and I'm hoping that I will get an academic job that will enable me to PI my own studies.  However, I think there is a chance that this will not happen. I love doing research, so I'm wondering - is there a way I can affiliate with a university so that I can use its IRB and do (self-funded) research part-time?

I was thinking I might try to find a job that pays well and then do it just 4 days per week so that I can have the 5th day to myself to do research. I am in the U.S.

Please also feel free to suggest tags in the comments so that I can get this post seen by the right people.

Thank you!


texts:
I have noticed in some citations that the journal or conference name is split up, for example "Neat Stuff, International Conference on" instead of "International Conference on Neat Stuff." For example:

  Ragsdale, Daniel J., et al. "Adaptation techniques for intrusion detection and intrusion response systems." Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, 2000 IEEE International Conference on. Vol. 4. IEEE, 2000.

Is there any reason for writing the reference this way?


texts: Approaching faculty members I don't know well to solicit career advice

texts:
While researching career opportunities, I have stumbled upon an alumnus of the school I am currently at, who is a relatively new faculty member there. In a sense, this person's career is what I want my career to be like. It seems like they could offer me very valuable advice.

However, I do not know this person and do not know anyone they know. I thought I might write a polite email to them asking for advice, but I'm not sure what the prudent way to phrase it would be. And on that note, whether prudence would preclude even doing such a thing.

What's the polite way to ask a professor how to get a job like theirs (specifically, at an institution such as theirs)?


texts: Using IEEE Citation style, how should I Cite a Figure, that was based on one in a text?

texts:
In a lecture I watched,
I found a very good diagram that explains a concept I am trying to explain.
I couldn't get hold of the original image, so I recreated it in Tikz -- with a few changes to make it perfect for what I am doing.

This lecture is not a primary source for the concept explained in the diagram -- it uses ideas from other papers I am citing. Though I do cite it a few times, where the ideas it explained were clearer than the base texts (as well as citing the base texts).

In the caption should I put:

  ... , then generating all the layers below. Right: A DNN initialized using the DBN [1].

Or

  ...  then generating all the layers below. Right: A DNN initialized using the DBN. This diagram based on one found in [1].

Or even -- since the caption is also drawing heavily on the lecture

  ...  then generating all the layers below. Right: A DNN initialized using the DBN[1]. This diagram based on one found in [1].

Where [1] is the index in my bibliography for the lecture.

Related: Creating a schematic figure based on an existing one


texts: How do I handle my teammate who does his task related with project very late just before the deadline?

texts:
Scenario

I am in college and in group projects. We have to work together with other team members to architect the design and dividing the tasks. Once the tasks are assigned to each person and when it’s over, we have to combine each other's task into a single system, which might need redoing and correcting some tasks.

Problem

I am the kind of person who wants to finish his task early before the deadline and avoid anxiety at the end. How do I deal with people who do their task just before the day and integrate all tasks just hours before the deadline, thus causing huge work just hours before the deadline? Could someone enlighten me on how to handle this scenario or correct my approach to the problem?


texts:
Some departments do an annual assessment of their PhD students' progress. It includes questions about topics such as: being independent, writing skills, analysis skills, time devoted, reliability, conscientiousness, punctuality, self-reliance, independence, intellectual curiosity, communication skills, etc.

It also includes a self-assessment done by the student as well as another one by his faculty research adviser. What I found interesting is that sometimes the assigned faculty meet the student before submitting the self evaluation form where he/she often tells the student to change some of the self evaluation responses. It is even indicated in the instruction of some universities' websites.

My questions are:

How they are assessed, are they only to evaluate students or is it also to evaluate the faculty advising skills?
How do these reviews impact the student graduation timeline?  Although they are important skills students should acquire, mostly they are not part of the fundamental milestone for student graduation like qualifying exam, proposal, etc.


texts:
I am currently a PhD student working out research and also doing mathematics for my PhD research. Most of the time these days I spend on studying -- maybe 15 to 16 hours per day. I believe that I joined the PhD as an active student, but now I am not as active as I used to be in the initial years. My productivity is less these days as I try to avoid mistakes in my research. I have started feeling nervous in front of my colleague as I don't have any publications until now.

I always try to prepare my best but these days fail quite frequently and make silly mistakes which are annoying. Sometimes I even forget the basic definitions. Looking at myself during my initial two years I find myself a fool these days. I think this is called the rigorous phase of PhD where your ideas have to pass rigorous mathematical proofs and I am quite independent these days.

Question: How to get through the rigorous phase of PhD?


texts: Advantages of delaying/accelerating PhD application

texts:
I'm an Australian maths undergraduate student, and our academic year ends at the beginning of December. I understand that PhDs in the USA (and elsewhere?) generally start before this time, about September. So, if I want to pursue a PhD overseas, I have a long time to kill in between my undergrad and postgrad degrees.

Consequently I've been investigating the possibility of cramming the remainder of my undergraduate degree into one fewer semester, so that I can graduate at the beginning of July (2014), just in time to start a PhD overseas.

However, this would mean I would have to send out applications in December this year, before I have actually finished my degree. I am particularly concerned because in Australia the last year of an undergraduate maths degree is an "honours" year, which comprises the main research component and the most serious coursework.

Does anyone have advice or experience?

  Would I be substantially more competitive for a top university if I delayed for a year and had an honours thesis and good results from many advanced classes under my belt, compared to applying early and having only a promise of an honours thesis? Or, would it be a minor issue with good letters of recommendation?


texts:
I am a graduate student in mathematics at a top school. Most of other students achieved gold medal in International mathematics olympiad for high school and/or other similar competitions. Most did their undergraduate in the very best school.

I came from a very modest educational background but worked really hard. I did not participate in IMO or other math competitions and if I did, I do not think I would have done well. I attended a not well-known small university in Australia.

Now that I am surrounded by all these gold medalists, I just feel that they are way beyond me and I am so dumb when I compare myself to them. How should I deal with this feeling?


texts: Should retracted articles also be listed on the academic CV?

texts:
Should a separate section list all retracted articles?

Should just a note (---retracted) suffice?

Is a short explanation expected (retracted for fabrication, plagiarism)?

Should one give a longer explanation (retracted due to Joe's work, my supervisor, who is a fraud. He is the rat, not me.).

Or should the retracted article be treated simply as a denied article, and not be listed at all?


texts: Applying to a job after just accepting an offer

texts:
I just accepted an offer after the usual cycle of tenure-track applications starting in December. However, there's another job posting I'm very interested in that was just posted now for some reason(*). Is it possible for me to apply anyway? On one hand I'm just curious to see if I might get interviewed at least, on the other hand I'm pretty happy with the job I accepted, but this second one is closer to home, so I might want to try to negotiate a double position or something (spending half the year at either university). Field is math btw, both are TT positions.
Assuming it is not unreasonable to apply (don't want to get on people's bad side), I assume I should explain the situation in the cover letter. So I guess part of the problem is coming up with a "valid" motivation for applying. If I tell them straight up I only want a double position, they might not consider my application at all(?).
(*) I don't understand why it's posted so late. It also says review will begin immediately - maybe they already have someone in mind?


texts: Professor uses academic employees to write proposals

texts:
I am working at a German university after I obtained my PhD. My professor asked me to write project proposals to get funding. One and a half years ago, I spent all my time during 6~8 months writing a DFG proposal that is supposed to be a joint effort between our university and another institution. No one contributed to the proposal except me. My professor used to give me some general feedback.
When we submitted the proposal, I wanted to submit it under my name but my professor convinced me that it would have higher chances under his name than mine and at the end, it did not change anything. I accepted, and the proposal was submitted under his name and the name of our partner and me as a co-applicant.
During the review process, my professor changed university and asked me to join him. However, due to private reasons, I couldn't join him. Now, the proposal has been accepted and I asked my former professor to keep the project in my university as my contract will end soon and because I wrote the entire proposal.
His answer was "No, I don't want to". I argued with him and he replied “it is normal to write a proposal for me when you are at the beginning of your postdoc”. In this situation, I am not getting any credit and the project will move with him and another person will be hired for it, where I might be unemployed.
Is it ethical that the professor uses his academic employees to write proposals and what to do in similar situations because I find it stealing my effort and credit?
EDIT
Currently, I am hired by the university and affiliated to a research group, so we can work on the project in our institution. Originally, the project was granted to my current institution.
EDIT 2
I think it is getting more into a discussion rather than answering a question. I allow my self to EDIT the question according to the answers and the comments. I didn't get a clear answer, but people were divided into three categories:

It is unethical and the professor did a terrible thing.
It is unethical but the professor has fulfilled his moral responsibility be offering a position in his new institution.
It is ethical and universities/professors can use employees or professional writers to write proposals. (Btw. I did not mention that I wrote the proposal but I also developed the ideas, where my professor did not agree with most of them).

The goal of my question is not to find who is wrong or to prove that I am a victim of my former professor's behaviour but to know if we are working in a healthy atmosphere or not and if it is unethical I would reject to write proposals for my next professor. Otherwise, I need to agree with the fact that this is how it works and continue doing it without feeling bad about my self.
EDIT 3
Consequently, I would vote to close the question as it is likely to be answered with opinions rather than facts and citations.


texts: What is expected in a masters thesis of a mathematics student?

texts:
What is the level of work expected in the masters thesis of a student of maths?
I know some people's works are worthy of publications while some involve only studying some topic in detail from a book and submitting a summary (since this is akin to a couple of courses, a year worth of work, in that topic in terms of content covered, I would consider this,which I believe is called a literature review thesis, as an extreme opposite of independent research work thesis).

But what is the "average" level of a MS thesis of a mathematics student? Is it usually closer to a literature review thesis or a research work thesis?

In particular, I would also like to know:

How much is it valued (if at all) when one applies for PhD?

I have heard that its value is more in Europe than America, which if I were to guess I would say, may be due to absence of GRE like criterion there. Is this true?

Edit: After the wonderful existing answer explaining the case in Germany, I would really like to know the situation in US too. I expect a drastic difference due to the presence of GRE system but would like to know how much importance the thesis has, there.
PS: Please excuse me if one can find answers to some of these questions in already existing questions. I have searched, but couldn't find them. Please provide the links in those cases.
Also, anecdotal details will also be greatly appreciated. Thanks!


texts: Should we chair a session in which we present?

texts: In a prestigious conference in my field, I am asked to chair a session. However,  in the same session, I have my own paper, should I chair this session?


texts: How do professors interpret normally distributed midterm or final exam scores?

texts:
I had recently taken a class where things are poorly taught and much of the studying was self study. This then turned the course into a function of time and workload, and the resulting midterm mark is normally or bell shape distributed with a center of 50.

Needless to say, people who had less workload earned higher scores, people who had more workload earned less scores. After the exam, no one felt that the exam was a good reflection of individual capabilities but it is uncertain if the professor had gotten the hint.

How do professors interpret this outcome? Specifically, are there actions taken to some how adjust this (because most courses have an average passing around a C or 70 instead of 50)?


texts: What are the various designations/stages in the academic career of the person

texts:
In context of a person's academic profile in a web application, I need to broadly classify the various degree/designations/stages in the academic career of the person.

For example I would like to clearly know what is the current stage the person , in his academic career path starting from a pre-university student & progressing ahead.

So I would like to classify something like (below) & ask user to select one of these designations:

Edited:

Pre-university student

Undergraduate(Bachelors/diploma/associate degree) student
-doing
-earned

Masters student
-doing
-earned

PhD(Doctorate) studs
-doing
-earned

Postdoc

Faculty

Scientist

Independent researcher

Does this cover most of the stages/designations in the academic career or is anything missing ? Is there a better term to represent any one ?

Update:

I don't really need a fine grained classification like assistant prof, associate prof, etc but I do want to include all the academic community & related people who have interests in academic topics(which includes scientists or self learners as well) & ranging from university student to faculty, independent researcher or whatever are the higher positions. May not be necessarily a hierarchical list but at least an exhaustive list is needed.

Update 2:

Another idea was too use classification which includes people from academia & even outside that work on/ explore  academic topics & removing ambiguity between faculty, scientist & research positions . Something like this:

    -> A Learner/ enthusiast,

    -> Pre-university student

    University/Research Students:
    ================================

        -> Undergraduate(Bachelors/diploma/associate degree) student
            -doing
            -earned

        -> Masters student
            -doing
            -earned

        -> Doctorate(PhD, DPhils, etc) student
            -doing
            -earned

    University Faculty/Research Positions:
    ==================

        ->  Professor
        ->  Associate Professor
        ->  Assistant Professor
        ->  Lecturer
        ->  Emeritus
        ->  Other

        -> PostDoc,

    -> Scientist

    -> IndependentResearcher


texts: In what cases is Ethical Committee approval not necessary for a study?

texts:
We intend to perform a study with a device we developed (approved for medical research). The tests are non-invasive and only require a very low power laser to be exposed to the skin (complying with all the existing norms).

People will have to travel from their place to our facilities periodically to perform this test.

We want to publish the results of our study, but we are afraid that at the end the journal might require an ethical committee approval (which costs a lot of time and money).

In what cases shouldn't be necessary an ethical committee approval?
Are there dermatology journals where this is not an issue for publication?


texts: What is the formal process for a theory to get accepted by the science community?

texts:
Question description so that anyone can evaluate and answer accordingly
Since last many years, I have self-studied a subject that is Theoretical Physics - Cosmology, Time and Space. I have never got the opportunity to study this at University level so I self-published a book on the theory which I have researched.
I don't know what is the formal process for a theory to get accepted by the science community, please guide me on how to proceed further?
The link provided in the comment section is different as it was more about publishing a paper in a science journal...
However, I got an answer below that there is no formal process and there are options of publishing a paper in a reputed journal or participating in the conference... I am looking for more options if possible.


texts: I am a final year PhD student in string theory. I couldn't apply for post doc positions as I didn't have sufficient number of publications. Now since my thesis work is almost complete I am looking for some long term visits (around 2-3 months or more). Can someone suggest me if these type of programs are there in Europe and US. Also should I write to some professors directly..


texts: Equal contribution noted in paper draft without prior discussion

texts:
My thesis has been accepted as a paper. Now, with the camera-ready submission deadline close, a new footnote appeared in the final version of the paper stating that the first (me) and second author have equal contribution. This has not been discussed with me.

In the paper, I have used the second author's algorithm (implemented as part of different project) as a component in the presented pipeline. His algorithm is an implementation of a complex paper with small modifications. It does not hold contributions in the paper by itself but it is an important component. The novelty of the paper is using this component in the context of a different task by combining it with other methods in a certain way. All the parts of the pipeline apart from this component, also all the experiments and evaluations have been done by me as part of my thesis. Can equal authorship still be reasonable in this case? What are the conditions for  equal contribution authorship? He still spent a lot of time on this component, but it was as part of his own project.

The second author is a PhD student and maybe he can benefit from equal contribution authorship (although not sure exactly how it works). However: What is the impact of such equal authorship on me as a first author? I plan to use this paper in my CV, potentially for a PhD candidate position - can equal authorship make a noticeable influence when looking at the paper?

Thanks in advance.

TL;DR:
Primary Question:

How to handle an equal authorship appearing in the final paper draft which was not agreed upon in advance?

Subquestions:

What are the conditions fo equal contribution of authors?
What are the implications for the first author, if any?


texts: How are letters of recommendation handled when they come from a member of the admissions committee?

texts:
I've asked three professors from the school I did my undergraduate studies at to write letters of recommendation for me.  However, one of the schools I'm applying to is that same school.
In other words, lets say I went to Harvard as an undergraduate, asked three Harvard professors for letters, and then applied to Harvard's graduate program.

It seems kind of weird to me that my letter writers will review the letters they wrote for me as part of the committee review of my application.  And I know at least two of them are for sure on the committee, the third I'm not sure about.

Undoubtedly, this is something that happens all the time, but I was curious how this situation is handled by the committee.

Of course, there are more committee members than the three who wrote recommendation letters for me who don't know me as a student as well, so it gives them a chance to learn about me.

I'm just wondering how this influences their decision, or, rather, how they can prevent it from influencing them too much.  I know being accepted won't be a guaranteed thing, but how can you not accept someone that you yourself have recommended?


texts: What should a TA do if they cannot do all of the assigned homework for a class?

texts:
I'm a TA who is assigned to help grade papers for an upper level course. In the first assignment, I realized that I do not know how to do one of the assigned problems. The professor has requested that I grade all of the assigned problems. I don't think I will get a grading rubric (showing the answers to the assigned problems). I'm extremely nervous since I don't know how to do all of the problems on my own.

Should I ask professor directly about the problem in his office hours? The alternative would be to look at all of the solutions submitted by the students and analyze which answers are correct.


texts: Why do I need to update my contact details before Arxiv submissions

texts:
Question as in the title. What are the practical or legal reasons Arxiv asks to check a box before each submission, affirming that my affiliation and contact details are still up to date?
Having to check a box makes it look like much more than just keeping up the record. In fact, why do they even need my affiliation in the first place?


texts: Is it ok to add new details to the camera-ready version of the conference paper?

texts: My conference paper got accepted. I was told I have an extra page for the camera-ready version. And my method is built upon an existing method. Now I realize that, in the existing method, there might be one key component that could tackle the proposed problem in my paper. Removing this component might not only influence the performance of the existing method but also my method. However, I skipped this detail in the previous version of the paper as I think this is not my main contribution and the space is limited. And also if I put the description of this component on the paper, I thought the reviewers might focus too much on this component instead of my own contributions. Should I add the description of this component into the new version given I now have enough space?


texts: Working on a methodology different from advisor's expertise. How to proceed?

texts:
I am pursuing PhD in materials engineering. My advisor is an expert in molecular dynamics (MD) simulations and density functional theory. She works with nanomaterials and batteries. However, for my research, she wants me to work with finite element analysis (FEA) and smoothed particle hydrodynamics as I will work in simulating additive manufacturing process. She doesn't have knowledge or past experience on these methodologies.
I tried to argue about using MD for my research as there are groups who use the method in similar research work as mine. But she says that those groups are not doing good work and MD can't be applicable for my research. She says, just because they can publish papers doesn't mean that they are doing good work.
Now, I am worried that how I will get proper guidance if she doesn't know about my research methods. How should I proceed? I don't have a co-supervisor.


texts: How to write a technical paper of a not so significant idea?

texts:
I am a PhD researcher in my first year. For the first 3 months all my supervisor made me do was read related papers on IEEE, so a LOT of literature review.

Recently in trying to recreate the result of another paper I was reading, I wrote some code on segmentation that appears to work really well and has got my supervisor's attention and interest. He thinks this may lead to a publication.

He asked me to write a technical report on it. So I wrote a simple report in MS Word which included a brief explanation of the method with graphs and result images but he said this is not what he wanted. What he expects from me is a IEEE style report/paper, including introduction, algorithm/method explanation, mathematical representation, experiments, future work etc.

The problem is that I believe he thinks too highly of my code, its just a for loop applied at different settings. That is all..

What is the mathematical representation of a for loop? How do I make it look more professional? As I know my reports are those of an undergrad standard.