texts: Does it amount to plagiarism by supervisor?

texts:
I have been working on an idea for last 2 years almost independently along with other research works. My advisor did not believe in my work much initilally, so I did not get an RA for two years even after requesting. Recently, I am getting encouraging results with some specific examples and scenarios with good hope for success to solve a complex problem using that idea. I have not published the work yet. Initially, my advisor was not interested in the idea partly because the work is not his area of expertise and insisted that I spend my time in other research projects with a senior colleague. I pursued it with my interest in spite of RA support, but with new results and potential benefits of the approach my advisor became extremely interested and even described the work as the next big idea in our lab meetings. I am happy about it or maybe he says it to make me happy.
However, recently I encountered a situation which was difficult for me to comprehend. I found my advisor present a perspective paper along with many other renowned experts in the field, proposing and highlighting the approach I have been working on as the future direction and visionary in the field along with other important developments in a conference. Even though I was not a co-author in that paper and my work was not cited or even acknowledged, I consoled myself as my advisor was alluding me that he was promoting the idea; it was an advertisement of the work (of course with out any acknowledgement).

As he was not the first author of the perspective paper and there is a possibility that first/other authors can make claim of it, he asked me to file an updated technical report in the department before the  paper is published. It looked to me like he wanted to promote himself among his colleagues with that idea with out acknowledging it to me before the audience and greater scientific public where it matters.

I happened to attend the conference as a PhD student, and found that the presenter of the perspective paper (whom I don't know) presented more than half of his talk on my idea with my slides that I shared with my advisor, and there was no acknowledgement or mention of my report or work. It was even worse to see that some of the terminology that I planed to use, was disclosed and few misinterpreted while explaining.

Even then, people really seemed to liked the idea and the approach and many are convinced that the idea is going to impact the field. While I saw a very drastic change in the way my advisor treated me recently, but what really made me sad was when my advisor asked me to refer to this perspective paper (to which I was not a co-author) in my impending submission (on the idea).

I feel like it was unfair but I don't know if research is done this way in academia or if it is perfectly legit to do something like that. I decided not to cite the perspective paper with possible consequences. I just wanted to know how other students handle such situations effectively and if such a thing is a common practice.

Edit: I do have all email traces and even a previous publication explaining part of the idea and a recent technical report submitted to the department with the complete idea.

UPDATES

June 2014:
I have continued with the situation I described above honestly because as a student I hardly have any options and as suggested by many that it would be an academic suicide. But, it had impacted me severely, mostly because I believe that any good idea I will bring to the table will be stolen or misrepresented and there will be cleaver manipulations to take ownership of them. I will take two steps forward and three steps backward. I could hardly perform in my potential. I will let you know my ordeal soon and many thanks for your kind help and support.


texts:
This comes following my other question. When writing a research plan/statement when applying for an assistant professor position, how should be the document structure?

I have to explain a few (e.g., 3- 5) topics for my future research.

Should these be general topics or as specific as a research proposal?

Should I prove that I have a strong background in these fields or it is enough that the ideas are novel and attractive?

Should I include technical data/figures or the purpose is just the general description?

Should I explain expected outcome as we do in a proposal?


texts: Questions about Sociology Writing Sample

texts:
I'm applying for a Ph.D. program in Sociology for Fall 2019. My background is in Computer Science, but I've attempted to build a competent resume by taking courses in my intended field and having relatively good grades in my non-major courses (philosophy, research methods, writing, etc.).

My query is related to writing samples. NYU requires a writing sample that, at maximum, should be 30 pages. While I have some great papers I wrote while at college, I'm wondering what it means to have a writing sample in your Ph.D application.

Do you write a sample from scratch, or do you simply make some changes to a paper you wrote in college? Are these samples supposed to be reviewed by a professor? If I write one from scratch, what's the recommended amount of time I should spend on it? I'm not looking to submit any applications before October, but not later than that, so I have about 4 months to write one and edit it.

Any advice would be useful. Thank you so much!


texts:
We have written a revised manuscript since the original version is received a decision of "major revision."
Since the status remained "reviewer assigned," we sent a mail with requesting clarification.
The journal editor office replied that the section editor decided to seek re-review for our manuscript given the nature and extent of the revisions requested.

Does "re-review" mean the revision is pending for the original reviewers' comments, or that the section editor sought other reviewers to re-examine the revision for different opinions, or something else?


texts: Does a chapter published in a book fit as part of a paper-based dissertation?

texts:
I've just received an offer to write a chapter for a book that will be published with an important publisher. I was about to say yes, because the topic fits with my dissertation topic and I thought I could use it for my paper-based dissertation, but a colleague told me that a chapter in a book may not be considered for a paper-based dissertation. What was your experience? Do you know anything about it?

Update: Finally my Uni will accept a book chapter as part of my paper-based dissertation. I had to argue that even though it was a book and not a journal, the chapter (actually the whole book) will be reviewed by at least two reviewers. Thanks for your answers!


texts: Mention getting an offer to the adcom when in waitlist

texts: I got waitlisted at Northwestern University for their Master's in Analytics program. I recently received an offer to join the MSE in Data Science at the University of Pennsylvania. Should I email NU and let them know about my offer to have a chance of reconsideration?


texts: What material should I bring to my first meeting/interview with my prospective advisor?

texts:
During a very brief email exchange, a professor of my university (mathematician) said that he is available to take on a masters student at the moment and gave me an appointment during his office hours.

Roughly in the same spirit as the question How much detail to include in first email to potential PhD supervisor?, I'd like to ask

  What kind of "support material" should I bring to this "interview" to make sure the professor collects a sufficient (and sufficiently well-organized) amount of information?

I mean, in addition to the basics, which are

a copy of my CV;
a copy of my trascript;
a concise summary of my mathematical background that is relevant to the (possible) thesis topic with precise references to courses, workshops, conferences, summer schools, and the books or papers I've read.


texts:
Longer monographs should have an odd number of chapters [the
  Internet,1700-xxxx].

Does this rule also apply for papers? I've got a paper with four chapters and I'm wondering if I should make it five. I could split up the outlook & conclusion part, but that would result in two really short sections.

What does the style police suggest?


texts: Should cheating be expected to be more common in Universities in India, and if so, how could any provided credentials be evaluated for authenticity?

texts:
I was a bit surprised to see the extent of cheating going on during state matriculation exams in Bihar (one of the states in eastern part of India). Looking at the images posted at twitter, it looks like large amounts of people do not have much respect for the exam process. My experience from different countries have generally been that cheaters attempt to cheat discreetly, if not so much for any other reason expect to avoid getting caught. In this example in Bihar it seems that getting caught was not a major concern for those cheating.

In this other article about above situation, an individual is quoted as saying:

  "Any examination of this scale in any part of the country has similar complaints."

I had earlier read about corruption being quite common in India, it is just that I did not expect it have led to this type of behavior in public. For example I had an Indian friend who told me how he had obtained his car driving license years earlier without any kind of tests or qualifications by just paying a clerk at the driving license office. This sort of stories are present also in articles like this one from Reuters that says:

  (Reuters) - Mahesh Kundu paid $45 for a driving license, Rupam Bhatia $110 to be admitted to hospital and Vishrant Chandra $130 for a marriage certificate. These are the commonplace bribery stories experienced by middle-class Indians who have poured into the streets to say "enough is enough."

For one reason or another I thought that this sort of requests for money always happened discreetly and money was always exchanged quietly, "under the counter". Looking at this rather public event in Bihar made me wonder, though, about what effect the level of corruption in India may have on any qualifications earned at their universities. How would you know whether a student has actually earned their qualifications?


texts: Am I graduate student or underpaid employee?

texts:
I started graduate course in a national research institute abroad (3 years ago). I just realized now this is my third year and every year we had different projects.

Main problem is that I am not having enough time to focus in one area to publish papers.  Second problem is that I am not obtaining knowledge from the other doctors.

Should I stop pursuing PhD if I feel I am not learning as much as I expected and feeling I am doing someone else work and tasks?


texts:
I defended my master thesis successfully yesterday. Everything in my master thesis was written by me and there is no problem. However I'm a bit skeptical about one thing. So in my thesis I have a part that explains a very well known model. To explain the model you basically need to calculate the gradient of some function, and calculating the gradient is basically lengthy and spans many subsections. So there are many papers and I believe even books that show how to calculate the gradient step by step. So I found one paper and I read it and understood it and understood how the gradient of the function is derived. Next I compared the calculations in the paper to other books and I found that they are very similar.

Since I'm introducing the model in my thesis I had to explain how to calculate the gradient. I explain everything in my own words. However when I wrote the equations they look almost like a copy from the paper!! Since I had the same understanding, so the calculations just almost look the same. So I was really confused what to do about this. Since I want to include the derivation of gradient in my thesis and it looks almost the same from the paper. So I was wondering if this is plagiarism! Since I was skeptical, I checked that the equations also look somehow almost the same from other papers. So to make sure that I don't be held for any kind of plagiarism and credit the authors, I mention at the beginning of the section that starts to explain the model is that my following explanations are based on the explanation given in the paper, where I learned about the model. Calculating the gradient is kinda lengthy and spans couple subsections, so in the subsections I assumed that since I credited the authors at the beginning then I didn't credit them again later for the other derivations of the gradient.

Now my question, is what I did correct?! I mean they were only the derivations of the gradient, so they were equations and I can't just "rephrase" them!

I remember once asking one postdoc that I'm using a lot of equations from one paper and he said that I just need to credit the authors that I'm using the same notation, which what I did. However, when I look at the formulas I feel somehow uncomfortable, because they look like a copy from that paper. Should I be worried?!

I really tried to credit the authors and I cited the papers in many places where I was explaining the models. But only the look of those large chunks of equations seems like copying.

As I said earlier I defended my thesis today, so I just hope that I didn't do anything wrong with that because I really worked hard for my thesis and every single word is mine.

P.S what I know is that copying common knowledge is not plagiarism. So this was my assumption behind the calculation of the gradient. Because the derivation of the gradient is not a contribution and the derivation is done in many papers. (like the gradient of the log-likelihood of logistic regression).

So in short, suppose that calculation of the gradient of the log-likelihood of logistic regression is very lengthy in general. And I just copied the equations from a paper that does the derivation. However when I motivated Logistic regression in my thesis I said that my explanations in the next subsections are based on the explanation in the paper where I copied the equations from. Is that okay?


texts: Convention to denote author who left the research group?

texts:
We at a company would like to publish a whitepaper to be included in the proceedings of an academic conference. The specified format requires us to list all authors together with their e-mail addresses.

One author (who did about 5% of the work) had parted ways with the company about half a year ago and had no connection with the ongoing research (or members of the research group) at all since. Thus he doesn't possess a company e-mail address any more either.

How should such a person listed among the authors? He contributed to the research, so naturally should be listed but I'd prefer to do it in a way that communicates "I have no connection with the group any more, I don't know about recent developments and if you contact me most possibly I won't be able to tell you too much useful information". Also, is it suitable to include his personal e-mail address?


texts:
One of my papers is only published as part of a thesis by compilation by another student.

Can I claim citations of their thesis as citations of my paper?

Is there some way I can instruct google scholar that my paper is inside of that thesis?

Clarification: I am first author on the paper. The other student is a co-author. I allowed him to publish the paper in his thesis. The other student is from another university. For a number of year, his colleagues (who I do not know) would sometimes cite our paper. After he graduated, they choose to cite his thesis instead. I cannot fault them for this, but am a bit sad to not be receiving any more citations on this paper.


texts: Should I do handover of tools and methodologies I have developed?

texts:
In some months my contract at a research university will end.
During my employment I have developed tools and methodologies that are of interest to the research group.
At present, I am the only person in that group that has in-depth knowledge on several topics.
Nonetheless, my employment will likely not continue.
My priorities are to finish up research papers, so that I can apply elsewhere.
I expect to be asked to hand over the knowledge that I developed.

Now my question: To what extent should I cooperate?
One the one hand, cooperation seems like the decent thing to do.
I am dependent on my employer's recommendations, and do not want to burn bridges.

On the other hand, I would abolish my employer's need for me, which feels like self-sabotage.

I have offered on several occasions in the past to hand over that knowledge and to collaborate.
Now, frankly, my highest priority is to get output, and not train somebody (or multiple people).


texts: Can I claim to have completed my degree on my résumé, prior to convocating and receiving the physical diploma?

texts:
I just received my (passing) grades for my last remaining courses for my BSc. I’ve completed all my requirements, but the next convocation ceremonies don’t take place until Summer 2018. Likewise, I don’t think I will receive my diploma (the physical, official certificate) until then. Usually when a résumé says “degree expected in ____”, it reads along the lines of: “I’m not done yet, but if things pan out, I’ll hopefully be done by then“.

This is not my case, so in my résumé, how can I communicate across that I expect to receive my diploma in Summer 2018 as a matter of certainty?

Am I justified to use the term graduated? If so, should I say I graduated December 2017 (when I finished my requirements) or Summer 2018 (when convocation occurs)?


texts: How to reuse algorithms from previous paper

texts:
In the past, I wrote a paper which included 2 algorithms A and B. Both of them were presented and fully explained. Moreover, B was built based on A, in other words, reader must know about A in order to understand B.

At the moment, I'm writing another paper which further expands B. However, it requires A to be presented (and explained) so that reader can understand. So, I wonder how to present an algorithm A in my new paper. So far, I have 3 solution:

Present and fully explain A in a new paper
Present A and say that its explanation is included in an old paper
State that an algorithm in a new paper in based on algorithm A in an old one, without presenting or explaining it.


texts: Is my code my intellectual property or the university's?

texts:
I'm an undergraduate researcher. I wrote a script to solve a problem when I was working on our previous research project. I was unpaid at the time.

Now I am paid for my research and am updating my script (so that it runs better and is more easily accessible to my research group and easier for them to maintain when I leave.)

Who owns my code? Me or the school? Does it matter that I was unpaid (essentially doing the research for fun) at the time I initially wrote the code?

I'm fine with my research group using it in the future, but I want to be able to use it in the future as well when I move onto graduate school.

My current plan is to really build on it and make a really nice suite that would be applicable to both what we're doing now and what I would like to be doing in grad school, but I don't want to do it if I'm going to run into legal hot water.


texts: Under what circumstances it is appropriate to add a team as a co-author, and how should I do so?

texts:
I would like to be able to recognize contributions in cases where the contributions of individual may not warrant co-authorship, but where the work would not have been possible without the diverse contributions of a community (e.g. developers of an open-source software).
I am particularly interested in the case of non-peer-reviewed white-papers, conference abstracts, software, and documentation, but also where it is appropriate in the peer-reviewed literature.
In the cases of writing an article, such documents could be placed in an appendix or archive. But citing "First author et al 2015" instead of "Acme Team, 2015" seems to promote the team while demoting the implied importance of the document (i.e. within the document it can look like padding if the references are to my self).
What is the appropriate context and method for using a team rather than individual name as the author? Is it possible to obtain a unique identifier, such as Orcid or ResearcherID that identifies a team of contributors rather than individuals?
Some prominent examples of this style of attribution include:
R Programming language:

R Development Core Team (2008). R: A language and environment fo statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria. ISBN 3-900051-07-0, URL http://www.R-project.org.

IPCC

IPCC, 2014: Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability. Part A: Global and Sectoral Aspects. Contribution of Working Group II to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Field, C.B., V.R. Barros, D.J. Dokken, K.J. Mach, M.D. Mastrandrea, T.E. Bilir, M. Chatterjee, K.L. Ebi, Y.O. Estrada, R.C. Genova, B. Girma, E.S. Kissel, A.N. Levy, S. MacCracken, P.R. Mastrandrea, and L.L. White (eds.)]. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA, 1132 pp.

And some conferences, e.g. the American Geophysical Union, allows team citation:

A research team may be referenced during the submission process in the Title of Team field, in lieu of adding the names of individual team members.
...
Scientific teams are permitted within an authorship list. Such teams and their members should be formally defined entities such as instrument, field or laboratory experiment, or mission teams. Examples: include "Scientific Team of ODP Drilling Leg XXX" , "The Cassini Imaging Science Subsystem Team".


texts: Should I ask for confirmation of my admission from University academic department

texts: I have applied to two Canadian universities for MS program. One of them has accepted my application and has given me admission. While for the other one, status is "Under department review". I am waiting for second university response. But the problem is that I have to give my confirmation with in two weeks time. In this case, can I ask them to accelerate the decision process for me and can give me a definite answer? Is this polite to do it? Do I need to mention the University name in mail?


texts: In letters of recommendation, how are the different percentiles of ability perceived by the admissions committee?

texts:
On my letters of recommendation, I was asked to rate if a student was

Top 1-2%
Top 5%
Top 10%
Top 25%
Top 50%, or
Not in the top 50%

The student got an A in my class, and scored in the top 25% of students, class-rank-wise.  But I am afraid that if I rate them as "top 25%," and they are applying to a top program, it will make them look like a bad student.

Does the admissions committee discard or look negatively upon all recommendations that aren't top 1-2% or top 5%?

(If it matters, I teach at a top 10 university, so someone who is top 25% here will probably be top 1-2% at a more middling university.)


texts: How do I cite a dataset from a database (Datastream)?

texts:
I have some data that originally is from OECD, but downloaded from the database Datastream. How do I cite this kind of data? I don’t even know the original name of the dataset, just what it’s called in Datastream, which is not necessarily the same thing, right? And what year do I put down?

Edit: Someone edited my title. The original source is not unknown as is clear from the text. I just can't find the data on the OECD website.

Edit2: The topics linked are not about citing third-party databases, which is what I would like an example of. For example, do I call the dataset what it's called in Datastream or do I need to find the original source and find its name? That doesn't seem possible in this case.


texts: Short publication as a letter and then more extensive as an article

texts:
I have written some paper, that is quite extensive, that I would like to submit.
However, the journal that I would like to submit to (with the highest impact factor) accepts only short letters that can be up to 4 pages.
With such a low limit I am not able to describe everything precisely and I am not sure what to do.

Is it good idea to try to publish some short letter in the journal with good impact factor and then try to submit extensive version to different journal, or maybe it would be better to submit the whole article to the journal with lower impact factor but without such low limit on the number of pages?

I also wonder how the journals are going to consider my idea to publish the same thing twice, but the second time in much more extensive way.

This is the first time I try to do such thing and I do not know if it is a common practice, and how much ,,knowledge'' should be included in the short letter.


texts: During one's career in academia, in the STEM fields of research at U.S. universities, what are typical examples of academic politics?

texts:
What are some typical examples of "academic politics" that professors face in academia?

Does academic politics mainly affect younger professors?

I've seen the term "academic politics" come up in some past questions on this site, but I realize that I don't actually know what it means - I just know that it is something that can cause students to quit PhD programs and professors to leave academia.

(I kept the question specific to STEM fields of research at U.S. universities, just in case my question would be too broad without it.)


texts: Instructor's manual -- model answers from it by instructor

texts:
For a textbook, there is an instructor's manual provided by the publisher to the instructor that has prescribed the textbook in a course. The instructor sets some questions from the textbook as assignment. After the assignment is due, the instructor takes the solutions from the instructor's manual verbatim for the questions on the assignment and shares with the students as model solutions without stating that they are from the instructor's manual that he has access to. In this particular case, it seems clear that if students also have access to the instructor's manual (via free document repositories) and turn in answers verbatim from the instructor's manual, that would count as academic indiscipline. But what of the instructor's actions?
Another variation of this is the following. The students at the beginning of the course, ask for some model questions with answers to help them prepare. The instructor chooses questions and answers from a different textbook (for which he has the instructor's manual) than the one prescribed for the course. He shares with them at the beginning of the course these questions with solutions without citing the source.
If the source is cited by the instructor, and the students ask for access to the instructor's manual, on what basis can access to it be denied? At present, it seems that the only basis for such denial is an agreement with the publisher that the instructor will not share the complete instructor's manual.
What is the consensus view on these issues?


texts: Authorship change on conference paper after conference program is printed

texts:
I am a coauthor on a psychology conference paper that was accepted based on a short abstract. The first author became unable to attend the conference and offered the opportunity to present to the coauthors. I accepted and later found out that I need to prepare the slides and text for the presentation.

The first author had presented similar material to a very different audience (a practitioner audience in a workshop setting in Spanish) and offered me the slides from that presentation. The material needs considerable reworking: it needs to be adapted for a researcher audience; have a theoretical framework integrated; be shortened considerably; and be written in (or translated to) English. I should also say that I made scientific contributions to the overall project and these particular results.

My colleague agreed that given the extent of the changes, I should be first author (up from fifth author where I am currently) and he second (remaining authors unchanged). He contacted the conference organizers with the request, but the conference program has already been finalized.  The first author believes that this means that no authorship changes can be made, but I am not sure.

There will be no conference proceedings, so the conference program is the only documentation, other than the presentation slides and any documents we distribute.

Can authorship changes be made in the presented version of a conference paper even if the conference program is already finalized?  Can we list the paper on our cvs differently from how it appears in the program? Are there any written guidelines on this topic?


texts: Changing affiliations and conference registration

texts:
Say the deadline to register for a conference is now, but the conference doesn't actually run until 3 months from now.  During that time, I will have changed institutions.  When I register, should I use my current or future affiliation?

There have been several questions here about how to deal with changing affiliations on papers, but I think the nature of my question is different, since there isn't a paper or publication at stake, per se.


texts: is workshop a relevant experience to be considered for a graduate school admission?

texts:
i know it's not as important as GPA but does it have any noticable effect to be admitted?
of course i am talking about workshop that is related to the graduate school.


texts: My supervisor accidentally forwarded some private e-mail communication to me. What to do?

texts: My supervisor has wrote to another cooperating professor regarding our project and had put me in the loop (CC). But I believe he has made a mistake and had also forwarded some of their previous private important chats and communications. I am afraid if he was willing to share those information with me. Even if part of those are relevant, but one may consider this as sensitive information of these big guys. Is that my responsibility to write back to him and inform him about this? Most of times the sender will notice such a fault, at least after sending the letter, but what etiquette say about this? I cannot say "you have wrongly put me as a receiver," because he had told me "I will put you in the loop," but this was just for the last email, not for their previous communications.


texts: How should I prepare for a research assistant interview as a cs undergrad?

texts:
I've reached out to a few professors and received responses.
I'm pretty used to going to interviews for industry jobs but this is new and I feel like I have no idea what I should talk about. I'm a second year cs student.

So far, i've read 2 or 3 of their most recent research works and have a good idea of what they want to do in the future. I also have a pretty general understanding of their fields although some areas do seem to be out of my league.

What are good questions to ask a professor about their research?
Are there common mistakes students make when approaching an interview such as this one?
How do these interviews typically go?


texts:
After starting my PhD a few months ago I'm now not sure if research is the thing for me. I'm uncertain on whether I should continue in the PhD program and try to make myself like research more, or if I should just stop and drop out of the program.

How can I know if research is for me or not?


texts: What can I do with like-new, recent-edition textbooks that I'm not allowed to sell?

texts: My employer is sponsoring most of the tuition and fees for my master's degree (in aerospace engineering), including required textbooks. Thus, it is unethical and against policy for me to sell those books once I'm done with the corresponding courses. Specifically, the policy is that I cannot "make a profit on" them, but other than that I am free to do with them as I please. I find that having the physical book is helpful when I'm taking the course, but afterwards if I need to reference it a digital copy will suffice. And while having my office/residence full of these high-level materials certainly makes me feel good about myself, it's not practical. Thus, what can I do with these textbooks that will have the biggest, most positive impact on academia?


texts: What the difference in CVs between "submitted to" and "to appear in"?

texts: For those papers that have not been accepted, some people write "submitted to" in their CV and some others use "to appear in". I want to know the difference of "submitted to" and "to appear in". Thank you.


texts: Can I submit the same article, which is written in two different languages, to two different journals simultaneously?

texts: I have written an article in Persian and then translated it into English. Is it possible to send them to two different journals (one in Iran and the other one in Belgium)?


texts: How many times can you present the same material at different conferences before it becomes stale?

texts:
I just finished my PhD in Mathematics and am in between my PhD and postdoc positions.  I was very fortunate to have the ability to present my research to seminars and conferences over the last couple of years. My complete results all reduce to a standard storyline and I feel like I have spoken about it to various audiences a lot, especially the specialists in my field. I have a conference coming up with the specialists again and I am a bit concerned about giving a talk that is just a minor mutation from the talks before.

My question is therefore:

How long can one talk about the same material in the conference loop until the talk becomes stale?
Is a repertoire of multiple research talks expected of a recent PhD?


texts: What is meaning of rolling deadline of grad school application in US?

texts: I am applying for US grad schools and not finding a deadline on the website of certain schools. Instead, those websites say rolling deadline. I am confused what is meant by rolling deadline. Does it mean that applications are reviewed in the order they are received? If so, I am guessing this 'first come first serve' method would be unfair to a good applicant who apply relatively late and decisions are already made.


texts: First publication – author list better alone or with supervisor?

texts:
Some context: applied/pure mathematics. My supervisor is known and respected in their field. We are writing a paper together, however for various reasons, by the time of submission, I will probably have written 80-100% of it myself. In this case, my supervisor wishes not to be listed as an author, specifically because they don't wish to claim credit for work that isn't theirs. (i.e. the quality of the work is not in question)

Question: as a first publication, would it have greater impact if I were to list my supervisor as an author regardless?

My thinking is that a publication whose only author is a no-name (me) will likely not be read, whereas my supervisor's name might attract readers who are familiar with his/her work. On the other hand, while it might suffer from lower impact to omit my supervisor's name from the author list, including my supervisor's name does detract credit from the work I have done, and I have to consider how it looks when applying to graduate and PhD positions.


texts: Report blatant self-plagiarism to journal editor or PubPeer?

texts:
I came across an article by X and Y that is a nearly 100% self-plagiarised from an article by X several years earlier. A couple of words were changed,  but that is it. The figures and tables are the same and so is the list of references. The titles are different. The publishers of the two journals are different.

To put it mildly, I am disappointed by the authors' unethical behavior, by the failure of referees to uncover the earlier work when reviewing relevant literature to assess novelty, and by the editor/publisher for apparently not bothering to use plagiarism detection software.

My first reaction was that I should report this case to the journal editor. Based on what I've heard from colleagues, however, they appear to not always take self-plagiarism seriously, presumably because it's a lot of unpleasant work. Should I therefore report this to PubPeer instead? Or to the editor and PubPeer?


texts: Does a full professorship necessarily imply tenure in American Universities?

texts: I'm having some trouble parsing the implications of all the job titles that get thrown around in academia. Does someone whose job title is just "Professor" necessarily have tenure, or are there nontenured full professors?


texts: Etiquette for a very short lab visit by a PhD student?

texts:
I’m a PhD student travelling to the US for a conference and my supervisor has contacted a former colleague to arrange for me to visit his lab. Under the current circumstances, I only have 2–3 days available for the visit, which means I won’t be able to do any meaningful lab work. They do some interesting techniques that I’d like to learn, but again, I’m not sure if there will be enough time – and I don’t want to be an annoyance for busy staff/students who’d rather just get on with things.

So, for such a short visit, what are the expectations? I’ve offered to present my conference talk at the lab meeting (met with somewhat of an “if you really want to” attitude), and I”d like to see their lab and chat to fellow students about how they do things differently to me... but I don’t think I need multiple days to do that. How long should a visit without any actual research be?

I also don’t know what to expect from them; as a visiting student and not a PI, I don’t think I can expect them to arrange meetings or visits for me, but for the same reason, I’m unsure about reaching out to others at their institute – should I be arranging to meet other people? Is that rude? Is it expected?

I don’t want to waste an opportunity – or embarrass my supervisor, and be a nuisance to a research group that I respect. Should I limit my visit to a single day? Any advice would be great!


texts: Does a 3-year PhD experience in a non-German EU university count in determining the salary for a TVL-13 (100%) position?

texts:
I was wondering what paygrade (Stufe) I am likely to get for a position advertized as TVL-13 (100%), knowing that I have a 3-year PhD experience from a EU (non-German) university.
The postition's title is Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiter in German but Research Engineer in English. Also, if we consider the kind of tasks/responsibilities involved in the position, it involves working in a EU project, which is something I did during the years of my PhD.
All similar posts (linked below) seem to be referring to the case where the PhD work has been conducted in a German university. So, I wanted to check if that wasn't the case, would chances of getting a higher grade be reduced or not?
I don't know if this is relevant, but unlike question (3), I paid taxes during my PhD.
Closely-related questions:
(1) Post-doc Salary in Germany
(2) Criteria of experience recognition for “TV-L 13” position
(3) Does PhD work experience (scholarship was tax free) count in Postdoc Salary contract (TVL-13) in Germany
Less closely-related posts:
(4) What is the difference between TV-L E13 and TV-L E14 positions? Is it negotiable?
(5) German postdoc salaries (TV-L E14)


texts: What strategies can bring technology resistant faculty on-board?

texts:
Faculty tend to fall into these groups:

early adopters
hesitant but willing
refusing to adopt b/c no time
refusing to adopt b/c not technically inclined

I would like to know what strategies I can use to bring the 3rd & 4th group on-board.
Context
A new learning management system has been adopted where instructors are encouraged to post their slides/lecture materials online.


texts: Two simultaneous part time master's degrees while working full time

texts:
I hold a BS in Mathematics with a minor in Statistics and I've been out of school for several years. I recently began applying to part time online master's programs in Statistics and Computer Science. I've been accepted to the online MSCS program through Johns Hopkins University and I'm hoping to be accepted to the online MAS (Master of Applied Statistics) through Pennsylvania State University as well. My goal is to earn both degrees, and with expertise in both disciplines become the ultimate statistical programmer!

The catch here is that I don't want to (and can't really afford to) leave my current job to pursue school full time, hence the part time online programs. I could do one degree after the other, but that would be another 8-10 years I'd be in school, all the while working.

It's useful to note that I'm already a statistical programmer. Degrees are helpful, especially if at some point I'd like to transition to being a full-fledged statistician or a more general-purpose programmer. In my mind at least, it offers a level of career flexibility not readily attainable with just a bachelor's or even a single master's.

But my question is this: Is working 40 hours/week and taking two online master's level courses at a time in two different subjects from two different institutions completely insane? My family sure thinks so. Does anyone have experience or input they could share?


texts: How graduate admission committees choose between TOEFL scores?

texts: I recently took the TOEFL test and my score didn't satisfy me, even the result is above the minimum requirement for almost all universities. If I will retake the test and send my new score for graduate admission, will the admission committees always choose the best score between two attempts or is it possible that only the recent score will be taken into consideration? I want to clarify it  before retaken decision, in case if my score will decrease.


texts: Is it a good idea to put detailed supplementary analyses to a publication on ArXiv or Zenodo?

texts:
I am often bothered by the fact that interesting information pertaining a manuscript ends up in the supplemental information because of constraints of space, formatting and narrative. It feels like wasting hard-earned results.

I am about to submit a paper which will be accompanied by supplemental information where I will put a very detailed analysis of some specific bit of the paper. This is too detailed to make it to the main text. Because I think they are nice results nonetheless and I would like to squeeze some juice out of them, I was thinking about putting the supplemental info as either an arXiv or Zenodo submission, which would assign it a DOI and thus make it citeable. It would make this info also more discoverable and accessible by someone who is interested in this part but not in the journal paper itself.

Is this a good idea or should I simply submit my extra data as regular supplemental info instead?


texts: My supervisor blocks the submission of my paper to a journal

texts:
From the start of my PhD (applied mathematics), I had many disagreements with my supervisor on the research topic (no funding) she gave me. This made our relationship bad and collaboration unpleasant. In the last year before my thesis defense, I asked for a separation, but she was against that. Then, I stopped doing research with her earlier than the expected time, and started writing my PhD thesis, which was approved by the department. This annoyed my supervisor apparently, and now she is very slow in giving me feedback on my PhD thesis.

After submitting my thesis for defense, I extracted a paper out of the thesis, co-authored with my supervisor. She has agreed to revise it and then to submit it to a journal, however, she has held  the paper for more than one month, without any comment. I write emails to her several times for appointments, but she does not reply. I have a feeling that she did it on purpose as she wants to make my academia life after PhD difficult.

Is it an ethical issue to hold a student’s paper like this? I need the paper to apply for post-doc. In such a case, if the student insists to submit a paper to a journal, is there any ethical problem?


texts: Is it possible to get a teaching job in US/Canadian universities with an NZ/Aus PhD?

texts: I am dithering between an NZ/Australia PhD, and the US/Canada one. Is it ever possible to teach in the US/Canadian universities with an NZ/Aus PhD?


texts: What questions can be put into a survey to prevent low-quality responses?

texts:
I'm designing a survey and I heard that there's a technique that sets up some questions in the middle of the survey to see if people are actually reading these questions.
Could anyone provide me the name of these kinds of studies, and examples of what kind of questions could be set up to prevent people from just submitting questionnaires without reading.


texts:
My story begins some years ago. Seven years ago I started my studies and did Physics and Mathematics. At the time i suffered depressions on and off, and the symptoms really told; I could vary between acing my exams and failing miserably depending on which state I was in. I told the head of department about the situation (lets skip the reason why). As a result, it was spread around and today most departments know about it, either from him or having seen it themselves. My studies failed; this culminated in me having to interrupt my Masterstudies in the middle of the project. (The bachelor project in itself went rather well). Some courses were unfinished.

My grades vary but are nowadays mostly good; after a while I learned that while in the slumps there is no use to take the exams and so I took them only when feeling good. As a result I have today, with some few exceptions, what must surely be a honors degree (mostly A- och B-grades and some Cs, one or two Ds). (This after cleaning up some old unifinished courses when I was in a better shape some two or three years later.)

Since two years or so, I have been essentially depression free and my life is good. I function, handle school, the social life and everything well. Within some months I will finish a Masters project in Mathematics and I feel good about it. My supervisor always gives me alot of good critizism/feedback about how I write my work and I get the feeling that the work is converging towards something of a quality that is not bad at all.

However, as most departments have heard, I have had the depressions, and I by chance ran into/overheard when one senior employee passed this information along as I went from one department to another. As a result I have some enemies and no department would take me in for a PhD. I was told by my supervisor that I should forget a PhD at my current Mathematics Department. He was however, optimistic when I mentioned studying abroad. I have not talked too much with other people about studying abroad for a PhD (although now when I am essentially healthy, this is what I want). I think about consulting the other people about LOR for abroad PhD studies.

My questions:

What are my chances of getting a PhD with this back-ground? If my adviser writes me a LOR, will he be forced to mention my depression background? (He is well aware of it). Do you expect general reluctance towards recommending a student like me?
Is it ethical of them to pass this information on? Should I decide that I want to report this, what are common venues to pursue this?


texts: Is that a good idea to send an errata list to a professor whose class I'm currently enrolled in?

texts:
There is a professor at our school whose textbook I was using in class A (not taught by the professor). I've studied the textbook from cover to cover and have spotted about twenty typos (many of which are quite serious, e.g. make an exercise unsolvable). I wanted to TeX them into a list and send it to the professor yet the following two aspects concern me:

I'm currently enrolled in his class B (not the book's subject). It's a rather small class and he knows me by name. Wouldn't it look as if I'm trying to improve my standing in his class by submitting the list?
It's known to me that the professor is aware about some typos (since he commented on a couple of them while teaching from the book two years ago). Yet for some puzzling reason there is no errata list on his website. It gives me an impression that he might be somewhat unhappy to see the extended list of typos.

The professor is working in the field I'm interested in, so I'd definitely like to make a good impression (and more importantly not to make a bad one). So is there a way that sending the list could harm me?


texts: Can my choice of co-authors affect how often my article is cited?

texts: I am a post-graduate student in dentistry; planning to publish an article either in an Indian journal or an international one. How does having co-authors like our seniors or our professors affect number of citations for my published article?


texts: Editor wants to change Full Article to Short Communication

texts: I received a review from a journal (life sciences) for an invited manuscript. The reviewer has requested minor revision and edits. However, the editor of the journal requested me to change my paper from 'Full Article' to 'Short Communication', but I believe my paper doesn't fit for 'Short Communication' since I presented numerous findings. In addition, my paper exceeded the word limits (up to 50%) for short communication. Any advice on how should I respond?


texts: How do departments evaluate and update their course requirements?

texts:
To begin with the main question: how do academic departments evaluate their course requirements?  By that I mean, how do departments decide if they are requiring too many classes, not enough classes, not the right classes, etc.?  The question also could be generalized to "how do departments decide what classes to offer"?  I'm especially interested in evaluation of what courses should be required, but I'm also interested in how that interacts with the overall course offerings of the department (e.g., what might lead departments to reorganize classes to reduce overlap).

I anticipate that the answer will vary quite a bit depending on the size of the department, the field, the type of school, etc.  I welcome that variety.  What interests me most is whether there are established decision-making processes for this.  (For instance, is it something that is specifically looked at when a department undergoes external review, and if so, how exactly does the external review committee evaluate it?)  I'm interested particularly in coursework requirements for grad programs, but would be interested in relevant comparisons with undergrad programs as well.

The background: I graduated from a PhD program about a year ago and have a number of friends who are still in the program.  Over the last few years (beginning in my last two or three years and continuing to the present), there have been some shifts in the department in terms of the size of incoming cohorts and the funding decisions for the new students as well as ongoing funding for more senior students.  This has created an environment of worry and uncertainty among some grad students who fear that there is an increasing disconnect between the assumptions of the department funding process and the reality of student progress.  (Simply put, people worry that most students will run out of funding before they finish, because the funding is for X years but nearly everyone takes more than X years to finish the program.)  There is a perception among some of the students that one contributor to this problem is the heavy coursework load, both because it delays students from starting on their own research, and because logistical hurdles (e.g., not having the right classes offered when you need to take them) make it difficult to complete the requirements in the supposedly "normal" time.

I did a bit of informal research and found that the coursework requirements for my department, compared to those of many other departments at the school (some related to my department, some not). are substantially greater (in terms of number of units required) and less flexible (i.e., much more "you must take course X" and less "you must take one of these three courses").  The department's requirements are also somewhat heavier than those of departments in the same field at other comparable schools.

So what I'm curious about is, is this a reasonable approach to evaluating coursework requirements?  I don't mean to suggest that this alone would mandate changes; no doubt many kinds of information would be considered together.  But is it the sort of thing that departments (or external review committees) would do to get a sense of how reasonable the curriculum is?  Is it the sort of thing that, if known, would be expected to arouse concern among the faculty?  If not, what sort of thing would?  How do departments assess their course requirements, and what would make them think they should be changed?


texts: How can I hire a professor to answer my advanced technical questions in a niche area?

texts:
In short, How does one go about hiring a professor or someone really well established in their field for a private tutoring session?

I tried looking online but can’t find much, mainly websites for tutors that are practitioners or “experts” as in with with n years of experience at best. This doesn’t cut it at my level as I am a researcher with a PhD and already have published papers on my topic.

However, I am very passionate about my subject and always looking to grow. So I do have questions, very technical (in my case computer science) and would happily pay a fee for consulting with a professor in the field.

Any advice?


texts: What can I do if I submitted a paper believing a journal to be free for authors, and after acceptance I'm asked to pay a fee?

texts:
Reading about a journal A, I understood that authors can submit papers free of charge to this journal. I have submitted a paper and received a letter of acceptence with a bill. The editor said that I have to pay print charges in order to publish my paper.

What should I do?

Can I withdraw my paper?


texts: How to motivate students to complete work that I cannot frequently check?

texts:
I assign my undergraduate students assignments from a workbook as homework. The homework amounts to about 30-minutes per day.

It is impractical for me to collect these workbooks at each lesson, or even weekly, as any days when I am checking the work are days when the students don't have their workbooks in hand. Furthermore, I cannot constantly collect, carry, and redistribute hundreds of workbooks each week.

As such, I've limited my collections of these to twice per term. The results, however, have not been good. A great many students save many weeks of work until the last minute, only to discover then that the task is far more difficult than they anticipated.

How can I motivate my students to complete work daily when it is impractical for me to frequently assess it?


texts: Can you submit the same session proposal to two different conferences?

texts:
Each conference is on a different continent but is in the same discipline
(A & H). If my proposal is accepted, I will be chairing both sessions but will obviously have different speakers.

I am concerned that the governing associations may not be pleased due to a fear of redundancy.

Is this an academic faux-pas?

An 'emerging scholar'.


texts: What to do about a student who missed multiple assignments and claims illness?

texts:
I am the professor in charge of a first-year course for undergraduates.
Recently, I received an e-mail from a student,
the general meaning of which is the following:

  Dear professor,

  I am sorry for missing the last few lectures and assignments.
  During the last few weeks, I was really sick with the flu.
  Could you please help me to get right on track with the class?

How should I respond to this e-mail?
Should I give the student an opportunity
to "make up" the missed assignments,
or should I give the student zeros for the missed assignments?


texts: Writing a letter of recommendation for your own, new grad student?

texts:
I have a new PhD student who needs a rather large number of letters of recommendation for a fellowship.  Normally I would not agree to write such a letter without knowing the student for a longer period of time, but at this point she has exhausted her list of other potential letter writers and has no other good option.  Also, I do genuinely believe in this student's potential (otherwise I wouldn't have hired her!), and have had nothing but terrific experiences with her so far.

Question: How do I write a compelling letter, given that I have known this student for only a short amount of time (less than a year)?

Obviously the fellowship is remunerative for me as well, since I wouldn't have to pay her out of my own grants for a few years.  A cynic sitting on the review board might say, "of course the advisor wrote a good letter—they want the money!"  What kind of tangible information might help dissuade a person with this kind of attitude?

(For reference, the fellowship is a big federal graduate fellowship in the US.)


texts: What is (if there is one) the equivalent of the tenure-track phase in Europe?

texts:
In the US, tenure-track (TT) positions seem a common and natural step in the progression towards an academic career and quite "stable" state-wise in terms of what one might expect from them, in that if nothing goes too wrongly, after the fixed X years in a TT position one can reasonably expect to get tenure (I've heard of  horror stories of denied tenure from certain R1 universities, but I'm more concerned about the generic case here).

Now, I'm in the early stages of my academic career (I'm soon to start my first postdoc) and, more relevantly for the purposes of this question, I'm based in Europe and, unless I have absolutely no other options, I intend to remain in Europe in the future. My understanding of what the "natural" steps to take after the postdoc phase in Europe is, admittedly, pretty muddy and quite scattered.

My question(s) is (are):

    Is there an equivalent (step-wise in the progression towards an academic career) in Europe of the tenure-track positions in the US? If so, is this equivalent step "stable" country-wise, or does it change considerably depending on the country? More generally, what is the "natural" progression in Europe after the postdoc phase?

Sorry for the many questions, but most of the advice I usually find is very US-centric.

EDIT: To make the question a bit more specific, I'm particularly interested in France, UK, Italy, and Germany. Also, I'm trying to pursue an academic career in mathematics, so I'm also interested in those aspects specific to the discipline, if there are any such.


texts: Are we focusing too much on cheating with online courses?

texts:
Recently, the online calculus class I TA for took their first test of the semester and the grades were horrific. Granted, this is my first semester as a TA so my expectations might have been high. However, the average was about a 50%. While the overall stress of the pandemic is definitely a factor, I also believe the structure of the exam played a significant role.
To prevent rampant cheating, students were given fifty minutes to take the exam but were not able to scroll through questions. That is, students could not look further ahead to see what questions were coming, nor could they revisit questions to change their answer. Does this seem a bit much to anyone else? Is worrying too much about cheating on tests, especially now, counterproductive? I mean, what if this semester's grades are inflated? It's only going to negatively affect the students who passed the class without deserving it as they progress through higher-level math classes.
Ultimately, I'm just a little discouraged as it seems we're more focused on gatekeeping grades instead of instilling knowledge.


texts: A colleague's CV is taking credit for service that I did, and now we're both on the shortlist for a job. Is there anything that I can do?

texts:
A few years ago I undertook the position of co-editor as a journal and organized a redesign of the entire journal: new layout, new cover, new typesetting, new printers, everything. I'm very proud of all of this work, and I make sure to bring it up in cover letters and interviews.

I learned about a year ago that my fellow co-editor lists on their CV that they redesigned the journal. (Note: they didn't even claim that they organized it, which would also be false, but that they did the redesigning, so it's plagiarism of the designers and typesetters, too.) But this is unequivocally false; they had precisely zero contact with our new designer, our new typesetters, or our new printers. I'm not even sure this individual knows what articles we published in the volumes for which they were co-editor.

Despite my frustrations with what I felt was outright plagiarism of my career, I ignored it. But I've recently learned that this person and myself are on the shortlist for the same job.

In my eyes, I'm in a lose/lose situation:

When two CVs say that a person was responsible for something, obviously at least one person is fudging the truth. I worry that my colleague's CV calls my own honesty and integrity into question.
But I can't really go speak to anyone about this, can I? It seems like I would just come across as trying to tattle or get a leg up in the job search.

Is there anyone I can contact, or any way to approach this in a safe way?


texts: Is it appropriate to ask a student I tutored how their exam went?

texts:
I tutored a student in math for two weeks to help her prepare for an exam. I expected her to inform me how the exam went, but she did not.

Is it appropriate to ask her how the exam went?

We are in Ireland.


texts: how do you verify your knowledge in a subject area for grad school admission while you have not been enrolled in regular class?

texts: If you want to apply for graduate school in computer science , you have to show that you have the prerequisite background knowledge . What are the available options ? Can I take a challenge test for credit in one subject area ,say ,algorithms provided that I have the required knowledge in this subject ? There is a man who managed to complete most of the undergraduate MIT computer science curriculum using MIT OCW . Can he verify his knowledge to the admission committee by taking challenge tests?Can I take the final exams that the university department offer to regilar students without attending to prove that I have the required knowledge for the graduate program ?


texts: How much of my teaching evaluations to bring to an interview?

texts: I'm interviewing for a lecturership (purely teaching, maybe 10% research).  I've taught one course before and I have received a thorough (positive) evaluation from my students.  However, my institution feels that more information is better, so my evaluation is 28 pages long.  Do I bring the whole thing, one copy per interview committee member, or would just the summary section (where the main numerical results are) be enough?


texts: How can I compare photos and PDFs submitted for an online math test to detect for plagiarism?

texts:
I have a group of 1000 students giving an online math test, and 10 teachers (each one evaluating 100 students). Some of the students sent photos and others sent PDF files for their submissions. I already found 2 students that sent the same document (yes, exactly the same), so now I want to compare all documents.
Does there exist any way to compare all the documents to find similar documents?


texts: My adviser wants to use my code for a spin-off, but I want to use it for my own company

texts:
I am a PhD Student in computer science.
During my my first 2 years I developed an algorithm that seems to work fine in a certain field of applications.

My adviser recently told me that he is starting a spin-off with a colleague of a different department and that he plans, in a couple of years to use my algorithm in it.

Now, considering that:

I am not interested in joining my adviser spin off as an employee
My advisor can understand the outcomes but not the 100% of the logic of the algorithm
In the future I want to make my own company based on that algorithm

I am quite worried.

How fair (and common) is that an advisor plans to use the code of one of his to students to make money (none of which will finish in my pockets)?

The fact that he will use my algorithms, will limit in any way me to use them in the future for the same scope (in a different field)?

May talk to him be a good way to solve this problem?

I don't know how to deal with this fact.


texts: About email contact with prospective advisors who are yet to join the institute

texts:
I am a second year grad student who is trying to find advisors in two people (quite brilliant scientists!) who are going to join my grad school as faculty. They are going to be in campus only rarely now but will be full-time here from the next year.

Does this situation sound very bad or scary or depressing or something wrong?
Am I late into the game?

So I have done studies and have written up research drafts in areas related to these scientists and have been trying to get into discussions with them over emails. Both sounded quite interested in me - one of them met me for a few hours of discussion while in campus about a month ago - and the other one said "we should keep in touch and meet when I am there the next time"  etc.

But I get very scared and nervous when I don't get replies from them after even a week from the last email (stating my progress in their respective subjects)- I am always thinking if they struck me off from their mind - did they just forget me - did they decide I am not worth it etc. etc.

[...I am getting sick of just the unbearable tension of the fear of having been dropped...]

Anyway is the implicit expectation that I am going to read up all current papers in their fields and be able to come up with a paper on my own? (...thats what I am trying to do but clearly thats not easy!...) I don't know how "advising" is supposed to work with so little contact (...may be there is a culture conflict because in my previous institute one met one's professors daily and even multiple times a day at times...)

[just a side information - may be irrelevant but still for completeness of information - I think I am way ahead of my peers in terms of depth and breadth of knowledge and speed of learning new papers and my grad school grades are all at the top..]


texts: Should I mention my interest in teaching in SOP and recommendation letter?

texts:
I'm currently thinking of applying to PhD in Economics, after much consideration and reading through answers in my previous question: Should I do master or phd to teach in community college.

Basically, I'm interested in teaching in post-secondary level, and I have little interest in doing research (though I'm currently doing full-time in a research institution). However, PhD is recommended to teach in post-secondary level in most institutions, at least in United States.

As I'm thinking of preparing for Statement of Purpose, I'm conflicted as how I should mention my passion in teaching, since SOP is meant to show research interest. Should I not mention anything about my desire to teach? If I do mention, should I mention that I'd like to teach rather than do research upon completion of PhD? How do admission view applicants who are more interested in teaching?

Similarly, I'm unsure of how I should talk to my professors who agreed to write recommendation letter about my deviation from being an enthusiastic researcher. I have two professors from undergraduate that I'm close with, but they only know that I used to be very interested in research when I was in college, and they do not know that I have lost much interest in research after graduating and working in a research institution. Should I let them know that my interest has changed? How about my current research advisor, from whom I'm thinking of asking for my third recommendation? Should I let him know as well?


texts: Should I look for research internships or stay at my university for the summer?

texts:
I am in my last semester of Physics and Mathematics and, at the same time, my first semester in a MS in Applied Math (which I will finish in two more semesters) in one of the top universities for physics grad programs. I plan on pursuing a PhD in Physics by Fall 2020 and was wondering what was the best option to do this summer to increase my chances of being accepted in a program at a top university. I plan on applying somewhere else.

One option is looking for a research internship at another university or a national lab. On the other hand, I have been working in several projects at my home university and I am in a collaboration with another university. I have a publication done with a small group and a renowned professor in mathematics, and if I stay this summer I might be able to finish one or two more since I have been working in said projects for a year or more. The important thing is that I want to publish them before I send in my applications for PhD programs this fall. I think there is a considerably smaller chance of publishing if I go to an internship, and I might be able to apply to short programs like two week summer schools while I work here at my university. Furthermore, I already have participated in two summer internships at a Fermilab and Princeton, so I don't know if it makes any difference participating in a third internship, or if it would be better to potentially publish 1 or 2 publications more before I apply to a PhD program.

Summarizing, what do you think is more important: another internship or another (one or two) publication(s)?

Thank you for your opinions!


texts: Publication a prerequisite for PhD Programs

texts:
I'm completing a master's in history (one year in), and am beginning to look at possible PhD programs. I have noted in a lot of forums that it looks really good if you have one (or several) publications to your name.

How does one even begin this process? Also, with coursework and the thesis writing process having just begun, how do graduate students find time to write and attempt to publish original work in addition to the aforementioned obligations?


texts: Can I ask a non-academic for an academic letter of recommendation?

texts:
A scholarship based on existing mental health problems and conviction to finishing/doing well in school and it requests 2 reference letters and doesn't specify from whom. I'm only a second year in my undergrad, and all of my classes are too big for a connection with a professor. There is no one academic to write me one.

My mom suggested this one family friend who is a nurse and who has known me for 14 years. Is this a good idea? Any ideas who could write the second one?


texts:
I work in biomedical sciences, and whenever I need to look up an article - or find recent references about a certain field of biology - I just go to PubMed, because it collects information from the vast majority of "serious" journals (from Cell/Nature/Science to niche publications).

Are there equivalents of PubMed (comprehensive and easy to use) in other fields, except for Google Scholar and ArXiv? For example, in physics, chemistry, geology, electronics...?


texts: Choosing PhD advisor in a field different from your undergrad research?

texts:
I am applying to grad schools now, in physics dept. I have been doing my undergrad research on high energy and astrophysics. But recently I have started to gain a lot of interest in condensed matter physics. If I get accepted to grad school, I will be selected on the basis of my massive undergrad research which is mostly focused on high energy physics. But, I want to do my PhD on condensed matter. But one of my main concern is finding an advisor. I am worried that the professors in top tier universities may not comply with it.

Is it possible to persuade advisors in condensed matter to guide me? (especially in a top tier university)

If yes, how easy is it ?

I am not so sure about it....But is this thing really common among grad students?


texts:
Is possible to obtain the information about the CiteScore rank for a journal?

I have seen in "Elsevier Developers" that there are different APIs to obtain the SJR and SNIP metrics, but nothing about CiteScore rank and I need to obtain the percentile in a given year.


texts:
I am a Spanish student who is intending to apply for a PhD in electrical engineering in some US colleges. As far as I read in the web pages of the graduate schools, they financially support all the students they admit to their programs.

Anyway, in the application program they ask for information about the external funding I am asking for. I will be asking for It, but the period to ask for is after the university application is over.

Also, lots of the fellowships i have seen are only for PhD students that are already in 2nd or 3rd year,while the TA and RAs are also starting from 2nd year(as far as I know), so I wonder how important is it to have the external funding to get accepted? And if I would not get It would I get funding from them?

Thanks!


texts: I want to know how can I get some participants for an empirical research study I would be conducting. Does universities have systems in place to call/recruit participants or do I have to find them myself?


texts: I determined a parameter for an experiment – shall I ask for authorship?

texts:
I am working in an experimental-physics group. They are going to publish a paper soon. So far, I see five authors on first draft (PhD student, postdoc, collaborator, collaborator, PI).

I am not sure whether I should ask my PI to consider putting my name on the paper or not. I was working on the project for only a month and then the PI gave me another project right after I finished it. I was not involved in any analysis of the paper, but I was working on finding a good parameter for the experiment.

Initially, when I was working on the project, I thought I would be one the authors, however, one year and half later, the first and second author of this project did too much work, so it seems like that I did nothing on this experiment compared to them.

Is it worth it to ask my PI to consider me in the paper?


texts: Use of external collaboration in masters

texts:
I have recently finished a 4yr Bachelor in Physics and have been looking for a masters thesis(the masters program at my university is rather dumb - you just do research and the thesis).

A recently appointed professor has suggested a thesis to me to which I am partial - though it does not strike me as "THE thing I always wanted to do".

The thesis would entail a collaboration with an external research institution (Max-Planck Society for those familiar with the field).

I do not - at least for now - plan on following the project to a PhD (though there is that possibility) mainly because I think it is not quite what I am interested in.

My question is thus: Are such a collaborations be beneficial to a search for a PhD position in the future?

My plan is to get (the hell) away from my current university at the latest after the master thesis.


texts: Writing a peer-review suggestions letter for a journal editor

texts:
I am submitting my review for a journal but they ask for a letter with peer review suggestions (3), but it is not templete, and i am not sure if I can suggest any peer for the review or they have a specific list.
Thanks.


texts: How does a student's misconduct history carry across to other courses (if it does)? Is there a difference between minor and major offences?

texts:
I have a general inquiry regarding the impact of past misconduct in different courses of study.

To provide an example: if a student takes a course and is removed because of poor performance (or even if they are not removed and have had a warning) could this be used against him/her in a different course in the future? Or does the code of conduct for each university specify that each course constitutes a different "chance". What about when it is not about removal, and is about academic misconduct or general behavior?

In cases where the gap between both courses is quite high (say a decade), would it be safe to presume that misconduct as (for example) a teenager could not be used without good reason in the future, or could it be waived all-together?


texts: Re-applying for the same PhD program abroad after finishing it in one's home country?

texts: This is a little bit hypothetical question… Let's assume I finished my PhD in math in my country but I am dissatisfied with it (assume I live in a developing country). Also I have enough money and time. Can I apply for a similar PhD program in an another country? Is it theoretically possible?


texts: Paths to mathematics/university/research while dealing with a few difficult situations

texts:
I'm a (just turned) 17 year old student (Year 11) from Australia in a bit of a tricky situation. Unfortunately, I spent most of the last few years and am currently in a psychiatric unit. I've also liked math for a while now, specifically certain subfields of algebraic topology and differential topology/geometry, like (topological) k-theory and cobordism for the former and spin geometry/index theory for the latter.
However, I've fallen very far behind in schoolwork and because of the risk associated with my going back to school, my the school admins decided to prevent me from returning  (it was not a good school  anyway - an all boys school (club) full of Neo-Nazis (that isn't even an exaggeration), rapists and the like. This leaves me in a difficult position because I don't thing it's possible for me finish school (I've been described/diagnosed by almost half of the DSM, MDD, Adjustment disorder with depressive features, GAD, SAD, BPD, cPTSD, NPD, OCD, ASD - all at different times).
I also can't really go back to home, so sometime next week I'm being put into a youth hostel/communal living place/refuge (this is bad because I might never get to see my cute dog (golden retriever) again). I really want to go to university to study math and eventually do research(?) in some of the areas I mentioned above but I don't really see a feasible way there. I know asking for life advice online is questionable but I really don't have any idea what else to do. Any suggestions/hard truths/similar experiences/comments in general would be really appreciated. Thank you all.


texts: How do you refer to foreign titles in APA6?

texts:
I'm familiar with the example for when I am citing a part of a foreign source but I have questions about referring to foreign titled work. I have written papers before in MLA, but I am required to write in APA6 for my next paper.
The example from the website:

In text:
Research has addressed that “Les jeunes qui terminent un placement à l’âge de la majorité dans le cadre du système de protection de la jeunesse sont plus vulnérables” [Youth who finish a placement at the age of majority in the framework of the youth protection system are more vulnerable] (Bussières, St-Germain, Dubé, & Richard, 2017, p. 354).

And in the reference list:

Reference list:
Bussières, E.-L., St-Germain, A., Dubé, M., & Richard, M.-C. (2017). Efficacité et efficience des programmes de transition à la vie adulte: Une revue systématique [Effectiveness and efficiency of adult transition programs: A systematic review]. Canadian Psychology/Psychologie canadienne, 58, 354–365. https://doi.org/10.1037/cap0000104

My example:
For example, if I am citing filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl's film Triumph of the Will (1935), do I first cite both the English title and the original German title as

Triumph des Willens [Triumph of the Will, 1935]

... and then subsequently

Triumph of the Will (1935)

Or is it common practice to just refer to the work's English translation? Is the example proper if I do the translation in the paper?
Do I also use the publication year only once, when first introducing the work, and then only write

Triumph of the Will

In subsequent references to it?


texts: Writing an arXiv paper without "Introduction" or "related work" sections

texts:
Many conferences and journals demand that a paper must follow certain guidelines; otherwise the paper will not get accepted.
For example:

Writing introduction section
Writing previous related work

Is it okay to not follow these guidelines while writing an arXiv version? I want to directly write the main result and its proof, and put that on arXiv.
Note: I take an exceptionally good amount of time to write an Introduction since I am not good with framing English sentences. And since my research area is a competitive one, I do not want to get scooped in that time.


texts: How to narrow down the scope of a computer science research project?

texts:
I'm working on a CS systems project for a while where I don't seem to find the right scope so that it turns into a research question that can be answered.

I either develop the project further which improves the performance but its rather a development advancement than a insightful research contribution. But when I try to frame a research question around the system, it is so vague that I cannot seem to connect it to the system I built.

Are there any approaches to find more concrete research questions in a structured way?


texts: Managing council work while working full-time as a PhD student

texts:
I want to know what are the few planning and management ways that one can use while being a full-time doctoral student (research, collaboration meetings, some coursework and teaching) and also holding a position as the head of a student council (mostly emails, meetings and coordination with other councils and university administration).
The work as a council head is also about collaborating with other student bodies where they have full-time employees, so keeping up with their emails and discussions is somewhat taxing, given we have to manage our entire workload as a doctoral student as well.
I do know some ways - like earmarking an hour a day to reply to such emails and a few hours a week to manage other council work, but there are some things that need attention right away. Are there effective (de-stressing and anxiety-reducing) techniques for both council work and life as a Ph.D. student that can help to get done with things and contribute to a better work-life balance?


texts: Are there conventions for research paper flowcharts?

texts:
Other than obvious aspects such as being legible, clear, and understandable (at least in theory) are there any mainstream conventions for flowcharts in research papers? I'm talking about scientific based flowcharts which give an overview of the entire thrust of the paper.

For instance:

I have noticed, for instance, that black and white two dimensional layouts are typical, while individual items may have some sort of consistency (e.g. cylinders tend to represent data-storage or datasets in a lot of papers). Is this part of a larger schema that researchers might adhere to?


texts: Is it considered misconduct to omit a university that you were enrolled in, but didn't attend any classes at, on graduate application?

texts: Is it considered an academic misconduct to skip listing a university's name in the graduate application, in which somebody got admission but never attended any class/lab/test/exam whatsoever and as a result his transcript is shown failed in all courses in one semester?


texts: Gaining software skills after PhD. Is it possible to achieve it in 6 months?

texts:
I have completed my PhD few months back. I am about to start my postdoc at my PhD lab soon. I will be working on a different project than my PhD.
My PhD was in computational materials science. I used open-source finite element software to carry out my research. I had to write Matlab scripts for developing 3D geometries (used a bit of computational geometry: voronoi and a bit of topology optimization) and python scripts for postprocessing of the simulation results. The codes I wrote were quite basic.
Now, for the postdoc position, I have to implement machine learning algorithms in my research. I have 6 months before I need to provide tangible results. I need to learn and be proficient in python modules.
How to go ahead with learning the language proficiently and also learn the fundamentals of machine learning in 6 months. Is it possible to do so? Or I am tackling an impossible task? Any guidance with the course material?


texts: If the editor handling my paper is a retired professor, then would it be fine for me to inquire about my paper status?

texts:
I have a paper under review at a journal for 2.5 months.

Given: 1) it is a short paper taking only two pages, 2) I know that the editor handling this paper is a retired professor, and 3) I have submitted several short papers (the number of pages is < 5) to this journal and all of them were handled by this editor. Yet according to the past events, 1 month is the longest for a first decision. Then if it is fine for me to send a polite, short email to inquire about my paper status in order to "remind" the editor?


texts:
I have published a paper earlier in a journal and would like to submit a continuation of research paper to build on the earlier paper's results. I was wondering how is the second paper identified as a follow up of the original.

Also, I have changed my name since (same co-authors), do I have to indicate this?

Details

The first paper contained a series of experimental and modelling results for a pure system, and the new paper will contain experimental and modelling results of non-pure versions of the original system.


texts: Algorithms, Combinatorics and Optimization graduate programs

texts:
Does anybody know of any other ACO (algorithms, combinatorics and optimization) graduate programs besides the ones at Carnegie Mellon and Georgia Tech?

From what I have searched, these two schools were the only ones that offered such a multi-disciplinary program. I like this intersection in CS/MATH. The only other multi-disciplinary programs are scientific computing ones where the focus is in numerical algorithms, differential equations, and parallel programming. Scientific computing would be my second choice type of program.

There are TONS of scientific computing programs, where aren't there more ACO programs? I think both topics are fascinating, but I just have more fun with ACO types of problems. Ideally, I would enjoy a 70:30 ratio of ACO and Scientific Computing.

I really want to do an inter-disciplinary program because, in a general computer science program I would most-likely have to do systems (ewwww!) and in a general math program I would have to study analysis and geometry (which is cool, but I would rather focus on ACO!)

Are there any other ACO programs besides the ones offered at CMU and GA-Tech?
Why are there so many scientific computing programs vs ACO programs?

Thanks for all the help


texts: CV contents for application for professorship positions in Germany

texts:
I am in the process of applying for a Junior Professorship (W1) in mathematics in Germany, and according the the job listing, the required application documents include a CV and a list of publications (among other things).

What should I include in the CV? Personal details, such as date/place of birth, martial status? How about invited and contributed talks at workshops and conferences? And research interests, or language / computer skills?

How long should the CV generally be?


texts: Is it wrong to unintentionally withhold information?

texts:
I recently posted something related to this (If an assumption proves to be false, is the research then meaningless?), but it is still bothering me.

As I mentioned in that last post, I conducted my first research project in high school last year, and I am now having doubts about one of my assumptions (I was not used to making assumptions at the time). I actually learned that one of my assumptions were invalid from a judge at a science fair.

As a matter of fact, I had not even noticed that I had made that assumption until he brought it up (and penalized me for it). Despite all of the people that I had proofread and check my research, no one brought it up. Furthermore, I competed at science fairs prior to that one and none of those judge brought it up (I am not sure if they caught it or not). I was successful at those science fairs, but I am now feeling guilty. I feel as if me not mentioning that one assumption is the only reason I was as successful as I was (although I cannot justify it).

Is it wrong that I withheld this information, despite the fact that I was not even aware of it? Is that considered cheating? This question has been bothering me and I would appreciate any help. (I am now working on a different research project and I am being much more cognizant about my assumptions.)


texts: How to handle Supplementary Instruction of Subject-Deficient Students with language difficulties

texts:
I work as a supplemental instructor for students that come out of high school with subject deficiencies. They are admitted as conditional students, and they are required to meet certain benchmarks in order to proceed. These subject deficient students are required to take supplemental courses alongside their first lecture in whatever subject they might be deficient in. The instructors for these supplemental courses, or enhanced labs, are all undergraduate students. We work alongside the professor of the lecture to develop lesson plans that coincide with one another. For example, in a Statistics lecture, the professor will only teach statistics, but in the lab, I work to teach algebra components they missed (or forgot in the case of non-traditional students) alongside reviewing the statistics covered before tests.

Typically, the number one problem is that these conditionally admitted students are on completely different levels from one another. This has its own solution that has always worked well.

That being said, another problem has arisen. I have a student in my lab that speaks very little English. Due to this, he has been struggling severely but hasn't dropped the course due to an incredible perseverance. The issue at hand is that I have absolutely no idea how to support him as an instructor and the professor I'm working with is also at a loss. When consulting with the Academic Support team, they're also at a loss, because we don't have a lot of support for languages from his region.

How should I go about handling this student? At this rate, he will assuredly fail, and I don't want to just leave him to drown. Collegiate statistics can be hard enough for students as it is.


texts: Am I supposed to add the name of a surgeon who had no contribution?

texts:
I'm need an urgent consultant regarding authorship rights.
Three years ago one of my professors asked me to write a surgical case report for one of his residents, later I found three similar cases and added to the article. I collected all data and followed all cases alone. The professor only gave the idea and neither the professor nor his resident made any contribution to writing the article or even reading what I've written. At last, they said this case in not worth publishing and we are not interested to publish your manuscript. They gave me permission to publish the article myself but the only document I have is a text message. Tonight, I got acceptance of my article and I want to make sure that I can publish that without the name of the surgeon. I have aknowledged their name.


texts: Is it acceptable to submit more than one papers to a conference?

texts:
I am an undergraduate and am new to paper writing.

I have been writing papers with professor A at another university since I was in high school. We are writing a paper together for an upcoming conference (which is pretty big).

I have been also writing a paper with professor B at my current institution for the same conference.

I am also writing papers with some graduate students for the same conference.

But - in total, I will be submitting about 5 different papers to the same conference (all with different people!).

I don't know if this is acceptable in academia. That is, will there be any sort of consequences for submitting a lot of papers to the same conference?


texts: PhD: admitted with TA with 5h a week, is it standard?

texts:
it is my first time applying to a (pure math) PhD program and I just received my first admission letter (yay!). It says I'm considered for TA and "Teaching duties consist to up to 5 contact hours a week".

Before applying anywhere I was under the impression that TA required ~20h a week. My question: Are they not showing some "hidden time" ? or do I have a special offer (=they "want" me)? Or is it normal for this university (GeorgiaTech)?

If it can make a difference, I'm 32yo/married so I'm thinking they might also want to be nice with me to accommodate for this "special" situation.


texts:
Are there universities that offer PhD in Mathematics without GRE or TOEFL in Europe?

I have completed my Masters in Applied Mathematics with a cgpa 8.0. I am keen to pursue research in Mathematics but I am not aware about the same. I would highly appreciate the comments in this regard.


texts: In my cover letter, how many faculty member should I list as people I want to work with?

texts: I am a grad student, graduating in the spring. In my application for postdocs, I include a cover letter that lists faculty members I want to work with. If there is one person that I am really interested in working with, should I just list that person? Or should I add another so that I sound open to working with other people too. More generally, if there isn't one specific person I am interested in, how many people should I list? How many is too many?


texts: Is it okay to reference theorem in the secondary source If I don't know where the theorem begins?

texts:
I would like to cite a theorem in my paper.
It's not famous, but it is used by many people.
So, I don't know who first proves the theorem.
Is it okay to reference the theorem in the source that might not be the first paper to prove it?


texts: Can I reuse a recommendation letter that was given to me a year ago for PhD applications now?

texts: I took a recommendation letter from one of my Professor last year and I want to apply for a PhD position now.Is it OK if I send that recommendation letter or should I ask for a new one?


texts: Is it ethical/ correct to cite a confidential document/ paper (under NDA)?

texts:
Each paper should be able to provide enough evidence that its claims are correct. Nowadays, where the number of joint industry-university projects grows exponentially, many confidential documents produced by private companies become available to researchers in academia under Non Disclosure Agreements (NDA).

My question is the following: is it ethical to cite a confidential work in a scientific paper and use it to make some statements, while the rest of the scientific community cannot evaluate the accuracy of the claims in that source?

In my personal opinion, this type of reference should be prohibited, since it hinders the progress of science, but I would be glad to hear other opinions on this topic and especially how they believe that such a case should be treated.


texts: Is it okay to cite the abstract(English) of a foreign (non-English) article?

texts: If you don't know any languages other than English (e.g. German, Italian, French, etc), is it okay to cite the abstract (which is in English) of a foreign article without reading the full text (which is in the native language)? I appreciate if you provide a reference too (e.g. APA Manual, etc).


texts:
I have uploaded a paper to arxiv. It has several citations / references.

However, when I look at the Bibliographic data, it is shown as empty..

Any hints of what could be wrong?


texts: Is it okay to switch languages in an email?

texts:
I am emailing a professor I have not met about a foreign exchange program. They teach Japanese, and I started out by writing my email in Japanese only to get halfway through and realize I would have to look several things up if I intended to continue writing it this way. I regularly email my own Japanese professors in mixed languages and I know a few classmates do as well, but we also personally know our professors due to the small classroom setting of the course.

Would it be bad/particularly unprofessional to switch to English as necessary throughout my email?
If any of you are professors, how would you feel if a student you do not know did this? I wonder if it is annoying to them..


texts: Include article in bibliography I didn't cite

texts:
Say I gained knowledge from a review article. However, I don't cite that review article. I do cite articles cited by that review article, but not the review itself.

Should I still include that review in my bibliography?