texts: How to reconcile with an old mentor after (unintentional) plagiarism accusations

texts:
The question is not about plagiarism, it is about its aftermath. I am presenting the whole situstion.

Three years back, in my undergraduate years (summer after sophomore, to be precise), I did  my first major project with a professor in India. The project came out well and we had two publications next year.

Obviously happy with my work, the professor offered me another project, next year, which was entirely different and of higher level of difficulty (he had his graduate student working on it). He asked me to do simple simulations and mostly literature survey so that he could later use it. He also proposed some survey papers (all by same author, call him X) to start with. I wrote the survey section based on the papers mentioned in the citations by X, and added reviews of another dozens of paper. I cited all survey papers by X and cited others too. I also did certain simulations.

Meanwhile, he provided me references to land into a Masters program at one of the top 5 electrical engineering programs in the USA, and I will be forever indebted to him. After I came to USA, he had his graduate student worked upon the project and submitted a paper (I was surprised to be listed as co-author) including the survey section and simulations I did an year ago.

One of the reviewers pointed that the survey section has been almost a replica of X's works. The reviewer added that, although X's works has been cited, word plagiarism is still relevant. I got disappointed and wrote my mentor and email apologizing for letting him down. He didn't reply.

Now, it's been six months since the review came, and I really wish to reconcile with him. What can I do ?

few clarifications

The plagiarism was using 3-4 sentences from various papers without double quotes but properly cited. Also, half of my citations were same as X's works. It happened because, my survey was about major techniques in a field while X's surveys were about techniques in a subfield of the field.

I emailed the professor only once. He didn't reply and I never emailed him again.

I never knew how my section was going to be used because the project-work was incomplete. When his graduate student finished the work, he immediately submitted the paper and informed me after the submission. I should have got time to review something I did an year back.


texts: How do I illustrate a postdoctoral professional Masters degree in my title

texts: I am finishing a Masters degree in Educational Technology (MET) and already earned an MA and Ph.D. How do I write this? Ph.D; MET? I am not sure so need confirmation.


texts: Should a graduate student accept random offer to be a reviewer for IEEE Transactions paper?

texts:
I have been asked by a well-established professor to review a regular paper submitted to IEEE Transactions, however, I am concerned as in the email, he titled me "Dr. Monkia" although I am still being a graduate student. Of course, I am interested in the paper's topic, but I don't consider myself an expert. He asked if I couldn't review, I can ask a qualified colleague to do so, or let him know immediately.

I had been asked many times to review for predatory conferences or journals, of course, I declined. As far as I know, IEEE transactions are reputed, however, this sounds a little bit weird.

The question: as a graduate student should I accept to review or decline in that case (given the fact I know the topic)?


texts: Why are some professors critical of even casual use of Wikipedia?

texts:
Many of the professors and lecturers I come across are very critical of Wikipedia, but they never give proper support for their claims of "Wikipedia is bullshit!". And they threaten "Do not use Wikipedia if you want to pass!", and they mean it seriously.

It is true that "any Tom, Dick and Harry can edit it", but it is also true that Wikipedia takes a lot of effort to add in citations.

I do understand why we should not cite Wikipedia directly, instead go for the primary sources, but many do not even allow Wikipedia as a introduction to a subject matter. If I tell them "I read from Wikipedia that..." I get dismissed immediately, yet in online forums we use it like a Bible.

What is the real reason Wikipedia is perceived negatively among many professors, even for informal use (e.g. as an introduction to a subject)?


texts: How common and expected is it to have published papers or patents as a Master student in Europe?

texts:
I am writing my master's thesis and applying for PhD programs in Europe, where Master studies are usually composed of mostly coursework and voluntary research projects. I do not think it is very common for papers to come out from such short projects.

How expected or common is it to have publications under your belt when you are applying for PhD programs in Europe?. If I remember correctly, master degrees in the US/Canada are more research oriented from the get-go and a publication record is more expected there.

The most probable option I can imagine is a paper or patent coming out from your master thesis. But taking into account the time it takes to publish/patent something, I can not picture it being expected at the time of applying.

All I have is a patent from my bachelor thesis (also in Europe). How bad are patents seen in comparison to a paper?. Do they even have any importance in the PhD admission process?


texts: Am I burning bridges if I am applying for an internship which I am likely to turn down even if I am accepted?

texts:
There is an internship opportunity at a prestigous institution, which I consider applying for. I do not yet have a job offer for the considered time period. I need a job/internship for financial stability. I am also applying to apply for internships in a different country, where I prefer to spend my time. These are less prestigious institutions, and I think I am more likely to get employment. However, I am not sure.
I want to make sure that I get employment, so I would like to apply for the prestigious institution as well. If I get accepted to both places (ie to the prestigious institution, where I don't want to be in general but I will cope if I have no other job, and to one of the less prestigious institutions, in the country where I prefer to be), is it burning bridges if I turn down the offer of the prestigious institution?


texts: Are there academic reasons to only use journal articles and books when writing?

texts:
Recently I was researching for a paper, but the results of my research got me reflecting on my habits:

Is is at all appropriate for me to use Google (partly also Google Scholar) for academic research, just because I have good experiences with it in my personal, non-professional environment? I noticed I feel slightly too comfortable in sourcing material via Google. As expected, the quality of the resulting materials is "bad", in the sense that the sources I happen to find are rarely journal articles and often chronically difficult to cite. Of course for many topics this is a non-issue, but for my current topic, a lot of government, international institution and NGO content was "on-topic" and needed, so that is how the situation came about in the first place.

While I definitely won't use Wikipedia or (online) newspapers, but I also came across e.g. OECD content: while the content itself is strong and academically valid, by now I sadly had to discard a significant part of it, also because I initially didn't (exclusively) use their "iLibrary". Specifically: The amount of time I had to spend trying to find e.g. the author of such non-journal content (and other source-data), trying to decide if I should invest my time into reading and citing the content vs. discarding it and that I have to enter bibliographic data by hand for such content make me tired.

Thus my thought is: Should I intentionally, sternly refrain/refuse to use (and of course cite) any materials that doesn't carry a DOI, ISBN or ISSN? There is still a lot of grey literature, manuscripts, working papers etc. and web content out there... My current frustration is so large that I seriously consider such a strict stance going forward, but I fear that I might miss out on crucial facts and that omitting such publication will affect the credibility and well-roundedness of my paper(s)?

In the age of Google I am very happy that academic standards are in place, compared to the lack of cite-ability etc. in documents published by NGO's, think tanks, policy institutes and some governments.


texts: Should I include a synonym in parenthesis in abstract of a PhD thesis?

texts:
Should I include in parentheses a synonym I will use in the main text already in the abstract?
Example:

The atomistic scale (micro-scale) shall be considered ...
The atomistic scale shall be considered ... (Then introduce the synonym in the main text?)


texts: What does it mean when a conference submission system asks if the first author is a student?

texts: When I recently submitted a paper to a conference, there was a checkbox asking whether the first author is a student. Did you encounter anything like that? Does this means the reviewers will consider this and will be less strict?


texts: Is it possible for me as a graduate student in the US to a sign a contract with an US company to create a US patent from my PhD research?

texts: I'm a third year graduate student in the US and a company in the US is interested in a special part of my PhD research, which was about developing an algorithm and create a software based on that algorithm for biomedical applications, and they want to sign a contract with me to create an US patent based on that algorithm and software. I know cause this work is originally developed in my university, the intellectual property is owned by the university, but it's not really clear in the university's intellectual property policy that in these kind of situations that a third-party is interested in a student's work what would be the procedure? I really appreciate if someone has any idea or suggestion regarding this matter.


texts: Will "academic expert" for study website hurt me on the academic job market?

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I've been offered a side job working to answer submitted student questions (at my own discretion) related to my field of expertise for a study website. Seems pretty harmless as a way to earn very minor extra cash.

Would this have any implications for my prospects through the academic job market? I probably wouldn't list it on a CV, but would a committee seeing this kind of activity see it as a bad thing?


texts: Is it acceptable to request information from US math departments about the job placement of recent PhD graduates?

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I am a first-year math master's student looking to apply to math PhD programs next year.

Is it appropriate for me to cold-email a US math department to request information about the job placement of recent PhD graduates? For example, I may want to ask how many graduates with which advisers managed to get postdocs and eventually tenure-track positions at either research universities or liberal arts colleges. Another example is that I may ask how many graduates with which dissertation areas eventually obtained non-academic research jobs (e.g. Microsoft Research, NSA, US national laboratories).

Besides asking departments directly, I can only think of the Math Genealogy Project, which is not always complete, and the Annual Survey of the Mathematical Sciences, which has excellent data but only for broad groups of departments and broad classifications of research areas.


texts: Difference in business school pay across developed countries

texts:
Why is the pay for tenure-track faculty at business schools in developed countries other than the US substantially lower than (and often only a fraction of) their US counterpart (with the exceptions of Hong Kong and Singapore, and then perhaps a handful of other schools in the rest of the world)?
Shouldn't the proportion of people who want to pursue business degrees and are able to pay business school tuition largely comparable across developed countries? Then should non-US business schools also be able to make money from tuition to hire top business researchers/professors and pay them as well as US business schools? What makes the economics of running a business school and paying faculty different in other developed countries?


texts: What are opportunities for academic math outside of academia itself?

texts:
I finished my PhD program in pure math a few years ago and have been in industry since then. I would love to continue my academic career, but (long story short) I was treated badly by my program and left with the doctorate but without a postdoc or much in the way of a publication record or connections (thus making the doctorate close to pointless) I haven't had much trouble finding jobs in software engineering or government labs, but I haven't found the work there to be interesting or satisfying.

Like pretty much everyone who goes into math, I love math for its own sake, and I love research. Is there anything available outside of academia where I could undertake something close to pure math research? Ideally, I'd like to beef up my publication record and make some connections, but a tech company doesn't seem to be the right place to do that. Although the jobs are certainly there, coding and engineering really aren't my things, and I'd like something more strongly related to math and more academic and research-oriented in nature.


texts: High school summer research in fields other than biology/medicine

texts:
I am currently in high school in the USA, and it is relatively common for students to work with various researchers in the summer. The majority of the work done is the medical/biology fields, and I would like to know whether this is a common practice (or a possible practice) in areas outside of biology and medicine.

The biology and medicine fields make sense for several reasons:

My area (a large US city) has a large biology and medicine faculty (especially because it is considered a "hub" for medicine)
Biology and (to a lesser extent medicine) seems to be more accessible to a high school student with a background in the AP curriculum and the medical programs available to students at the local districts. Subjects like mathematics are hardly accessible to undergraduates, much less high school students.
Biology and Medicine are largely laboratory sciences, while the same can not be said about things like mathematics. Furthermore, the social sciences and the humanities (less present in my area, but still significant) seem to be nearly absent in summer research type work.

It makes sense, therefore that with a large population of students wanting to be in the medical field, and a large research faculty, that the practice of either formal (through a program), or more informal (E-mail a researcher for a spot in lab rotation), research happens in these fields. So, is there a similar practice in mathematics, physics, the social sciences, or any other area of science?

EDIT: In response to amlrg's post I have some further questions: how can I tell if a researcher in physics or math is studding a computational area? How should I go about approaching such a researcher>

It is interesting to note that the fact that a similar thing does not happen in the non medical/academic disciplines popular around here. For example, as an Engineering hub, you might expect that it would be common for students to shadow or intern with engineers, but this is much less common than high school research in academia.


texts: Writing theory section of thesis - feels like I am just copying

texts:
I am doing a PhD in physics / applied math and have just started writing the theory section. A large-ish part (5-10 pages, estimated) will be setting the scene with some theoretical tools that I am using but did not invent. These tools will eventually be used as the basis for analysing data.

I will say the word so you don't have to think it: plagiarism. I have absolutely no desire to plagiarize so am very careful about citing my sources - however while writing I get the feeling that I am simply copying off of others.

Question, in two parts:

Can anyone give a strategy for how to write a theory section and make it ``your own'' while clearly citing relevant material?
Is this feeling actually normal and am I just over-reacting?


texts: What's the difference between a Doctor of Computer Science and a Ph.D. in Computer Science?

texts:
I'll be starting a Masters of Science program soon and wanted to make plans for my professional/educational future.  I've been looking at different doctorate level degree programs and I'm having a bit of trouble in understanding the difference between a Doctor of Computer Science program and a Ph.D. in Computer Science program.  I've seen it listed both ways which leads me to believe that they're two separate programs.

Could someone explain what the differences between the two are and identify which is more appropriate for someone with a development and software engineering background?

Here are two programs that show the difference in titles. These are not necessarily the programs I have in mind but they're the first ones I could find that show the title difference.

Colorado Technical University - Doctor of Computer Science

Nova Southeastern University - Ph.D. in Computer Science


texts: Is it okay to defer accepting a PhD scholarship to see if I get accepted into foreign Universities?

texts:
If I apply for a PhD scholarship at my current university, where I'm completing my honours, they'll notify me within 6 weeks of the deadline November 1st.

However, other universities I'd like to apply to overseas won't tell me until as late as March next year.

Is it acceptable to defer acceptance until I get a rejection from my preferred university? I really don't want to come across as ungrateful for the opportunity.


texts:
I am a new tenure-track faculty.  I did my phd in a very weird way -- my advisor was in a different dept.  So even for my committees, I did not have anyone from my department -- I even do not know anyone in my department.

I got hired for a tenure-track faculty.  I had a social meeting -- three people asked, "what department did you graduate?".  For many reasons, I said, my advisors department -- not mine....

However, now I am questioning it is ok...  May I get your advice?  Do I need to approach them to correct?

I feel panicky as a new kid here now


texts: Etiquettes and content of review text for replying to reviewer comments?

texts:
I submitted my first paper to a reputed journal and it came back with major revisions. One review is positive while other suggests to reject the paper. Though the reviewer who rejected the paper was under a wrong impression that a smaller version of the paper had earlier been published somewhere else (I provided a preprint on arXiv and declared so in the cover letter).

I have made significant changes to some sections of my paper and now writing the review text. So my questions are:

What is the etiquette for replying to the reviewers. "Thanks for such comments" etc after each comment seem very repetitive to me and seems they sound just as formality. Are there any established etiquette to reply to reviewer comment (specifically for very negative comments)
Is it OK for the review text to have 5-8 lines in response to comments which are not there verbatim in the revised manuscript. (Since I want to connect to the revision as compared to the previous version)
Should I include the changes (such as tables for new results etc.) in the review text or rather point to relevant sections in the manuscript ?


texts:
What is the longest gap of unemployment that will likely not affect your chance of getting an academic position (post-doc or faculty)?

For example if you graduate from your PhD in December or January but most post-doctoral/faculty positions in your field don't start until May-Sept, is a partial year's worth of unemployment looked down upon in future job applications? If not, what is the longest gap that won't look so negative while applying to future jobs?


texts: What should PhD students do when they are told to add authors who did not contribute to the paper (e.g., head of school, international funders)?

texts:
There's a department at my university where the head of department is routinely put as author on papers he didn't contribute to, and where researchers from overseas who had no input (but who provide funding to the department) are put on papers.

As a pragmatic matter, how should a PhD student respond when they are told to put three names on a paper, when those people didn't contribute?  Assume that refusing to put the co-authors on is not an option, because:

There will be bad consequences if they do not, and
This practice is routinely done at a high level, and there is nobody at the university to complain to about it.

This is not a duplicate of this question, because its answer assumes that it is practical for the student to refuse.


texts: How common is it for grad school admissions to use a whitelist of undergrad institutions?

texts:
I was talking to a professor recently and he mentioned something that I found surprising. Namely, for graduate admissions in his department (top-30, US public) they had a whitelist of universities and they only consider applicants whose undergraduate studies were at one of those universities. He went on to complain that initially the list was too US-centric and it had to be expanded because they missed good international candidates.

I was very surprised by this. I did not know that this whitelist approach is used, but evidently it is. My question: How common is this? Have others heard of this practice?

I'm pretty sure my undergraduate institution would not make it onto any such list. So I'm sad to hear about such practices. Fortunately, I did get admitted to several very good US grad schools, so evidently the practice is not universal.


texts: If a grad student is working as a TA, can they also be asked to work as their adviser's lab manager for free?

texts: I have been my adviser's chemistry lab manager for the past 2 years, mostly working as a TA to pay the bills while I try to get research done.  My adviser has no funding so I've been running the lab for free, which includes training, advising, and processing samples for people (we're a service center too).  Someone told me this was illegal but the department head knows that I'm doing this.  The department sporadically supports me on an RA but I feel that they do this to keep me from seeking legal recourse; they've had a history of legal issues with former employees.  I was curious if anyone had any input on this.


texts:
Context:
As I am writing my first paper, I cannot determine what, when and how I should cite scientific literature. It is because I don't know why I should cite (or not cite) other work.

My fist 'newbie' approach was "Every assertion you write should be proven by a relevant citation, so that other can believe you". Given that "I know nothing", no one would then take my word for it and thus I must prove that what I'm saying is true.
However, this lead to overcitation (and, I must admit, over-generalization of results), and frustration since I must find a paper corroborating what I want to say for every sentence, or so*

Then if I'm leaving this strict rule, I tend to think I am writing triviality, or affirming things I am not 100% sure. I also fear to unintentionally plagiarize, when I say something someone else already stated.

Question:
In a scientific writing, why do we [have to/need to/should] cite?

Clarifying this might help answering corollary questions: what to cite? and when should we cite?

What to cite? Should I cite a paper (i.e. give credit) for ideas that are in its literature review, and that are totally not related to the core/added value of the paper? Should I cite every paper related to one field? Can I cite only not-that-much-cited source and not classic ones? etc.
When to cite? If I am writing an assertion that is general (e.g. "Polar bears have mostly white fur"), should I justify it?(!) Which is the criteria to determine when an assertion need to be proven by a citation, and when it is admited?  When I define a key term for my paper, should I always rely on past definitions?

Disclaimer: Of course, I am aware of some obvious reasons for why we cite, such as giving credit and proving assertion, and I've read Arno's answer (who lists giving credit, for proof/evidence, and providing context as reasons) on a similar question. The originality of this question would be, to detail the link between the theory (why) and the practice (what, and when) of citing.

Furthermore, I am conscious that there are multiple questions in this post, especially in the bullet point list. However, these are just here for explanation purpose, and should of course be asked separately to get a specific and detailed answer.

* I know this should be done the other way (i.e. basing what I want to say on literature, and not looking for someone who could corroborate what I want to say)


texts: Who deserves to be first and second author? PhD student who collected data, research associate who wrote the paper or supervisor?

texts:
I am composing a manuscript using data collected by a PhD student over two years. She doesn't have enough statistical or analytical skill to publish her work. On top of that, language is also a huge issue for her.

I redid the analyses, created the graphs and started writing with my own flow and conclusion. I am also receiving supervision from a post-doc who got his PhD in the relevant field as the topic of the paper while I don't have much experience on the area.

I am quite confident I have the right to claim as the first author but when I allocate the second authorship to the post-doc, the student was acting up with me. Without me writing and the post-doc supervising, she will never be able to publish her work. So, who really deserves which?

Updated : Let me clear a few things here. I understand the conventionality of assigning authorship here in the US or other advanced countries. PhD student is from a country where even young faculty doesn't know what peer-review publication is. Post-doc(the supervisor) and I (research associate) are based in the US. PhD student collected the data 3 years ago and she and her adviser came up to me to collaborate on research projects and she handed the dataset to me to write. She has no interest in taking part in the writing process (no phone call, email or no showing of desire to learn anything from the process). When post-doc and I started writing, there is not even a promise of her data and research design can produce anything. We had to recraft research questions, redid analyses, graphs and everything. It was much like you download the someone esle collected data from public website, you write analyze and write a paper on it. During my Master year, my US adviser used the 10 years dataset from a peer who collected the data but didn't express interest in writing it. The guy offered us with the data, we wrote it and his name came as 3rd author. Seriously, we don't even know this paper can even be publishable and we are just making the best out of it.


texts: How to write a letter to work at an university?

texts:
I'm writing a speculative letter to work at university in Siberia.

My real motivation is that I'm slowly changing my mind. After graduation I immediately started working as engineer because I thought I wanted to build things. I never stopped studying and if anything I studied more while working than before. I just started working in a R&D lab so I could reconcile all the time spent studying with actual work. Still I'm not convinced and I'm writing a letter to find a contact in an university I like with the hope that I could somehow be hired.

The problem is that my academic cv is incredibly poor. This is what I have in a nutshell

Master degree with full grades
One publication in prestigious journal based on master thesis
3 years of relevant work in the field

Soon I will have a book published. It's a technical book but it's not academic, not sure if it counts.

In the letter I'm writing I tried to explain why the technology I'm researching is important and have practical applications worldwide. I listed my publication saying that it contains some results of my research. Finally I specified that I'm working in a R&D lab and I'm developing expertise on the topic.

In the letter I ask if the university have done some research with this technology and I ask for a contact.

When I started writing I was convinced to do something useful but reading the letter to myself, I imagined to be a professor and I would be puzzled and chances are I would ignore the email.

How can I write a letter with some chances to find job in this university? Is it possible that a professor could be interested in a collaboration with me? How to best elicit interest supposing my research field is of genuine and immediate importance? What is the most probable position I could aspire to?


texts: Publishing in a Procedia journal versus a 'proper' one

texts:
I’m torn between asking for my (somewhat weighty) conference paper to be included in an issue of Transportation Research Procedia, versus submitting it separately to a journal with an impact factor, e.g., Transportation Research B. The conference paper will have to be peer reviewed to qualify, but the journal advice says,

  The Transportation Research Procedia does not have, and is not eligible for, an Impact Factor as it does not publish primary research, full length, peer-reviewed articles.

Is a separate submission likely to be worth it (i) for dissemination of the research, and (ii) for REF (Research Excellence Framework) return?


texts: What is harder? Taking lecture or learning from textbook? Is it weird for finding learning from textbook easier?

texts:
Dear Academia Stack Exchange.
I'm a slow thinker, so I always have trouble with taking information actively as other are speaking. Sometimes I feels like I have trouble with studying but it's not like that. When I study from textbook, I can understand all the points of the author, I was able to comes up with my own question and answer them myself too. Although this is a little bit consuming but it is still better than when I couldn't learn anything from other lecturer. Why is this happening to me? Is this normal? Is this just a matter of preference in learning style? Or is it that I am doing something wrong in the way I'm taking in lectures? Please give me some advice.
p/s:And no, although in the original I did ask for some comparison of two ways of studying, this question main point is not about such issue.


texts: As a student, how to deal with low quality tools in lab assignments?

texts:
In a lab today we were working with electronic circuit boards (kind of like old-fashioned Arduinos). I had done the prelab but I had a great deal of difficulty trying to get my circuit board to work in the way it was supposed to. Slowly, everyone in the class left. The next class arrived and I continued to work. I consulted the TA for help several times and eventually I was able to prove that the board I was working on was faulty. It was very difficult, as it seemed to work as expected with one micro-controller, but given multiple some funky stuff started happening. The TA emphasized that it was important to understand the basics and advised me to come back tomorrow to make sure I understand how to use the circuit board. I already missed a class staying in late today. This is very frustrating especially considering I pay lots of money to be in the class and half the labels on the chips are so faded you're not even sure what you're putting in.

My question is, could I have done anything differently (and not missed my next class)? I find it nonconstructive to blame things on the equipment, but it does really happen sometimes. Should I have pressured the TA more for help? It was 1 TA for a fairly large class but she almost never looked at what I was personally doing and just gave general advice. What would be fair for marks? An omission or an extension?

This was embarrassing and frustrating. After the TA told me how I had to be able to do this, I thought about dropping the course. It would have been unfortunate if it was because I happened on a defective board.

Should I have put more pressure on the TA to help me or make sure my equipment was working properly?


texts: Is it possible for an individual's TOEFL score to decrease between exams?

texts:
I heard that if you take TOEFL exam several time your score will never  decrease. Is it correct?

It seems rational, if TOEFL is a standard test, its difficulty level should be equal in all exams. For example if in your first try you get 28 in reading and it shows your good skill in reading, it's not rational that ETS assign a lower  score in successive exams.

I took exam for second time after ten days of my first attempt. I feel the reading section was harder than my previous exam. If TOEFL is a normalized exam, its evaluation of my skill in reading should not be decreased in such short period.


texts: Copyright issue regarding creating an image by using other images taken from a website

texts:
I need to use images related to "cricket umpire signals" in my paper. I want to create a new image by putting some of these small images together along with graphs and comments next to them. But my concern is the copyright issue when i take those small images from websites.

I found the images on many websites such as BBC or WordPress blogs.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/cricket/rules_and_equipment/6135798.stm
https://paulsaekiblog.wordpress.com/umpire-signals/

But BBC says that they don't own all of the images on their website, and they don't reply back fast. and on other websites, there is nothing specifically said regarding the copyright license.

Also, i asked someone who has used such images in his paper about the issue, and he replied back "they are in the public domain and a permission is not required" along with the following link.
http://123coolpictures.com/cricket+umpires+signals.
But I'm not sure how acceptable/reliable is his answer regarding this issue.

I'm writing the paper for an ECML/PKDD workshop (computer science) in europe and I live in Germany.


texts: Does having developed a local (La)TeX system help in graduate admission?

texts:
Suppose that a person was born in country A and the language of country A was his mother language (non-English); he then immigrates to country B (English speaking), is a citizen of country B and has done his undergraduate entirely in country B. This person had no need to typeset anything in his own native language but devoted a lot of time and developed an open-source (La)TeX system for country A; the localized (TeX)LaTeX system that he has developed is now extensively used in country A in academia for typesetting books, theses , ... . He is also a well-known person in country A for his TeX work. His TeX work for country A was very significant that improved the quality of the academic publishing in country A a lot and academics in country A can even write a letter to confirm this.

Now if this person applies for graduate school in electrical engineering (USA), does his TeX work for country A help him in his graduate admission? is there any need to mention his TeX work or will not the admission committee really care?

Note: USA is neither country A nor country B


texts: Getting Letter of recommendation with letter head

texts:
So I did my engineering back in 2010. I do know few of my teachers but none of them are now in the same university.

I want to get an academic reference letter for admission on postgraduate level in UK universities.

Would it be fine if I get recommendation letter from my teachers. Of course then the recommendation will be without letter head. So it would be preferable to get recommendation on university letter head?


texts: "Soft" ways to contribute to the research community in a new and growing field

texts:
I am doing my PhD research in a new multidisciplinary field within Computer Science. It is new in the sense that there are still no tools/implementations publicly available and several workshops co-located with different conferences. Many papers targeting this new area, have been published in different conferences and journals.  As a PhD student and besides the scientific contributions, I would wonder what other soft things I can do for the field?

So far I have developed a tool for one of the main models in the field. I am documenting it to make it public. I thought about maintaining a bibliography. but not sure how beneficial it is.


texts: How to handle requests for a race-based exam structure?

texts:
A colleague of mine is a non-tenured teaching-track faculty
in a neighboring university.
We work together frequently through our joint outreach and REU projects.
He is currently teaching a summer course in mathematics (pre-calculus algebra) with a compressed schedule from mid May to early July.
The final exam is scheduled in two weeks.
Last week he received students’ requests/suggestions,
cosigned by presidents of two large student organizations¹, that:

The final exam should be cancelled for minority students (but remain the same for the rest of the students, i.e. minority students will do strictly less work); or
The final exam should be modified to contain only questions that relate to life experiences of marginalized minorities; or
Marginalized minorities will take an easier final exam.

None of these requests are realistic at least in the current semester.
Indeed, imposing different grading standard by race is likely illegal too.
So we can start with the premise that
none of the requests can be granted.
Yet, it seems dangerous to dismiss these requests completely, as they are backed by large student organizations.
Moreover, in one discussion, some student estimated that the failure rate in his classes has a strong correlation to race factor in the last few semester.
(Students probably reached this estimation only by
surveying other students who took his classes in the past, but my colleague admits that it: “sounds about right”.)
It sounds to me that the students are collecting data for the next level of action should he reject the requests.
The vague official message from the chair and dean is that he, as the instructor, has the right to design the course.
However, it is seems that the administration is getting ready to let him take the blame, should this develop into a PR disaster – e.g., the chair will only discuss this on the phone but not over email.
He feels that his job is on the line.
How could one react to this and avoid both a PR disaster or doing something illegal?
There may not be enough time to save my colleague, but I’m still curious, as I wouldn’t be surprised if this would happen on my campus soon.

¹ The two presidents are not enrolled in this class, but many club members are enrolled. This letter was only addressed to this one instructor, cc’ed department chair. If they send the same request to other instructors, we wouldn’t know.


texts: How to deal with and communicate overflow of ideas with a supervisor when working on a thesis?

texts:
I had a bad previous experience with flow of ideas. I received a fellowship for six months to work on a project. I started on the project. I was very active and attentive with my supervisor who was very supportive and flexible. I worked very hard, but after two months many new ideas accumulated and I started trying on the dataset and searching for new datasets, after two more months, I had a shallow understanding of all of these ideas. It was late to focus on one point and I got depressed and I ended the project earlier and my supervisor told me I wasn't focused and I didn't do the tasks she suggested and my body language reflects I am not even listening to her (as I say OK a lot) and she will not write to me a recommendation letter.

I am now working on a master thesis with a new supervisor who is nice and flexible. As usual, I started working very hard, but having this terrible anxiety of losing control on the topic and after one month of work, I found that the idea I am working on, will not lead to a real advancement in science, so I changed my mind and changed the research idea a little to what I believe might benefit science. But I fear to discuss with her, because I know after another month, I will have another idea.

In brief, the first problem is that I lose focus not only because other ideas are attractive but also because I feel the idea I am working on isn't worth my effort and there should be an improvement. The second problem is assuming it is right to move between ideas, how to communicate this with the supervisor ?


texts: Compressing figures for paper submission

texts: I recently submitted my first paper to a journal and had some trouble with the figures I uploaded. Specifically, the journal required vector graphics figures to be exported at 1200dpi, grayscale at 600dpi and coloured at 300dpi and I could choose between tiff and eps formats. The problem I faced was that there was an upload limit of 30MBs and I had to submit each figure separately. Keeping the dpi guidelines produced images that had a total size more than 200MBs and the only way I could upload them was by exporting them to 200dpi. Has anyone faced a similar issue and if so, how did you solve it?


texts:
I'm designing and implementing an algorithm for 3D mesh segmentation. Probably I'll publish the results. However, I'm also interested in using this for commercial means, and to do so I need to hurry with the implementation. For that reason I'll need to hire some coders to implement parts of my algorithm.

In my publication, Do I need to reference this coders? Is this allowed in academia?


texts: Should a TA be doing software development for the professor?

texts:
I am a PhD student and a new TA for a class. I receive no extra money for TA'ing. Instead, my TA'ing offsets my advisors need to fund me. The professor I'm TA'ing for knows that I have advanced software engineering skills from professional experience.

The class I'm TA'ing for is very different than lecture style classes. It is more of an incubator/studio/software project class. In addition to office hours and lectures, the professor has asked me to continue development on future iterations of custom software made specifically for the class. The professor has previously paid other students to do this development. While I am able to do this development, is this a valid use of a TA?

I can't help but feel taken advantage of, because my software work usually pays quite well.


texts:
I'm currently doing university level continuing education in Quebec, Canada.  As part of my degree, I want to do some courses from another university online.  I've talked to my chairperson, and he validated certain courses.  So I made an application this January, and recently received a conditional offer of admission.

One of the conditions was receiving the official transcript from my current university.  No problem, right?  Simply ask my home university to send them the document: they have an online form for it, which I filled out, and off it went.

What I'm concerned about is that under the Documents to send is listed "Official transcript" and under details, "with H18."  What is H18?  Does it refer to something that must be on the document, or something about the university?


texts: How detailed should I describe my actions regarding code?

texts:
I am writing a thesis about a data analysis I'm implementing and am currently describing my data preparation where I talk about what needed to be done prior to the analysis (formatting the data, removing noisy data).
Now, I was wondering if I should also include steps that only helped me to work more comfortably like creating multiple different sets of data with different variables?

This has no direct impact on the analysis but I'm not sure if it still needs to be included.


texts: Should I include a paper with a low impact factor in my CV

texts:
I'm a Masters Student who has an old paper. I wrote a paper years ago with a research group in my old school. However, it's a really simple idea and was published in a not very reputed journal (Impact Factor 0.3). It was a long time ago, and honestly I would rather not be affiliated with it.

International Journal of Advanced Trends in Computer Science and Engineering

Should this be included in my CV?

http://www.warse.org/pdfs/2013/icetcsesp%2010.pdf

It's relevant to what I'm doing now but just not very important and I consider it a not very good use of my time


texts: What should I do with award certificates?

texts:
I recently won the "Best Student Paper" award at a moderately significant conference in my field (subfield of CS).
This came with a Trophy and a Certificate.
The trophy  I will put in the corner of my the lab, and use for motivation.
But I don't know what to do with the certificate.

What should I be doing with the certificate?
Do I need to save it to prove to someone later my paper did actually get the award? Surely they can look it up online.

I am generally opposed to the hoarding of documents -- I strive to minimise the number of physical possessions I have.

So I was kinda thinking of just using it as scrap paper...


texts: How to handle a co-author who doesn't reply any more?

texts:
This question is a follow up to my earlier question asked here FIVE months before. How to politely ask a co-author to remove his/her name from my manuscript?

Now I have decided to remove this co-author's name from this manuscript, put in acknowledgement and submit it to some journal. Because the co-author has stopped replying my emails. Unfortunately the health condition of my supervisor is also very bad and not in position to talk.

So I am wondering if I simply remove this co-author, put in acknowledgement and submit to a journal, then whether will it initiate any future problem? Can it be overcome at that time? Any advice on it is highly appreciated.


texts: Level of detail when reviewing the language of a low quality paper

texts:
I am currently reviewing a computer science conference paper. I like to give constructive feedback both related to the content as well as for language issues, such as typos or grammatical mistakes.

The paper I'm currently reviewing has significant language flaws. Mentioning each and every typo, wrong word order, and grammar issue would take me about an hour.  The paper will likely be rejected anyway, so I am not sure if these language suggestions will even be used. It would be different if the paper were likely to be accepted, because improving the language would further improve the quality of the paper.

Does it make sense to give thorough and detailed feedback on a poorly written paper's language quality in a review if the paper will likely be rejected?


texts: How common are romantic relationships between faculty and students?

texts: Romantic relationships between faculty members and students are often depicted in movies or books, and the student falling in love with his/her professor seems to be a bit of a cliché. But how common are such relationships in practice?


texts: Converting a degree program to a non degree one

texts:
Is it possible to convert a degree program into a non degree program?

For example if someone has started a degree program and is not able to complete it, or decided not to complete it, can he/she convert it into a non degree program?

I know different university may have different rules regarding this but does anyone has any experience or information abut this?


texts: How to change corresponding author of my published papers?

texts:
I have few publications in which my previous supervisor (X) is the corresponding author and I am the first/lead author. However, he passed away few months before.

Recently I got to know that a reader of one my paper had emailed to X for some explanations, but the reader did not get any response because X is no more.

The reader and me accidentally met in an academic conference, where he came to know that I am the lead author of that paper and cleared his doubts from me.

So I am wondering is it possible to change the corresponding author of those published papers? May I request to the editor in chief to change it?


texts:
Health sciences researcher out of my area of expertise. I have an assistant calling businesses at random, using a publicly available registry, to ask about their automated external defibrillator (AED). We are sampling without replacement.

My question is, what happens methodologically if we call one of the registered AEDs (selected by random) and the person/informant can give us info on multiple AEDs on the registry that have not been selected as part of our random sample? We're in this position with a large business who has 10+ AEDs, all of which are registered, but our randomization only selected one of the 10+ devices. It seems crazy not to get info on all the devices to me.

Can/should we include these devices that were not randomly selected? I'm having trouble understanding the implications of sampling these and including them in our analysis. Including these other devices seems like snowball sampling instead of just simple randomized sampling.

Any help would be extremely appreciated. Thank you!!!


texts: In the statement of purpose, I have research work that's in progress and will be part of a manuscript to be submitted likely after applications season.  How should I go about describing my current research and future research goals?  I feel I would necessarily have to go into some details about my work with our research group, but I wonder if there is then a risk of getting ideas scooped by the admissions committees.


texts: How should a PhD student deal with an unprofessional and unhelpful advisor, who misses most scheduled meetings?

texts:
My advisor is extremely unhelpful and unprofessional.  I don't want to get into the details, but suffice it to say he has 0 interest in what he told me to do, and only rarely shows up for scheduled meetings,  maybe 1/4 meetings and even then many hours late.  (I came from a job in "the industry" where such behavior is completely unheard of.)

How should I deal with this?  If I was still in the industry, I would just go over my advisor's head, and explain what is happening, is this a valid strategy in academia?  (I am asking the question in the present tense, but I have already left the program).

Related question:  Is such unprofessional behavior common in the academy?  I never experienced anything close to this in my undergraduate education.

Edit:

Following the advice in a comment: I did ask for advice from the graduate committee chair and relayed some issues I had with missed meetings. His advice was more or less "work harder".  Well, I think the fact that I complained must have got back to my advisor because he was furious with me the next time we met.  Out of the blue he scolded and said something like "I meet with you every time you ask me to."  Of course this was completely false but I saw no point in arguing with it as we had plenty of other things to discuss.


texts: Is it allowed to publish an explanation of someone's thesis?

texts:
Last spring, I did a research project where I tried to develop code, modelling a physical system using a method developed by a researcher and presented as his PhD. thesis.
Now I have completed my work and am required to present documentation of the theory used and the performance of code. Now, while I was explaining that paper, I did detailed derivations of all the steps taken which had been omitted from papers for brevity. These derivations I have put in the manual as well so that any other undergraduate trying to work with same paper can quickly get started.
However, is it plagiarism to upload such a manual on my homepage and GitHub repository where someone else did the hard work of deriving concepts in the thesis and I just present proof of intermediate steps?
I am unsure if this is a right practice even if I state that I am only explaining his derivation.
What else can be done to mitigate the copyright infringement? One option, I think, is to submit the report to my supervisor and he will personally distribute it to students in his research group who he thinks will benefit from it.


texts:
My question is that do most people keep in touch with their doctoral advisors after they graduate? Do doctoral advisors forget their PhD students after the students get their degree?
I am mainly asking about math/physics if that makes a difference.


texts: Finding (correct) citation info for math references

texts:
I've just recently learned about BibTeX, rather than manually making a bibliography at the end of everything I write. Now I'd like a reliable source for the citation info.

At school I can use MathSciNet through my university's account, but at home I cannot access that. I have been using Google Scholar to find citation info in BibTeX format but I find that very frequently the year listed is wrong, so I need to dig up the article and double check everything. Just to take the most recent example Lectures in Hyperbolic Geometry by Benedetti and Petronio is listed as having been printed in 2012, but in my copy of the book it says 1992.

Perhaps it is giving me dates of reprints or something, but that is no good either. Having the date of the original publication is important when surveying the historical context of one's work, which is especially relevant to what I'm writing lately.

Is there a more reliable database for BibTeX-formatted citation info on math articles, which can be accessed for free?


texts:
I am an Assistant Professor of Chemistry. I try to be an active peer-reviewer but on average it takes a few hours to review a manuscript (reading, some searches in the literature, checking some relevant reference, and finally writing the report).

I review 2-3 papers per month and I need to spend some time outside my working hours. In various blogs, articles, websites like publons.com, I see it is not uncommon to review 10-20 papers per month.

Then, I came to the conclusion that I am doing something wrong. Because by my calculations, it is impossible to peer-review many papers along with various tasks of an academic.


texts: What is the chance of an 'invited manuscript submission' to be accepted?

texts: I recently submitted a manuscript in a reliable journal in my field through 'invited manuscript' scheme. This is my first time to do such a thing since I mostly publish my paper on a regular submission. Of course, in general, the paper will be accepted based on its quality and merit. But, I was wondering if there is a difference in the chance of getting published when the submission was invited?


texts: Career change for a mathematician - from academia to ...?

texts:
I'm looking for good hints for my professional life.

I am a mathematician (32 years old) who worked up to now in academia in Europe.
My short CV: PhD + three and a half years of postdoctoral fellowships.
Domain of expertise: dynamical systems / ergodic theory (no applied math).

It's been some time that I have been losing progressively motivation for research, I do not manage to obtain a permanent position and I start wondering what I could do elsewhere with my expertise (besides teaching, which is of course a possibility).

However I fear that I'm too "specialized" in my domain and I don't feel adapted for the industry. I have some programming skills, but not enough in my opinion to work in a big data company.

Do you know some examples of mathematicians who found their way in industry with a 100% academic CV like mine? And where? In which areas? Do companies hire mathematicians with no experience outside academics? Do they invest in people with pure-theoretical background and competences?


texts: Should I cite author names as they appear in the journal or as I know them to be complete?

texts:
Since I've been using Mendeley to manage and extract metadata from my PDFs, I've come to notice that authors are sometimes denoted with all their initials and sometimes with just one. I assume this has to do with different journal's rules on denoting author's names. However, this makes a mess in my author list in Mendeley, as the same person may be known under two or even more names (e.g.: "Last, F."; "Last, First"; "Last, First M,"; "Last, First Middle").

If, for completeness' and tidyness' sake, I edit the author fields to always have the most complete name of the author available to me regardless the journal the author published in, I inevitably will change the way I cite them. For example, an article from a certain journal only uses the first initial:

  Last, F. Article Title, Journal name, x:y (YYYY), pp. xxx-xxx

After I have "updated" my authors, it is possible my citation includes also the second initial, i.e.:

  Last, F.M., Article Title, Journal name, x:y (YYYY), pp. xxx-xxx

So my question is: am I incorrectly citing the article when I include more complete information about the author's name than is given by the journal article itself?


texts: What are the masters options available for getting into computer vision and image processing research from an electronics background?

texts:
Having done bachelors in electronics and instrumentation and a research experience in the field of image processing and computer vision and some publications in the same, what are the possible MS options where I can study computer vision and image processing? Can I opt for MS in robotics, computer science, signal processing?

My confusion is regarding the fact that I was a bachelors student in a different field. Would it be difficult for me to change to a masters program in this other field?


texts: Is there an affordable way for non-students to subscribe to multi-journals/archives?

texts:
As a student I had free access to thousands of scholarly articles through my universities in databases/archives such as JSTOR, EBSCOhost, Google Scholar, Econlit, PubMed, etc, etc.

With no subscription, glancing at the full text of any 1 article costs anywhere from $20 to $60.

For any one project or paper I'd use at least five to ten papers and I'd skim over the full text of many more. For a meta-analysis of the literature, I'd go over dozens and perhaps even over a hundred papers.

As a non-student the cost is extremely prohibitive to continue reading past the free abstracts. I don't want to pirate the papers or give up reading them, but I can't find any reasonable alternatives.

Does anyone know of any monthly subscription I could sign up for to give me student-like/institutional access to papers?

  Note:
  A community wiki answer has been added to this question to provide a list of solutions to the problem.


texts: How to publish my PhD as a monograph when examiners are unable to oversee the process?

texts:
Before my viva (as they call it in the UK) one of my supervisors strongly hinted that one of my examiners would likely be interested in supervising me with the writing of a monograph. Three months after my PhD was awarded, I decided to contact both examiners and both responded that they did not feel qualified: one does not hold a doctorate, the other's main disciplinary area is outside my own.

Fair enough.

I was given your typical stock advice to publish and review but my heart is still set on publishing a monograph.

There are a couple of professors throughout the UK and North America whom I am keen to contact as potential supervisors for my project on the basis of our  shared research affinities. Do I just send them an email? What is the protocol?
This newbie academic does not want to commit any faux-pas!

Is a monograph or book of some sort an independent endeavour?.

Sigh.... post-PhD distress


texts: Scientific hackathons or other intense voluntary bottom-up events

texts:
In programming there are many hackathons - intense voluntary one day-week events, where participants collaboratively attack problems. They may be proposed by a company, NGO, participants or a group; for qualification/profit, for fun or for a good cause (eg. http://www.rhok.org/).
The question is - are there any similar events in science?
If not, what can be done or why it cannot work?
(As a comment: as I observe, while scientist are open-minded for a discussion, they are conservative, when it comes to action; at least much more than some of the programmers.)
EDIT (much later):
There are such events, even if extremely rare, e.g.:

Ariel Waldman, Hacking science: the intersection of web geeks and science geeks, Scientific American (August 29, 2011)

So how can we continue to make science more disruptively accessible across all science disciplines, geographies, industries and skill-sets?
Enter Science Hack Day, a 48-hour-all-night event that brings together designers, developers, scientists and other enthusiastic geeks in the same physical space for a brief but intense period of collaboration, hacking, and building ‘cool stuff’. A hack is a unique modification, an interesting mashup or a quick solution to a problem – maybe not the most elegant solution, but often the cleverest. By having a fresh set of eyes from those who solve different types of problems across a variety of industries inside and outside of science, new concepts often emerge and can go on to influence science and adults’ relationship to science in unexpected ways.


texts: How to structure presentation to avoid getting questions that will be answered later in the presentation?

texts:
In the past when I've given presentations at my lab and conferences, I've not had to deal with this problem. But at my new institution I'm constantly dealing with the following phenomena.

I'm constantly being asked questions that will be answered later in the slides.

First try, I tried top down approach. So I started with the overall problem. I work in AI, so in my particular situation, I start off by saying this is the problem we're trying to solve, here's the overall architecture and now let's analyze the individual components. But then, I'm constantly bombarded with, well what about this component, what about this metric, can you go deeper into just that one component - I don't understand the mechanics behind it, etc. And all these questions will be answered later on. But no one seems to wait to see what the next slides are going to be.

Second try, I tried bottom up approach. "Here are all the individual tools you'll need to understand the overall architecture. Here are the metrics, here are individual mathematical concepts, etc. Now, let's see how these are incorporated into a larger framework." But before I can explain what the larger frameworks are, at every slide, they're constantly asking, wait, why is this being used, why are you talking about this, etc etc.

I understand questions arise and I can simply say I'll cover it in the next few slides. But there are sooo many questions being constantly asked and it completely throws off the presentation because constant tangents are being drawn and one person's question confuses another person. This isn't a classroom setting, it's more of a lab setting.

How can I get around this? The only solution I can think of is to have a little box on each slide, right about the page number that has the title of the next page.

Any advice on dealing with this would be very helpful!

Update: After listening to everyone's suggestion, the following tips really helped solve this problem.

Preparing slides to control the conversation. Focusing on only what I prepared instead of making all encompassing slides. For example, if I want to convey the training procedure of a neural network, then only have details regarding input, output, architecture(not every detail, just overview), and the loss functions. Stating "I used equation 'x' because it does will in situations 'a' and 'b'," instead of pasting the actual equations and inciting more questions for understanding every detail of the equation (as was happening previously). But I keep more detailed notes in the appendix slides in case anyone has a very specific question.
If someone does have a very specific question, then I can refer them to the appendix of these slides and say "Thank you, that's a great question. I have lots of information regarding that in the appendix of these slides. But due to time constraints, let's take that conversation offline."
Sending the audience the slides and notes before your talk so that people can review the slides before hand and better prepare their thoughts before asking random left-field questions during the actual presentation. This doesn't work in conferences, but definitely helps in lab settings.
When stating a key concept in a slide that hasn't been addressed previously, I have a small textbox that says "will be covered in upcoming slides" in red lettering. This seemed to curtail a lot of questions as the audience no longer feels anxiety over not understanding something on the slide.
Right after the title slide, I had a "goals of today's talk" slide in which I stated "goal is not to explain every detail of a particular technique. Rather present overview and my adaptation of it."

Disclaimer: the above suggestions work great if you're presenting at an internal team conference amongst peers. For example, an R&D lab at a tech company (my situation) or in an academic lab setting. Doesn't go great in a conference, but the audience are generally kinder in such public avenues.


texts: Does significant editing of a paper with the possibility of minor contributions to its scientific content warrant co-authorship?

texts:
The question of whether writing/editing alone merits authorship is already addressed here. This question is about writing and editing with the possibility of minor scientific contributions.

I have been asked to review a draft paper written by a colleague (a more senior PhD student in the same research group), whose native language is not English. The main purpose is to improve the style and grammar of the paper, rather than make substantial comments to the scientific content.

It is possible that I will be able to contribute some science to the paper, however not likely of the "pedagogical oversight" variety that is normally the domain of the last several authors on a ten-author paper.

Should I approach my colleague with the request that I be placed on the author list, only if I can make a reasonable contribution to the science (by way of some substantial comments or extra data analysis)?


texts: How to reach out for research collaboration?

texts: I am an early career researcher (pre-PhD) and planning to work on research articles before applying to PhD studies. May I ask is there any clear cut method to approach well-established scholars to ask for collaboration? or our options are only limited to the professors we worked previously? Thank you!


texts: Suggestions for working effectively with international students from a non-western culture

texts:
I am a Masters graduate student studying finance at a large public university located in a major city. Recently, I accepted a job as a teaching assistant. A significant number of students are from non-western cultures, with East Asia being especially heavily represented(China, S.Korea, etc). In leading discussion,I have found communication to be a problem and I strongly sense it has cultural roots.

Encouraging participation through questions does not seem to help and the students seem to be painfully shy. I attempt discussion that builds upon the text, but the students seem to have trouble expressing themselves and finding their voice.  I use mainly open ended questions with some close ended questions for clarification. At the very first session, I explained my expectations:

Respect is crucial. While attacks on ideas are encouraged, personal attacks are inappropriate.
Creativity of thought is encouraged
That I am open to feedback about the students opinions.
Acknowledge wish to speak by raising hand

I feel its important for students to have their own ideas and to actively engage in these smaller discussion sections as it applies the concepts taught in lecture. In addition, I want feedback regarding what I can do better and students' opinions are valuable.

Some relevant background

English proficiency: Understandable but mediocre with accent
Most present in the USA less than 1 year
No  family present in the US.

Coming from a western culture (USA), aside from leveraging the professor, what else can I do to improve the efficacy of these discussion groups?


texts: Unable to grade student assignment in blackboard

texts: I created an assignment for students using blackboard. This assignment is something that is completed externally. When going into the grading center I am unable to assign grades unless the students have submitted something. How can I grade this without requiring them to submit anything? I've already tried setting the column as external the the category to no with worked for a different assignment.


texts: How should I cite a paper from a journal that has changed its name?

texts: I found that a journal changed its name after 2005. The paper which I am citing is from 2004. Does it matter if I use the current journal name or should I cite the paper using the (old) journal name in 2004?


texts: How much does the academic family tree matter for a PhD?

texts:
I remember my MSCS advisor often refers to his "academic grandfather" (his advisor's advisor Dr. Leonard Kleinrock) as the person who sent the first data packets.  Although distant, I think it is cool for him to be a descendant of someone famous.

For PhDs, have you ever traced your academic family tree?  Does it matter for those of you that are not in academia?  I am also a PhD student now and would it be too early to imagine folks in my lab as my "academic brother/sister"?

Would like to hear your thoughts on this. Thanks!


texts: How to convince professor that I have read topics on my own?

texts:
I am keen to apply for Doctoral program in Europe. But I have some questions.
All my mathematical interests are centred about Hyperbolic Geometry. And I am keen to apply for PhD position (or join a research group) in the particular field. I have never done the course in my masters, because my university does not offer such course. Also, My master thesis is not in that field (in not hyperbolic geometry). Also, I can not join a internship program or summer school, and reading project on the field under some professors, because this current (Covid 19) situations. Therefore, I am planning to read the topics on my own.
To apply for a PhD program I need to write my interests to that particular professor. Since I am learning the topics on my own, and I have no document for that, then how I would convince him/her that I have read the topics and well prepared to work his/her research group.
Please help me. Thanking in advance.


texts: My conference paper got rejected. Will it be bad for my PhD performance?

texts: I'm a PhD student. A paper for a conference got rejected. I haven't met my professor yet to discuss about it. But is it bad for my PhD performance? I mean, probably the professor will not trust my manuscripts anymore.


texts: Biographical Sketches in NSF Postdoc application

texts:
I am applying for NSF postdoc and it is asking for Biographical Sketches ( see part 14 in here) https://www.nsf.gov/mps/dms/MSPRF/MSPRF_Application_Instructions_FY20.pdf.

So I was wondering if we can upload our CV here?


texts:
Since the beginning of the Corona Virus pandemic and the adaptation to distance learning, I have had to adapt my classes to hold exams via video calls.  In previous semesters when I've had students with special accommodations (i.e. entitlement to extra time on exams), the students would generally go to a different office where they would take the exam with a special proctor who was aware of their entitlements.  My institution however has levied this burden to instructors to keep track of students' various time limits on exams.

A student of mine with an extra time entitlement had emailed me to confirm that I was going to honor this.  I didn't have the time to respond to them via email prior to the exam, but I had sent this student a private message via the video call platform to confirm with them their extra time and wrote out instructions for submitting their exam.  This student however never read my message, and as a result submitted their exam prematurely claiming that I hadn't confirmed their extra time entitlement.  Because the video call platform doesn't record private messaging into their transcript, I have no physical evidence to show the student that I had messaged them at the start of the exam.

I'd like to know what would ethically be the right way to handle this situation.  I want to honor this student's time entitlement, and potentially give them the lost time to complete the exam, but I'm already at a place where I have to go over the exam with my other students.  I'm not sure what the correct way to handle this situation is.  It's frustrating because there was a second student who had a similar entitlement during the same exam, and they read my message and took advantage of their extra time.


texts: Obtain a secondary school teaching certificate?

texts: I am currently taking a year off to reapply for PhDs. My ultimate aim is to work in academia. I am currently teaching secondary school biology as a way of filling this year. My government presents the opportunity of obtaining a teaching certificate by taking weekend classes in addition to the teaching. I was wondering whether a secondary school teaching certificate would be in any way valuable in obtaining a lecturing position after completing my PhD. I know that there are specific university teaching certificates which might mean that a secondary school teaching certificate is useless?


texts: I was a judge in a science competition, should I include that my resume

texts:
I served as a judge in a science competition for high, middle and elementary school students. I am confused if I can put this activity in my resume. Also, I do not know in which section I need to include if I can put this on my resume.
Thanks!


texts: Thesis writing - should I write "will be discussed later" or "as was discussed previously"

texts: I am writing my MD thesis, which is about therapy for MS, and some drugs come up in more than one specific subchapter. Should I discuss them in detail in the first subchapter they come up in, or should I discuss them in the last chapter they come up in?


texts: Good idea to warn students they were suspected of cheating?

texts:
I am a math professor. Several of our midterm questions were posted to Chegg. We found some students who clearly used them and gave them zeroes for the exam. We also had two students where I kept going back and forth. Most of their work was fine but, in each case, there was one answer which was surprisingly close to Chegg but not so close that I thought it couldn't be a coincidence. I kept sitting on the edge and finally decided to let it go.
I've been thinking, after all grades are in, of writing these students and saying "If you were cheating, you came very close to getting caught. You should be scared about how close you came and make sure you don't do this again; you clearly know enough to pass without it. If you weren't, than I am very sorry to have suspected you." Good idea or terrible idea?


texts: Professor didn't write recommendation letter on time, what should I do?

texts:
I'm applying to graduate school programs, and for a few applications due yesterday only 2/3 of the professors I asked to write rec letters for actually sent them in. Will I be removed from consideration from the programs where the third person didn't send them in? Note:they did send them in for schools that had their due date a few weeks ago. Is there anything I can do? Or is it all out of my hands. I emailed them a day before with a reminder and also a day after asking if they will send it in.

Thanks


texts: While showing my work to my supervisor, an adult website appeared. Am I in trouble?

texts:
I will try to make this brief. I am a student at a prominent university in the UK, and while I was showing my thesis work, a website, to my supervisor, the website crashed. Then I was asked to close the browser and open it again.

When I did, it seems a tab of adult content was open from the previous day with explicit content, when that happened, I immediately (without thinking) pressed Cmd-W to close it but it was evident he saw it.

The conversation continued normally and my supervisor completely ignored it. I feel very embarrassed and I am afraid I could be reported or anything.

Am I in trouble? Will I face issues because of this? Thank you in advance.

Edit: My laptop is a personal laptop and not provided by the university. I've also used the University network to access the site from my dorm. I also don't think there are university guidelines that prevent us from accessing adult content.


texts: Why are small fonts the norm in research papers?

texts: Is it just me or are the published articles a strain on the eyes in general? Has there been(/shouldn't there be) a study on optimal font sizes for reading?


texts: How to make my master thesis defending smooth with good english speech?

texts:
My master thesis dissertation is approaching, but I have a few concerns. First of all, I am not native English speaker. When I practiced my presentation on my own (I recorded my speech), it was not coherent to me. I feel that the transition between each sentence might be difficult to understand. Can anyone instruct me or provide me a useful English speech that is commonly used for thesis defending?

Second of all, I have limited time to present my work, and I tried to make my presentation as possible as clear to outliers. So to make the presentation clear, I have prepared some background knowledge for my audience, but the time to introduce this background knowledge in bioinformatics is more than what I expected. What should I do? My expected audience has a background in computer science, while I finished my thesis in bioinformatics. Can anyone give me possible ideas? Is there any volunteer that can give a useful English speech for thesis defense? Thanks a lot.


texts: Status still " Editor Assignment Pending" after 8 weeks

texts:
I submitted my paper in Journal of Intelligent Information Systems (springer)
The journal says the average time from submission to decision is 1 month, but after 8 weeks the paper status is still listed as "Editor Assignment Pending".
I tried to contact the editor in chief and he said"The Editor is still in the process of evaluating your paper as well as finding suitable and able referees."
 is it normal?


texts: Apply for two different Ph.D. positions at same group?

texts:
Currently, I am applying for several Ph.D. positions. I have seen two interesting positions from the same group/professor. The requirements for both positions are really similar but the topics are different (but same field). Since there are not that many positions within my field, I considered applying for both positions, but I wonder what the professor might think? The documents (CV, cover letter ...) would be the same and he might think I just copy & paste my applications.
Should I contact him before? What could I say?


texts: Understanding the works of intellectuals

texts:
I'm a master's graduate in biology. I completed a thesis recently on 'Social science in the age of biology'. It discusses how social scientists and biologists approach and answer questions pertaining to human behaviour and organisation of society differently. I was able to complete this thesis because I was guided by a social scientist. I developed a keen interest in the social sciences.
I am now reading Foucault's ' Madness and Civilization' and Marx's ' Capital' and am finding it very difficult to decipher the text, even after understanding the individual words. Why is it that I'm finding it so difficult to make sense of the works of intellectuals in the social sciences? The amount of abstraction is also lesser as compared to the sciences, in which I have some training. My reading and comprehension skills are also reasonably good.
What can I do to bridge the gaps in my ability to comprehend the works of intellectuals in the social sciences?
Is doing coursework necessary?


texts:
I've submitted a short paper to a well-known cs journal. It got rejected after two years with the below one para explanation. While I admit that the submission was not strong, I feel cheated because of waiting for two years for this explanation (no full report was made).

In the paper, the author shows that NP-completeness for [...].
The proofs are very basic and standard. The results are reasonable, so it may be acceptable if this paper was written in 1990s. However, as far as I
know, such a kind of paper is obsolete nowadays. Since 2000s, among
such papers, few papers are acceptable for [...] only when there are
some extra value to be published. For example, they solve big open
question, or the NP-completeness has very important influence to the
other research. From this viewpoint, this paper is not strong enough
for the recent [...]. So my recommendation is reject.

  What shall I do? I think this situation is unacceptable, let me know if you disagree.

I've already complained of course to the editor upon receipt of the report, but I got no answer.

ps. Btw, imo the given journal still publishes NP-completeness proofs regularly, that's why I've chosen it for my result.


texts: What is the role of a teacher (of mathematics) at university?

texts:
Until now I've been completely focussed on research. I did serve as teaching assistant on some occasions, but I must honestly admit that I didn't give it much thought and my only concerns have been:

being clear and detailed (and slightly slow) in explanations;
being available for further clarifications;
being fair (and not particularly harsh) in evaluations.

These are, I guess, the characteristics that I value the most in a teacher. However, now, teaching will be a more prominent part of my career (although not at all the most prominent) and I will be assumed to have a sound "teaching philosophy". So I'd like to ask to experienced faculty (and also to students):

What is the role of a teacher of mathematics at university level?
What are the traits that are most commonly associated to good teachers? Should I read some research papers on pedagogy to find answers the question above and prepare myself to be a better teacher (and in the future also a good advisor and mentor)? Which ones do you suggest?
What research papers on pedagogy can I read in order to develop a "scientifically sound" point of view when it comes to grading, course design, presenting to students, solving exercises in class, and other aspects of a teacher's life?

I prefer to post this question here rather than on Mathematics Educators Stack Exchange because I really welcome remarks and answers from scholars (and students) working in other fieds too.


texts: Application of standard techniques to new data: is it publishable?

texts:
I have been working at an internship this past summer, and have applied a relatively standard technique (formal analysis of a security protocol) to a new (company internal) protocol. The company are pushing me to try and get the analysis published in an academic journal. The results do not highlight anything of particular note (a few caveats and gotchas but nothing with substantial security implications), but simply provide a rigorous mathematical underpinning for their security assertions.

Is this something publishable? I feel it isn't because the only new bit is the protocol which was simply given to me (and is being published in its own right). If not how do I make the results of the analysis available? Obviously the analysis needs to be made public and peer review is vital (because otherwise nobody would trust the security claims). Do I just put it on the company website and hope people in the know stumble across it? Can I email appropriate people and hope they look at it?


texts: Leaving a Graduate Program in a Polite and Professional Manner

texts:
I'm a first-year PhD student and I plan to leave my current program in order to transfer to another program next year. If possible I will also ask for a master's degree from the program. I am looking for advice on how to bring up the issue with the graduate director in a manner which doesn't "burn any bridges;" I do not want to leave the salty impression that I am deeply unhappy about their program. Maybe I'm just overthinking the issue.

The approach which I'm considering is to just be honest as possible:

The program does not match my interests well because there is very little presence in my primary field of interest. I have searched thoroughly. I do not yet have an advisor.
Some secondary factors are also marginally involved, for instance I have felt suffocated with the general location and climate, and moreover I would like to move closer to my family.
I've gotten admission to a program which matches my interests and location preferences significantly better, and they will give me credit for the work I've done here.

However, I believe that the issue should be handled delicately and non-bluntly for the reason that my current program has given me quite a bit of flexibility and awards, I finished my exams, and I want them to give me a masters. I don't want to be rude or dismissive of these.

So what would be a good approach?


texts: Is it possible to get a PhD position in the USA without applying to a PhD program?

texts:
I came across this question, where an industrial scientist wonders whether they'd have a chance to get into a PhD program in the US.

In my experience (Europe, biochemistry), they'd have a very large chance to get a position. You've already shown you can work, are productive, scientifically literate, and you might even bring some interesting industrial contacts. If you make a good impression someone might even create a job opening for you.

I understand that in the US you don't apply for a position with one professor, but you apply for a PhD program at an institute. You send a statement, recommendation letters, transcripts and GRE and hope for the best.

If I would be a professor in the US, what would be my options to hire such a person if they contact me? Would I have to convince a committee to let them in or do you usually have no influence? Could I just give them a position if I have funds available? I'm interested in the unofficial process in the US.

For a European perspective:

In my field, many positions are filled by hiring people that applied to a research group, even when there's no advertised or available PhD position. If there's funding available, professors check who applied in the previous months, and maybe put out a message to relevant research groups to get more candidates. People are almost always hired directly after completing their Master's, and they did one or two projects on a closely related topic.


texts: To what extent is the university budget public?

texts:
I guess this is technically a legal question, but since it is about universities I hope it is ok to ask it here.

Let's say that university A has employed the construction company X for a big project. Let's also say that from an outsider's perspective the deal seems a bit dodgy. How much of this information has to be public? In other words, what can a general member of public learn about this deal?

Assume that university A is a standard "public" UK university and company X is just a big private company.


texts: Transcript of records is full of grammatical/spelling/formatting mistakes and the issuer gets angry when I inform them

texts:
Institution in a non-English-speaking country.
I do not speak the native language of that country.
I studied entirely in English language and all of my educational documents are originally issued/generated in English, therefore there is no possibility of receiving the document of interest in a language other than English (Patricia Shanahan's answer is thus absolutely irrelevant [this answer]).

Types of errors in the transcript of records

Grammatical
Incorrect course titles
Initial letters of some of the course names are capitalized, some are not
Margins, line spacing, and the overall format/style of the document (pure chaos, ...)
Incorrect usage of the in course titles (e.g. Introduction to the Mathematics)

I have been dealing this issue for more than a year. My BA degree's transcript of records is full of mistakes, not one or two, but dozens of them.
Last year, when I received the transcript for the first six completed semesters, there were so many errors in the document that I simply could not believe some other student might not have noticed it throughout the years. Thus, I went to discuss this with the person issuing the transcript. I delineated all of the mistakes one by one. However, they were absolutely reluctant to modify any part of the transcript at first, and they even went on to tell me that I am wrong. I then decided to provide examples of transcripts issued in the US and use online resources and dictionaries to prove my point, which all in turn made the said person annoyed and yet more reluctant! More surprisingly for me was their reaction when I explained the margins/line-spacing/style/format issues, their simple reply was whether I have ever been diagnosed with OCD.
Nonetheless, I was able to fix quite many of the mistakes. Now, a year later, I have received my final bachelor's degree with the complete transcript of records encompassing eight semesters. And, there are still a lot of mistakes: grammatical, spelling, and incorrect course names. The format of the document looks terribly unprofessional, with different margin sizes on different pages, inconsistent line spacing, and unnecessary white spaces/blank areas. It looks like a cheap document issued by a 'nobody'. If it was not for the huge seal of the university and the Ministry of Education on each page, anyone would have considered this document to be fake.
The person in charge is so selfish they do not want to admit that their English is insufficient. Their lexicon is extremely limited. Once they were so enraged when I mentioned a simple mistake  that they actually had to call the English Language Center of my university. However, the center affirmed that indeed the version I have provided is correct and the one written on the transcript is wrong. However, even after that incident the person in charge of issuing the transcript were still reluctant to follow many of my corrections.
How should I deal with the incompetence and reluctance of this person?
Should I create the document neatly myself in LaTeX/Word, clearly highlighting all the changes I have made, and then ask him to consider issuing the document that way?


texts: Is it ethical to ask students to proofread a textbook?

texts:
I will have a draft of a new textbook ready for the fall semester. It is an engineering class.

I very much want feedback from the students concerning the quality and usefulness of the material.

What are the best practices for getting this feedback from students? Is it ethical to give a grade (or extra credit at least) based on students' feedback?


texts: PhD Application Review moved from Fall 2015 Start to Spring 2016 Start: Options?

texts:
I applied for PhD programs starting from the fall of 2015 at several universities and I was waiting very eager to hear from them, because I just finished my MS last spring semester and don't want to waste time.

However, in the mid of this month, I received email from one school telling me that  the admissions committee has decided to move my application for review to the 2016 - Spring semester. In the letter, it didn't mention any acceptance/rejection. They moved my application for the next review which doesn't mean I have been accepted.

I'm really wondering why and how did they decided to delay my application. Moreover, What would you advise in this situation? Can I ask them the chances of acceptance or the reason for the delay? Or should I just wait?


texts:
I am a beginning graduate student in mathematics. My university holds regular seminars in different areas of mathematics, and I try to attend all of them. I like getting exposed to different areas of research I did not know of, and get updated about recent developments. Listening to different speakers on different areas of mathematical research has greatly helped me become more confident in approaching new areas with new thoughts.

Often the researchers pose open problems. I note those down and after returning home, I try to read up about them but usually I find there are lots and lots of background material to cover and certainly I would have to spend a lot of time reading things up to get to the point where the speaker leaves something as an open problem. Please note I am a beginning graduate student.

Even if open problems have not been directly posed, following the speaker's work may eventually lead me to solve related problems in the area. Unfortunately the time taken scares me and essentially those notes get lost.

I am not even sure if the system I am following is proper. How does one get the most out of seminars? Or, what message is a seminar really intended to convey? Just a demonstration of some work done by the speaker, to be validated (at least at face value) by the audience? Or expose the audience to areas they can work on? In the latter case, how does one keep track of all the information obtained from seminars? A disciplined approach would be solicited.


texts: Applying for different PhD position: letters of recommendation

texts:
I'm a PhD student in my second year and strongly considering applying for a PhD position at a different university (see my previous question).

However, I'm not sure I want to bring this up with my advisor at the current moment (of maybe at all before I have secured another position, this seems to be the general advice over at workplace.SE).

For applying, though, I need to have two letters of recommendation, which will be hard to get not including my supervisor (because I have mostly worked with him so far, so there aren't many others I would consider asking) or maybe even excluding people who know him and would tell him that I am applying elsewhere.

What can I do in this situation?


texts: How is publishing in PLoS One perceived by peers and hiring committees?

texts: I am a final year doctoral candidate and have three other publications in decent field-specific journals. Will an addition of a first authored plos one article make my cv or publication record thus far look worse, especially to peers and hiring committees (for academic/non-academic jobs)?


texts: Is it okay to write a cover letter with one more page

texts: I have written a cover letter for faculty positions. I read that it need to be one page. However, mine is one page and half since i have many experience including industry and research. Is that okay?


texts: As a student, is it appropriate to use my university's letterhead for a letter I write, to give it extra weight?

texts:
A program I participated in for six years, while I was in junior high and high school has just had a huge chunk of their funding removed by the school. I credit this program with the majority of my success in college and my general interest and capabilities in science, and a lot of my maturity (which was sorely needed in junior high...).

The program has a new coach (who I worked with, but has just now taken over) who is not a confrontational person. I would like to write a letter to the school expressing my support for the program, and would encourage other alumni of the program to as well, many of whom also have a lot of respect for it.

This is just a thought I had while drafting my letter. Is it appropriate to find some sort of letterhead or something like that from the university (perhaps my major department?) to give more weight to my letter?

I am personally an undergraduate student, but would it be appropriate for a graduate student or postdoc to use letterhead? Or should use of the letterhead be reserved solely for faculty and staff?


texts: Attempting to move an accepted PhD to another university

texts:
I've currently had my proposal accepted at a good university in Britain, this with the assistance of a wonderful professor there.  However, it does appear the better path for me would be to shift this to a university in Bruxelles for a variety of reasons (the first being I've moved there, though there are better funding opportunities as well).

First, I'm wondering if this is frowned upon, and if I'm doing a disservice to my former supervisor, who I'd love to still work with if possible.  I'd hoped to integrate this between two universities, though am reaching a bit of a hurdle here as well.

Second, and perhaps for the reasons listed above, I've had a bit of an issue maintaining contact with individuals in the departments who would be interested in my research.  I've taken the time to look over potential supervisors' papers, and have received response from one professor who has since gone silent.

As I do know what I'm looking to do, and who I'm wanting to set up a meeting with - and since the issue is now becoming quite time-sensitive due to pursuance of funding - I'm getting a bit frustrated I cannot set up a meeting, this despite weekly attempts at contacting professors.

I know this most likely sounds a bit complicated, but I'm afraid I'm starting to feel that I'm spinning my wheels; I've not much experience (outside of my degrees) with what to expect in the academia, and don't want to push things that shouldn't be pushed; however, if someone responds, and then goes silent, should I take this as a sign there's no interest?  Sigh.

Okay, somewhere in there there's a question.  Thanks to anyone who may be able to help.

Best Wishes
Jim


texts: What typically incentivizes a professor to change jobs to a lower ranking university?

texts: In my field of computer science it is not uncommon to see professors who, after many years at a highly ranked university, choose to take on a position at a lower ranked (though generally still good) university. I see this happen even if the professor does not get a promotion or endowed chair. What might incentivize a professor to do this?