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139673 | Manuscript status "Submitted to Journal" over a week in an Elsevier Journal
I submitted a manuscript to an Elsevier journal on 8 days ago. However, the "Current Status" of the manuscript is still "Submitted to Journal".
Is it common that the status "Submitted to Journal" lasts over a week?
When I click "Send E-mail" in the "Action Links", it shows that "This letter should not be used at this time. This submission is not in a status that would allow this letter to be sent to the intended recipient."
I cannot even withdraw this manuscript now because the Action Links do not contain "Withdraw" button. I submitted several manuscripts to this journal about three years ago. I checked the email at those moments. When I approved the submission of PDF files built by the submission system, I would receive a confirmation email from the editorial office. However, this time I did not receive any such email.
What should I do at this moment?
Wait, it can take weeks.
@Zenon Thank you. But may I ask why it lasts so long?
I can take months, even years. Any given editor uses the editorial manager as the editor sees fit. In some cases the status does not change from "submitted" until a decision has been made on the article.
@DanFox I understand what you mean. I cannot even withdraw this manuscript now because the Action Links do not contain "Withdraw" button. I submitted several manuscripts to this journal about three years ago. I checked the email at those moments. When I approved the submission of PDF files built by the submission system, I would receive a confirmation email from the editorial office. However, this time I did not receive any such email.
@scaaahu That is fine. Thanks.
Have patience -- you're asking that many things happen within a short amount of time. Your paper needs to get through an initial administrative check whether the formatting is correct and/or whether there is any plagiarism. Then the editor-in-chief needs to assign the paper to an associate editor. And then the associate editor needs to assign reviewers. Only then does, in most system, the status change to "Under review".
So it requires three people. Any one of them might be on vacation for the week. Or they have a paper or proposal deadline themselves. Or they have a family emergency. Or they need to grade a term paper. You can't expect that they stop everything they do and turn to handling your paper. They'll get to it in due time -- I'd say you can start to get upset if it's been 3 weeks, but before that my recommendation is as stated at the top: Have patience.
8 days is nothing in academic time. Like the blink of an eye. It is not uncommon for reviews to take months. Just be patient. I know it's hard, but just move on to your next project. If there's no movement in a month or two, then maybe e-mail the editor and ask for a status.
Thank you for your answer. I know that it takes months to review a paper. However, it seems that my paper has not been sent to the editor yet.
@Hebe: I would guess that it has been sent to the editor, but that the editor has to take some action to acknowledge and has not yet done so.
@NateEldredge Hence, it is possible that my paper is already under review by the referees, but the status in the system never changes until the decision is made, right?
It's possible. What I'm saying is that it could be that the editor has already done something with the paper (anywhere from "initial skim" to "considered some possible referees" to "actually sent it out"), but hasn't clicked the corresponding buttons in the editorial manager software to acknowledge having done so. For this reason, I think it's always misleading to assume that the status in an editorial manager actually reflects what's going on.
@NateEldredge I see. Thanks for your explanation.
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195695 | Need clarification on the status of my manuscript in ScholarOne
I recently submitted a manuscript to a journal using the ScholarOne submission system. After the second round of review, the editor provided some minor language revisions, and all three reviewers had no further comments. However, after we made the revisions, the manuscript status changed to "Awaiting Reviewer Invitation." Does this mean that my manuscript needs to go through another round of review? Or it is just a brief status which actually means the paper is going to the chief editor?
I would greatly appreciate any insights or advice on this matter. Thank you in advance for your help.
Manuscripts will go as many rounds of review as needed, until the reviewers (and ultimately, the editor) is happy with the manuscript status. I had papers published with 1 review, and papers published with 5. There is no way to tell.
When you review papers for such system, you are explicitly asked again if you would like (again) to be the reviewer for the second (nth) time.
The system is telling you that the invitation has been sent to the original (and perhaps new) reviewers and they are waiting for them to confirm.
In essence, there is no way to force the reviewers of the original submission to be a reviewer again, so they asked, again.
Thank you for you kind reply! I feel less anxious now. Thanks !! Hope things go well for you!
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28390 | On the verge of being "fired" from post-doc position, how to act towards supervisor?
I am in month 5 of an extremely unfulfilling post doc position in France. My sole responsibility is debugging 10k+ lines of spaghetti C++ code. I am a mechanical engineer and although I did my PhD with a focus on numerical simulations, debugging isn't what I envisioned myself doing.
My current supervisor has been "controlling my life" by controlling when I leave from work by strategically placing meetings at such times. He has also suggested on numerous times, quite explicitly that I must not leave work until he does; and he is a workaholic - works 12 hours a day. This has continued for the last 4 months and this has severely affected my health. I am now depressed, balding and have lost 15 pounds of body mass.
Today I had a conversation with the director of my research lab and he hinted that since things aren't working out, "I may be given enough time to find employment" and leave.
I am confused, hurt and extremely displeased to say the least.
Losing my job would be very problematic for me, as I am an Indian citizen and it would affect my ongoing H1B processing for a faculty position in the US starting next fall.
My current contract doesn't state what the "rules of being let go" are. All it says is that I am required to work 35 hours a week. I have consulted a lawyer "friend" and he tells me that most contracts are at will anyway and for foreign nationals, once your contract AND work status are revoked, you may not be able to fight the system.
Considering that I will be given a few weeks to a month or so perhaps, how do I behave towards my supervisor. Should I show up for work or just say screw it?
You need to consult an immigration attorney as soon as possible. Any other advice to this is superfluous to you figuring out how to handle the current situation.
@aeismail Career wise, how do I handle this? Have I failed? How do I show that on my CV or have conversation with potential job offers (if I even get offered something in the future - fat chance)
Isn't a 12-hour work day/60-hour work week explicitly illegal in France? Seems like you need a French employment law attorney as well.
@BillBarth See edit. Contract says 35 hours a week. I cannot go around searching for an attorney now.
I think it's a given that consulting an attorney is a good idea, if you can manage it. I've edited the rest of the post to focus on the question of how to act, now. (And I do think the question about the CV is a very good question, and you should definitely ask it separately)
@ff524 Thank you for doing my work for me. I appreciate it even if it is from a stranger.
Why not? You might have to sue your current employer after they let you go for not doing the illegal and anti-contract thing they've asked you to do.
@BillBarth Lets look at what you said:1) I get fired 2) since I don't have French employment, my visa is invalid (it is not just an entry document in Europe) 3) I go home to India and then search for an attorney to fight my case from... INDIA? Right. thats going to work.
You wrote "You're on a leave of absence from a US university for 1 year" and then "I will return to my university in May 2015 to take up a non-tenure track lecturer position." Cannot this university help you, and the remaining time is like 7 months or something. Can't you ask them to let you stay for 7 months till your new job kicks in, or am I missing something? Anyway, sounds like a bad situation. I've also been there - Indian citizen in the US... lots of scope for abuse. Though this is France...
@FaheemMitha Good point. However, I don't have a visa to the USA. They would petition my visa only if I returned next year in May. Not before, not later. Petitioning for a visa takes place in the city of current residence. in my case that is Paris. However, not for long. So if I am "cityless" as far as visa procedures go, my visa dossier would have defaulted and will be rejected.
@drN Sheesh, that sounds nasty. I assume you have asked your "home" university for help? If not, I suggest doing so immediately. It does sound like your best bet is to try to keep the people you are working with happy for the duration if you can. I suppose you had no idea it was going to work out like this? Sounds like something went badly wrong. I was in a somewhat similar situation once that went on for years. I'd have thought stringing these people along would be possible for 7 months. Try to act all enthusiastic about your job if you can.
Which is why you should get the local employment law attorney now! I doubt it's legal for your employer to fire you and have you deported while your lawsuit unlawful working conditions is pending. You might not be able to work, but I suspect you can find a way to stay in France while you work out your dispute. It's also possible that your advisor/university will back off and not fire you if your attorney points out to them that what they are doing is illegal. GO GET SOME GOOD LEGAL ADVICE!
At the risk of being superfluous, Bill's advice sounds good. Since (if I understand your situation correctly) all you basically need is to stay put for 7 months, and you have a job waiting for you after that time, legal action (or even the threat of legal action) might be enough to swing that. It is quite likely the adviser/university will back off under the circumstances. After all, they have little or nothing to lose by letting you stay on in the area (or even stay employed) for the next 7 months. I would certainly try to stay employed if you can, even if you don't enjoy the job.
You get money, looks better on the CV, possible health benefits implications etc. This is an obvious thing to say, of course. Sadly, it sounds like you are not going to get any publications or even a reference out of this, but at this point those are probably low on your list of priorities.
You need to talk to a lawyer in France and maybe to the US school about whether a January start is possible, there's no point talking to random academics on the Internet about this further until you understand your options better.
Was your lawyer friend French?
@NoahSnyder Yes. He is French. He couldn't say more since he has a conflict of interest.
Assuming that the legal work contract situation in France may be somewhat similar due to EU: In Germany, the fixed time contracts that are usual for postdoc positions usually cannot be canceled without mutual agreement. Important exceptions are: 1. probation period is possible (up to 6 months) - within that time, no reason is needed to cancel the contract (both sides). 2nd exception: there are situations where the employee is entitled to the employer's agreement, e.g. if they have a better job offer. IANAL: I'd seriously suggest to get a lawyer that knows both about immigration and employment
There are two problems here. An academic dilemma and a legal issue. The latter is specific to country's immigration, workplace rules, your residency status, etc., therefore I will politely keep the focus to the first one. There are also good comments to your post, so keep them in mind as well. Needless to say, the legal problem could be more intimate to your situation but you will find actual support from a legal authority as you yourself have stated. Now, to the academic dilemma at hand: first of all, I suggest talking with your supervisor and make your position clear in an honest sober way. Your problem is a practical one and need not to be emotional. Here, I would suggest and stress on keeping the best of relations with your supervisor (even if you decide to leave or they decide to let you go), especially if this is your first ever post-doc position. This is important for two reasons: first, you want to leave on good terms even if it didn't work out for you and so you don't need to give an impression of personal grudge. Second, there might be opportunities in future where you will have to work/collaborate with the said supervisor or the university. You also don't want to ruin the possibility of good references for your own future work from this university - hope things will work out for you, and my two cents help. Good luck.
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196889 | Cancellation of certificate of course completion
I took a 4-month online course in London. Upon completion, I received an email congratulating me for passing the course with the course certificate attached. The following day, I was told that there was a mistake in the grade given and that I did not pass the course. There is no plagiarism involved. Is it legal to revoke the certificate and change the grade from pass to fail?
For legal questions, consult a professional. Personally, I doubt such cancelation was illegal.
It would be normal procedure for an institution to correct a grade if an error is found afterward, no matter whether the new grade was higher or lower, and no matter if the student had already been issued a certificate. The goal is to "get it right".
The institution may have internal time limits as to when this can be done, or how much internal review is required, but those limits would typically be months to years. One day is practically no time at all on academic time scales.
Of course, if you think the newly assigned grade is not actually correct, you probably have a right to appeal or request a review. You would have to refer to the policies of your institution to find out how to go about that. But if you acknowledge that the new grade is correct and the original one wasn't, there isn't really anything to be done.
Legal questions are outside the scope of this site, but since this is common practice, I would be very surprised if it is illegal in any country.
It is certainly unfortunate and frustrating that the mistake was made, but at the end of the day, the grade is what it is. I wish you better success going forward!
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8239 | Are there any acceptable reasons for omitting data in a publication (i.e. "data not shown")?
I was recently going through an article (which I was told is fundamental in the area of my new project) published in a respectable medical journal. In short, the paper is about the similarities between a particular sub-type of tumor cells versus a particular type of stem cells in the body, then they go on to investigate what that similarity might indicate.
Barely two pages in and I realize that the authors omit what I consider to be critical data when motivating the use of two particular proteins as markers in establishing their fundamental assumption, that their immunohistochemistry findings are representative of the reality and that their model is valid:
Accordingly, we screened all known ..... markers against our ..... data to determine which, if any, decrease with differentiation (data not shown). Of all the potential ... markers, we found that X and Y are the best candidates, and they were therefore used in this study.
Now it might not be a big deal to some but I find it important to see that omitted data, since:
I am not that informed in that particular type of biology
Seeing that their "real" findings are built on the results of the aforementioned screening, the validity of their research is practically depending on the decision of using those two markers.
Which brings me to my question: Are there any cases where not showing "critical" data in such a manner is acceptable or common? I know that some journals do not accept "data not shown", but obviously it does happen in better journals as well...
I am not in any way familiar with biology, but it seems odd to refer to "all known...markers" when, apparently, there are only two markers of interest. Are you sure what you quoted from the paper is accurately reflected by what you understand is the authors' methodology?
I think I got the methodology right, I had skipped the next line which might have caused the misunderstanding. Please see the quote now.
I think it is perfectly reasonable to not "show" data. For example, consider a multivariate randomized control trial with two groups. If there are a large number of partially correlated dependent variables, the data are not suitable for graphical or tabular presentation. What we are potentially interested in is if there is a difference between the two groups. We can "see" that from a single sentence about a statistical test and a comment that the data are not shown (so people do not go looking to find the figure).
In a biology example, maybe you are counting the number of intact cells after two different treatments. There may be hundreds of slices that result in two numbers. What exactly do you want to see?
Interesting, I had not thought of the data presentation problem, even though I doubt that is the case. This field of biomedical research is riddled with HUGE pdfs with cluster graphs and heatmaps, you name it... It has not hindered people from having 900+ pages of supplementary (yes, I did come across such a paper). Long story short, yes I guess it might be an issue in some cases.
Critical data? Probably not. But, I have seen many papers with data left out simply because of paper length restrictions, and in all cases other graphs and data appropriately contributed to the papers' fundamental arguments.
In the cases where I wanted to see the data that was omitted, I've written one of the authors and they have almost always forwarded it along.
how about supplementary data then? I mean there usually isn't a limit on supplementary data, right?
@posdef I think it goes back to the question of whether it is critical or not. If the authors didn't think it was critical, and the reviewers/editors accepted the paper, then the peer-reviewed answer is that it wasn't critical.
What constitutes "data" is a highly subjective issue. If "data" means "all scientific output," in many cases this exceeds what can reasonably be shown in a paper.
In molecular simulations (my particular field), we may generate gigabytes or even terabytes of data for individual papers. This data needs to be crunched down and represented in figures that process the data and make sense of it to the reader, as it is plainly impossible to show the reader the same data over and over again. Thus, we choose to show only the most essential information, rather than deluge the reader with more information than can be handled either visually or in tabular form.
I sometimes start with gigabytes of measured raw data, even before any bootstrapping of models or whatever takes place... Clearly outside usual sizes for supplementary material.
It is of course difficult to judge this particular paper without having seen it so I will stick to general terms.
I do not see any reason for not representing all data in some form. When I say represent I mean that the complete data set can be given in terms of, for example, statistical measures which would at least provide some way to see or judge whether the subset shown is truly representative. But, I still have a hard time seeing a good reason for omitting it without clearly explaining on what grounds.
Journals allow supplementary information and so it seems reasonable to use that option if it exists in th eparticular journal. In very old papers where plots were mae by hand, there may be some excuse if not everything is included.
As I see it one of the fundamental principles of scientific publication is reproducibility. That requires access to all data. There are of course instances where this i snot possible such as when patient journals are involved.
From the way you've described it, it sounds like the choice of markers was somewhat arbitrary. Presumably they had figures that demonstrate that the markers they did choose are good at marking whatever-it-is that needs to be marked. Thus, the fact that they looked at howevermany others is immaterial to the scientific content of the paper and is rightly omitted.
Now, that data could well be useful to someone else for whom markers X and Y are inadequate (maybe because of expression problems or tissue type or whatever). It would be useful to the scientific community to know what that data is (if indeed it was done carefully enough to be worth anything--maybe it wasn't, but it didn't matter because X and Y checked out). But there's no requirement to be especially helpful to the rest of the community (or to avoid being sloppy in some areas as long as you go back and do it carefully/right once you know what you're doing). So it seems reasonable to me.
(Again, inferring from what you've said. If that screen was what told them that X and Y had the properties that they thought, and there is no other confirmation, then they'd better show that data in convincing detail!)
"Thus, the fact that they looked at howevermany others is immaterial to the scientific content" not necessarily: looking at howevermany may constitute a multiple testing situation. And then it does make a difference whether 10 markers or 100s or 1000s were screened. See e.g. http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110323/full/471428a.html However, the fact that they are not reported points to rather larger numbers I guess. The question is whether later on comes a really independent confiramation of the required properties or whether this is not independent of the screening data.
@cbeleites - It's irrelevant how many you look at if your screening criteria are different from your criteria used to confirm. Otherwise, yes, the statistics are rubbish. I said as much in my last paragraph.
I read that last paragraph. But I think data dredging is so widespread a problem that it needs to be emphasized far more than by a paragraph in parentheses. I'm biased, for the moment I tend to believe that if such a paper doesn't have an explicit sentence stating that there is no problem because the final testing was independent of the screening, I tend to assume that it probably wasn't. This may be wrong for the biological field in discussion, though (I'm not a biologist, but my field interacts with biological/medical questions).
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15745 | What are the super cool tricks to getting published in high impact journals?
I am starting a post-doc in Cognitive Neuroscience and I am interested in publishing my work in high impact journals (e.g., Nature, Science, Behavioral and Brain Science). I have already published review articles in not-so-high impact journals, and I would like to know your thoughts and tips for publishing in high-impact journals. I will be responsible for submitting these papers to these journals and I will be seeing them through to the end. Ay helpful advice and tips would be greatly appreciated!
Do you mean Science-Nature or more regular journals with high impact factors? depending on which the answer may differ.
Also some hint on which research field we are talking about would be great.
I think you will learn more (and easier) from the opposite question: What to do to a great result to be sure that some high-impact journal will never ever accept is?
If your postdoc contract specifically asks you to publish in Nature and Science -- good luck.
@Joe Really? Or is that the fact that a paper is accepted increases its chance to have a colon in the title?
Sad, dishonest, but important to know about in this context: Check a recent Science article on how to fast-track to publications in reasonably good journals (Science 29 November 2013:
Vol. 342 no. 6162 pp. 1035-1039). TL;DR: money buys it for you!
Here is another way: http://academia.stackexchange.com/q/72680/4484
There is no 'super-cool tricks', I guess. Just do a breakthrough which could a show the world something very crucial.
I’m voting to close this question because ... it is a stupid trolling question, whether or not intended such by the questioner.
High impact journals, or in other word, top ranked journals (based on IF) are those publishing the state-of-the-art research works with high percentage of novelty and originality. In my own opinion following tips are very important in getting into the high impact journals:
Select a real challenging problem whose solution/amendment significantly impacts on the domain.
Formulate the problem (using mathematical modeling, visualization, or empirical experiment depending on the domain) and let peers/reviewers see the significance of the problem.
Propose a solution with high degree of novelty in a way that has not been undertaken before for the same problem.
Throughout the research try to follow the conventions of research in your domain in the highest possible level, especially when it comes to evaluation and validation of your work.
In data collection phase, try to follow the most appropriate approaches and use accurate tools to measure/quantify. Maybe looking at similar papers can help you in this.
Avoid silly mistakes. Usually reviewers do not expect to see silly mistakes in the work. If you make small obvious mistakes, how can reviewers ensure the rest of your work is error-free.
Show high level of confidence in understanding and expertise over the domain. If you need to review related works in your paper, try to select those closely related to your work; not any work.
Present your work nicely. Avoid English errors (no grammar and no spelling). Use professional drawing tools to draw high quality figures, draw nice tables, use proper sizing for objects in the paper, not too big, not to small.
There is an approach by some young authors that leave some works to be done in revisions stage, which is not correct to me. Don't send incomplete work to any high quality journal. There will hardly be any chance to correct mistakes. The review is more to evaluate the significance of the work, the novelty, relevance to the journal, and research practice presented in the paper. Reviewers are not English proof reader and their job is not to correct you.
There may be lot more tips that I will compile as I noticed. Hope it works.
For an (extreme) example of a paper that does things like this, take a look at the paper that announced LIGO's discovery of gravitational waves. It's around 2-3 pages of "we've seen this", followed by 10 pages of "and this is why the measurement is valid and not an error."
Others have asked and tried to answer this question before. Here is an ad-hoc list of resources relevant to your question, both print and online.
Sternberg, R. J. (Ed.). (2000). Guide to publishing in psychology journals. Cambridge University. (field: psychology)
Bem, D. J. (2003) Writing the empirical journal article. url. (field: psychology)
Roediger III, H. L. (2007). Twelve tips for authors. APS Observer, 20. url. (field: psychology)
King, G. (2006). Publication, publication. PS: Political Science & Politics, 39, 119-125. doi:10.1017/S1049096506060252 (field: political science)
Senturia, S. D. (2003). Guest editorial: How to avoid the reviewer's axe: One editor's view. Journal of Microelectromechanical Systems, 12, 229-232. doi:10.1109/JMEMS.2003.814319 (field: mechanics)
Manuscript review histories of the Journal of Consumer Research. One can track the whole review history of a couple of papers including the submissions, reviews, resubmissions, etc. (field: consumers)
There is really nothing special that causes your paper to be accepted in a high-impact journal. If we start by looking at Science and Nature, they publish material more like a newspaper would than a scientific journal ( I am not saying it is without worth, they just have different criteria for their selection). The material needs to be extraordinary by, for example, being "sensational" in some way, by affecting many, or by causing a change in paradigm. It is really hard to design your research to obtain such results. They may be a result of good design but also luck. So if we disregard from results that fall into the science/nature categories and focus on more normal science output the following (adapted from Lichtfouse, 2013) will be the basis for high-impact publications:
Select your journal carefully
Be careful to follow the instructions for authors
Focus the article on one finding
Prepare one figure that shows or illustrates the main main finding
Explain your new finding in the abstract, the discussion AND the conclusions
Delete any irrelevant results or those that are not explained
Distinguish clearly between the results from your study and those of others
Include a good dose of education and dissemination
Read your article at least five times before submitting it
make sure your manuscript is written in good English
While this may look like generic advise, it is followed by so few that it will set your manuscript apart from the majority. Some of the points also involve serious work so it is perhaps a deceptively simple list.
Lichtfouse, E., 2013. Scientific writing for impact journals. Nova, New York.
really nothing special that causes your paper to be accepted, but I think you missed two most important things top quality journals are looking for. They are looking for a paper 1- reporting results of a research on the state-of-the-art domain, 2- addressing an original problem using a novel approach. As an example, I was attending a talk by an EiC of top 1 CS journal where he discouraged submission of papers on routing in MANET since this is not he trend and there are already very large number of articles in this domain. Top journals do not publish a 50's research for sure.
Let me give you another example. I prepared two survey articles with identical theme. One on the state-of-the-art domain and another one on a 20-year old domain. The first one published in the journal with the highest impact factor and the second one got rejected from the 30th journal because the topic was old. Timeliness is VERY VERY much important.
If you are publishing in emerging fields where much research has not been done, you have good chance to get published, even though its not groundbreaking. First movers are always at an advantage. Just like patents.
Isn't publishing something interesting in an unexplored field the very definition of 'groundbreaking'?
Well, if "super cool" ... There was a history when one laboratory has published a highly impressive discovery in a very reputable journal. Then they found a mistake in they experimental setup, and applied with another paper to the same journal, just to say the previous result is wrong. This was also accepted and now they have two publications in highly reputable journal ... for nothing.
But I believe this "trick" was not intentional and I am far from recommending it.
Then one found by a PhD student, right? Yes, that was cool. I believe, lack of further amendment, is what is missing in today's publication, at least in online-only versions. Publishers may look at this issue seriously.
1) Produce good science
2) Go to groups which already published in Science, Nature, etc.
Both conditions are necessary (especially the second).
Slots in journals with IF>10 are practically "inherited" (you can publish there sth if your PI already published there etc.) - thus you need be very selective in case of where you want to do PhD, postdoc.
In simple words, if you are independent scientist without publication record in Science, Nature, Cell, ... Editors will reject your manuscript in one day without reading it (you will get this nice courtesy letter, that your work is nice, but does not have wide impact ble ble). Sad, but true.
This is hard rule, I know only one exception in which one scientist broke it, but it is single case in the 20-year history of science in my country and it was celebrated almost as national holiday, but he was already established scientist, EMBO member etc).
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26470 | How to make the most of a currently unfulfilling post-doc experience
How to make the most of an nnfulfilling post-doc experience
Before I pose my question, I would first like to describe the circumstances and provide as much "quantitative data" relevant to this as possible.
Background
I am on a leave of absence from a US university for 1 year (2014-2015) and currently working at a lab in France as an Engineer II (let's face it, E2=fancy_way_of_saying(post_doc)). I posted a question about the merits and demerits of doing this a few months back and received some useful feedback (in hindsight obv.!)
I am at an early stage of my career. I received my PhD in Mechanical engineering in 2013. From Aug 2013-May 2014, I worked as a non-tenure track instructor at my US university. I will return to my university in May 2015 to take up a non-tenure track lecturer position. I prefer teaching track to research track. The idea was to diversify my portfolio to work and hence the leave of absence to work as an E2 in France. I am in month 3 of my E2 position.
Gist of current position
To introduce major modifications in a "spaghetti code" developed by my E2 supervisor some 6-7 years ago. The code itself is quite obfuscating and models certain thermal engineering physics problem.
My perceived failings as an E2
The code is obfuscating! No, I am not making excuses but the previous two E2 quit to go on to purportedly greener pastures.
I was given tasks to modify certain aspects of the code and in my opinion (I have no yardstick for comparison), I have not done the best job at it.
Result (for now)
My supervisor has hinted that "we must hurry as there is a deadline next month we must meet" (I did not know of this deadline prior to taking up this position).
I am making a sincere effort to accomplish the tasks but I am not sure if it is my ineptitude or lack of scientific maturity that I constantly see myself failing at my job.
Over the last couple of weeks, my supervisor has not asked me to do any important things with this code/project and I think I have been relegated to "just check the code for mistakes".
Also I find that unlike my previous department head, my current supervisor treats me like a student and is sometimes disparaging in his comments. I suppose this is normal.
Also, what is normal in my current lab is that post-docs share the office space of their supervisors and the supervisors LITERALLY are looking over their shoulders at all time. Yes, I know what LITERALLY means.
I understand that this is a character building exercise for me and I'll treat it as such.
Future
Do I have a future or am I looking at a premature "pink slip"? My contract doesn't mention conditions of being fired.
How should I make the most of this situation? I want to have a positive impact on this project which in turn will have a positive impact on my career. Although I am in a teaching track from 2015, I feel that this research experience will only enhance my teaching capabilities.
References I have used to understand this better
A postdoc experience
Making the most of your post doc
However, I would feel better if I got "real time advice" from the diverse membership of this forum.
Any particular reason for a -1? Can I improve this question?
The main problem with this question is that it isn't really one. "Any advice?" style questions are just a very bad fit for SE. Further, the question is probably way too localized. See for instance this meta discussion (http://meta.academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1093/time-to-expressly-ban-i-want-to-do-x-heres-my-life-story-questions) - not exactly the same, but closely related.
@xLeitix Thank you. Any suggestions?" When a user wants to do X and asks for help without giving life story, users automatically ask for details regarding the professional life as comments and the author edits the question and adds asked details. So it is essential for us users to read a life story or detailled paragraph to consider different aspects and give a good answer."
The problem is not so much that the "life story" is given by itself, but rather that the need to tell said life story is a good indicator that the question is of little value to anybody aside from the OP, and hence off topic on SE. I think this is also true with your question. That is why I also don't have a good way to fix the question.
@xLeitix Thats one way of looking at it. The way I look at it is that it is perhaps a unique situation in the world of academia and there is little or no way to predict if this will NOT happen again and solutions for this will NOT be sought in the future. Hence a solution to this problem may be useful in the future.
+1 I think in this case the "life story" helps highlight the issue and I think the issue is one that many post docs face.
it is perhaps a unique situation in the world of academia — You can't have it both ways. If this is a unique situation, then the question is relevant only to you and should be closed. If it isn't a unique situation, the details of your life story should be deleted to better expose the useful question.
@JeffE that would be ideal, but presenting a life story which allows someone to understand the issue is much easier (for the asker) than distilling the life story and presenting only the isolated issue.
I agree with @StrongBad: the question is fine. Let's show some self-awareness: many of the details disclosed by the OP would, if absent, be inquired about by us in the comments.
Do I have a future or am I looking at a premature "pink slip"?
This is unlikely, especially in France. The financial savings from firing a one year post doc is pretty small compared to the hassle and bad blood that will result from doing it.
Although I am in a teaching track from 2015, I feel that this research experience will only enhance my teaching capabilities.
Is this really your goal of the post doc? It is not clear to me how a year spent disentangling spaghetti code is going to enhance your teaching capabilities. Most engineers do not take up a non-teaching post docs to enhance their teaching. I am not sure that most post docs would spend a year disentangling spaghetti code with supervisors hovering over their shoulders. Are you sure that an E2 is really the equivalent of a post doc? It is probably worth talking to your supervisor, hopefully again, to make sure you are both on the same page.
Realizing that you are unhappy with the current state of affairs does not really help you to change things. I think grad students and post docs sometimes have unfulfilling experiences because they do not know what they want. You need to figure out what it is you want to get out of the post doc and then figure out a way to work towards that goal. Often once you know what you want the road to obtaining that goal becomes clear.
The fact that my primary goal would be disentangling spaghetti code was not mentioned in any discussion or contract. Since I am a mechanical engineer and not a computer science person (tried and tested excuse), un-obfuscating code is not my strong point. However, it is a challenge that will enhance some aspect of my teaching abilities-the courses I have taught have focused on numerical methods for PDEs etc. Yes an E2 apparently gets paid the same as a post-doc. Coming back to the point: I don't mind disentangling code for one year if that is what I am required to do.
...contd. How should I make the best of this situation really? Make lemonade from the lemons bestowed on me. Supervisors hovering over the shoulders of their wards is then uncommon??
@drN: "The fact that my primary goal would be disentangling spaghetti code was not mentioned in any discussion or contract." What were you told was the primary goal of the job? Also: "Yes an E2 apparently gets paid the same as a post-doc." Just because two jobs get paid the same does not make them equivalent.
It's an interesting question whether it matters whether your job is actually a postdoc. One could argue that it does: postdoctoral positions are supposed to offer advanced training and career development. If all you are doing is working on someone else's project under their direct (literal!) supervision, it doesn't sound like you're getting that. It sounds more like a "real job". Finding out what the parameters of the position are and could be seems like a key point for you: if it is really not what you expected, maybe you shouldn't continue with it.
@PeteL.Clark Thank you for the perspective. Just checked about E2. E2=Ingnieur/Chercheur-Postdoc. So An E2 is a postdoc per my lab. Yes, I am definitely not developing something new here. I pretty much have "strict orders" to "do this and then do this and then this". I have made suggestions such as "what about this?". They were shot down quite swiftly as being "bad ideas" without quantitative proof that they are "bad ideas".
@PeteL.Clark As for not continuing with it, not quite an option. I am a foreigner and my University in the US has just applied for an H1B work visa and petitioned for me to go to the consulate in Paris. Essentially I have to be here and work here at least to ensure I get my US visa and head back :( next May.
@drN: Okay, I'm glad you checked. Although what you describe is not what a postdoc ought to be, I strongly doubt you are the only, or almost the only, postdoc who is in a similar situation. The visa stuff is key information too. Actually I worked as a postdoc in a foreign country (Canada) and learned that such issues are not to be messed with. I agree with StrongBad that it seems unlikely that you will get fired from such a 1-year position...though of course I can't guarantee anything! A frank talk with your supervisor seems to be in order: at least you know where to find him!
@drN to make the best of the situation, you need to define "best". Once you can articulate "best" you can ask your supervisor, friends, and AC.SE how to obtain that goal.
@PeteL.Clark in my experience post docs have a lot more freedom and responsibilities in NA compared to Europe. I wouldn't go so far as to define what a post doc should or shouldn't be.
@StrongBad Yes. Should ask my friends who I haven't yet approached about this. However from the horse's mouth (my supervisor). To make the best of this, I should "change the (computer)code" that I am working on. I suppose I am just a "research tool" but not quite "research".
StrongBad: A former PhD student of mine is currently doing his second European postdoc. Both of them involve at least as much freedom as most cognate North American postdocs and significant time to devote to his own projects. I feel confident that there are some NA postdocs who would identify with the OP's plight. In terms of defining what a postdoc should be on a global scale: that is certainly not within my power! However, most people (that I know) take postdocs with expectations like the ones I mentioned above. Surely the moral here is: find out the parameters of the job in advance.
@PeteL.Clark Yes. Finding out the parameters in advance was an attempt I made. I suppose that the lab too liberties after I left the united states and came to Europe since it's not like I can just leave and go back to the USA since I am not a US citizen.
@StrongBad My experience is consistent with Pete Clark's. The European postdocs I've known were all given significant freedom and independence, just like North American postdocs in the same fields. This may be more a cultural difference between math/algorithms and other fields of science/engineering than between North America and Europe. +1 for "Find out the job parameters in advance", and not just by asking the supervisor.
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19282 | Decision making paradigm for career planning
Despite receiving a job (post-doc) offer in January I have kept applying to other positions (post-doc and teaching track jobs). This was not a bad idea in retrospect, I suppose
This post doc job offer I received is in Europe (France) and required me to apply for a "long stay visa". I am currently a visiting faculty in a well known mid-western university in the USA. My citizenship is "Indian".
I did apply for a long stay visa and have not received it yet. In the mean time I have received a job offer for one teaching track (non-tenure but "long term" contract) job at my current university.
I have not been offered tenure track jobs anywhere since I have a backlog of publications right now.
Here is the problem:
My post doc job starts in 3 weeks time and I haven't received my visa yet. I have to make other arrangements too (air tickets, housing in Europe, other stuff for a trans-continental move).
I have been given 3 weeks to decide and confirm my availability for the teaching track job.
I prefer the post doc since it is a more appealing challenge. The downside is I have to exit the USA if I get my visa and go to Europe.
The teaching track job offers me stability, a full time employment and a salary that is difficult to beat in the post doc job and in my home country of India. The downside is that teaching track lecturers are treated as "mules" in the USA and are burdened with courses that "tenure track" do not want. This would mean that any research aspirations I have go down the drain since I won't be afforded time to do research.
For me as a foreigner, it is not just working on my "passion" but also getting a lucrative position with which to support my family. I have to strike a balance between working on my passion and living in a developed country with a good salary.
I am confused as to what to do.
Here are options that occur to me (deferment of either position is not a possibility):
Wait for 3 weeks and irrespective of the visa decision, take a risk and say "no" to the teaching track job and take my chances with the European visa and miss an opportunity to have a full time job in the USA.
Wait for the next 3 weeks, if EU visa is not delivered to my house, just tell the lab that I cannot wait any longer since I have to make a career decision and take the teaching track job and miss a fantastic research opportunity for a great salary but a job that could very easily become flavorless.
Some more detail that I need to factor in:
I love to teach and have received some teaching awards for graduate and undergraduate courses I have taught as a visiting faculty.
However, I love research as well and understand that teaching and research are symbiotic activities and that the EU postdoc (which is a research position) allows me to do research and develop as a better teacher.
My question:
I am not asking this forum to make my decision for me; I just want to know how to weight this situation rationally and try and cut my losses if things go to pot. What are some of the decision making paradigms that one would use in such a situation?
If there are other details that may not have occured to me, would prove useful, do let me know via a comment below and I will try to include them.
Amendments to question:
"what is the likelihood that the visa will appear in the next three weeks, and what methods do you have to estimate this likelihood?"
The consulate tells me that it takes between 2 weeks and 2 months for a decision on "long stay visa" to be made. It is week 3 of my wait.
There would appear to be no way of estimating the likelihood other than tracking the status on a status page. All it says right now is: "Your application is under consideration". Contacting the consulate yielded the same answer.
One data point that I'd need for a decision is: what is the likelihood that the visa will appear in the next three weeks, and what methods do you have to estimate this likelihood ?
@Suresh Good point. Pl see amended question.
I asked because with visas (and I have a fair bit of experience with this) some processes are routine but long, and others are long and have nontrivial outcomes. Have you been able to get a sense of a) whether visas are ever rejected for cause b) how long it's taken others in the past to get visas for the country you're applying to c) what your putative employers have to say about the visa process and their experience with dealing with it ?
...continued. My point is that from your question it's clear that you'd like to go to this European location. So all your efforts should be directed at getting good information about the visa processing (or at explaining that information to this forum)
@Suresh it would seem that the visa process and ETA for a long stay visa would seem to be variable. The lab that has hired me in the EU is confident that I will receive my visa but as I see it, they are (and have to) be positive about it and present an optimistic front! There is little to no official information available on the visa process itself wit regards to "timing".
@drN I sympathise with your predicament. However, I notice you have not specified the European country. I can't think of a reason not to do so. I don't know whether it would help you get better information from the forum, but it couldn't hurt.
@FaheemMitha It is France. Have updated second paragraph of question with that detail in bold
@drN Ok. Can you also say how many years the post-doc is for? Also, one thing that is not clear from your answer is whether your post-doc employers are willing to wait on your visa decision, which might take longer than 3 weeks. ADDENDUM: I see your earlier question says 1-2 years. So it could be just for 1 year?
@FaheemMitha The post doc is for 2 years. The employers delayed my joining date to May 2014 on request as I was unable to join them in January 2014. I will however ask them about the effect of this delay. This has not occurred to me but wouldn't it not be "equal opportunity" if reasonable delays are not accommodated?
@drN Ok. two years is not a very long time. Is there any possibility it could/would be extended? Your earlier (February) question says "I have been offered full time faculty position at two other universities in the USA." Has the situation changed since then? Another relevant variable - you talk about a backlog of publications. Giving more details of these might be relevant if you feel comfortable with it.
@FaheemMitha No, these are teaching track positions that I was offered. I have realized since february that although teaching is a good option, I will be relegated to a lower rank and my contract would be dispensible in favor of tenure track faculty -- this I would like to avoid and the post doc gives me a way to do that.
@drN Yes, it makes sense to avoid that.
Since the purpose of this question is to ask for general decision-making strategies that might apply more generally, here are some (that also impinge on this case):
Acquire information: Get as much information as you can that would affect the decision: in your case, estimates of time for the visa process, and so on.
Determine the "real" timeline for decision making: in this case, do you really have to decide in three weeks ? can it be delayed slightly ? and so on.
Determine how "permanent" the decisions are: can you negotiate a 1 year contract ? Can you defer the postdoc ?
Separate out facts that affect the decision from feelings/opinions: Is it true that "if the visa comes through I'm going without a doubt" ? If so, then everything depends on facts regarding the visa. Is it instead true that "if the visa comes through I have a preference, but I do enjoy teaching and like staying in the US" ? In that case, there's a personal preference coming into play that isn't usually resolved by "facts", and so timelines and data collection don't matter as much as (or are influenced by) some soul searching.
Thank you for your answer to a rather tricky question. Yes, I may be able to delay my decision on the teaching track job by 4 weeks instead of 3 weeks. Little but useful breathing space. The post doc job is for 2 years and neither position may be defered (I would love to defer the teaching track job!)
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2510 | Pros and cons on commenting on public review papers
Journals such as AMTD and ACPD contain an open discussion where anybody can comment on papers under review. The peer-reviewers are still anonymous, but other people commenting are not. If I'm reading a paper and have questions about it, what are the pros and cons on posting them as public comments versus writing an e-mail to the author directly? On the one hand my comments may improve the paper; on the other hand, if I write something stupid or step on somebody's toe, that may harm my future career.
What do others think?
(Edit: I might add that in the case I have in mind, I am already in contact with the author)
As I pointed out recently in http://nuit-blanche.blogspot.com/2012/07/problem-with-pre-publication-peer.html , the problem with the current peer review system is not the rejection and all the horror stories that go with it, it is the secrecy that goes with the process. Make anonymous the reviews but hold the reviewers accountable is the surest way reviews can be both effective and provide some "currency" as +David Ketcheson points out.
In short If I were you, I would send the author some questions, then (after her/his approval) make the whole discussion available on the interwebs (after you have edited the parts that are sensitive or the ones that make you look really clueless). I do this often on Nuit Blanche with good results. Make sure you run the whole thing you are going to publish through the person you talked to as you are not a journalist. If you ask questions, you surely are not the first or the last one and remember what you publish must enlight both the people of your community and your future self.
What I finally did was simply proposing the questions to the author and asking his opinion if he would prefer private or public, and following his preference.
I would try to answer this from the standpoint of a cost-benefit analysis.
A private conversation with the author will benefit you in that you now know the answer, and can harm you in that if your question is completely boneheaded the author will think you're an idiot.
A public conversation has the added benefit that you and other people both benefit. This is somewhat of a questionable added benefit, as oftentimes the question being asked isn't relevant to most people, but still, added discourse is often a good thing. Public discussion also has the added cost that more people can see your boneheadedness. While typically this wouldn't be a problem, as most people wouldn't ever encounter the discussion, anything on the internet can go viral, even if only within a smaller community (such as your research field). Personally, that cost strongly outweights the potential benefit. I would definitely stick with personal correspondence.
By openly and intelligently commenting on many new papers in your subfield, you might gain respect among your peers, which is the currency of the academic world. I can give at least one example: http://nuit-blanche.blogspot.co.uk/.
The first advantage that comes to my mind is that emailing the author and getting an answer will only help you, while commenting on the paper and getting an answer in the open discussions might help other readers as well.
But I really understand your concerns. One does not want to embarrass oneself or the author.
Which leads me to the inconclusive result of +1 for both methods.
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27669 | Should I post a response to reviewers online?
I usually spent an incredible amount of time answering the questions raised by reviewers when submitting research manuscripts to a journal. The length of the response is often longer than the paper itself. Such a process, albeit time consuming, has significantly improved the quality of the work.
Since there are many thoughts that can not be delivered in the paper, which are elaborated in the response of the reviewers, I am wondering whether it is good to upload the response online along with the paper? (e.g., research profile page) I think this will benefit the readers but am not sure what might be the consequences resulting from that? Do note that I don't have any clue as to the reviewers' identities.
In case you're interested, there are some journals in the biological sciences where this is standard. For example, at the EMBO journal you can click "Review Process File" under "Transparent Process" http://emboj.embopress.org/content/33/16/1740.transparent-process and at eLIFE you can click "Decision Letter" http://elifesciences.org/content/3/e03245/article-info#decision-letter to read the editor/reviewer comments and the author responses.
Could you give some examples? In most cases, I would think review responses would correspond to stuff that can and should go into the paper.
@NateEldredge Agree. Either it's irrelevant misunderstanding, or it should go into the paper. Or not?
@NateEldredge Thanks for the suggestion, the time I spent most for respond is exactly like the question New_new_newbie has raised: "why the approach in the paper conflicts some sacred tenet?" These discussions are not supposed to be incorporated in the paper, but are useful for the readers as they may think in the same way.
I added a relevant comment to new_new_newbie's answer.
You are free to post your response as you see fit, If you know who the reviewer(s) is/are then you may need to think twice about mentioning their name(s) since. I am not sure how you may be thinking of posting such comments but I assume you will rewrite them into some form of self-contained text. As such it would not be very different from a blog entry and so one suggestion would be to use a blog type web to add comments around your publications. You may also provide means for commenting on your papers and associated posts.
But, in short, no problem posting your own thoughts but stay clear of adding the thoughts of others that may be given in a context other than open posts.
And if/when they are known, you can just ask them if they let you post their comments.
Yes, asking is always a good strategy
(I request that this answer may be viewed as an addendum to Pete's nice answer here, in light of Nate's comment above.)
As Nate pointed out, most of the typical referee responses would be concerned with stuff that should enter the manuscript. So, assuming that all his useful suggestions were incorporated in the text itself, there isn't generally more meat from that conversation that could warrant a separate 'response log' to be uploaded anywhere (I'm assuming on arXiv, for example).
But the impression that I get from the question is that, OP is inquiring about suggestions that go deeper than the above paragraph. In some cases, it is possible that referee queries stuff on the lines of
How is [a fact that you established on the basis of your calculation in the manuscript] consistent with [a sacred tenet, or a well-established or experimentally verified result] ? Aren't the two incompatible because of [some qualitative reasoning, devised by the referee]?
The reasoning looks valid to you, so you sit down and calculate the implications of your calculation on the established fact, and find that the two are indeed compatible. Then, you identify a weakness in the qualitative reasoning, and let the referee know about this. Now, all this isn't worthy of being included in the text of your manuscript, since it is off-track from the overall theme of the work. Yet, this is a valuable piece of information, and is likely to help future readers because they may also reason this apparent contradiction. Responses of this kind are worthy of being put up. Occasionally, one encounters those one-page or two-page ''Comment on [a paper]'' sort of things on arXiv, so these can definitely be put up too. It doesn't necessarily have to be journal article manuscript always.
Lastly, regarding acknowledging the referee, there are two options - either take their permission (ref - Pete's answer), or you simply acknowledge ''the anonymous referee'' for pointing it out, in case option 1 doesn't work out. I know some instances where this has been done in my field, but one example that I can find is over here. Sorry, there isn't any corresponding arXiv version for this, so if you can't access it directly, here's the relevant excerpt:
The author would like to thank the anonymous referee for making insightful comments which have been helpful in improving and updating the manuscript.
But seriously, option 1 is the better option (why strip the poor guy of his due credit!).
Hope that helps.
Well, I don't know the details, and this could be culture/field dependent, but in such a case I'd be tempted to say something in the paper anyway. "The reader may be concerned that our result appears to conflict with [sacred tenet] because of [referee's reasons]. However, this is not the case, because of [brief sketch of why the conflict doesn't really exist]." If the referee had this concern, surely other readers might as well?
@NateEldredge - You are right, that could be an option. But like I'd said in the answer, it will mostly be off-track from the theme of the paper. Also, if the paper is something like a letter communication, where there is a word or page-restriction, you can't go on and on. The way I'm imagining this question being posed is the way it goes in PhD qualifying oral exams - you describe, e.g. how your devised plan is going to work, and there is a big prof on the other side of the table who stumps you with a plain ''But this is inconsistent with ... How can this be right?'' remark.
@NateEldredge - (contd.) So, while proving consistency is a very important requirement in such situations, it isn't that in a subsequent presentation, you include this consistency argument. The way it goes is - I've shown that there is an overall consistency, now believe rest of what I say! Thus, while consistency is important, that's not the subject you are addressing. But, of course, you may be right, maybe it could be field-dependent. Nevertheless, thanks :)
Yeah, okay. In my field (math) it's not unusual to write with a more pedagogical tone, where you really try to help the reader follow the argument, and point out possible pitfalls. Also, we rarely have strict page limits (and if one journal does, you can usually find an equally good journal that doesn't).
@NateEldredge - I'm not saying that mine (Physics) doesn't have pedagogic papers, but it is a mixed bag - some pedagogic and some totally cryptic. However, cryptic and concise aren't really synonyms (to me at least). And conciseness is appreciated in letters (page restrictions etc.) and even otherwise.
@NateEldredge - But I must add that some of them, like Physical Review Letters, do allow for supplemental material (where there isn't any such restriction). So, people can move big derivations etc. over there, and have only the important steps in the 5 page text. But of course, all of them don't, which is why some papers are cryptic.
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16526 | What advice would you give students applying for graduate school in mathematics?
I work in the mathematics department of a university that has a new, small, mathematics bachelor's degree program, and no graduate mathematics programs. Some of our students are looking for advice on how to successfully apply for graduate school. I don't know what to tell them. Everyone in my department (myself included) applied to graduate school so long ago that I think our advice may not be relevant. I don't think anyone else who works for my university knows more than my department colleagues do.
What are good things for students at a small school to do to get into graduate school in mathematics? In particular, what are some things that might not be obvious to mathematics professors who've been out of graduate school for a few decades?
EDIT: In response to this question being put on hold for being "too broad", here is my modified question: What advice would you give students applying for graduate school in mathematics in 2014 that you would not have given them a decade or two ago? In other words, how would the advice differ? I am thinking both about what students have to do as undergrads and about the application process itself (which I assume is done online nowadays).
I think this question is too broad for stackexchange. Perhaps you could break it up into more specific questions. You might also look at the questions and answers already available, which contain a lot of good advice.
It is a little on the broad side. Here is one idea for sharpening it: you write "Everyone in my department (myself included) applied to graduate school so long ago that I think our advice may not be relevant." But that's clearly an exaggeration: e.g. I'm sure you know that taking challenging course and doing well in them is good advice. It might be interesting to ask: "What advice would you give in 2014 that you wouldn't have given N years ago?"
(Also, do you mean advice on what to do during one's undergraduate career in order to successfully apply to grad school or advice specifically about the application process? The latter is much less broad.)
@PeteL.Clark : thanks for your comments. I modified my question.
@Stefan: I may not have fully grokked the ethos of this site...but I voted to reopen your question anyway.
Graduate level
It is important to work hard, and work professionally. But it is also important to enjoy your work.
Think ahead to understand the way forward; ask yourself dumb questions to understand the way before.
Attend talks and conferences, even those not directly related to your own work.
Talk to your advisor, but also take the initiative.
Don’t prematurely obsess on a single “big problem” or “big theory”.
Write down what you’ve done, and make your work available. In this regard, I have some advice on how to write and submit papers. Terence Tao, Fields Medalist
I personally had the experience of applying to graduate school from a very small college that has not produced many math Ph.D.s (though oddly enough, I'm not the only 2002 BA graduate working at an R1 university in North America) not so far in the misty depths of time. Of course, I only have a couple of data points, but let me try to give my thoughts.
I think one thing is you've really got to get the basic stuff right: take the hardest classes available to you from the selections you have (and you should note in your letters that the student did this!) and ace them. Do well on the general and subject GREs. I assume you could have told them those.
I think the biggest non-obvious thing is that it's essential to seek out experiences outside your small program. If you're at a large school with its own graduate program, probably you have all the resources you'll need at your fingertips, but in a smaller program, I don't think you really have the ability to fully prepare someone for graduate school. Study abroad is good for this (I went to BSM in Budapest, but there are other programs). So are REU's (I did the one at LSU). On a smaller scale, you might be able to take more advanced courses at a nearby college (for example, students at Smith and Amherst can take graduate courses at UMass), or do a guest semester somewhere in the US (like at the Penn State MASS program).
These will, of course, be generally enriching experiences, but they also help by giving some real points of comparison. Graduate schools know what an A at BSM means (where they might not know it for your school); a professor who supervised you at an REU can speak with authority about having supervised many talented young people, and having some experience with which of them succeed in grad school.
Another possibility is working at summer mathematics program like PROMYS or Canada/USA Mathcamp (there are many other) though I think you should give some weight to activities like REU which are more likely to result in letters.
EDIT: I'll just note that what I've written about is still advice from the Web 1.0 world, but it's not so clear to me what Web 2.0 has changed about the admission process. I think it has made communicating with other people going through the process easier (for example, you can see in essentially real time which schools are sending out acceptances and rejections. This seems more likely to drive you insane than help though). I think for students at a smaller school this can be a boon (for example, the applicant profiles in this thread could be helpful for understanding where they might get in, though it's worth a reminder to take things with a grain of salt).
I think one thing I didn't know was that it's very reasonable to contact the Director of Graduate Studies at programs that interest you if you have questions. Don't be a pest about it (only email if you have a real question), but communicating with applicants is part of the job, though my DGS may not appreciate me telling the internet that (sorry, Tom).
The Web, of course, has also changed research about grad schools a lot. In theory, you can know a lot more about individual professors now than it would have been easy to figure out even 10, but especially 20 years ago. It's not super clear to me that this will help very much though. I generally feel like researching individual professors before starting grad school is a mug's game, since you're so likely to shift interests. I think it's much wiser to choose based on the program, and then worry about getting an advisor after a year or so of grad school when you know a bit more.
You've left out a crucial verb in the phrase "it's essential to outside your small program."
@BenWebster : What's BSM?
Budapest Semesters in Mathematics (I had linked to it earlier, but not with the name).
@BenWebster : sorry, I didn't click on the link. As far as the Web 2.0 world goes, LinkedIn and maybe ResearchGate might help undergrads make contacts. I don't know. It wouldn't hurt, unless they wrote something inappropriate.
I suppose in theory, but I'm not sure how. I don't know any academics who take those sites seriously. It probably is true nowadays that you want to try googling yourself, and putting up a website in order to control the top google hits a bit isn't a bad idea. But I wouldn't have any high hopes for the effect of such a site.
@BenWebster : A lot of people have downloaded or viewed my papers on ResearchGate (I don't think anyone ever looks at my personal Web page). I've found some other researchers there with interesting papers and downloaded the papers (haven't had time to read them yet). I have met a good senior mathematician through LinkedIn, and we correspond. I don't know if it will ever get me a new job or a raise, etc. I think the "endorsements"/whatever systems of both LinkedIn and ResearchGate are silly because anyone can recommend anyone for anything. I hope no one takes them seriously.
Ben Webster has already wrote a great answer about how to get into a good math grad school, so I will not repeat that answer here. I do, however, want to interpret your question more broadly (what advice would I give to seniors applying for grad school?) and give you some advice. In particular, most of the things that I am about to talk about were not so much of problems back in the 70s, I think.
No one tells you about the darker side of academia when you are an undergraduate student. But academia is really, really hard. Here are some cons of becoming an academic.
the most serious problem by far is the fact that you do not have any choice on where you live. You just go to the best grad school that you got into, then after that, you apply to around 60 institutions for your postdoc job, and cross your fingers. Most schools give you two weeks to decide on your position, then off you go to some random city that you have never thought of. The same deal repeats for your second postdoc (if you are unlucky), or tenure-track. If you fail to obtain tenure, you might have to do another postdoc or tenure-track. So you are actively changing cities every 2-3 years for the next 10-15 years of your life. As an undergraduate student, this is not a serious problem, but when you have a significant other, and you are past 30, you really do want to settle down.
academia is an extremely hierarchical society. Whether you get a job or not depends on your letter writers, one of which must be your advisor. As you obtain letters from people senior to you, it is often very difficult to express your opinions, as it is very easy to burn bridges. Academia is also very small; words travel fast. If you mess up in one place, chances are, everyone knows about it. Sometimes, it's not even your fault, but people can get very, very upset at you.
the job market is very tight these days. The schools that I consider to be the top grad school are Harvard, Princeton, MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, Michigan and Chicago. These schools alone produce about 100 PhDs a year. I think that there are around 300 research postdocs available each year in the US (if you apply to every PhD producing institution, I think that you would send out around 80-90 applications; let's assume each school hires around 3 people, which I think is being generous). You can do the math.
These are only the universal issues that apply to practically every PhD student. Then there are issues that apply more strongly to some people than others (elitism displayed by some mathematicians, competition among peers, difficult advisor, your thesis problem being scooped, etc.)
So I advise that you need to be very, very sure that you really love math. I have been through many of these issues, and honestly, your love for the subject is the only thing that will keep you going. If you don't have the passion, you will regret your decision very quickly.
There are also perks of being a mathematician, of course. I do enjoy the flexible schedule (aside from teaching and committee work, research can be done any time, anywhere), being able to travel to conferences, and the job security that follows, if you make it to the ranks of a tenured professor.
@NoahSnyder I don't think what you are claiming is correct at all. If I am reading the AMS job survey correctly, they in fact claim that 573 of the new PhDs are now postdocs (which I think is too high, and I am probably missing something). But 100 is way too low.
The number the AMS gives is 525 (not including statistics), though it's worth noting that only 249 are in math departments in the US. 127 are outside the US, and 149 are in government, industry and research institutes in the US. I wish I understood better what that really meant, since this is contrasting postdocs with other industry/government jobs.
Indeed I was looking at the wrong number. I think your 300 is roughly right. The number of math postdocs at universities (i.e. postdocs in Groups I-III+Va) is 228, but some portion of a few of the other small categories are math postdocs too (e.g. IAS, MSRI, Microsoft research). So between 250-300, plus another hundredish getting postdocs overseas.
@user45756 : Thanks. I am well aware of the facts you describe, largely because of my own experiences. You stated things more eloquently than I might have. When I help my students get into grad school, I will ask them why they want to, and inform them of these realities.
@StefanSmith It is a sad fact of academia that your initial starting point matters a lot. As much as I wish that I didn't have to say this, I think that it is significantly harder for a student from a small school to make it to the tenure level. Although there are some exceptions (as Ben Webster said), I assume that it is quite a bit of struggle. I have seen too many mathematicians who have reputations of being "nice" completely ignore students from smaller schools, for example.
@user45756 : Thanks. I had always thought that academic employers didn't care much about where a person got their undergraduate degree, and cared a lot more about more about where they got their graduate degree and what they did there. Was I wrong? If so, is there any way I can verify or document your assertion, in case the students don't believe it?
@StefanSmith: I think you're right that once students get their Ph.D. the undergraduate institution doesn't much matter. The harm of a small school is going to come at the getting into graduate school stage.
From experience, I can say that having gone to a tiny undergraduate school is just a piece of small talk once you're in graduate school, whereas where you went to graduate school sets the tone a bit more. That said, I think the networking possibilities of going to a fancy school vastly outweigh any snobbish valuing of the name. A nice pedigree will get your application a look, but people have to like what they see.
"These are only the universal issues that apply to practically every PhD student." Actually, I think some of your comments must apply only to your field, ie math. E.g. the para starting "the job market is very tight these days." Presumably some job markets are less tight than others. The rest fo the para also seems quite math specific.
@Faheem The job market is tight accross all of academia. My impression is that most academic fields have even worse job markets than math. (Certainly the humanities, but also theoretical physics for example.)
@NoahSnyder yes, both the areas you mention might actually be bad too, or maybe worse, but academia spans a very wide range of subjects, by definition.
Is it really that common to apply for 60 (or even the 80-90 mentioned) postdoc positions (maybe @NoahSnyder can weigh in on this)? I felt lucky to get a position without having to apply too many places, but I did not expect the number to be an order of magnitude smaller than what prospective american postdocs generally apply to.
@TobiasKildetoft I think it's pretty common for people to apply to a lot of postdocs. I "only" applied to around 25 myself, but I think that's definitely on the small end.
@Noahsnyder thank you. Now I feel even luckier that I only had to apply 7 places.
This is too short for an answer. However, I do think it is worth an answer.
Tell your students to get on this site ! There are plenty of questions and answers about graduate school admission. If they don't find their questions answered, then ask their own questions to get useful advices.
Your students may have the same general questions as how to apply for admission. They may also have specific questions regarding their individual situations. The best advice is, get on an excellent, informative and reliable Q&A site and that's us!
Matt Might's advice page here provides some really useful tips of the kind you're looking for. The three of his tips that I found really useful for when I applied to graduate school two years ago (that weren't mentioned above) are as follows:
Consider emailing professors whose research interests you with a brief statement asking them about their work. As Might states on the linked page above,
Tell them you were considering applying, and you're curious about the research opportunities available in the field. Comment intelligently on some research that faculty member has done. Attach any research you've done, and briefly summarize your research interests. That faculty member can then make sure your application receives a thorough review. Bear in mind that professors receive lots of form-letter spam from prospective students. It's painfully obvious when the email is form-letter spam, and most professors will summarily discard it.
He suggests to email a month before the application deadline, but I emailed maybe 2-3 weeks before and it was still fine. He also has tips on how to send professors emails here.
Consider writing your essays in LaTeX. You'd need to learn how to use it in graduate school anyway, and it makes you look more like a mathematician, so to speak.
In your essays, put really important words in bold. I used this to emphasize the names of the faculty I was interested in working with, awards I had received, and my particular research interests (partial differential equations for example).
I've never understood why people bold words in their essays. It's annoying and makes them harder to read. I haven't seen a single professor do this, yet it seems popular among undergraduates for some reason.
Different strokes for different folks, I guess, but I'm taking it directly from a reputable professor's page himself.
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90872 | What is the correct APA citation style with two places and two publishers
Is this the correct APA form of citation with two publishers in different locations?
Cazes, S., & Verick, S. (2013). The labour markets of emerging economies: Has growth translated into more and better jobs? Geneva. UK: ILO-Palgrave Macmillan.
From this APA library guide it says;
If more than one publisher is given, use the first one or the one that
represents the home office, if given.
This answer at writer stackexchange supports this as well
So for your example the following should be fine for APA
Cazes, S., & Verick, S. (2013). The labour markets of emerging
economies: Has growth translated into more and better jobs? Geneva:
ILO.
The title should be in italics though, no?
@OGC Yes it should, my bad. Edited now.
I'm going to say something perhaps controversial here: I do not believe that location information is really relevant any more.
Consider, in your example, Palgrave Macmillan: Wikipedia tells me it is located in London, New York, Shanghai, Melbourne, Sydney, Hong Kong, Delhi, and Johannesburg. And what good does it do to know that? After all, anyone attempting to access the reference is going to use a library or the internet, rather than attempting to physically call some office in Melbourne to order a copy. My point is that I think you should fill in this obsolete slot with something reasonable (like you have done), but that I don't think it will actually matter to anybody.
It does seem reasonable to keep both imprints of publisher, and a hyphen like you've used (or maybe a slash) seem like reasonable enough ways of doing so.
I feel your sentiment and don't find it controversial, but it's not how APA says you should do it.
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7688 | Verifying that cited results are still current before publishing
Assume you are knee-deep in a project, going through a series of papers that are seemingly relevant to your project. You found this ~10 year old paper, which looks very promising indeed. A lot of interesting results, good discussion, etc.
At this stage, I think it's obvious that you should check whether or not the results and conclusions in the paper are still valid by searching for any correspondence related to the article (e.g., pointing out that some claims do not hold, etc). However, I have yet to find anyone that digs into such information. You normally find a paper, read it, find more interesting papers through references and keep on digging in this manner until you have accumulated "enough" articles to form an educated opinion.
My questions are as follows:
Is this (or any other) type of quality assurance process, when it comes to cited literature, common practice?
Is there a way to streamline this process? PubMed does not seem to include all correspondence related to each article.
I should perhaps note that, if you are in biomedical sciences (especially related to complex diseases), about half of the publications turn out to be wrong or misleading after some years, and perhaps a quarter more are shown to be incomplete in its findings. I believe it's in the nature of biology, in contrast to more human defined sciences like mathematics or computer science. There are no formulas or calculations to check the integrity of the work published.
Those are Review papers usually.
Related, maybe even duplicate: How to find all of the responses to a published research paper? I suggest you edit the question to focus on the first part, which is different from the question I link…
I think what you're looking for are the papers that cite a given paper. This is often listed as "Cited by" in various databases. If paper B shows that paper A is incorrect, paper B will almost always cite paper A. In that vein, you can look at all the works that cite a given paper to see if any disprove the results.
More typically, though, if a paper published 10 years ago is still relevant today, there are other more recent papers on the same topic which will either cite that paper or derivative works thereof, and you would use those more recent papers to ascertain the current state of the research. Old papers, particularly in quick-moving fields, tend to either fade away pretty quickly or serve as foundations for other research. If no one else has cited it in the interim period, it's probably worth taking a very critical look at why that is the case before throwing in all your chips on that single paper.
There are cases where something is seriously wrong/arguable with a paper (e.g. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512005637) In such cases the correspondences/replies come in as separate entities, not just papers that cite and criticize the original paper. I have to disagree with you regarding articles becoming foundations due to continued validity, it could just as well be due to the fact that people care more for having references than for doing a QA on cited literature, or am I completely off the mark?
@posdef - Not sure what that linked article is, but there are links directly on that page to the resultant comments. Yes, they aren't peer-reviewed articles, but they are still academic publications, and they cite the relevant article in such a way that you could find it using a "cited by" search.
@posdef - Regarding your second comment, I disagree; researchers usually don't just cite to get citationCount++. They will cite when the cited paper is relevant to their work for one of many reasons; examining a related aspect of the same problem, found similar/different results, provided a springboard for this problem, etc.
Sadly, some citations exist solely as a defense against referees who might react badly to their vaguely-related paper not being cited, not because they're actually relevant.
@JeffE true, besides I personally know PhD students that hunt down articles that seem to have relevant information in order to strengthen the interpretation of their results, without actually dissecting the work described in the paper in question.
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2206 | What are the tradeoffs involved in taking a postdoc at a top university versus an assistant professorship at a non-top university?
When it comes to getting a tenure-track position where one has both a lot of resources and academic freedom to do what one wants to do (so having a tenure-track position in a top university might be more useful because one may get more resources at a top university).
Or in short, when one wants to maximize one's chances of becoming a "top scientist".
There are obviously numerous factors, and "rank/prestige" should not be considered as a factor in itself. That said, the period after one gets a PhD is an extremely important time for building up connections, and those are easier to get at a top university.
"Better" for what? According to whom? Given what career plan? In what field?
If rank/prestige isn't a factor, then I'm unclear on what you mean by "academic advancement". If your goal is to get a tenure-track job, and you don't care how prestigious it is, then a tenure-track position is by definition better than a postdoc. If you have other goals, then the answer may vary, but I'm not sure how to give a comprehensive answer (except by a case analysis for possible goals).
Okay - tenure track position. I'll explain more.
Maybe the question intention is: "postdoc in order to get better job VERSUS job right now" ?
What field are you in? (This significantly affects the definition of "postdoc".)
Earth/Atmospheric Science. But I intend this to be more of a general question for people here since no one in Earth/Atmospheric science hangs out here.
Getting experience at a top university is good for your CV and for you as a researcher.
Getting more research experience under your belt can increase your chance of getting a job in the future, but there are no guarantees.
A post-doc will give you a chance to write more papers and to find out what topic you really want to do your research on.
Taking the assistant professorship now would get you immediately on the track to full professor, which may be delayed if you spend years doing a post doc.
Working at a non-top university might mean that the students you have access to, for example, as RAs or PhD students, to develop your research vision, will not be as good as at the top university. That said, as a post-doc, you will generally not have access to such students anyway, except perhaps as part of a collaboration.
The pressure to succeed at a top university is much greater than at a non-top university.
A post doc is merely a step towards getting a tenure track position. I would always suggest taking the tenure track job. The only time I would even suggest thinking about it is if the tenure track position has a heavy teaching load (e.g., 3-3 or higher in the sciences and 4-4 or higher in the humanities). Even with a ridiculous teaching load I would still suggest the tenure track position.
Not everyone with a postdoc at a top university gets a tenure track job afterwards.
It may be merely a step, but it can be a lot of fun and can really contribute towards one's development as a scientist.
Nor should one neglect the degree to which a postdoc may be a step toward failing to get a tenure track job, in which case you need to consider the extend to which you are getting experience that may be less helpful in industry while also getting paid less than you would in industry...
@dmckee I don't understand what you are saying.
Not every postdoc will get on the tenure track (much less achieve tenure), and postdocs do work similar to what they would do if they got into industry for less money. There is a cost to keeping your sights on academia.
A postdoc is not a career goal; it's yet another step in training, with the purpose of preparing the trainee for the eventual faculty role. With that in mind,
Postdoc is good because:
You're associating yourself with some top-notch researchers and gaining valuable research experience.
You're learning new techniques and methodologies from a well-known and well-respected professor.
You're writing grant proposals that are X times more likely to be funded because <well-known researcher>'s name is on them.
Faculty is good because:
You're running your own lab and getting experience managing teaching, research, mentoring, and administrative duties.
You're proving that you can do it by yourself.
You can do research on your own interests, without having to worry about what your PI wants you to do.
Additionally, think about the opportunity cost of both choices... it really depends on where you want your career to go.
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535 | What does author order indicate?
When you look at a paper, what order to you assume the authors are in? Most important/most work done first or alphabetical? In my group we usually use alphabetic order, but I've been wondering if that might create a misleading impression with lots of people.
On a related note, would you expect the name of a PhD student to be always first on publications related to her/his work?
Obligatory PhD comic: http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=562
You might also want to read: http://mathoverflow.net/questions/19987/math-paper-authors-order
Closely related: http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2467/what-does-first-authorship-really-mean
Because of different tastes in different departments, isn't it better to narrow your question to a specific field or major? Because I know that some departments prefer alphabetical order, some others prefer the level of contribution, some departments prefer their PhD students to be the first author, etc.
The answer is strongly conditional on discipline and, to a lesser extent, country of origin. Conventions vary widely, as does the degree to which they are institutionalized. For instance, in some fields (e.g., Philosophy), co-authorship is not common and there is no convention about attribution, so absent an explicit note people are are likely to think the more senior author is the primary one. In Sociology, co-authorship is common and the convention is that the first author is the lead author unless there is a note indicating equal authorship. In Economics, co-authorship has become increasingly common over the past few decades but the convention is to list authors alphabetically, regardless of degree of contribution. In some fields the primary author may be determined by looking to see if there's a note specifying to whom correspondence should be directed, regardless of order of authorship on the paper.
Meanwhile in many lab-based science disciplines, where it's sole authorship that's rare, author order is governed by different norms. In some fields, the first author is the one who is primarily responsible for the paper (what that means can vary, too), the last author is the lab head or primary grant-holder, and the order of authors in between is sometimes influenced by other norms. But other conventions exist, too. Knowing what they are and how to interpret them is part of one's socialization into a discipline.
To make things more complicated, some fields—or some journals, or some labs, or some individual authors—may have their own rules or conventions designed to clarify things by listing credit more explicitly. Even worse, there may be a kind of hermeneutics of author-order where people parcel out credit to different contributors regardless of order of authorship, as when someone says "Sure, X is the first author and Y helped him write it up but it's obvious the paper was Z's idea".
In your case, if your lab or unit is using a convention that's not standard in your field the most straightforward solution is to make a note of this in your articles. This isn't an ideal solution because papers will still be cited or referenced without people paying attention to your clarifying note, but there isn't much you can do about that.
A corresponding author isn't necessarily the primary author: they may just be the person who was willing to deal with submitting the paper and the resulting correspondence.
Yes, that's why that sentence begins with the words, "In some fields the primary author may ..."
Can you give any example of a field where being corresponding author indicates being primary author?
In my field (Epidemiology) I would always assume that the authorship is appearing in the "Most important work first, PI/major senior contributor last, others in the middle" authorship scheme, but it varies dramatically based on field.
Under that scheme, I would expect the papers that emerge from a PhD students dissertation to have them as the first author. Ancillary papers, those where their results/data are published as part a compendium of findings from a larger study, etc. are where I wouldn't necessarily expect their names to show up first.
what would you do if there were 3 authors and all three contributed equally? Or, what if there were 3 authors, and the bulk of the work was done by two authors (the third contributed to writing some of the sections but was not the primary author of those sections).
Generally, in situations like that, my usual rule is "Whoever wrote the main body of the paper is first author". In your 2nd case, Authors 1 and 2 seem like good candidates for joint first (I'd make them switch off who was first-first in my lab between papers), and Author 3 is a logical 2nd author.
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82264 | How can we recognize accurate scientific results when things like p-hacking are so common?
Research has shown that most of the published studies in various fields are false. For example, the Reproducibility Project: Psychology only managed to confirm 36% of previous 100 psychology studies had a statistically signifiant result the second time. Also, only 6 of 53 studies considered landmark in cancer were successfully replicated. In these circumstances, when such a quantity of false studies pass the peer-review process in most scientific fields, how can we filter authentic information from fields we don't have expertise in?
Welcome to Academia SE and thank you for your question. Can you please [edit] it to clarify whether you want to ask about p hacking (as indicated by your title) or general problems leading to irreproducibility (as described in the body of your question). I recommend the former, as the latter would be rather broad.
From (RP confirmed 36% of results) does not follow that (64% of results are false).
First thing to consider is that research can never provide absolute certainty. Any result you find is only preliminary. You can have various degrees of preliminary: a single study with an acceptable but not brilliant design can provide interesting clues or first steps for a larger project, but not much more. It is right and productive that these studies are published, but don't treat them as truth.
Second thing to consider is that the problem is not necessarily with the articles themselves, but with the lack of replication. So, if you find a result that interest you, try to find replications. If none exist, then you need to be more careful.
Your first point is very important. p = 0.05 always means there is a recognized possibility that the result will not replicate even if the research was done and analyzed as perfectly as possible.. However, the OP's invocation of "p-hacking" indicates that they are concerned with papers whose findings are not robust to replication b/c their p-values are not accurate due to design or analyses that compromise a valid interpretation of the published p-value..
The p-curve (see p-curve.com) has been proposed as a way of identifying whether a set of results is likely to have been p-hacked. The term and technique was coined and/or developed by Uri Simonsohn and colleagues, who blog about replication and p-curving at Data Colada.
"P-Curve Won’t Do Your Laundry, But Will Identify Replicable Findings"
"Ambitious P-Hacking and P-Curve 4.0"
"P-curve vs. Excessive Significance Tests"
The technique has been applied by several research groups besides Simonsohn et al, ie Head et al 2015
There have been critics of p-curves (including John "most published finding are wrong" Ionnadis ), as well as other techniques such as excessive significance tests and the distribution of published p-values.
Some references:
Simonsohn, Simmons, Nelson (2014) "P-Curve and Effect Size: Correcting for Publication Bias Using Only Significant Results" Perspectives on Psychological Science V9(6) p.666-681
Simonsohn, Nelson, Simmons, (2014) "P-curve: A Key to the File Drawer," Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, V143(2), p.534-547
Simonsohn, Simmons, Nelson (2015) "Better p-curves" Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.
Ioannidis and Bruns. 2016. p-Curve and p-Hacking in Observational Research. PLoS ONE.
Head et al 2015 The Extent and Consequences of P-Hacking in Science. PLoS ONE
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85660 | Is there a list of all online creative commons based journals?
I know there is a good list of all paper peer-reviewed journals but I would like to know is there one specially for creative commons based online journals? I am kind of trying to figure out which is better to publish in terms of access to "outsiders"-people who aren't research scientists and most likely will never care about research journals but if I post a link to my paper on a social media site would make the effort to see it. Is there anyone here who has experience with such audience? Publishing not for the colleagues, but for the general public. You know people these days don't like to pay to view something on the Internet and if your audience isn't a member of a faculty impact factor is crap. But I wish to know can my papers go through at least some kind of(even very rudimentary)peer-review process. This is why I am looking for a list of free online journals who have at least someone with academic background on their editorial board.
Does such a thing exists?
I would suggest writing a blog. You can ask some of your colleagues to read it in order to get "rudimentary peer review". Your intended audience will be much more likely to read it.
I have tried writing in forums, social media, for sites for the general public, etc. but my feedback(at least in most cases)was that the site administrators(although they aren't scientists and often have no background in science)would much prefer to have to cite a peer-review paper in order to accept my text. It just helps a lot. I think the Internet is going in a direction where even a layman wants to see this text is based on some peer-reviewed work. And if you can provide a free-of-charge original peer-reviewed online paper he or she can read this adds credibility.
The point I make is in such cases the layman trusts the peer-review process itself, not the quality of the review. My experience is very few "common people" understand how peer-review works or even care for that matter. For them it is enough that you can say this journal has peer-review and this is science(see for example how those who oppose man-made climate change back up their claims with "scientific arguments"). This is why don't care what is its impact factor. What is important in the case is only to show it is a scientific journal. This is why ask about creative commons journals.
I hope you can "feel" the topic of my question. But if you have any suggestions how I can improve it, please, write them down.
The Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) is "a community-curated online directory that indexes and provides access to high quality, open access, peer-reviewed journals."
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21665 | Prestigious institutions with open admissions policies
Has any college in the US managed to unite being prestigious and being open access, at undergrad or grad level. I mean open enrolment in the European sense, where they have kind of minimal requirements (language cert, high-school and not much more).
I wonder, given that they could charge thousands $/year, what's the problem with admitting mass-wise new students (and provide them with decent teachers, materials and the like). Why limit the number of clients you get?
There are two fundamentally opposing ideas here. Yes, it would be nice if everyone could afford, and be admitted to, a top-tier university. But that's simply not how prestige works.
If you admit lower quality students, the number of truly excellent graduates is diluted and your university will lose prestige.
The loss of prestige may mean a gradual decrease in the quality of faculty, as the very best are hired by other prestigious universities. You'll certainly need to hire more professors to teach the extra students, and can you be sure that all the new hires will be just as good as those you've already got? There are only so many researchers in the world worthy of Nobel prizes.
An everyman's university will never have the prestige of a university such as Oxford, Caltech, or MIT. The key to the success of these top universities is consistency. Damn near every one of their graduates is a top performer, which is very desirable to employers (and also quite attractive for prospective faculty).
Once you lower the barrier to entry, their perceived quality will head downwards, and the flow-on effects will snowball.
There are many very excellent (and open) universities that are not as prestigious as they perhaps deserve, for example ETH Zurich is a truly excellent university that is open to all Swiss citizens who have passed their high school exams. This Times Higher Education ranking page shows somewhat quantitatively the elitism that is at play.
Don't Oxford, Caltech, or MIT have legacy admission? Or being admitted as athlete, minority and the like? Or any other non-academic rules that push the level down?
How can some universities in Europe (apparently not in the UK), be prestigious and still open?
@QuoraFeans See my updated answer. They may be extremely good, but they don't command the level of prestige that they perhaps deserve.
Oxford, at least, have no admissions route other than by academic prowess as demonstrated by results and performance at an interview. Occasionally a strong interview and extenuating circumstances (medical problems, deprived background, etc) may be allowed to compensate for weaker exam results. However, we're talking "very good" instead of "excellent". I can't comment on CalTech et al.
Can you define what you mean by prestigious?
@StrongBad I would define a "prestigious" university as one that is in the top 10 or 15 in the world. The next few hundred are no doubt excellent universities, but most of them don't command worldwide respect and admiration to nearly the same degree. I'm talking about the elitist few at the very top.
If folks are going to downvote my answer, I'd appreciate knowing why you disagree.
@Moriarty Don't take it personally. I assume this is one of those cases where people don't like your answer and thus downvote it (despite being arguably 100% correct).
One minor comment though - I am not sure how ETH could be more prestigious. In my circles, ETH is widely considered the by far best european university for technical sciences.
Having looked at ETH's admissions policy it seems mad to me. What is to stop 1000 students deciding they want to sign up to course x one year and completely overwhelming the available facilities?
@nivag Given that the system seems to be working rather nicely since a long time, I assume it is not "mad". For your concrete case: what prevents this from happening is simply basic statistics - you don't get that large, unpredictable changes in student interest in practice, even if you don't specifically prevent it. Small changes are simply covered by small resource re-allocations (e.g., move some TA money).
The best example, that I can think of, of a mainstream US university that is respected at both the national and international levels with a policy that is something like open access is Arizona State University. They have a fixed bar admissions policy: https://students.asu.edu/freshman/requirements
Applicants must also meet at least one of the following:
Top 25% in high school graduating class
3.0 GPA in competency courses (4.0 = A)
ACT 22 (24 nonresidents)*
SAT Reasoning 1040 (1110 nonresidents)*
Prestigious is a difficult concept to quantify. To some if it is not Harvard, then it is not prestigious. That said, ASU ranks in the top 150 in both the US news and THE rankings. Which I think puts them well within a reasonable definition of prestigious.
However, I think they are probably on the border of both "open access" and prestigious. That said, Arizona is not a particularly affluent state, so I think there is the potential for the model to work.
In partial disagreement with Moriarty's answer, I think that ETH in Zurich is an excellent example of a university that is both prestigious and open-access.
I was told by people there that the university is very sink or swim, and that each year they routinely fail a majority of the students taking, say, freshman calculus. (And that "freshman calculus" there is more like real analysis in the US.) A bit harsh, but I think necessary if you want to maintain extremely high standards but be open to all.
I don't know of any US university that does this.
Question is about US universities that have done this, and if not why. This therefore does not seem to answer the question.
Well, I said that no US university to my knowledge does this. As to why; why is no US university willing to fail 80% of its students? I don't think this admits a factual answer, other than to perhaps say it goes against American culture.
Indeed, there are many pressures on a US university to have a high graduation rate (rankings, etc).
The "throw everybody in and see who swims" approach is also commonly applied in other open universities, e.g., in Austria. In my alma mater we had graduation rates way below 25% in computer science. Really kills us in rankings, but that's more a systemic difference than anything else.
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85662 | Writing an REU recommendation as an Instructor
I'm a new full-time faculty member in the process of finishing my PhD. Because I have not yet graduated, Instructor is the only title I feel comfortable using until I defend.
A student has asked for a letter of reference to an REU program, and I've become concerned that a letter from an Instructor may not be as highly received as a letter from some rank of Professor. In particular the REU is a research position and Instructor doesn't make it clear that I've been involved with research in any capacity. (I did in fact mentor 6 REUs while a grad student and several more independent study undergrads, and think that this particular student is a fine candidate.)
I should note that I was asked for a letter based on having this student in class, and I feel I can write a strong letter for this individual on their qualities as a student. Another faculty member (Assistant Professor) is writing a letter based on an extracurricular project.
Two questions:
1) Will my Instructor rank cause problems for this student? Of course my letter will be less highly regarded in general due to my newness, but does being an Instructor present an additional hindrance on top of that?
2) If so, is there anything that can be done in the letter itself to mitigate this? Or, should I counsel the student to pursue a different recommendation?
Include the following information in your letter:
You're a new full-time faculty member.
You mentored 6 REUs while a grad student and several more independent study undergrads, and think that this particular student is a fine candidate.
If your job title and academic rank is "assistant professor", then that's what you should put on your REU recommendation letter. This also applies if you don't have an official title, but your position is considered tenure track. It's not particularly relevant to the letter that you don't have a Ph.D.
More generally, it's fine to be a little insecure about not having a Ph.D. yet, since this is certainly not the norm for a starting full-time faculty member. But this letter isn't about you, and you have a professional responsibility to represent your academic rank accurately on a letter of recommendation. This means that you report the rank that your college has bestowed upon you, not the rank that you personally think that you deserve.
If your job title really is "instructor", you should make it clear in your letter that you have been involved in research. For example, you could mention as part of your recommendation that you were involved in mentoring a group of REU students at (insert college here), and that the student you are writing the letter for seems at least as capable.
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17465 | Renewal of postdoctoral appointment
I noticed during my application process for post-doc jobs that several say "1-2 year appointment" or "possible renewal for second year". I understand from this answer that it is in everyone's benefit to not be "stuck" in a postdoc situation for too many years for fear of starving oneself.
My question is, if not mentioned, what is the general criteria for a renewal of postdoc appointment to a second year (or perhaps to a third)? Most of the applications I have put in to labs/univs. are not clear at all on renewal criteria. Is it based on need? performance? Mutual understanding? Does anyone have examples on some of these situations?
Have you asked your postdoctoral advisor(s) about their evaluation criteria? I would think that it varies from person to person.
My feeling is that unless there are funding issues, there would be some resistance to firing a postdoc unless there were real problems: the startup cost/time for a new postdoc can be high.
@Suresh Your answer does make sense considering that some of the post-docs offered have a long-ish (~2 month long) security clearance type situation.
Maybe I'll convert to an answer.
My feeling is that unless there are funding issues, there would be some resistance to firing a postdoc unless there were real problems: the startup cost/time for a new postdoc can be high.
Having posted ads like these myself before, I can say that one non-funding-based reason to mention a 1-2 year postdoc is to allow for a hedge in case the hired person turns out to be really bad. In that case, you have the option of doing a first-year review and dismissing the person (i.e the default bit is set to NO and some activation energy is required to make it a YES)
In the reverse case of a two-year postdoc, the default bit is now YES and significant activation energy is required to make it a NO. If not done right, this could even lead to charges of unfair dismissal and so on.
So since there's a glut of postdocs and a short supply of positions, the "buyers" have some power to shape the position to suit their needs.
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1189 | Prospect of pro-bono/voluntary work with current advisor after graduating with PHD
As an international student in the united states, I am legally allowed to work for 12 months, extendable to 29months for STEM fields, after graduating with my PhD (or masters degree for that matter) without having to change my visa/student status.
Now, I am looking for post doc opportunities in the US at several univerities but unfortunately none of the PI's respond to any queries OR application material that I send them for opportunities advertised on their websites.
I am seriously considering working voluntarily, without pay for my current advisor after I graduate in Dec 2012 with my PhD in Mechanical Engineering.
I am legally allowed voluntarily as part of the optional practical training period available to me after graduation.
I intend on doing my post doc / work pro-bono in the US because, lets face it, my home country doesn't really do much research and the pay grades are about $140 a month for fresh PhD graduates whilst I earn several times more as a grad student here in the US.
Visa regulations make it horrendously difficult to move to an other country for post doc opportunities and it is easier for me to continue in the US as I am alreadly legally here.
I am planning on writing a couple of proposals with my advisor so that I may grow my own post doc
It is an absolute pleasure working for my advisor and I wouldn't mind doing it for free for the mental stimulation that it provides (although I wouldn't want to work for free forever teeheehee :P)
How should I approach this situation? I am planning on requesting him to retain me on a pro-bono thingy as I genuinely like the direction my research has taken since I signed up with him 3 years ago!
Has anyone else encountered such a quandary?
What does your advisor suggest?
@JeffE My advisor is a very supportive but he is a little absent-minded at times when it comes to understanding the tribulations of international students.He hasn't had too many intl. students, he tends to overestimate the time that international students have. This leads to the student generally starting his job search a little late (It is recommended for international students to start their job search at least 4-6 months before graduation. This way once I graduate I either have a job lined up or at least I am not starting from scratch in the 90 days of unemployment that I am eligigle for)
4-6 months? I generally recommend PhD students start their job search about 5-6 years before graduation.
@JeffE 5-6 years. Ok... As a foreigner that is quite impractical for me. I wouldn't even know where to start. Plus, I was unsupported and scrounging around. So... not really. That advice would probably work for domestic students but not really international students at my university at least.
The mechanics of the job search may only take 6 months, but getting a feel for your likely job market(s), establishing your reputation, making contacts with potential employers and/or letter-writers, and doing kick-ass research can never start too early. (And this is completely independent of differences between domestic and international students.)
Why not just bring up the idea of staying in your current lab with your advisor? Without mentioning money straight off the bat?
If your advisor claims it's not possible to keep you around due to funding, then you can mention that you would be willing to do it without payment. And if you are willing to do it for free — and if you're already trained and have a good relationship — I can't imagine she/he would say no.
On the other hand, keep pursuing other options. If you work out something else, neither your advisor nor anyone else is going have hard feelings (or any sense of shock or surprise) if you leave for gainful employment.
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8408 | How to balance application for a faculty position between exceptional and ordinary?
Following the opposite factors described in answers to the question What makes securing faculty positions difficult?, I came to conclusion that an application for an academic position should be balanced. It is understandable that there is a high competition for faculty positions, and a qualified applicant may be not even invited for interview; thus, everyone tries to even overestimate his/her achievements.
However, the interesting points in answers to the above-mentioned question was that too good application might scare the committee, then preferring not to take a risk. Thus, an exceptional application will be simply ignored.
In addition to obvious evidences in the CV, how to highlight exceptional features in the cover letter? For example, potential research achievements, which are not obvious in the CV, promising plans, etc.
Or the strategy must be in this direction to convince the committee that this superstar applicant is a good chance for your department!
how to highlight exceptional features in the cover letter? — Nobody reads cover letters. I think you mean your research and teaching statements.
@JeffE what about an administrative role such as department chair or dean? Then, there is no research and teaching statements, but a cover letter stating administrative experiences and abilities.
I was on the committee for with my department's last head search. Yes, applicants most definitely submitted research statements, along with other statements describing their service/administrative experience and their vision for the department/field. I don't remember if there were cover letters.
@JeffE then it would be useful if you post an answer describing your experience for dealing with exceptional cases (as quoted on the question). Real experiences can reveal vague points in this issue (whether being too good is bad?)
One non-surprising way to help your application rise to the top is to have your advisor or another letter-writer contact a colleague they know at a school you're interested in and give you a good word in person (obviously not always an option).
If you are really in the position where you are "too good," then you should follow the advice in the other thread you mentioned, and explicitly spell out in your cover letter why you want to work at a particular institution.
Your first paragraph stated a very subtle and important issue. This means that personal trust is still more effective than formal documents.
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40864 | How do I cite or reference code that has not been officially published?
Let's say I go to someone's website, look up the source and use some of the JavaScript idea/pattern/code that is not a part of the wider framerwork/something similar, but a unique code that was written by the author of the website.
If it's not officially published in e.g. some coding tutorial, but I looked up the source of the website, is it appropriate to reference directly to the code on that website? (e.g. http://example.com/someonesscript.js)
Small edit #1: Just to mention, I have extensively edited the script, it is still similar, but not the same. It is about 100% longer, but there are similarities.
Whether you can take code from someone's website and modify it for your own purposes, also depends on the license that governs that piece of code. Ideally, the license would be stated somewhere in the file, but that is not always the case and in those cases the safe assumption is that the code is under a license that does not allow you to use and modify it.
If it is part of the website or a webpage, simply refer to the webpage in your references. It clearly mentions that you are referring to a code which is published on a website.
Just look at this structure for a Chicago styled reference:
Last Name, First Name. "Page Title." Website Title. Web Address
(retrieved Date Accessed).
You can produce your citation like this:
Code Producer's Last Name, Code Producer's First Name. "Sample computing source code for idea/pattern/code." Website Title. Web Address
(retrieved Date Accessed).
is it possible that getting into the source of the website and using someone's javascript partly for anything could considered as stealing?
@redCodeAlert I think that is another question and can not be asked and answered in the comments. Please make sure that your question is on-topic to Academia and then ask it. If your question is off-topic here, please consider viewing other StackExchange websites and find an appropriate one to ask your question.
I meant stealing in terms of academic substitute e.g. plagiarism
@redCodeAlert I understand. I suggest your newer question can be titled as: Is it considered plagiarism if I refer to the source code of a website in my paper?
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100112 | How to handle plagiarism on method that does not affect outcome results when reviewing a paper?
I was reviewing a paper related to my field (computational fluid dynamics) a while ago and, while reading a part of the methodology section where the numerical scheme and the equations were explained, I had a weird sense of déjà-vu. Regretfully, I found out that the author had plagiarized about three to four paragraph from a paper published two years ago. What was even crazier is that the author had plagiarized me, since the paragraph he had copied were from a paper I actually had previously published, thus explaining the feeling of déjà-vu.
I obviously noted that in my review and in my message to the editor, but I did not reject the paper directly. I acted this way since it was in the methodology section and related to mathematical formulas and really did not affect the outcome of the result. Was I in the wrong? Should such small plagiarism warrant instant rejection or is it sufficient to point them out and let the editor deal with that?
If they stole your paragraphs, it's possible they stole something else as well, you just didn't see it because it was from more obscure papers. Don't assume that plagiarism is small, it could be just the tip of the iceberg
When I saw "small unimportant plagiarism" I thought you were referring to a clause in a sentence. Three to four paragraphs is not small, unimportant plagiarism.
@aeismail Although there is some importance to context. If it's something like "The Navier-Stokes equations are "..." where rho is the fluid density, u is the fluid velocity ... then it's slightly more understandable. Then again, if that's managed to reach 4 paragraphs, then the paper might have other problems.
Something strange about this question, why plagiasmi is detected after going to reviewr and not before? are plagiasm cheker programs unrealible?
@SSimon I don't think journals commonly use them.
Was at least your paper cited in the very near to those paragraphs? Like "stollen text or copied text"[ref]. This would moderate the story. ... Besides this copying word to word part of others work is plagiarism regardless of the importance/extent of the material. It strongly points to other issues with the paper that other hypothetical referees might spot as you did. It happened to me to find my paragraphs of a review in a huge review. .. I was laughing about it but my at that time supervisor contacted editors and all coauthors....
@xLeitix In direction of initial assesment of one famoust publisher is similarity check before going to editor, before going to peer review. I am suprised with this question and something wrong is here, in my understanding of peer review process and 3 biggest publishers
Really, how many ways are there to explain a numerical scheme, without channeling the ghost of James Joyce and making the explanation unreadable?
I must add that it was really related to the formulation of the equations and of the model. So some sentences really were like : where $\rho$ is the density, $p$ the pressure, etc. Others were not, but nothing was related to the results, only to the mathematical formulation / the methodology.
@jamesqf I think if Blab explained it well the first time you should just reference his/her explanation "... the numerical scheme devised by Blab...". If Blab butchered the explanation then you should come up with a better explanation.
If the authors are non-native English speakers you might be more tolerant, because they may not have the skills necessary to tweak the sentences while keeping the same meaning. If they're native speakers this is just lazy, though. Or... is it possible the authors include a co-author of yours on the earlier paper?
@aeismail I interpret their meaning as not affecting the outcome results. I've changed the title according to that. Hope I guess it right
@DSVA also in RSC and ACS they check for similarity before sending to reviewers, so IDK, kinda strange question
@Joe So taking a few paragraphs and just tweaking sentences and keeping the same meaning is not plagiarism? Also, should you really be more tolerant of someone doing something wrong because doing it right is a bit harder for them?
@BrentHackers If you don't want to directly quote from someone else's work, you need to do more than "tweaking". That's called close paraphrasing. You need to put it fully into your own words. And whether you put someone else's ideas into your own words or quote them directly, you still need to cite your source.
@BrentHackers How many ways can you describe a mathematical formula? Also, imagine a non-native speaker trying to take those sentences and paraphrase them without screwing up and giving a meaning he didn't intend. Third, academic reviewers (good ones) should be helping other authors to improve their work, not looking for excuses to report them to the authorities. OP told the editor but didn't ask for the author's heads... seems like a fair and reasonable action.
@Joe So quote the guy you're taking the formula from
Seems like a good thing to suggest in the review.
There is no such thing as unimportant plagiarism. And three to four stolen paragraphs is not small.
You did the right thing to report it to the editor. But I also would have rejected the paper. There is no place in academia for academic misconduct. It certainly shouldn't be published.
Once plagiarism has been detected (in this instance it was detected with certainty, since the reviewer's own work was plagiarised), should one immediately reject on this basis? Or continue reviewing regardless?
@user2768 - one should immediately reject and inform the editor.There is not point in proceeding further.
Similar to how I read the first 2 sentences of this post and had the almost word-for-word thought as expressed in this answer...
Technically, reviewers do not reject papers. They recommend rejection to the editor.
@JonCuster If the paper is rejected, it will be resubmitted somewhere else, where the plagiarism might not be noticed. Wouldn't it be better to inform the editor of the plagiarism and request revision to remove the plagiarized material?
@DmitrySavostyanov When I first wrote my answer, I said I'd recommend rejection. While technically more correct, I decided it sounded wishy-washy, like I wasn't sure whether it should be rejected. I'm sure.
@JonCuster (a) That's the other journal's problem, not yours. (b) If they're careless and publish, you can alert them, likely forcing them to retract the paper and get more serious about their review process.
If the paper adds to science, it should be published once free of plagiarism.
It is not for a reviewer to decide whether the plagiarism has actually happened and whether the paper has to be rejected because of it. This is the editor's call. However, it is reviewer's duty to note the similarity and express concerns about possible plagiarism to the editor, supported by evidence.
Plagiarism is a serious breach of academic integrity and should not be tolerated. The amount of the copied text is not really relevant here: authors should not pass someone else's words and work as their own, however big or small it is. If the text was borrowed, it should've been properly attributed. This is not about the validity of result, but about the principles on which the academic community stands.
I this instance, it is known that plagiarism has actually happened, since the author plagiarized the reviewer's work.
In addition, according to the OP, it seems even if it had not been their work, it was said to be copied implying verbatim plagiarism, which is beyond argument.
I dont know dmitry, something fishy here, all papers I know have plagiasm chaker before sending to reviewrs, I am kinda sceptical to this question. or Am I wrong?
@user2768 You are right. My point is - even if OP was in doubt about the plagiarism, it is not the reviewer's call to make. The reviewer's task is to attract editor's attention and suggest action, not to make the final decision.
@SSimon The plagiarism checkers are computer tools which have to be operated and double-checked by people. A lot of journals, including some famous once, do not have enough staff to check all submissions, and delegate the task to reviewers.
are you saying Turnitin and similarity check is unrealible? @DmitrySavostyanov ? my uni pays a lot of money for subscription, knowing publisher profit margins I am ssuprised.
@SSimon They compute a measure of similarity using a formula. The calculation is reliable, but the formula itself is not a fundamental law of life, just an estimate. It is well known that these tools can generate false positives and false negatives. One can't rely solely on them.
but @DmitrySavostyanov OP stated that whole paragraph were stolen. I think you refer to small casses, this case here in OP question discribed is HUGE
"however big or small it is" there must be a lower limit, otherwise nobody could use any words that are in a dictionary. There must be a minimum number of words that should not be considered plagiarism :)
@DavidPostill Plagiarism is passing someone else's work as your own. It is not about the number of similar words or sentences, it is about the fact that they were used from another source without reference. Occasional match, even large, is not a plagiarism. Intentional failure to cite the source is.
@user2768: No, we don't know for sure that plagarism happened. When you write things like "where $\rho$ is the density, $p$ the pressure" (which I copied from a comment above :-)), there are only a few ways, possibly only one, to write concisely and understandably, especially in scientific fields where phrasing is often formal and stereotyped. Calling something like what this appears to be "plagiarism" is just plain nuts, headed for a reductio ad absurdum where every single formula, even every single word, has to be cited.
@DmitrySavostyanov that is why this question doesnt have sense, because such abig copies would be detected by plagiarism checker
Regarding unimportant plagiarism, I have to note that sometimes plagiarism is unintentional. Last year, we submited a paper to a top-tier conference, where we accidentally plagiarised two sentences from a paper of the program chair (who we were pretty sure that were also one of the reviewers). The paper was still accepted to be published.
That program chair published a well-known paper 10 years ago, which formalized a model, and proposed a naive algorithm (brute-force) to compute some entities on this model. The approach was demonstrated on some toy programs, written in a toy language, with a couple lines of code.
We were the first, in 10 years, to propose a practical algorithm for this model, which scales to thousands of line of Java. Of course, all of us read that paper countless times, and discussed it for several months. As a result, many of its sentences stuck in our heads, and somehow made their way to our paper. Notably, two sentences were exactly identical, since they described the settings for the problem.
One of the reviewers, whose review only appeared after the rebuttal phase, explicitly said that he did not read technical details, and only wanted to give editorial comments. So we were almost sure that he was the program chair.
That reviewer was extremely upset about our discussion in the related work, since we only compared our algorithm with the naive brute-force, and he felt we did not give credit to the model that we implemented (we formalized the model in a different way). In particular, he pointed out those two sentences that we lifted verbatim from that well-known paper, as a proof of the influence of his paper to ours.
But that didn't result in a rejection, and it was not a conditional acceptance, i.e. they didn't review our paper again.
It seems like it would be harder to explain 3-4 entire paragraphs as accidental. Anyone with that level of eidetic memory should also be able to remember where they read it.
I think that you did the right thing. I believe that some unimportant parts can be copied and a limited amount (certain percentage) of plagiarism is unavoidable. If the author wants to refer the same thing which is included in your paper, it makes no sense to change the wording a little so that it doesn't get caught in plagiarism issues. If the majority of the work that the author presents is original and not published before, then copying a small amount of essential details should be acceptable. How large were the 3 or 4 paragraphs and did they really capture the essence of the whole paper are the questions, which only you can answer. The gist of what I want to say is that if the author has presented a new, novel and an original idea, which has not been published before then a small amount of copying must not matter. These are my personal views. Of course, you can refer it to the editor with your views on it and let him deal with it in whatever way he finds it appropriate
If another paper's description of a concept is good, and doesn't need to be tailored to the publication at hand to support the novel elements it presents, then the source material can be explicitly quoted with a citation. Honestly, I wish large quotations of stock background material were more broadly accepted practice, as it would spare a lot of effort rewriting these descriptions over and over.
@Novelocrat “Before continuing here, consult [Reed, Tehfu, King, Man et al. 1743] as a general introduction to the subject”...
@leftaroundabout I cannot find that can you send me in pm?
@SSimon There's no such thing as a PM on this site.
really> it is called private chat @wizzwizz4
@SSimon Which can only be set up by moderators, and though it can be used as a PM feature isn't really one. In addition, it should only be used for purposes of moderation, not for sharing information that others might want as well (such as a link to a paper).
@wizzwizz4 post paper on that
@SSimon Erm... I don't think there are any papers discussing this, but I found this mSE answer. If that helps.
You can also tell the authors that entire paragraphs are just copy and paste work from ref (your work) and this is detrimental to the overall paper as it might even open discussion about plagiarism. You think that they can easily rephrase the methods section.
They will suspect it is you as likely just the original author can recognise that. But they shall be grateful for ever as you didn't rejected as well as you didn't start a big unpleasant issue. It is likely a lazy young that will likely take the lesson.
I agree with others that this is not a small act of plagiarism. With that said, it's hard for you to identify the motive behind it. What if they had copied it as placeholder material with the intent of replacing it later or properly citing it, and simply forgot?
I agree with you that it should not have been immediately rejected, but not because I view it as minor plagiarism. Instead, the results of their research have the potential to contribute to science. By rejecting it on the merits of the author instead of the merits of the research, you could be doing more harm than good for science. The issue of plagiarism should be addressed some different way; for example, by the editor notifying the author's institution so that they can handle the issue, which will be better equipped to determine why the plagiarism occurred. If it becomes a recurring issue, then the editor can consider simply blacklisting the author from submitting in the future.
@dan1111 Let's assume there are other issues. If they're allowed to resubmit, then the editor can apply extra scrutiny because they are aware of the previous issue. But if they're rejected, the author simply might just submit to a different publication, which probably won't be aware of the previous issue and be less thorough in looking for others. There is literally no advantage to that. The misconduct should be handled by the institution
I think you should reject it until the plaigiarism is corrected then if all else is good it can then be published.
The correct example should be set - this should be a simple correction for the author.
I'm not sure how one "corrects" plagiarism. We do not, e.g., allow students who've been caught plagiarizing to resubmit without the plagiarism for a regrade, so why should the standards for a journal be more lax? If you reject a paper for plagiarism, I think it should remain rejected.
Can you also "correct" the act of stealing by giving the item back to the owner and go free?
@NicoleHamilton The paper of a student only has value as an assessment: generally no one cares about the results except that they demonstrate that the student has learned the material. The paper of an academic could be very important despite having some plagiarized material. What if Einstein's ``Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Körper'' had a plagiarized paragraph? Should it be rejected forever? I agree that the academic should be punished in some way, but we should not necessarily discount their discovery.
What about "not stealing" but act of finding abandoned think which they failed to find owner. In this case they may find the paragraphs in some internal not referenced drafts and didn't check literature whether it was published by somebody real. And if it is not important related to published results, then it's up to editor whether to accept revision with correction.
So, the general opinion is that any person caught plagiarising needs to be flogged at the stake, hung then drawn and quartered.... And whatever the discovery it should be lost, buried and not used...
@SolarMike Basically, yes. It is the kiss of death in academia. It is important to know that so you don't do it.
@StevenGubkin People like Einstein don't plagiarize. It's pretty much the definition of plagiarism that the work isn't that original so it's unlikely to be all that great a loss if it's never published. Sooner or later, someone honest will independently discover and publish the same stuff.
@TJK Passing off someone else's work as your own is plagiarism no matter where you found it.
@NicoleHamilton Plagiarism is plagiarism. But the cases are different - it could be intention, cheating or a terrible negligence.So the punishment should be different too; life sentence or a strong warning message.
Dear @NicoleHamilton I respect your rigorosity and thoroughness but this is not a case and practice Academia. Never was and never will be, however, this is the case for some US university and that is not relative to the whole world of academia, basically it is cultural relativism.
@NicoleHamilton Einstein was accused of it! he copied work of his wife, also he didn't publish a lot of work, in today era he wouldn't be a productive member of the academic community, also OP pointed out it is in introduction not in style
@SSimon re: the plagiarism claim, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Extraordinary_claims_require_extraordinary_evidence I don't think that evidence exists. re: productivity, Einstein's citation count of over 112,000 https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=qc6CJjYAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao looks productive to me.
@NicoleHamilton but his H index is only 60 my advisor has 80
@SSimon It's not often that an H index of 60 is referred to as "only 60".
@NicoleHamilton bcs it is ajusted for time if i understand formula for calculationj?
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8450 | Has anyone ever written a paper and put your name on it?
I am a professor and researcher in mathematics and my research is kind of on the theoretical side. Online, I discovered a mathematician who had written some papers with ideas similar to mine, and we corresponded and discussed possible collaboration. Then he wrote an entire paper, listing both of us as authors on the front page, and sent it to me. I didn't think it ethical to take any credit for a paper I had no part in writing, so I discontinued all contact with this person. Has anyone here had a similar experience? How common is this?
I am becoming very disillusioned with the pure research game. People spend huge amounts of time on self-promotion because there just isn't that much demand for their work.
I was with you till you got to "I didn't think it ethical to take any credit for a paper I had no part in writing, so I discontinued all contact with this person."
Why not just simply say what you wrote here and ask not to be included in the paper because of this reason?
Why not assuming good intentions? maybe he felt that your conversation was substantial for his result, and didn't want you to feel he is stealing your joint result? Why not just asking him to remove you as a co-author if you believe you didn't contribute enough?
@blackace + Ran G. You have a point, and maybe I am assuming sinister motives where there are none. Maybe I should just have just asked this person to remove my name from the paper. But in fact our conversation was not substantial for his/her result, and what this person did was pretty strange. I'll consider contacting him/her.
I am the first author, because alphabetical order, on a paper to which I contributed some data and some discussion, but no writing. Nothing sinister there. (I did ask to have my name removed, but the other authors said they couldn't have written it without my collaboration and left my name on.)
I bumped into this quite a bit when collaborating interdisciplinarily, especially involving someone from the mathematical world. I know mathematicians make assumptions all the time, but in this case, why not ask a simple question? A simple and common-sense question would significantly clarify the situation.
Without knowing too many details of your situation, could you perhaps give the other author the benefit of the doubt? Cutting off all contact does seem harsh (unless you have other reasons) for what could simply be a misunderstanding.
I don't know the conventions of your field, but it seems in many science fields that authors are added if they contribute intellectual ideas on the research, not necessarily for doing the research. Other authors simply add support in some fashion, so get added. It is not uncommon to have many authors on a science paper. It does in fact get tricky because one can offend others by not including co-authors.
I'm of the opinion that it's probably better to include someone who contributed in some fashion than not include them. You could argue that this dilutes research and is a "pure research game", but honestly, one paper is not going to make or break anyone's career.
Could this author simply have been trying to extend kindness, or perhaps thought you had a bigger role in the research than you actually felt you did?
Thanks for your comment. I will reconsider my decision and maybe contact him/her and request him/her to remove my name from the paper. This person wrote the whole thing and it would simply be wrong for me to take any credit. But we have some shared interests, and might be able to produce some real collaboration.
People in math tend to be pretty honest about writing papers and don't claim to be authors merely for "lending support". It is rare for a math paper to have more than 3-4 authors. In some other fields, I have heard that a paper can have a dozen authors, some of whom participated indirectly at best.
contribute intellectual ideas on the research, not necessarily for doing the research — In some theoretical fields, there is little or no difference between "contributing intellectual ideas" and "doing the research". And I do not mean that disparagingly.
To answer your stated question: the only general requirement for your authorship on a paper is that you contribute to the research significantly, and that generally doesn't imply co-writing it — contributing to the ideas can be significant, especially if the proof becomes trivial with an idea you contributed. (I've heard mathematicians describe "significant contribution" very differently — say, that PhD students are expected to draft papers, get advising and feedback from their supervisor, and not list their supervisor as coauthor — unless the student failed to contribute to the project).
Now, you have similar ideas. In my experience, tracking down who originated an idea among people who did work together can be very hard, and joint credit can be an easier solution which is accepted in our community (in Computer Science, Programming Languages).
However, since all authors are jointly responsible for the claims in the paper, I've been taught it's very bad style to add somebody to a draft without his permission; submitting the paper without your knowledge/consent would be unethical, but dropping contact is not only brisk, but ambiguous. Couldn't he genuinely (in good faith) think you were okay with the draft, but didn't have time to respond?
In fact, if he thinks you contributed to the research, to publish it ethically, he'll need either your agreement to have your name in, or your agreement to have your name out.
You were completely wrong in thinking it was unethical to co-author a paper you had no part in writing, or that the other person did anything wrong. Quite the contrary.
Contributions to papers may take very different form; one can merit a co-authorship without writing a word if one contributed essential ideas. As a famous example, Adelman of the RSA code fame did not participate in inventing the code; what he did was defeating dozens of previous attemps by Rivest and Shamir. When they came up with a proposal he could not defeat, they included him as a co-author.
By doing what they did, your correspondent simply acknowledged that discussions with you helped him to solve the problem, in which case it is customary to offer a co-authorship. Of course, you might feel differently, e. g., that you only communicated common knowledge, in which case it would be appropriate to decline the offer. But from other side, it was just new to them; how could they judge whether it's common knowledge or your unique perspective or the result of you thinking on this problem specifically? For them, it's only ethical to make sure they don't err on the wrong side of it.
Sorry, but a person's consent is required before you include them as an author. Required
@Buffy, nothing prevents me from typesetting an article, including whomever I deem right as an author and sending the result to them. Nothing. The consent is required before I submit the article to a journal or make it public, but nothing in the OP indicates that ever happened.
You can send it to them, but not to a journal or conference without their consent as you say. But the first sentence of your answer clearly implies something else.
It implies what it says: by typesetting a draft, including the OP's name on it, and e-mailing it to the OP, the other person did nothing wrong.
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11475 | How to fund a 2nd master's degree (UK), or should I directly go for a PhD?
I will receive my master's degree soon. Even though it was a nice program, I found out I'm more interested in something else. Now, I'm thinking should I do another MSc (one-year) in the other field before starting a PhD? The MSc program I'm interested in is given in the UK. I think (hope) I'm so good a student, that they would happily take me in.
Well, then there comes the question how to fund the 2nd master's degree.. In general, are master's degrees (fully) funded in the UK? I'm european if that matters. I would also appreciate if you can point me to grant-providing institutions.
What exactly are the field of your current MSc and the one you're considering? Do you actually need to do the new MSc in order to get the PhD place?
In general there is no funding available for MSc courses in the UK. In some cases there are 1+3 courses (i.e., a 1 year MSc and a 3 year PhD) where the MSc course is funded, but in general this is not the case.
One benefit of this is that the admissions criteria for MSc courses are pretty low. Essentially anyone with a 2i or higher degree classification can find a program willing to accept them.
Are you sure that EU (but non-UK) nationals pay a higher course fee? I would think that that is not allowed under EU regulations. See e.g. http://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/education/university/fees-and-financial-help/index_en.htm
Do you know if MPhil is ever funded in the UK, or is it comparable to MSc?
@PieterNaaijkens you appear to be correct that there is no difference in fees. I am still learning about the UK system. I believe, but I cannot find any documentation, that home and EU MSc students cost my department different amounts of money.
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203343 | How to manage and differentiate literature reviews for different papers with related subject?
I wrote a research paper on a given topic. And now I'm writing a continuation for the same research. My question are :
How to include the literature review of the previous paper in the current paper while avoiding plagiarism?
How to differentiate the current literature review from the previous one?
When was the first paper published ? Are there papers of related subject written by other authors published after you published your first paper ?
The first paper is still in review by the journal.
Yes, new papers with related subjects were published by other authors recently.
First, it is absolutely acceptable to have significant overlap (in terms of content) between the two literature reviews. Of course, you need to avoid plagiarism. The best solution is to rewrite the literature review from scratch. By doing this, you can also reassess if all content from the original review is needed in the new paper and whether the order in which you present information makes sense for the new paper (but see below).
To distinguish the new from the original literature review, there are several things to address:
Most importantly, include a brief review of your first paper to highlight what was found there and use this to highlight why an additional paper is needed.
Your continuation will address questions not covered by your first paper. Make sure to include sufficient background on these new questions in your new literature review.
Add any relevant information that was published since your first paper.
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204169 | Talking to my supervisor about leaving the lab
My supervisor is really toxic. She has been yelling at me for every lab meeting and getting angrier by the day, due to which I am subjected to immense anxiety and panic attacks mad severe depression. So much so that I have decided to leave the project after 3 years of work. I know that she is going to get really angry after getting to know this. How can I put forth the mental health issues in a way that she is at least a little bit convinced by my reason to leave?
This sounds like an awful situation. I'm very sorry! Does your department have an academic who is in charge of the PhD programme? Or do you have a "mentor" (someone who is neither involved in your research nor in the assessment of your work). Either of those may be able to advise.
Do you think it is better that I inform her first rather than getting a third party involved without her knowledge?
This very much is situation-dependent. But if you believe that she would just "get really angry" in such a conversation and that this would further negatively affect your mental health, I would advise to get third-party support first.
Do you need her approval to quit? I don't think there is any way to communicate to a toxic person that you are leaving (and the reason is her) in a way that she will not be angry. But it also matters little.
I don't need her approval. I am employed at the university hospital so even if I tell her that I quit it will be sufficient ideally as my contract is coming to an end in January. This discussion would be to let them know that there isn't a need to extend my contract further.
There are people who will not be reasoned with. They will not be convinced. They do not negotiate. Understand one thing: Unless you endangered lives (in which case, I could see a case for yelling), and I assume it's not, it is not your fault. Period. In the end, it's just yelling and you are leaving. Don't give her control over you by discussing your exit. You have decided. That's your decision to make, she has no say in that. Understand: you have decided. If she catches you and yells, you have decided. Think: "You have no power here". But if you don't have to tell her, why bother?
You shouldn't care if she gets angry. Also I think you don't need to give her a detailed explanation or even convincing if you don't want. If you already decided to leave, just follow the administrative process (which often does not require you to make contact with her) to finish your contract/project through the school/employer.
Remember that your health is first, and no profesional goal or the opinion of anyone should comprimise that. She was in a position of power before. Now that you are leaving she has no more power over you. Don't worry and take care of yourself.
All of the suggestions help a lot! Thank you all!
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163324 | What did Israel Gelfand mean by “You have to be fast only to catch fleas,” in the context of mathematical research?
I'm confused about a statement by Israel Gelfand
given in the book TOPSY TURVY: A Book for All in One Page No:155
Why did Israel Gelfand say “You have to be fast only to catch fleas,”
and how does this phrase apply to researchers?
This quote basically implies you can be slow for "big results" but I'm not really sure it's accurate anymore except in some exceptional cases like Fermats Last Theorem. The quantity of papers coming out continues to grow. Doing any type of original work is becoming increasingly difficult for every field.
@FourierFlux Ah, but the questions considered and our toolboxes also continue to grow. I'm not convinced that research is getting more difficult---it's always been hard---though how people do research has changed.
"Unless your objective is catching fleas, you dont need to worry about being fast"
It would be useful if you can give more of the context preceding the quote, for the benefit of those of us who don’t have this book.
Also the book you are quoting seems like a book of random quotes, some of them mis-translated, misappropriated or taken out of context.
No, in the past you could make a successful career by focusing on one area but that is close to finished. Modern mathematics is pretty much a perfect example, pure analysts are coming to an end. Maybe experimental areas you can still specialize but most of the classic subjects have been pretty much exhausted.
To me, at least, the metaphor seems clear. Anyone can pick up pennies off the street, but it takes hard work and time to amass a fortune. Hmmm. Another metaphor.
If you want to make a reputation publishing trivial (or small) results, then you have to be fast, since they are available to most mathematicians in a subfield. But if you want to do great things (catch bears, for example), it will take time and effort. It will, necessarily be slower and that is ok as the results are more profound.
The word "only" in the quote is very important. Yes, you need to be fast to catch small, fleeting, things, but only for that. Without that word, the meaning would be entirely different.
Gelfand, of course, is known for some pretty profound work. They didn't result from 3 week research projects.
And, this is only my speculation, since he can't be asked directly.
Just to add that this is quite a common expression in Russian, and the gist is essentially correct: no need to rush, we aren't hunting fleas here.
No, I don't think that's quite the same meaning. I'd say "You only have to be fast to catch fleas" as in, if you want to catch fleas, you have to be fast with the implication being that if you want to catch something bigger, speed is less important.
Inferring from this and my language knowledge, it might be (for a better result the original quote is needed) the counterpart of the English saying "Nothing must be done hastily but killing of fleas." But the Russian counterpart means to me merely "don't be in haste", "don't rush things".
Is the original Russian sentence really with "fleas" and not "flies", which would sound more natural in my view?
@Federico, no, "fleas" sounds better in Russian, although the two words are just as close. But the main difference is that it's practical: nobody really catches flies by hand: there are better methods. Whereas catching fleas was common (well, still is: I recently caught a flea on my dog), and you need to be really quick before it jumps off and disappears (as is well known, fleas are record jumpers with respect to their size).
The word order in the question is in fact the most appropriate one, but the contrapositive might convey the literal meaning more clearly: "You do not need to be fast for any reason other than to catch fleas". If instead the quotation were "You only need to be fast to catch fleas" then the most ready interpretation would be that speed is sufficient for flea catching.
This is just speculation, but as a native Russian speaker, I'm pretty sure this is a literal translation of a Russian saying, better translated as "You only need haste when catching fleas" (Спешка нужна только при ловле блох). Since Israel Gelfand had lived in USSR, I think it's pretty likely he was referencing it.
It's pretty much a generic "haste makes waste" proverb that means you shouldn't rush and that you should think before doing something.
I would vote this answer up if you could convince me with a citation or two that this information is correct.
@MatthewChristopherBartsh No citations are required to offer an example of an aphorism popular in some part of the world. This is for the same reason that 0 is the minimum sample size required to be statistically certain that at least 50% of Americans over the age of 30 have eaten ice-cream at least once in their lifetime. I mean, you could round up 10,000 people, ask them a yes or no question (have you eaten ice-cream before?), assume that there is an underlying binomial distribution, etc... define a null and alternative hypothesis, report a p-value, but that would all be a waste of time.
Not an answer, but another "catch a flea" quote from a mathematician.
In guessing a conundrum, or in catching a flea, we do not expect the
breathless victor to give us afterwards, in cold blood, a history of
the mental or muscular efforts by which he achieved success; but a
mathematical calculation is another thing.
Lewis Carroll
A Tangled Tale
Answers to Knot 4
I am only speculating, but the meaning in this context seems clear to me: "You only need to be quick about generating and publishing material when the material is relatively trivial." The implication is that you can take your time, not only not rushing, but even being somewhat slow, when you are generating momentous material, that is to say, solving big problems.
Furthermore, "fleas" may allude to opportunities to generate trivial new mathematical content in the form of minor nitpicks, adjustments, corrections, and additions to a recently published big breakthrough. These "fleas" are thus perhaps small spin-offs from recent breakthroughs that are easily seen by everyone. There may be an allusion to a woolly mammoth or other large animal, brought down by some great hunter, that has fleas on it. You would need to be quick if you are to catch one or more of them before they have been caught by other hunters.
I also get a sense that catching fleas is not something to be proud of.
"You have to be fast only to catch fleas" unfortunately (I just realized) could be taken to mean, instead, "You always need to be fast. Even to catch only fleas, you have to be fast" In the context of mathematical research, that would mean you always need to quickly publish results, even trivial ones. If Gelfand meant "You don't have to be fast except to catch fleas", perhaps he should have said so, or "You only have to be fast to catch fleas".
I don't think this is accurate any more, unfortunately people are expected to come up even with big results with a reasonable amount of speed. Wiles and Fermat's Last Theorem is a bit of an exception if I remember rightly, as he was salami slicing and publishing intermediate results as separate papers on the way to the proof to give the illusion of productivity (see the book by Singh).
Edit: I am aware that Wiles was publishing important articles in this period and I am just paraphrasing his own words from an interview, but I appreciate that he was being modest/self-deprecating and simplifying what actually happened to make it understandable at a popular level.
I'm also interested in the extent to which this applies to scientific research and physics. I guess it still applies but then there really is a race for results and sometimes time is of the essence. In general a lot of emphasis is given towards those people that can make very quick (not necessarily non-trivial) extensions of other people's work or to come up with quick explanations of recent experimental results.
In physics, Einstein said he had no time for those physicists who 'find where the board is thin and drill lots of small holes' ie. he was interested in things which took a lot of thought and conceptual understanding rather than just choosing what looked to be an area with lots of quick results which can be obtained with relative ease and speed.
Looking over Wiles's publication record (as I did just now) does not bear out a claim of "salami slicing": in the period from 1986 to 1993 he has several papers that are really excellent in every sense (solving important problems, published in the best journals, with lots of citations...) If I remember correctly, what he said was that he had important results from before 1986 and he took his time writing them up. That may be the case...or it may be that he was not being entirely serious. Note that he dared to have no publications from 2008 to 2015.
But I agree with your first sentence, and I upvoted your answer. What Wiles gets away with many years after he became one of the world's most celebrated mathematicians has little do with the pressures that other (especially younger) mathematicians face.
I am just paraphrasing something that he said himself in some interview (I think in the popular book by Singh). I appreciate that this very much has to be taken with a pinch of salt, as he was simplifying a lot to get his point across in that interview.
As you say, he may just have been being self-deprecating or not totally serious.
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76322 | Should I introduce myself to my supervisor via e-Mail or set up an appointment to introduce myself?
For my graduate studies my supervisor was assigned to me without me having spoken to him first. Now I am wondering if I should introduce myself via e-Mail and then ask for an appointment, or keep it short and ask for an appointment specifically to introduce myself. I don't want to waste his time or appear rude.
Getting to know his students is not a waste of time of a supervisor. Don't overthink it!
Sort of depends what you mean by "introduce myself". It'd be weird to ask for an appointment without stating your name, but he doesn't need your life history.
I would send mail suggesting you think it might be helpful to meet, just to get to know each other, and ask if your supervisor might suggest a time that's convenient.
Personally, I'd recommend going to their office and introducing yourself in person. Ask if they've got a minute and, if not, arrange a later time to meet. They may, of course, be busy or absent when you go in which case I'd fall back to e-mail, and write something like:
Title: New MSc Student
Dear Dr. Chappy,
I am on MSc programme X, and I will be joining you to work on your
project 'Project title' shortly. Could we arrange a time to meet up
and discuss arrangements for this project, please?
In the meantime, I am keen to get started. Could you recommend any
relevant papers for me to read before we meet?
Kind Regards,
User61635
Note that there are cultural differences in how you address professors so you may need to adopt a more formal tone in some countries.
Also, be aware that when you've arranged what you expected to be an informal chat your supervisor may have different ideas and launch into a detailed technical explanation of the project. I suggest you prepare for this. Finally, and this is a key point, if you don't understand anything he says stop them and ask for an explanation. Don't think you'll impress them by feigning knowledge you don't possess, you will do far better to ask questions early so you understand what the project is clearly.
Contact them -- be efficient. The draft above leaves them plenty of room to respond as they wish. And if they don't reply promptly, wait a little and remind them. They ask for a new supervisor - politely of course but they have job to do and if they don't do it, YOU will be the person in difficulties.
First of all, you should try to figure out what the typical course of action in your department is. For example, in our department, MSc students are also assigned to supervisors (both students and supervisors can have some influence on that process, but the principle is the same as it seems to be in your case: It's not primarily something between the prospective supervisor and the student, but between thesis coordinator (who assigns) and the student on the one hand and thesis coordinator and supervisor on the other hand.
In our case, students get an email from the coordinator laying out the further procedure. In particular, this email states that it's the student's responsibility to set up a meeting with the assigned supervisor within a given timeframe.
The supervisor will know that you have been assigned to them, so just emailing them to say essentially the same does not help much. Every supervision trajectory will have to start with some meeting, so it is most likely that this will be the first ``real'' contact you have. Depending on your department, it is either you (most likely, IMHO) or the supervisor (less likely, IMHO) who takes the initiative to set up the meeting.
You can write email to him, i would go like this
Respected Dr/Prof/xyz
As you may already know that i have been assigned to do my project work under your supervision. I feel honored and motivated and i am confident that under your supervision i will excel my skills and will be more productive.
I am really looking forward to meet you at any time convenient to you, so we can discuss further and i may start my graduate work.
Please suggest me the time and date for the meeting, and also advise me if there is any thing i should consider preparing for the meeting e.g. some proposal or articles etc.
thank you and i hope i will do well under your supervision.
Frankly, if I were the professor and I read "I have been assigned" (lower case I) and "thank you and i hope i will do" (no capitalization and lower case I), I would not be impressed at all.
Its not to be copied and pasted, just an idea for have a look. And formal emails has to be drafted revised and approved before sending.
When you give an example of e-mail, please have it in proper English. Thanks.
Whenever I see something starting with "respected" I automatically assume it's academic spam. This example is too long! Make it short and to the point! Writing like this lowers the chances of the mail being read to zero.
Cultural norms differ between countries, so this language may be appropriate depending on which country our Questioner is in.
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8564 | Unhappy with my PhD program in my home country, thinking about applying to another university in UK
My problem is a bit unusual and I would love to get some advice…
I'm a first year PhD student in social-sciences and I already got my proposal approved. I moved back to my home country (where I am currently doing a PhD) after completing an undergraduate and an MSc. I am very unhappy here.
I would like to have a future as an academic. The only reason I decided to a PhD in my home country and not abroad was because I was determined to try, stay, and make it work here, but recently I been thinking it was a mistake. I am thinking more and more about discontinuing my program here and applying for doctoral studies in the UK, as a new student (after a bit of online research I found that they rarely accept a transfer and it is best to start as a new student).
I would love to get your thoughts regarding my situation,
I am considering sending an email to a potential supervisor but I am not sure how to explain why I want to drop-out of my current PhD program without talking my university down? How do you suggest I do that?
Did anyone had a similar experience or have some advice?
Can you clarify what types of problems you mean in your statement "no one to turn to in case of a problem"? I assume you have a PhD advisor. Also, can you clarify how far along you are in your research (i.e., halfway through data collection, analysis begun, analysis complete, dissertation half complete, etc.)?
if you feel that the program does not satisfy your expectations, do not waste your time. We only live once. Good years of PhD studentship is memorable, don't ignore and miss it.
Hi Eykanal. Yes, I do have a supervisor but that is it... When I said 'no one to turn to', I meant that, in case you have difficulty with your supervisor, there is no one you can talk to. The program is not really organised at my uni and the only thing you got is a supervisor... Currently I am collecting data and will be halfway through my data collection in, I believe, 6 months or less. I did not start the analysis or any writing.
This is, in my experience, quite common. Of course you will want to make sure you get good letters, so think about where those will come from. You don't want to say "I hate my current program" in your personal statement, so instead be sure to learn appealing, specific aspects of the programs you apply to, and describe them instead.
"Don't run, walk". You have a position now, that albeit bad, is not abusing you. Don't throw it away unless you have something better.
It happens that people change their PhD programs (I know a few.)
Basically what you lose is:
Time (usually you need to start from the scratch),
Relationship with advisor (the latter is not always the case).
If, for any reason, the first year was bad, it is rather unlikely that the next ones will be better (I have never met anyone who is enjoying PhD more and more with each year...). Moreover, if you don't like it, maybe your advisor does not like it either and eventually you won't be able to finish at all.
But beware - "grass is greener...". You can experience the same problems in other places. So here are the most important things:
What is not working?
Do you have any reasonable argument that in the target place such thing is better?
(Anyway - if you are very unhappy after one year (of 3-5 more years to come), then just change it to another PhD or to something different (don't disregard other careers). It's better to end up with "wasted" years or a "suboptimal" career than hanging on a tree.)
HOW to do that is a different question (or questions - because it involves both application to a new program and quitting your current one). See e.g.:
current PhD applicant applying to another university
Apply to PhD after expulsion from another
Switching from one area of graduate study to another?
I enjoyed my PhD more and more with each year (or at least, the first year was the worst and I tried to leave at that point, then it got better.)
PhD without challenge is meaningless,
Most of us don't know what is PhD until we are broken in like a baseball glove,
You will never escape politics in academia, in your household, and elsewhere.
You should re-evaluate if spending the next 4+ years of your life pursuing your studies is worth the effort; and if you have an actual desire to pursue your studies. There aren't many benefits, and the major contributing factor should be your interest in the subject matter, field/area, or potential position as faculty or other.
I think one year is not enough time to have an opinion, and by the time you are able to have one it will be too late to change!! Last thing you want to do is upset your PI, and odds are they will make you pay in the short or long run.
With that said, many frequently change labs due to advisors departure or other reason. You can certainly find a lab, but I think anyone would be concerned your jumping ship to their own, and want to bring your baggage too! There is such a thing as integrity, and it is uncommon for another advisor to pick up someone's project out of the blue as they are mostly concerned on their own.
+1 for clear points, but about your third item. There is a significant difference between academia affected or controlled by politics.
Everything is controlled by politics, personally I don't have to look outside my household to see that prevalent truth.. it's just a matter how you adapt and contribute to a slow change in a better direction.
Thank you for your answer. It is not my intention to have someone else pick up the same project. Rather, I intend to change the project but use some of the field work. Also, I understand that politics is everywhere and I can deal with that, but small change can't happen if your are forced to think somebody else's thoughts... Politics is different in closed societies and I might be able to foster more change if I'll have the support of an outside source (another university in another country), while researching my own country.
It seems you are coming out of the gates screaming that you disagree in the efforts of your PI. If so, it may be a good opportunity to stay (call me a sadist) or you should not have joined the lab vis a vis reading prior publications. I would not expect then for it to be ok to take your work from that PI, which belongs to s/he, and use it elsewhere. You may, however, do the research again if the new PI agrees it would be worthwhile. Maybe you can find a reason to move home, and justify you cannot stay away, and then proceed to apply to a new program, and careful to temper expectations.
-1 as the first two points advertise a long-term masochism (which is dangerous to one's psychical health). Sure, PhD is challenging and will contain a lot of frustration (unless someone a not-so-ambitiuous project), but if after one year someone is very unhappy, it may be devastating to proceed further, with life-long consequences (regardless whether finding another PhD is an option). Other points (e.g. 3.) are fine, though.
There are many reasons one might not want to do one's PhD studies in one's home country, especially if that country is in the third world. It might have to do with a low level of academic rigor. It might have to do with the culture shock one gets upon returning to one's native land after living abroad for some time. It might have to do with feeling stifled by family, religion or culture. It might have to do with violence and/or corruption. I'm sure I left some possible reasons out.
Could you send out some feelers to a couple of universities that interest you, to start with?
I agree that you don't want to say anything insulting about your present institution (in writing). You can get a lot across by writing with delicacy. For example you could talk about seeking greater academic rigor, or looking for an institution where independent thought is highly valued.
+1 For seeking greater academic rigor, or looking for an institution where independent thought is highly valued. I think that's what the OP was looking for (without talking my university down).
If you are unhappy in the first year itself then you should change it. It is not rare these days. You should not see it as a bad move on your part. However when you go to another place, and if you keep the same attitude and complain again then it will be bad on your part. One advice, if you have already decided to change your PhD, then it would remove red flags if you could ask your referees and get a couple of lines in support of your decision written in your letter of recommendation.
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165884 | How do academics control their own biases?
As an academic, you are in the business of producing research. I know it might sound odd to call it a "business", but frankly, you get paid to do it, and most of you wouldn't do it if you didn't get paid, hence it is a business and you're selling a product (your research) to your clients (the rest of society) and you get paid a price for that product (grants and aid and donations and other types of support from governments and other institutions).
This means that there is a danger that your research output is driven by a self-serving bias. After all, the 'better' research you produce (as in, research that draws a lot of attention), the more of it you will sell and the more money you will make.
How do academics controls themselves for this bias, that may be occurring consciously or subconsciously?
One might say that peer-reviewing solves this exact problem, but I fear that all peer-reviewing accomplishes is moving the goalpost. Okay, so now the bias of the lone researcher is being controlled, but who controls the biases of the peers? After all, this bias is an industry-wide phenomenon. Your peers, the ones that review your research, have the exact same bias as you do, and are also interested in seeing your research be validated if it brings more attention to your field, a field which is obviously shared between you and your peers.
Hence the bias affects you all at the same time. Who is controlling that? Is there a 3rd party? If not, how do academics, as a group, control themselves?
Obviously, this question is more pertinent for less fact-based fields, so not for example mathematics, where if a wrong theorem is approved, it would be catastrophic and probably discovered soon enough, to the shame of all people involved. But for more experimental fields such as physics, medicine, etc., how do academics ensure that there isn't a cartel of researchers some where all (sub)consciously agreeing to promote research that advances their careers?
Are you talking about the bias of trying to do research which other people will be interested in? That sounds like a pretty good "bias" to me...
Catastrophic is a bit strong, even for math. In fact, lots of math papers contain errors that haven't affected the reputations of the authors. It seems odd, but it is true. I originally worked in a subfield that had the reputation of every published proof having an error. They were by some very highly regarded people. Many of the proofs were cleaned up later by others. And the missing piece between the known world and a theorem often provided insight in itself. So, a bit of nuance is needed, even in math. We aren't as good at logical reasoning as we think we are.
Everything is in the end vetted by the community and by time.
Many researchers were fooled by their biases (including Galilei or Millikan who did systematic errors in their studies) and the biases were slowly uncovered by time. This is normal. Of course, a good researcher, as Feynman says, needs to take care not to fool themselves, and good researchers work hard to do so. In the end, however, it is time and the scientific community that filters out the wheat from the chaff.
One key thing to maximize your objectivity is to avoid p-hacking. Be aware what your hypothesis is before you run the experiment. Be aware of what parameters you extract from the experiment and how to factor them into your evaluation of the theoretical vs. experimental model.
Try to have at least two maximally independent ways of getting to a critical result. Understand the assumptions that got you a result.
Taking care of these various things will minimize the probability (it will never entirely go away) that you fool yourself and increase your confidence that you have done a proper job at doing good science.
The question seems to be about choosing the topic/ type of research so as to pander to grant agencies, rather than falsifying or having experimental biases. I'll focus specifically on the first.
Yes, grants and financial support do sustain research and most of us must tailor our work to have synergy with the funder. But rarely do researchers limit themselves to that focussed research. The usual tendency is to do this directed work (ie the bias in the question) so that other interesting ideas can be supported and pursued in parallel. The origin of dynamic programming and its nomenclature is a notable example of this. So while some research output is indeed directed by the interest of funding agencies, it would be wrong to conclude that all research is driven by this.
Note that the topic directed research could be biased, not its outcomes, unless there is something unethical or inadequately rigorous happening.
This is a good question, and arguably I would say research is not without bias. There are many biases that exist, and there are several fields that have actually become too bias and suffer from this cartel mentality, but that is an opinion.
One thing that you can personally do to combat your own bias is to practice being mindful about how you engage with your research and that of others. It’s very hard to remove bias from research because humans are inherently bias. This why there are fields of study dedicated to survey research and making surveys less bias.
You just need to practice good scholarship and encourage/promote it within others. That’s about all you can do to reduce bias in others aside from changing them as people.
The answer is about one specific type of bias and this seems to answer about biases in general.
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15252 | Is the new ACM 2012 taxonomy usable/in use?
I've wasted about an hour trying to figure out how I'm supposed to categorise an ACM article using the new 2012 taxonomy here, and how I'm supposed to represent those categories in my article.
On the plus side, the 2012 taxonomy has some perfectly apt categories for my paper (unlike the previous 1998 version).
On the minus side, the instructions are abysmal with respect to how it should be used, it seems to be completely incompatible with the standard TeX macros provided with standard sig-* templates, and not only do the TeX macros provided by this interactive system not work (\begin{CCSXML} and \ccsdesc), they don't even seem to even exist (at least Google turns up little if anything).
Is anyone actually using this new 2012 taxonomy and if so, is there any good guide on how to use it with a standard LaTeX sig-* template?
(Otherwise I think I'll just go back to the 1998 version ... as weird and archaic and seemingly useless as it is, at least it's a straightforward way to fill in those pointlessly mandatory category fields. Grrr.)
+1 Because I also wasted an hour on this a month ago. I ended up using the old taxonomy, though the new one was more appropriate :( Hopefully someone will know the answer!
how I'm supposed to categorise an ACM article using the new 2012 taxonomy — I don't think you are.
@JeffE, I'm not sure I follow. From the homepage: "It replaces the traditional 1998 version of the ACM Computing Classification System (CCS), which has served as the de facto standard classification system for the computing field. [...] ACM will a provide [sic.] tools to facilitate the application of 2012 CCS categories to forthcoming papers and a process to ensure that the CCS stays current and relevant."
@cabad, good to know I'm not the only one at least. I thought that I was doing something stupid or missing something obvious since presumably the ACM would have clear guidelines but it seems to be a non-trivial question as to what this 2012 taxonomy is for and how to use it. :)
The bounty will expire in 4 hours if anyone wants to post a reasonable shot at an answer :).
+1 to this. I can't believe this is still an outstanding issue, nearly 2 years later. By the time they start using the taxonomy, it might be as out of date as the 1998 one! ;)
If you're using sig-alternate.cls, this sample TeX file seems to have been silently updated in May 2015 to give an example of how to do this. Here's a precis:
Download sig-alternate-05-2015.cls into your local TeX tree (or temporarily into the same directory as your project)
Edit the first line of your LaTeX source to use it:
\documentclass{sig-alternate-05-2015}
Further down your LaTeX source, within the document enviroment (usually after your abstract), paste in the code that the 2012 ACM Computing Classification System gives you once you have chosen your categories, for example:
\begin{CCSXML}
<ccs2012>
...
</ccs2012>
\end{CCSXML}
\ccsdesc{Computer systems organization~Robotics}
\ccsdesc[100]{Networks~Network reliability}
Follow this with the line to print out your classification section:
\printccsdesc
And finally, add your own keywords:
\keywords{ACM proceedings; \LaTeX; text tagging}
I say this was added 'silently', because internally, the sample.tex file still says it was last updated April 2013, and it says This file should be compiled with V2.5 of "sig-alternate.cls" May 2012, whereas it actually compiles with "sig-alternate-05-2015.cls", which claims internally to have last been updated in Aug 2013, despite the date in its filename! No wonder everyone is confused.
Thanks to ayman's answer above, which has become broken, but pointed me in the right direction. (Could someone edit the broken link in ayman's answer to the sig-alternative.cls file from December 2014? --- I'm a newbie caught in the reputation catch-22 where I can't comment answers).
Thanks Bob. I guess this answer might change itself in future (esp. with all these updates and explicit dating of files), but I will accept since it's just a question of finding the most recent template from http://www.acm.org/publications/article-templates ... the rest of the procedure looks fixed. (Finally we have answers to this question!)
I've tried to follow these points, but I get the following error:
LaTeX Error: File acmcopyright.sty not found.
It's a pity that our time is wasted just like that by ACM's sloppiness.
@pms, you just need to add the acmcopyright.sty file to the directory that your paper is in. A recent version of this file seems to be here: https://www.acm.org/publications/article-templates/acmcopyright.sty/view.
Note that to get the copyright boilerplate that appeared with the previous style file on the first page of your document by default, you must also add a setcopyright command before the start of your document, e.g. \setcopyright{acmlicensed}.
Is it usable with sigplanconf.cls?
I get 404 not found for the sig-alternate-05-2015.cls download.
So it seems some rather recent documentation and code has been posted to the ACM site.
http://www.acm.org/publications/article-templates
Has all the needed code in the cls file to generate the CCS macros (so actually use that more recent sig-alternative.cls file from December 2014). And the document:
https://www.acm.org/binaries/content/assets/publications/article-templates/ccs-howto-v6-12jan2015.pdf
Discusses how to include it in LaTeX and in Word. The SIGCHI template is being updated soon to reflect these changes as well.
For LaTeX, this document omits the code that is needed to generate visible output--it is \printccsdesc.
I get 404 not found for the HOWTO PDF.
Thanks, I updated the URL.
The only piece of official information I've been able to find regarding the status of the taxonomy is this notice at the bottom of ACM Computing Classification System toc [Retrieved 2014-07-24]:
Tools to help authors apply the 2012 CCS categories and concepts are being built. A new set of instructions will be issued in early 2013. Until then, authors please continue using the 1998 categories, following these instructions on how to classify your work: How to Classify Works Using ACM's Computing Classification System.
So it seems that the tools mentioned were long overdue already a little over a half a year ago when this question was asked. Not much of an answer, but as at the time writing Google turns up this question as one of the top results when searching for the 2012 CCS taxonomy, so I'm documenting what I was able to find out here.
The ACM Digital Library has shows both the 1998 and 2012 terms on the Citation Pages of all indexed articles, but this seems to be the result of the old scheme being mapped to the new one. I haven't seen any of the additional categories in the new taxonomy showing up.
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91535 | What is the "right" rate at which my papers should get accepted (to computer science conferences)?
In general, when submitting to first tier conferences there is a smaller chance of acceptance but also a better reward.
At one extreme, one may only submit his work to third tier conferences and get nearly all of them accepted at the first shot. Alas, especially for younger researchers, the visibility of these will be very limited and the author might not get recognition for the work at all.
On the other hand, submitting only to first-tier conferences bares a higher risk, especially for PhD candidate looking for a post-doc/position, as it may take several iterations till the paper is accepted and published.
So where should one aim to be in general? Obviously, better papers belong in higher tier conferences, but there may be a goal rate in which your papers should get accepted. If the average number of submissions before accepted is 2/paper (but not all of them are first-tier venues), should one aim higher? If it takes 3-4 submissions but papers end up in first tier venues, should we attempt less competitive venues and publish quicker?
Context: I'm a CS PhD student. My supervisor usually insist on sticking to top-tier conferences even if a paper was rejected 2-3 times. I wonder if it is better to lower the bar after a rejection or two to get my results published faster. From another student here I've heard that they usually get papers accepted in the first attempt, but most of her publications are not in a top ranked conference. What is the right balance here?
You should aim on doing quality work. Especially for PhD student, this is the most important. If you get really good results, even if for one reason or another they can't make it to TOP vanues, the quality is going to be reflected on your thesis and on the letters of recommendation. Tjis is one of the best periods of your life to do really cool research. TOP venues will veentually come.
@PsySp - obviously, it is better to do top-quality work. The question is where should I submit it to.
If you, and your advisor, believe your work is TOP-tier material, then submit there. In the worst case the work will be rejected but with some hopefully helful feedback. Then, based on that you can go on some less prestigious venue. That is good thing for (T)CS: there are many conferences all year around to submit your work.
OK, so say we submit to top tier conference and get rejected with so-so reviews. What then? Go to a lower ranked conference or wait till the next major one?
It depends on the context: if their reaction is "meh" then obviously the chances to get on a TOP conferences are being decreased dramatically and you can go on 2nd tier. If their reaction is "ok, cool =, but more work needs to be done", then do the extra work and resubmit!
@PolinaD, perhaps you can add more context or maybe an example to clarify the question a little.
I'm sure that this varies a lot by specific discipline, but my perception is that top tier publications really "count," while second tier publications generally don't count for nearly as much during evaluations (i.e. job placement, tenure review). I don't really think there is an equivalence- it's not the case that reviewers will consider two or three second tier publications to be worth one top tier publication, so it's always worth submitting good work to a top conference.
I think the distinction between top, 2nd, and 3rd tier conferences is a little misleading.
I think of top tier conferences as places that publish research that is well done, comprehensive, and broadly applicable. As a result, everyone in the discipline will at least glance at these papers. They also happen to be good papers, because only well done papers can be broadly applicable. The reverse doesn't hold though: merely being a good paper is not enough to be accepted at one of these venues.
Work sent to second tier conferences tends to be much more specific with a much narrower audience. The conferences themselves tend to be very subject-oriented, so people really interested in that specific sub-discipline can disseminate, but the results and the work aren't deep enough that the work would be interesting to someone not familiar with the specific field.
Putting that all together, consider a hiring committee that has to decide between someone with 10 top tier publications and another with 20 second tier publications. The first person has demonstrated that they can produce broadly applicable and interesting work. The second person has demonstrated that they can produce a greater volume of narrow, less general work. When it comes to academics, that first person is going to win every single time.
To a first approximation, promotion depends on top-tier publications and nothing else. If career concerns are important (and they always are) keep submitting to top-tier venues (as long as you believe the work is good), even if it takes several iterations to get in.
There's so much variability in what gets accepted that it's best not to take the outcome of any single set of reviews too seriously. If you start to see a consensus among reviewers as to why they recommend rejection, then of course you will need to address that. But otherwise, don't lose hope and keep submitting.
Context: I'm a social scientist.
I do not quite agree with "keep submitting". If your work is rejected more than 1 times, this means that there is a very good reason for that. Moreover, these venues have memory. You do not want people to say öh, not again this".
I'd generally disagree with that. There have been re-review studies for CS conferences to see whether papers that were accepted would be accepted a second time by a different review team. I do not remember the exact rate of agreement but it was surprisingly low.
So much depends on the taste of the specific reviewers.
@sessej - if you could share a link to such study it'll be great!
@PolinaD sure -- here's one: http://blog.mrtz.org/2014/12/15/the-nips-experiment.html .
@PsySp btw -- I didn't mean keep submitting to the SAME conference -- just to other top-tier outlets.
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36543 | Will I be paid a percentage of the fee that readers pay to download my article?
I am a fresh PhD student and I have a question regarding the scientific publication process.
Let's say that I have submitted a paper to a certain journal in Springer, Elsevier etc... and it has been published.
The editor will charge 31.95$ to anyone who would eventually download my article.
How much do I get from it (as the article's writer) ?
You are mistaken to assume that there are real people out there that actually buy individual articles for 31.95$ a piece.
@xLeitix Not so fast! ACM (the Association for Computing Machinery, the professional society for computer science) makes a significant fraction of its publication revenue from non-subscriber downloads of conference and journal papers from their Digital Library, at $15 per paper.
@JeffE Is there data on this? Who's the demograpics that actually does this? (and, most importantly, why?)
The only way I've ever directly made money from an article is through publication bonuses from my university.
Not exactly an answer to your question, but in Germany you can get a small one-time revenue (roughly 0.001 € per word, IIRC) from the Verwertungsgesellschaft Wort, which come from a tax on printers, photocopiers and the like. (And yes, this holds for articles published in foreign journals.)
This is the cost and profit related to the publishing process (typesetting, proofreading, archival, printing, distribution, etc.) to which you did not participate. The money you get for that paper is your salary/stipend while you were creating the contents.
You get exactly diddly squat.
@xLeitix you are mistaken to assume that out there there are people who are always affiliated to institutions which can actually pay for subscriptions to every journal. :-)
@Aubrey I am fully aware of this, but with so many papers being freely available on arXiv, ResearchGate, department web pages, and the possibility to just mail an author, paying 20-ish bucks for a single article seems like a horrible move for almost everybody in almost every case.
@CapeCode: My impression is that at least in some fields, typesetting and proofreading are entirely and exclusively done by the authors and possibly the editors of the proceedings, not the publisher.
@O.R.Mapper I'm aware of some fields where it is the case, but I think it's more an exception that the norm. Especially for subscription-based journals.
@xLeitix I agree with you, of course, and I really hope that everyone who wants access of an article never has to pay that amount of money for a PDF. But I'm not sure that that never happens. We need to work in order to make a new, better system, in which we'd never has this problem again.
How much do I get from it (as the article's writer) ?
Nothing.
Moreover, through subscription fees, your university is very possibly paying a substantial amount of money for access to your work.
And quite probably most (if not all) of the downloads are from users with institutional access to the article as well.
Although some journals will kindly allow you to download your own articles for free. Check out Science's rightslink, e.g.
@dbw I never had could imagine such benevolence! There is certainly hope for the sharing scientific community.
Just thank the journal editors that they don't charge you the "downloading fee" every time the article is accessed. I really mean it and intend to do it the next time I hear from somebody that he couldn't get my paper because it was behind a paywall though I do not believe that it'll bring the journal editors back to their senses. As to "you've been already paid for your work" and "high typesetting expenses", this is just a ridiculous nonsense invented by the publishers to keep the science community at bay and milk it easily...
You normally get nothing.
Unlike a book, where you retain the rights as author to some of the proceeds from the sales of the textbook, unless you have some very special arrangement in place with the publisher, the publisher normally keeps all of the proceeds from subscription fees.
(Note in part that very few copies of articles are sold through the publisher. That's one of the reasons why they're so expensive. In general, most people who want such an article do so through interlibrary loan agreements or by directly contacting authors.)
This doesn't make much sense, does it? I mean, from the intellectual property perspective, I don't see much difference between authoring a book and a research paper. So, why different sets of rights are used?
You will not receive any royalties from an academic publisher (for an article---books are different). You may even need to pay to have the article published, although in many fields, the best journals are free to publish in.
You will, of course, get the benefits of exposure and possibly opportunities to network with other researchers. But there are no financial benefits from publishing scholarly articles.
there are no financial benefits from publishing scholarly articles that's not entirely true. There are large sums of money at stake (grants, appointments, etc.) that depend on how much and where you published.
Cf. my answer to the "How much do Springer-Verlag authors make per book sold?" question:
If the Work is sold electronically as part of a Springer e-book package, Author will receive an equitable share of royalties from the income generated by Springer from the e-book package. The share formula for each individual title within the e-book package will be determined by Springer no later than April for the preceding calendar year. This amount will be paid in addition to the royalty described above and shown separately on the annual royalty statement.
The same stipulation might hold for articles, too.
This refers to how Springer calculates royalties for e-books that are downloaded via a subscription rather than sold individually (and thus don't have a clear sales price). It doesn't apply to journal papers, because Springer doesn't pay any royalties for them, regardless of whether they are purchased individually or through a subscription.
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67527 | What are the consequences of refusing to grant honorary authorship to a superior?
Recently, I learned about honorary authorships in papers and publications - e.g. the head of an institute or person who secured the financial grants.
If you are in an inferior position, like a PhD student or not being the head of an institute, and you do not believe in giving credit via authorship to anyone who was not significantly involved in the studies directly; (by the way, according to some scientific boards, not even securing grants or offering the lab counts as such), can you successfully deny adding an honorary authorship for your supervisor or other superior without having to bear negative consequences for your work and later supervision?
After all, honorary authorship has a bad influence on life balance of scientists if seen on a large scale.
"or person who secured the financial grants": Given the difficulty of securing financial grants, I wouldn't underestimate this role.
Strongly related question: 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)?
@Massimo Ortolano: Of course not, but according to the honorary authorship article on Wiki, many universities do not see securing grants as having contributed significantly to design, execution, analysis, and paper writing of some research...what again is considered the requirement to count as author in good science, as it seems to be stated in several scientific board guidelines.
What are "respective moral standards" and what have they got to do with the question? It's hard to understand, because you are asking about cheating a supervisor out of authorship.
Most of the time, just add the authors. This was advice I had from a good mentor. Sure, they may not have done the requisite work, but if they think they and there's some policy that they should be added, make them happy. In the end, it's a practical choice of making friends/enemies with the higher ups.
But this simply making happy policy has huge consequences in the large picture and accumulated over a lot of universities: stress increases and life balance goes down the river...which would not have to be at all. It's simply because some scientists want to be like Einstein or celebrated like Hollywood stars as having done huge discoveries for mankind. Of course, in the end, we're all humans, but we could at least strive for better situations, which do not come it thinking is not altered and no action occur.
It depends on how much of an unethical jerk the person who wants honorary co-authorship is. Obviously.
This sort of scenario is an example of the potential for self-immolation that serves no purpose... since unless everyone else in your situation did he same. "Standing on principle" in the face of over-whelming force is dangerous, etc., ...
@paulgarrett: "Standing on principle" is incredibly valuable sometimes - case in point, the VT research group that helped uncover the Flint, MI crisis. That said - I agree, this is a matter of picking your battles. In the grand scheme of things, adding a supervisor's name to a paper - assuming they provided something, even if it's funding (which presumably meant they also had a role in the project's conception) - is a battle not worth waging. There are wars to be fought elsewhere of far more importance.
Standing on principle: good point that it might be bad in an inferior position and when facing reality. But why is it so hard for superior scientists to be honest and admit that the significant work was all done by their humpalumpas? I couldn't live with lying to have made a scientific breakthrough or merely some usual scientific work when I was not as involved in the process as others were. I'd always know that it's the work of others and not mine.
I once had an entertaining afternoon at a panel discussion on journal name integrity pointing out that the folks at the panel were all openly talking about violating one another's principles. Ultimately, it's still a field and area of handshakes and agreements, and what one person considers reasonable, another will not. And sometimes favors will win out
Related questions:
http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/51185/my-advisor-escalated-things-after-not-getting-a-coauthorship-he-did-not-deserve
http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/20076/what-should-i-do-if-my-advisor-insists-on-being-first-author-in-violation-of-my
http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/26670/authorship-issues-in-numerical-mathematics
More closely related questions:
http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/644/when-should-a-supervisor-be-an-author/
http://academia.stackexchange.com/q/12030/81
I'm surprised this is still an issue - though I guess not as surprised as I'd hoped to be. It's rather sad that there are still people out there who demand to be credited for work they haven't done.
Some journals have clear guidance for what merits authorship. For example, pretty much all medical journals sign up to guidance from the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/defining-the-role-of-authors-and-contributors.html#two) which requires
Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or
the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work AND
Drafting the work or revising it critically for important
intellectual content AND
Final approval of the version to be
published AND
Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the
work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity
of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.
(So in the example above, getting the grant money would probably count as contributions to conception or design, so warrant authorship as long as the putative author then didn't abandon the project but could meet the other three criteria; but providing space for the work e.g. in a lab or recruiting participants, on it's own wouldn't be enough)
Most journals then require a statement of what the authors did to meet these requirements which is published with the article - so in order for someone who doesn't warrant authorship to claim it they, and their 'co-authors' have to lie in print.
So in the unlikely event my head of department, or anyone else, insisted on being added as an author when I thought they didn't warrant it, I'd ask them to justify the request using the ICMJE criteria.
Of course - thats the easy bit.
If you're working in an area which doesn't work like this, you have to think about keeping on board with the community. If someone senior really thinks they deserve authorship on your paper, and you don't, you have to decide whether you're going to keep them happy.
I'd suggest you may need to find someone else to persuade them they should't be named. That may be someone superior to them in your institution, or you may need to discuss with the editor of the journal you're submitting to - who can then ask for justification of contributions should they see fit.
Fundamentally though it seems that attitudes like this may suggest something rotten in the culture of either a department, or possibly a discipline. And culture change like this will take years.
And if you're a last-year PhD student trying to get the final few publications out, paying the journal fees depends on an advisor who's primary strength was always networking and not so much research content, who now finds you "sufficiently independent" to do only basic grammar checks in manuscript revisions, and ignores your e-mail about "how should I phrase your contribution please, the journal requires it?" -- that's exactly what you do. Or, at least, what I did; kept it as vague as possible, but ultimately invented his contributions in print beyond 'space/money'. Feels bad, would do again.
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987 | Data publication basics - where, why, how, and when should I publish my unpublished data?
Many researchers have unpublished data. Some of this data may never be published as a manuscript. But I would like to make scholarly contributions of data that I have no intent on publishing, e.g. by publishing a "data paper"
The term "data paper" may be too new to be familiar, so here is a description from the Ecological Archives website:
Data Papers are compilations and syntheses of data sets and associated
metadata deemed to be of significant interest to the ESA membership
and the scholarly community. Data papers are peer reviewed and are
announced in abstract form in the appropriate print journal as a Data
Paper. Data papers differ from review or synthesis papers published in
other ESA journals in that data papers normally will not test or
refine ecological theory. Data Papers can facilitate the rapid
advancement of ecological knowledge and theory at the same time that
they disseminate information. In addition, Ecological Archives
provides a reward mechanism (in the form of peer-reviewed, citable
objects) for the substantial effort required to compile and adequately
document large data sets of ecological interest
This brings up the following questions:
What makes a good data repository?
Which data repositories provide a doi: for raw data?
Should published data be separate from articles on a CV?
When you say data, do you mean rows and columns of numbers (which is the obvious assumption) or is it all DATA pertinent to research such as equations, figures?
@dna Perhaps data papers can include descriptive statistics but not more than that.
@david do you mean something like DataOne?
@David: You need to provide a more complete description of what you're looking to publish. Is it just raw unformatted data; is it post-processed data of the type that fits an existing archive? What resources do you have available to you at your institution? Is there something field-specific already available?
@aeismail it is post-processed data but not necessarily a standardized format. The specific field is earth science, and might be appropriate for Earth System Science, Ecological Archives, or, as suggested by abe, DataOne.
It is sad that non-reproducible results can be published at all (happes a lot in computer science).
There are a few things that I would consider when choosing a data repository:
Does it let you release your data under a license you're happy with?
Applying too restrictive a license can prevent anyone from doing anything useful with the data, so think about what you're prepared to allow. In particular, remember that most of the research done in academia could be considered "commercial" from a legal perspective. On the other hand, you may wish to choose a license that ensures you get credit for your work. You may or may not agree with them, but reading the Panton Principles will give you some idea of the issues here. Also take a look at this list of licenses written with data in mind
How easy will your data be to find?
People will only use your data if they can find it. I recommend Googling (other search engines are available) for some datasets you know of in your field and see if they come up — those repositories which are indexed by the major search engines will put you at a big advantage when it comes to attracting citations.
What repositories are well known in your field?
Your institution may have a repository which you can easily deposit in, but it won't be the first place colleagues in your field will think of to look. If there are well-established repositories I would prefer those, or make sure your data is indexed by a well-established aggregator (I know ANDS runs a national aggregator in Australia).
What does your institution allow?
In many cases, your institution will own (or otherwise have a claim to) the data you generate as part of your research, so check what your local policies are and if need be ask your supervisor, head of department, legal team, etc. This will particularly affect your choice of license.
The other parts of your question can probably be answered better by others here (or maybe it should be split into several?)
Figshare provides online hosting and a permalink to your dataset, though it does not provide a DOI. I've been posting some figures there, but not data, and I quite like the service. They allow the option of keeping the data private as well, so you can use to store the data and later release it when you're done.
Update: I think Figshare now provides DOIs http://figshare.com/faqs/#q2
If you have a website with free preprints of your work (which you probably should have), put your data (and code) there. Alternatively, I know people who use GitHub (or similar) for the purpose of (distributed) storage. This has the charm of persistence and an immediate potential of collaboration.
For a (hopefully) persistent approach to citability, DataCite looks legit. In particular, they issue DOIs and are funded by libraries and research facilities from around the globe.
I think the best place for data is in a subject-focused data repository, but in the absence of that, there are repositories such as Dryad.
Biomed Central just announced a partnership with a site called LabArchives to host data of BMC authors, including DOIs for the data and the re-use promoting CC0 license, but I don't have any experience with the site.
Sounds like it might be appropriate for Pangaea: http://www.pangaea.de/submit/
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27430 | Is it commonplace for a recruiter to ask to see an unpublished PhD thesis?
I would have thought the document and overall findings are to be a closely guarded secret until defense or publication, so you can imagine my horror that a hiring professor would ask if he can have a pdf of my dissertation. This is in the context of a job application, whilst he decides whether or not to invite me for an interview. I have already sent them the other standard documentation that was requested in the advert. Is his request as unorthodox as it seems to me?
Are your findings a closely guarded secret? You tell us!
Since your dissertation is supposed to built on already published results, with some exception, like industry sponsored research, it is pretty unlikely that every single page of your dissertation is highly guarded secret. Also, I can imagine good reasons to ask for a PhD thesis, e.g. if you hint expertise in your CV that otherwise not clear from your publication record.
Just to clarify, to me, the word "recruiter" suggested a recruiter from industry. I don't think people usually use that word for potential academic employers. (Though I think my answer would be fairly similar if an industry recruiter were involved.)
Yes, it is a strange request, because your thesis is already available from your web page, and probably arXiv as well. Right? (Ha ha only serious.)
Recruiter for which type of job? Unpublished in the sense that it's not been published yet? Have you completed your PhD or not?
@JeffE: Well, I think most people do wait to put their thesis on their web page or arXiv until it's actually finished. In this case it sounds like the asker is still writing it and has not yet defended.
The thesis has not yet been submitted to the faculty. It exists as a series of documents on my lap top. It is a work in progress. Thanks for all your responses. Things seem to be working out on the job search (touch wood).
@TheWonderer Then please modify your question and replace "unpublished" with "unfinished", and "recruiter" with "potential postdoc supervisor".
In a word, yes. It is very common for academic employers to want to know about a candidate's research in progress, and they often ask for research plans, unpublished manuscripts, reports on ongoing projects, etc. From the employer's point of view, they want to know as much as possible about what the candidate is doing, so as to evaluate the promise of their research program and their productivity. This is especially true for junior candidates who do not already have a large body of published work. So a request for a draft of a PhD thesis would not be out of line.
When a candidate shares such material as part of their application, the hiring professor or committee has an ethical obligation to hold it in confidence. They should not circulate it beyond those people within the department who are involved in the hiring decision. Also, it would be ethically inappropriate for anyone with access to this material to exploit it for the gain of their own research program (e.g. by trying to solve the candidate's thesis problem before they do, or giving it to one of their own students). As the candidate, you have the right to expect that this will not happen.
Of course, as a matter of practice, if you want the job, you don't have much choice but to give them what they ask. But I wouldn't see such a request as unusual or unreasonable, and I don't think you need worry about them using it unfairly. If you are still worried, you could send them the thesis along with a note saying "since this is work in progress, I would ask that you keep it in confidence".
Also, I would say it's an exaggeration to say a thesis should be a "closely guarded secret" or to react with "horror" to a request to share it. It's generally prudent not to share unpublished work indiscriminately, but it's not as if it were missile launch codes. If there is something to be gained by sharing it with someone (e.g. useful input from an expert, a potential collaborator, a job) then often that's a good idea. It seems to be pretty common for people starting out in academia to overestimate the risks of people stealing their work: yes, there are horror stories, but in the long run, you usually have more to lose from excessive secrecy than from reasonable openness. Paranoia is generally not a helpful trait for an academic.
"has an ethical obligation to hold it in confidence" - exactly, and if the OP doesn't trust in that, there should be no problem adding a note stating just that into your document - e.g. a footnote, or a greyed out watermark, on each page, saying something like "unpublished version - do not cite, do not circulate". (Of course, this shouldn't sound/look like specific distrust towards your prospective employer, but rather like a standard note that was routinely inserted to the document for the very purpose of handing out preliminary versions to collaborators.)
"It seems to be pretty common for people starting out in academia to overestimate the risks of people stealing their work" +100
+1: I found terrifying when researchers (and not only young researchers) hide their current projects as if you were really going to start a whole new project just to scoop them. I regularly present unpublished research sometimes even in its "embryonic stage" and I find that it is much more helpful to do this rather than hiding in your corner and not telling anyone. Also, it is a very good way to start collaborations and to have people become interested in your research.
@O.R.Mapper -Great idea
@xLeitix Those chances are much higher for an unaccomplished researcher. The story that scares me the most was when some guy republished Perelman's proof of Poincare conjecture as his own and got away with it, until the international academic community stepped in to defend Perelman's intellectual property years later. The chances are if an average young scientist's ideas are not worthy of the Field's medal, no one is going to bother to step in for him if he is scooped by a more accomplished or talented researcher.
@ArthurTarasov : It sounds to me that you have garbled the story about Perelman. Perelman's preprints were extremely terse, and there were three separate multi-year efforts by experts to go through the preprints, correcting errors and supplying all the missing details. The question is, was Perelman's proof "complete" and should he get 100% of the credit? One group was Cao and Zhu, whose paper originally contained wording that was perceived as giving themselves too much credit and not giving Perelman enough credit. Also they included some material from another expert without attribution.
(continued) The academic community quickly responded with outrage, and in the published version of Cao and Zhu's paper, they changed the wording accordingly. Anyway, even the most extreme opponent of Cao and Zhu would not say that they "republished Perelman's proof as their own," nor did they "get away with it" for years. For someone to try to "republish Perelman's proof as his own" would be like trying to steal the Mona Lisa and sell it to a pawn shop, hoping nobody notices.
It might depend on the field, but it strikes me as pretty normal to ask for the PhD thesis in the context of an academic job application.
Your PhD thesis shows the quality of your research. Your PhD thesis shows the quality of your ability to communicate your research. Both are essential skills in (academic) research. Unless you already have many published papers — and it appears that you do not (or else why would it be secret?) — then your PhD thesis is the only document that can serve as evidence that you do possess those skills.
If you are worried about results leaking, you can ask for the manuscript to be treated confidentially. If you are worried about the recruiter stealing and abusing your results, you might want to reconsider if you want to work there in the first place.
As others have said, it's not unusual.
However, to answer those talking about paranoia; at my Uni, we used to have seminars where we discussed with other PhD students different aspects of our thesis. This was done with the explicit agreement that these discussion will remain in strict confidentiality, and we will not use each other's work. However, there were no written, signed documents to ensure this.
So after one such sessions where I was explaining a central point of my thesis, one of the fellow students, who was researching an entirely different subject, was quite interested and stayed on to discuss at length my thesis. I was flattered by the attention - only to find, a few months later, that he published a book containing, basically, all of my PhD thesis. I had to completely change my thesis, and although my tutor commented on the fact that the book contained what looked like my work, there was nothing I could do. The guy who stole my work is now a lecturer at the same University.
Did you confront the thief? Did you have any way to prove your authorship (eg., via publications, preprints, witnesses,...)?
I would prefer if horror stories came with context, so people know when to be scared. What is missing from your story is (i) how anyone can publish an academic book in "a few months," (ii) why the faculty in your department -- especially your thesis advisor and the other student's thesis advisor -- did not resolve this issue and (iii) why in the world a university would hire a former student who was accused of stealing another student's work. You only mention a "tutor," so I'm not sure where in the world this distressing story is set.
Pete, I haven't been here a while, apologies for the late reply. To answer your questions: (i) I don't know how he did it, but yes, the book was published about 10 months after our discussion. (ii) The faculty downplayed the whole incident and didn't want any fuss. I was a foreign student, the guy is a local Brit, the reputation of the institution mattered more than what happens to a 'bloody foreigner'. (iii) See point ii. Everything was kept quiet, and someone with a published work looked great on paper. A guy with the ruthlessness to do that will presumably have a great career in academia.
I know at least one country where it's a general requirement that you send two copies of your thesis for any application for an academic position (in a particular field). Very few recruiters have the time and inclination to actually read it but that's still a requirement. Theses are also all archived (on microfiches!) and can be ordered from any university library in the country.
It's all a bit silly now because online repositories are much more practical than either copying thousands of pages or reading microfiches on a bulky machine but it underlines the fact that in principle a PhD thesis is a public document and one that (academic) recruiters might want to see.
Also, a (completed) PhD thesis is a form of publication, even if you haven't put it out in the form of a book. Depending on the field, it's not as well regarded as journal papers but it would certainly establish your priority claim in the extremely unlikely even that someone would try to publish something based on it.
Thesis archives, whether on paper, microfiche, or electronic form, contain completed and submitted theses, which are safe to divulge. The OP has, apparently, yet to defend their thesis, so the situation is rather different. If the requirement you mention in your first paragraph also holds for theses in preparation then you should really point to specific resources that state that.
@episanty That's not entirely clear to me, from the question. Either way, the requirement underlines that it is not unusual to request an applicant's thesis.
After recent experiences of my ideas stolen and authorship credit being stolen from me, I have become one of those people who overestimate risk. It is better to be safe than sorry. To help: seek advice reg. this situation with a trusted adviser/ graduate's guide/ free legal services of uni. This can also help to prepare a professional approach.
Do you have an option to ask the recruiter to sign a form / letter / email communication that the unpublished thesis will be treated as confidential, and clarifying the extent of confidentiality. This cannot be an uncommon request, if you cite examples and state your worry in an upfront manner.
Digital document signatures have the ability to authenticate possession with a timestamp... digitally sign the document, get it countersigned by a trusted timestamp authority, and then if the recruiter does try to steal it or make it public, do the world a favor by ending the thief's career before anyone else gets taken. You don't have to get their signature on any document to have rights, the author automatically holds exclusive copyright. A footer like OR Mapper suggested is quite enough to exercise that right.
I personally found that the much-feared phenomenon of stealing ideas is quite rare, but it does happen. More likely are scoops where someone with better visibility gets out with a very similar idea; and it does not help much to be earlier, the second discoverer may well attract most attention. Remember Stigler's law: "discoveries are never named after their discoverer". It's the general risk of being a scientist; therefore, enjoy the process of discovery and don't worry too much about due credit - if you deserve it, you won't get it - in fact, if you get it, that's when you should worry ;-)
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58942 | How does PhD admissions committee look at my old gre score after starting my Masters
I am currently an international Masters student studying at a US university and I'm in the process of applying to several computer science PhD programs in North America. I didn't have the chance to retake the GRE exam to increase my score. I'm wondering how the PhD admissions committee takes into consideration my 3-year-old GRE score... will they give it less weight given that I've already started my Masters, or will they treat it exactly as if I have just took the GRE exam?
What was your score? If it's baseline for acceptance I would retake. If it's strong I wouldn't pay attention to it.
I do not have experience from the perspective of a committee, but I believe that the general way to look at it is that the GRE scores, no matter how old they are, are simply another part of your application package, regardless of timing.
There is no difference in consideration for undergraduates if their GRE is new or from their freshman year; I would imagine that there is no difference that you took your test before your Master's.
Sorry but as soon as I read your statement "I do not have experience from the perspective of a committee" I stopped processing/believing what you wrote afterwords.
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24285 | What does it mean if a professor does not answer your email in time?
I recently joined a research group as a postdoc. I wrote the professor an email to ask quick but important questions including asking him when when he wanted me to start. It's been over a week and I haven't received get an answer. Other emails I've sent previously have also gone unanswered for long periods as well.
With that background, my question is: do professors sometimes (intentionally or otherwise) not respond to emails in a timely manner?
Have you seen Is it acceptable to ignore emails in academia? This seems to be a duplicate question.
I get that professors are busy, as a student that also works on campus using three different emails, I really get it. But a professor usually hands out their preferred way of contact and when they’re in their office. As well, because our emails at universitys are our main source of communication it should be checked daily. I myself happening to be dealing with a professor that only looks at emails and doesn’t usually respond. Which is maddening when you need a response for matters like needing a paper extension or you need to bring your child to class.
I wrote him an email to ask quick but important questions, like, when do you want me to start. I didn't get an answer even after a week. And similar things happened before as well.
Some professors are notoriously bad in answering emails. This does not necessarily mean anything. Don't fret about it.
So I want to ask that as a professor, sometimes will you (on purpose) to NOT answer emails in time?
I'm not a professor, but, no, this is not how I would expect an adult person (in a management position, none the less) to behave. If the professor is indeed having second thoughts about you and decided to just not answer anymore, I would say you dodged a bullet there.
However, I really think that this is unlikely. Just send a polite reminder, or propose to have a quick chat e.g., over Skype, at a time of the professor's convenience.
Would you explain how to propose to have a quick chat ? By e-mail or by phone? Or some other means? If by e-mail, how would the OP know the e-mail won't be overlooked again?
I see no other way than to do it per mail. If he consistently ignores your mail, you should start worrying.
As a professor, I will second the quick chat suggestion. Sometimes I will spend an hour writing an email that ends up less productive than a half-hour (or even less!) conversation. Knowing that kind of email in advance makes me more likely to put off responding to the original email. So I am likely to respond to the follow-up with "Sure, call me at x time and we'll sort it out."
If one is deliberately ignored, it's not the right place to work at, anyway.
Unlike other professionals, academic faculty have multiple competing tasks of wildly varying natures and deadlines. Broadly divided, we need to balance:
Teaching: Two to four courses a semester with dozens, scores, or hundreds of students; a handful of TFs; and occasional irate deans and parents. One or two or three independent readings with students outside of that. Letters of recommendation. Trying to find internships and grad programs for advisees. Handling postdoc requests. Working with academic review committees. Working with course of study committees. etc. etc.
Service: Serving on several unrelated college or university committees. Serving on the steering committees of affiliated programs at the university. Having the provost scout you out for a pet committee. Running a search committee. Doing grad admissions. And this is just university service. If you do service work on your national association, then there is considerable committee work there. Not to mention doing peer reviews of journal articles, book manuscripts, grant proposals, etc. etc.
Research: And if you can find time after all that, there is your own research. Trying to keep several articles in the pipeline, tracking down an editor to listen to your book proposal, getting around to writing the conference paper you promised, etc. etc.
The way some faculty handle the multitasking is by singletasking. They only do postdoc intake work on Friday mornings, for example. Others give up and have a mailbox from hell.
In other words, things can easily get lost. While a simple questions such as yours might seem to be simple, it might require the prof to have to e-mail the department chair (who is even more busy than the average prof) for an answer, which then gets lost again.
I'd give it a week and then politely ask again. Use the same e-mail title (or reply-all to your own e-mail) so as to bump the e-mail thread back up to the top of the prof's e-mail queue. It's important to try to keep e-mail threads together as faculty have limited brain resources and we rely on our e-mail as our offline memory extension.
Since it has been a week, I think it would be acceptable to email them again just saying that you just want to make sure that they did get your email and that you would appreciate their opinion/response/whatever regarding your questions.
Professors receive tons of emails daily, and it isn't uncommon for them to miss important ones that get buried in their email.
I know the problem very well and had to wait very long for an answer. It should not be understood as an impoliteness. Professors get a lot of emails and answering every email can be a lot of work. If they just do not have time and read the email, then they forget often to respond later. This issue is not specific to academia.
I would first of all not write email, but call him. Another email could also be overlooked.
I disagree with both points in this answer. First, if the mail contained rather simple questions, the probability of an answer arriving after a week approaches 0. In a busy inbox, such mails are typically either answered quickly or not at all. Secondly, I would advise against calling out of the blue and wanting to discuss organisatorial matters right then. Send a polite reminder, and let the prof decide when to answer.
Visit or call.
For a while, I used e-mail as a rough to-do list - if there was something in my inbox, it was a task - once I sent a reply, the task was done (in my mind - acting as though a reply was guaranteed). Psychologically this worked well for me, as it let me off the hook. And, this may work well as a student, if you receive only a few dozen e-mails a week, of which many will be group e-mails.
But, as everybody has said, professors get a lot of e-mail.
So I came up with a new system. As early as I could, send the briefest possible e-mail, with a succinct subject, and add it to a list. Whenever I see my advisor, or whenever the list gets a bit long, or whenever a deadline is approaching, I corner my advisor and go through the list. In most cases I find that he's seen the e-mail(s) and didn't get a chance to respond, because he gets hundreds of important emails each week.
Timely manner differs for everyone. Also, some professors do not regularly check their email, or they may have a specific email address they use aside from their college/university address.
I have found it is usually best to ask a professor which way they prefer to be contacted, than to just send and email and expect to hear back in the same amount of time that, say, my parents would write me back.
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82846 | I think my professor misunderstood something I said and may have taken offense; what should I do?
I am following a graduate mathematics course. While in class, I noticed that my classmates notes almost sliding off her inclined desk, and I whispered to her that gravity was a bitch. I think I saw the lecturer, a woman, react to this but I am not sure. I am now worried that our lecturer thinks I called her a bitch. I have the utmost respect for her and I'd hate for her to think otherwise. How can this be fixed?
Ouch! I very rarely use swearwords, for exactly that reason. Perhaps she'll overlook it if you behave polite, non-confrontatively, and neutral-nice to her, and with good and constructive participation in class so that she may understand she wasn't the target. Don't grovel. If you distinctly notice a difference in behaviour, you may come clear to her, but some things are better solved implicitly. I am not sure it is good advice, though, some misunderstandings are difficult to resolve.
Swearing is important for at least a few social and neurological reasons. It can even be used as endearment. Maybe you can explain this to her (possibly preceded by an explanation how you weren't, in fact, demeaning your colleague)?
@101010111100 Swearing is relinquishing control. Many things would be comfortable and important doing, and people nonetheless refrain doing (so I hope) in company or else the burden to bear this is on others. Unless you are in an obviously and unambiguously friendly context, swearing always puts the cost of understanding on others. I once had to do with a colleague with very outspoken opinions who also was using swearwords a lot. You never knew whether they were swearing at you, at your argument, at their own argument or just in general. Very unpleasant.
I'd say, forget about it (easier said than done, I know). Most likely, this is a non-issue.
I talked to her today and she didn't give any indication of being insulted- thank goodness.
I think the best course of action is to explain what happened and apologize to the instructor. After that it is up to her if she is willing to accept your explanation and apology. Natural you should avoid repeating this attempt at joking in a classroom setting and save it for more informal environments.
Apologize for what, exactly?
For swearing in class, for speaking during the lecture, for giving her the impression that they were gossiping in class. There are many reasons to apologize in this case, but the main one is that it is a good way to humbly seek to redress any misunderstanding with someone, no matter if there was no intentional harm.
None of these warrants an apology, they are not inherently wrong. Qui s'excuse, s'accuse, and all that. You can show some regret if you want, but anything more would be a lie.
+1: People are so sensitive about stroking their own egos that they forget that other people have egos, too - frankly, I found that a swift apology to clarify a misunderstanding can go a long way to avoid rancour and ill will that otherwise will drag on for months. It's more often than not the right decision.
It's generally not wise to use the word "bitch" around women. If you're certain that she noticed and was likely offended, you should apologize for being too...colloquial. It's generally not wise to use any questionable terms in mixed groups.
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120364 | Is it beneficial for a student to publish their research code and data?
There are at least four benefits of releasing the code and data produced during a thesis or research project (citing textually this laboratory):
Allows to reproduce figures in the revisions of a paper
Other people who want to do research in the field can start from the current state of the art, instead of spending months trying to figure out what was exactly done in a certain paper
Makes easier to compare the method to existing ones
Increases the impact of the research
This is really cool for someone trying to develop its own study as he/she can have access to world-quality material for free. However, I have observed that this is a practice followed by well-known universities, with federal financial support, and that usually host international students. Is this practice also recommended for universities with little or no federal financial support and no grants for students?
I am curious if a student from a university like the latter would improve his/her chances to work in academia by releasing his/her material in this reproducible research modality.
An article about a computational result is advertising, not scholarship. The actual scholarship is the full software environment, code and data, that produced the result. (Buckheit & Donoho, 1995)
Yes, you should publish your code and data. Reproducibility is part of the definition of science: if the results of your experiments or computations cannot be replicated by different people in a different location, then you're not doing science. Far from being a mere philosophic concern, reproducible research has been a key issue in prominent controversies like climategate and cancer research clinical trials.
The person most likely to benefit from your efforts to clean up and publish your code and data is your future self. Why?
Error is ubiquitous in scientific computing...I find that researchers quite generally forget what they have done and misrepresent their computations. (Donoho)
The first step toward working reproducibly is simply to put the code and data that is used in your published research out in the open.
You may adopt reproducible research practices for philosophical reasons, but you will soon find that they bring more direct benefits. Because you write code and prepare data with the expectation that it will be seen by others, you'll find it much easier for yourself and your colleagues to build on past work. New collaborations may form when others discover your work through openly released code and data. And the code itself may be the main subject of publications in journals that have come to recognize the importance of scientific software.
More resources:
Top Ten Reasons to Not Share Your Code (and why you should anyway)
Publish your computer code: it is good enough
Thanks David. Could you please include in your answer some possibilities of PI protection? Patents can be expensive and there is a risk that they would never be used.
@JFonseca I don't know what "PI protection" refers to. I'm also not familiar with patent law in any country; if you're planning to patent your work then you should probably get advice from someone who knows your country's patent laws.
Two selfish reasons to publish that relate to this answer: 1. It may increase how well known you and your code are; 2. If others use it, they may find bugs. That will initially be embarassing, but is better than continuing to use code and getting the wrong answers from it.
Well, my country follows the international standards defined by the WIPO, so patent's law should be similar to the ones stablished in the US. Now, I was curious about using reproducible research as a way to boost your chances to get funded, which seems something improbable unless you are already affiliated to an institution, like you seem to be. Afterall, there is no issues if government pays.
Well, my country follows the international standards defined by the WIPO, so patent's law should be similar to the ones stablished in the US. Now, I was curious about using reproducible research as a way to boost your chances to get funded, which seems something improbable if you are not affiliated to a public institution. I was hoping to see some evidence of the private sector or personally financed researchers releasing their code.
@JFonseca In the question you asked specifically about a university student. Now you are raising a totally different question. I think it's interesting, but you should ask it as a separate question.
Go it, thanks @DavidKetchenson. I created https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/120497/incentives-for-independent-researchers-to-work-on-reproducible-research for that topic.
The core of scientific research is that we are open on how we came to a certain conclusion. That way we can move beyond "I am wearing a white lab-coat, so you must believe me", to "this is how I got my results, you can replicate them and see if they are robust, or you can try different approaches and we can discuss and learn how that affected the outcome". So making sure others can understand in detail how you got to your results is central to doing good research. Releasing code is an important step in that, regardless of the university you belong to.
So don't think of this as a service to others (it is nice if that also happens, but that is not the goal). It is about doing good research by documenting how you got to your results, and making that documentation available.
Thanks, @MarteenBuis, is there any standard way to determine by beforehand if a journal is fine with you if you decide to release your code on the Internet? I am asking because it may exist some conflict of interest if your code is also used to generate the figures included in the paper.
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138395 | Can I still publish a paper in a journal after it has already been assigned a DOI through Zenodo or ResearchGate?
Zenodo and ResearchGate can assign a DOI to an article. After publishing an article on Zenodo or ResearchGate with a DOI, if the article is good, will the article still be accepted for publication by peer-reviewed journals? Assume that the journal in question allows green open access (i.e., posting of a preprint on a public site).
That depends what you mean by "publishing". Perhaps you could clarify exactly what problem you're facing that prompts this question?
(the answers to your second and third paragraphs are: (a) Yes, you can upload to all these places; and (b) whether it's the appropriate action depends on what you're trying to achieve)
Later, I want to send my article to a peer-review green journal for publication.
Is there anything against using arxiv or similar platforms? High-ranked journals are often okay with accepting papers that have been published as pre-print there. However, some journals are quite strictly against sharing work on platforms such as ResearchGate after peer-review/publication - it feels like they might decide against reviewing papers that have been uploaded to RG before submission as well.
The existence of a DOI is irrelevant to the question.
To "publish" something really just means "make it available to others". So, there are many ways to publish something: You can strive to get it accepted in the most prestigious journals of your field, or you can just put it on your website -- strictly speaking, both qualify as "publishing". Putting an article on Zenodo, ResearchGate, or arXiv is closer to the latter than the former; the fact that some of them can give you a DOI really just means that you make it easier for others to find and reference what you uploaded.
From a practical perspective, the difference between all of your options is how much vetting and endorsement the locations where you publish provide for your work. Academic journals review your article, and this provides a level of endorsement that lets others trust that what you published is useful and correct. On the other hand, putting an article on a web site or ResearchGate involves no vetting and, consequently, does not bestow on you the prestige that comes with the vetting. If you wanted to use your "publications" as part of a job application, it is this prestige you want, and consequently, putting your work on a website of your own will not be enough.
Thank you! Yes, the best way is to submit my manuscript to a peer-review journal. My question is that after putting an article on Zenodo and ResearchGate with DOI, the article will still be accepted by a peer-review green journal for publication if the article is good?
Strictly speaking, journals typically require you to assign copyright to them before publication, and that would prevent you from publishing the work in any other way. In practice, they often turn a blind eye to pre-publication on arXiv, researchgate, or your own website, even though strictly speaking you shouldn't.
You need to check with the individual journal(s) you are interested in eventually submitting to. In my experience, most have posted policies somewhere in their "instructions for authors" sections.
Most likely the presence of a DOI is completely irrelevant, but there isn't a general rule on what publishers will consider prior publication.
Thank you! Yes, I just found that Zenodo is a preprint server.
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68757 | How many math PhD spots are offered each year by the top 50 US programs?
I'm trying to estimate how many math PhD offers are awarded each year in the United States, say at the top 50 schools, if that constraint helps. (I'm interested in departments called "math," not "applied math.") For the top 50 schools, is it on the order of 500? More than that? I know programs vary greatly in size, so I'm looking only for a rough estimate of the total.
I know that the AMS releases data on the number of PhD's awarded each year, as well as the average completion rate for PhD students. But is there data showing how many PhD offers are extended each year, or at least how many students matriculate?
One reason I'm interested in this question is that I know that between 4000 and 5000 people take the GRE math subject test each year. I'm curious to what extent the top 500 scorers on this exam fill the spots at the top 50 schools, but that is a harder question to answer, because so few schools release data on their admitted students.
Those between 4000 and 5000 people taking the GRE math subject test each year may not go to top 50 US math schools. They may go to top 200 math graduate schools. They may go to math graduate schools outside the US. They may never go to math graduate school at all.
@scaaahu: yes, obviously. But most top 50 U.S. schools require the subject test, as far as I can tell. If they offer around 500 spots, I doubt they're taking a lot of people below the 90th percentile. (Not necessarily because their scores are high, but because those are the people who are most likely to have strong applications on the whole.)
I was once told that if they selected only the top Math GRE scorers, every program would be 99% Chinese. I'm now in applied math and we don't require the subject test, so I don't know how accurate that is.
The total pool of PhD applicants accepted by the top 50 schools is more or less the set of people who end up going to the top 50 schools. Schools make a lot of offers that aren't accepted, but most of these people end up going to a different top 50 school.
At MIT, in pure math, if we used the GRE as the sole basis of admission, we'd probably only take people who scored 98% or higher. But we always admit a reasonable number of people who score below 90%, and occasionally admit people who score as low as 60%. Extrapolating, I'd guess that there are a lot of people who aren't in the top 500 GRE scorers who get offered one of the top 500 spots in U.S. math graduate schools.
@Peter Shor: Thanks for your comments. Can you tell me how many students MIT matriculates each year? Is it >20? Chicago's page says "15-20," for example.
All the information needed for this calculation is on our web page: around 110 students total, 2/3 in pure math, average time to completion of degree slightly less than 5 years. And very little attrition. So on the average 15 students per year in pure math (in practice, it fluctuates quite a bit around this mean).
@Peter Shor: Thanks. I did see those numbers, but there is no explicit information about attribution rate, so I wasn't sure by what factor to split the ~73 pure math students. Some schools come out and say directly "we admit around X students a year from a pool of Y applicants." To my mind that information is more valuable than the number of grad students enrolled.
@DavidKetcheson -- having been on our graduate committee for the past 3 years, I can say that if we only took the top scorers in the Quantitative GRE test, we'd have more Chinese, but not 99%. Maybe 50-60%. I can't speak to the Math GRE since we don't require that.
@Wolfgang: I decided not to mention Chinese students' scores on the GRE in my comments because I didn't want to compute these statistics, but my impression is that the Math GRE isn't any different from the Quantitative GRE in this respect.
If all you're interested is a ballpark number, then here is one way to estimate: At Texas A&M, the math department hires 20-25 graduate students every year. (We make about twice as many offers.) If this was representative, then the top 50 schools would hire 1000-1250 students each year.
Now, A&M is a big department (~85 tenure track faculty). Most departments will be smaller, but in the top 50, most will be at least half the size. So my best guess is that the top 50 programs together will hire ~750 students each year, plus or minus maybe 250.
(And, for comparison: Practically all of our hires have a Quantitative GRE score above 163. This coincides with about the 85th percentile.)
Thanks for these numbers. But I'm not talking about the general GRE, measured 120-170 on quant and verbal; I'd expect most top PhD math students to get a perfect score on the quant section of that. I'm referring to the GRE subject test in math.
I don't have any experience with that since we don't require our applicants to take it.
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5874 | Letters of recommendation: what information to give to a recommender
The head of our department is writing a letter of recommendation for me for MD-PhD (MSTP) programs. I have two graduate level classes with him. He is very busy and writes letters regularly for students. I want to make sure that he does not end up using a canned letter.
I will be sending him my C.V., Cover Letter, and letter of intention. What else should I provided? He knows me in a classroom setting--I have not done research in his lab.
remind him of your grades, class projects and the result of the project. Professors usually forgot students names and performance (specially in the undergraduate level).
He knows me in a classroom setting — Unfortunately, that almost guarantees that he will write a canned "did well in class" letter.
@JeffE That's not necessarily true. I got a wonderful recommendation letter (basically sticking to David's advice) from a professor with whom I never did any research/projects together. It's all about context: I did some class projects for his classes which he only evaluated, and since he was one of the rare professors open to suggestions about his first-time subjects (he had a new subject and a subject with his completely new programme) we had a few informal after- or between-class talks about the student perception of his classes which he seemed to appreciate.
...we had a few informal after- or between-class talks... — So the professor knew you in more than a classroom setting, which meant he could actually say something substantial. My point stands: A professor who knows you only in a classroom setting can only write about your performance in the classroom.
You won't find a better or more complete answer to this question than the one given here, by Professor David E. Keyes. Here is the key paragraph:
Likely reference writers (for instance, well-known professors of core courses) are sought out by many well-qualified candidates. To ensure that such a writer is well primed to execute your reference efficiently, you should create a self-contained packet containing all the information the author will need to dispatch the reference in one sitting: (1) contact information for the recipient of the letter, (2) a description of the position and application closing date, (3) your own application essays and cover letter, (4) a resume, (5) relevant transcripts and scores, and (6) an explanation of the niche of the writer! It is very useful, as a reference writer, to receive a reminder along the following lines: "Professor Keyes, your letter will be the one that comments most authoritatively about my analytical ability, my promptness in completing projects, and my reasons for wanting to pursue X next fall. Remember that you gave me an A– in partial differential equations two years ago and it was your suggestion that led to my summer at Los Alamos with Y." You should provide this packet in both hard and soft copy. Writers of lots of references maintain files that may be hard or soft, or both, and you should make it easy for those writers to locate your files quickly for subsequent updating and future requests.
Some faculty write many dozens of letters of reference during peak months, and they may even ask candidates for sample text to be incorporated into letters, to ensure that they capture their niches. You should not be flustered at such a request, and should not be modest in complying. You should be aware, though, that your words will not pass directly into the delivered product; they will be used simply to get the author's juices flowing following the formulaic paragraphs of the letter.
When I agree to write a letter of recommendation for a student, I ask him/her for the information listed here, including most of what David mentioned, as well as a self-assessment of the student's strengths and weaknesses and a list of long-term career goals.
Send him information about the program and department you are applying to. Also ask him/her if they might know someone in the department you are applying to. It might be beneficial to name that contact person in the cover letter. Finally provide a deadline.
Give your letter-writer a packet containing:
A copy of your transcript (showing what courses you've taken and the grades you've gotten).
A copy of your personal statement or other essays that go with your applications.
A brag sheet, with reminders of things your letter writer might want to mention. This might include significant acomplishments. It should also include reminders of interactions you've had with the professor (e.g., you may remember that you suggested I study with wibbly wobbets do or don't wangle their wuckets; see my research paper, where I found that they do, but only on Tuesdays; or, you may remember that I solved two of the optional bonus problems in your class).
A list of places where you are applying, and the deadline for each. Highlight the first deadline.
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120246 | My professor who doesn't let me use my phone to read the textbook online in while I'm in class. What should I do?
I'm currently taking a course where I acquired the textbook as an e-book. Physical copies were available too, but I find kindle-versions far more convenient as I can read it wherever, whenever, using the kindle app on my phone.
Then naturally during lectures, I'll have my phone out (on mute of course) so that I can access the book. This is no different to any other student in the hall who have their physical copy out. In fact, I am less disturbing, because when those other students need to look something up, you'll hear pages turning, while my finger is silently scrolling my phone.
And yet, my professor doesn't seem to realize the benefits of technology and bans usage of phones. I of course do not intend to follow this policy: I've paid money for my e-book and am not going to spend more money for another physical copy just to appease this tosser.
However, my question is specifically, what should I do? Should I just keep on using my phone as usual, or should I contact some authority figure immediately? I'm not really worried about what he can do (because there's not really anything he CAN do, he can't throw me out of class or anything), but I would still like to take optimal steps.
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Are you sure the textbook is not in the university library?
It might be worth stopping by office hours or after class and just asking the professor how he would like you to proceed. "I would like to be able to use the textbook during class, but I only have a digital version and you don't allow phones in class. Is there a way I can be able to look at the textbook without having to purchase a new book?"
Sounds like an outreach to others to justify a lack of regard for the rules set in place by those who are given such authority [ie the professor] You want to talk about how it is not a distraction to have your phone out; if you are the only one with their phone out, it is likely a distraction. Furthermore, phones tend to be distractions overall in most settings these days; much more so if you other students are paying attention, and potentially "induced" to pull out their phones for non-study purposes. What should you do? Comply with the reasonable rules that in no way infringe actual rights.
"I'll have my phone out (on mute of course) so that I can access the book. This is no different to any other student in the hall who have their physical copy out. In fact, I am less disturbing, ..." - As a student, I would find what you're doing more disturbing. I've been conditioned to tune out the sound of turning pages, but a phone screen (especially in a classroom where phones aren't allowed) now that's something that would distract me. You might not be like me, but enough students are.
As a general rule, faculty members have wide latitude to set the policies for technology use in their courses, as well as the consequences for violating such policies, if any. So long as the policies are not excessively punitive (e.g., failing a class because your phone accidentally rings once), it is unlikely that you will gain any relief from the university administration.
So this is one of those situations where both of you have the freedom to do what you wish, but that does not spare you from the potential consequences of your actions if the faculty member decides that they are inappropriate.
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83871 | Will having a recommendation letter from someone in a different subfield hurt my chances of admission to PhD programs?
I am applying to the graduate program in astronomy in US universities. In support of my application I have provided three recommendation letters. Two are from my thesis advisors, while the remaining one is from my course instructor who works in condensed matter physics. He is well known in his field, but perhaps not in astronomy. I did very well in his course and he agreed to write a good (but not detailed) letter for me. Will this hurt my chances of admission?
Will this hurt my chances of admission? — Compared to what? Compared to having only two rec letters, definitely not. Compared to having a weak third letter from a third well-known astronomer, definitely not. Compared to having a strong letter from a third well-known astronomer, possibly.
Obviously, the better your letters of recommendation are, the better they support your application package. Impersonal, though supportive, letters may not hurt your package, but they don't help as much as fantastic letters from people who know you well.
So, not so much "hurt", but "not as much help as it could be", which some would say is equivalent to "hurt"
When you have to produce 3-4 recommendation letters, which is a lot for a PhD candidate, it is normal that some will be from slightly unrelated people (an instructor from a course that you liked, tutor, head of department, etc). It does not hurt you, since many (most?) other applicants besides you will have the same situation.
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64148 | How to deal with a professor who grades assignments and exams incorrectly
I currently have a (graduate) professor who clearly does not understand the material she teaches at the level required by the course. This normally would not be a problem - I'm fine with educating myself via textbook - but unfortunately her inaccurate knowledge also extends to grading. I have no problem with studying hard for a difficult class, but I can't possibly know how to predict the exact incorrect ideas that the professor has and incorporate them into my work.
My first response was to very, verrrrry diplomatically approach the professor and talk to her about the questions - but she immediately became angry. I then talked to my advisor, who said that this isn't the first time she's heard of problems with this teacher. My advisor said that her only idea is for me to go to the head of the department, but I'd really prefer not to do this for two reasons:
Relatively small department; it's likely that this professor has
a good relationship with the department head, and I would look bad
It seems like a "nuclear option" and I would prefer to avoid it
(if possible)
This is my last semester of graduate coursework in molecular biology, and I have never had a problem like this before. I feel like my only option is to drop the course - without it, I would still have all my coursework requirements fulfilled - but I don't want to have a W on my transcript.
I have been unable to come up with a satisfactory way to resolve the problem.
Possibly helpful additional information
I have talked to other students in the class; all (of the six I have talked to about the issue) have experienced similar problems in grading
I have confirmation from other teachers that my answers are correct, but they don't want to confront a colleague (and I can't fault them for this)
I don't dislike the teacher; she seems like a relatively OK person. I just wish she understood the content better
The teacher can't possibly have a grudge against me, since I had never met her before the class
I'm very interested in what this class covers, which is why I took it despite not needing to
I have taught some of this material at the undergraduate and graduate level; I understand it's difficult stuff. It's more the teacher's attitude towards grading that is the problem.
Are the "incorrect ideas" not delivered in lectures or reading assigned in addition to the text?
@BobBrown the textbook is correct, but every lecture is riddled with errors.
So, if I now understand the problem, you know what incorrect ideas are being presented, but not which ones will be reflected in the grading. I think I should wait for someone with more experience in academia than I to answer this question, but at the moment, I'm in favor of the nuclear option, with an incorrectly graded paper in your hand.
"I currently have a (graduate) professor who clearly does not understand the material she teaches at the level required by the course. This normally would not be a problem - I'm fine with educating myself via textbook " then why are you wasting time and money in graduate school?
@emory: Often people want a credential that shows they know the material.
@emory: Because for one thing, it's pretty darned hard to get a job in academia or research without a PhD union card.
@emory: (1) Getting guidance on what literature to read, (2) interacting with experts when you have questions, (3) achieving certifications needed for many jobs (academic and otherwise), (4) getting started with a research/publishing career, (5) developing a network of colleagues to help with that research, etc.?
@DanielR.Collins All of those are good reasons to go to graduate school, but I question whether they are happening for the OP. When I was a graduate student, I always thought my professors were experts in their field. It would have been a big problem for me if I thought they were not.
@emory: Just because someone is an expert in their field doesn't mean that he is an expert at whatever he is teaching. I, for one, was once asked to do problem sessions in a topic I had no clue about, and learned as I went. I didn't pretend to know more than I actually did, though.
Which subject is this OP? Some branch of Maths or something else?
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This is not nearly the "nuclear option". Going to the department chair is about three levels below that.
How is it possible that you taught some of this material at the graduate level before and are now taking a graduate course on it?
This is not uncommon in the biological sciences, especially in small departments.
I have been in this very same situation. I confronted the lecturer, complaining my answers were correct, yet my grade did not reflect that - she quickly became angry, threatened that I would not be allowed to pass the exam if I continue to behave this way(pointing out her errors). But I was confident in my work, so I was planning to use the "nuclear option" the next day. However, she had corrected my grade by then. Your teacher is clearly not doing her job well - you have every right to nuke her. If she's going to be angry at criticism, she should not be in academia at all.
Could you clarify your reasoning on these actions? You're afraid that going to the department chair would make you look bad, but that badmouthing this professor by gossiping to her coworkers won't. I don't understand this logic.
I wonder how this turned out? Would love a quick update-edit to the question.
Not a definitive answer, since I’m a postdoc with comparatively limited experience of such conflict situations, but I do have a few suggestions. They aim to:
maximise the chance of getting better grading without ruffling too many feathers;
give you solid documentation if you do end up escalating the complaint;
minimise the embarrassment in case it turns out that you’re misunderstanding something and your lecturer’s grading is defensible after all.
If you confront the teacher again, do so by email rather than in person. This has several advantages. Firstly, it allows you to look over what you’ve written and make sure you’re phrasing everything as tactfully as possible. Secondly, it gives her time to (hopefully) get over any initial anger/embarrassment and give a considered response. Confronted on a sensitive topic in person, it’s easy to get flustered and defensive, and entrenched in a position it’s difficult to climb down from later. Finally, if she doesn’t respond constructively, you have the exchange in writing, so are on firmer ground for escalating the issue to the department head.
If possible, phrase the question/request so that your desired outcome is also palatable for her. If you argue that she’s fundamentally misunderstanding the course material, she’s pretty unlikely to accept that — admitting that one’s wrong about something is already difficult, admitting one’s incompetent is a whole lot harder again. Instead, you could say that (e.g.) you have learned some of the material previously, and so know it with a different viewpoint from hers (and maybe give a couple of examples here, ideally with sources in well-established literature) and you would like to check that this angle will also be acceptable for work on the course. I’m not saying you should say exactly that — but look for something that allows her to concede that your understanding is correct, without having to admit (to you or herself) that hers is wrong; and down the line this makes it easier for her to improve her understanding of the subject, rather than remaining antagonistic towards your suggestions. On the other hand, if she does defend her current approach, this gives her a chance to lay out her case more clearly and carefully.
If you do this and she still doesn’t engage constructively, you’re now on very solid ground to escalate the complaint. You have a written record of your good-faith effort to sort this out tactfully. You have specific examples where she has doubled down on her misunderstanding of the material. (I’d suggest double-checking these with your advisor or another faculty member to be absolutely sure you’re right about them.) Even if the head of department supports this teacher in general, it will be comparatively difficult for them to dismiss the complaint or paint you as a troublemaker.
Thank you. I think this is the best option that I have available to me.
My recommendation would be to withdraw from the course. I'd almost go so far as to say you have a prime opportunity to do so in this case: it's not a required course, and you know you can learn it on your own, and you have other things that take priority with your time. Granted how defensive she got (and noncommittal your advisor was), the overall trajectory seems to be some combination of (a) getting into an ongoing and escalating dispute with her, (b) contending with department interactions over an extended period, (c) triggering end-of-course grade disputes, etc. This threatens to be a huge sink in your time and emotional energy, so I would recommend simply sidestepping the whole issue as the best option.
Now: The one thing that makes me hesitate with this advice is that I don't have very deep experience with what a effect a "W" has on a PhD transcript. Personally, I have a whole bunch of W's on my undergraduate transcript (albeit none in my major), and they have never been an issue or mentioned in any context: not on applying to graduate school, getting industry employment, or getting a full-time lecturer position.
Edit: Thanks to @vadim123 for the comment: "Nobody cares what you have on your PhD transcript. They care about (1) what you've published, (2) what's in your thesis, and as a distant third (3) your GPA. Oh, and (0) what your letters of recommendation say about you." Sounds about right.
I'm not certain, but my sense is that a W would require explanation. And that is not something you want to need to give. Whereas a less-good-pass is likely a non-issue and won't even register as anything but 'fine'.
Good point. I think this question is more about "what should I do", and if OP do not like the nuclear option (where most serious argument would escalate anyway), the other clear way is the W.
Nobody cares what you have on your PhD transcript. They care about (1) what you've published, (2) what's in your thesis, and as a distant third (3) your GPA. Oh, and (0) what your letters of recommendation say about you.
Find out the final-grade appeals process in your department/at your university. (Where I am the procedure is department-level, but that may or may not be the case where you are.) Keep every assignment your professor has graded; separately, write up where and how the grading is incorrect.
Follow the procedure to the letter. Be apologetic and accommodating (as you have here) rather than angry. Explain that you did try to raise this with the professor directly, and the result was not positive.
This deflects the situation into being about your grade, which is impersonal, rather than a personal dispute between you and the professor, which you (probably quite correctly, graduate departments being as clannish as they are) wish to avoid.
Realistically, how much do the actual grades matter in your program? In many programs they do not matter as long as you pass. The main purpose of graduate courses is for you to learn so you can do better research, and it seems you have achieved that goal.
If this is the case, a reasonable option would be just to ignore it (you are about to finish your graduate coursework anyway) and just focus on the most important part - research.
Really? In the two graduate programs I know about, grades are A, B, and C-U-later.
@BobBrown So A and B pass. Does it really matter if you get an A or a B as long as you pass?
Well, it mattered to me.
@BobBrown nothing wrong with that. But I think it is important to point out to OP that in the grand scheme of things, grades are a minor part of the PhD.
Grades are not so unimportant. If you ever go into industry or seek a teaching position or even research position at a lesser institution, they may ask for your grad school GPA. And it can very well matter.
@Chan-HoSuh I don't doubt this happens but, if it actually matters beyond 'good enough', then the recipients are fooling themselves. GPAs from different schools are radically incommensurable. (Mine didn't even produce GPAs for graduate students.) Those which only count A/B as passes, for example - well, guess what? Almost all students get at least a B in all their courses. Somewhere else, the story will be different. Which doesn't mean it doesn't matter - if people count it, it can matter. But some places just want to see you did OK. The rest is irrelevant.
Those aware of grad school grading schemes are likely to view B grades very suspiciously, especially if you didn't produce a very strong research output.
If you are at a proper University and have mediocre grades that is much better than A passes from a diploma mill . Look at the MIT in the USA and compare it to the MIT in New Zealand .This is the Manakau Institute of Technology .The lecturers at MIT NZ would not get into the MIT USA as freshmen.
especially if you didn't produce a very strong research output — So don't do that then.
If the grading is incorrect then there will be people who pass or fail incorrectly.
Basically, I agree with @PLL. I wouldn't tell to the professor directly that she is wrong. It may be hard for her to realize that she is wrong if you directly tell her that. Also, I agree with you in a part of preferring of not going to the head of the department. She is a professor and it is a little bit sensitive topic.
Still, I think she should know that she teaches wrong because students have an issue with a wrong teaching, and she has an issue even though she doesn't know that (or she knows but she doesn't want to change?).
I would send her a mail. You may write that you are confused because you thought that some other thing is correct and now you don't know anymore which approach to take. Also you can ask her for a help. Of course you don't need a help but she should think more about the problem and at the same time she shouldn't feel that she is under attack because she may start to act "too defensive". You can be stubborn in your reply (e.g. "I really thought differently/ I would like to know which part of my approach is wrong so I don't make any mistake/ What should I change", etc.).
Beyond your department, your university most likely has an ombudsperson who can help you navigate this issue. They may be an essential resource, since they are helpfully outside of your small department, and should (hopefully) be knowledgeable and well-versed in the areas you need: grade disputes, university policy/procedure, academic politics, etc. Reasons why it might be good to get this person involved:
You don't know what is going on in the professor's life. We don't have enough information to form a conclusion about the cause of the situation, but it's worth entertaining a number of explanations for conspicuous behavior, and the ombudsperson might be able to help.
I've also once heard through the grapevine of a department head complicit in assigning a gravely unqualified teacher to a course, and it would almost certainly be unwise to try and force that issue by yourself.
Is it a plausible scenario, given the information we have, that the professor has mental problems? No it isn’t. Ungrounded speculations like this does not belong in an answer imo.
The advice to get a third party involved (ombudsman or similar) is the saving grace here, and by quick glance not covered by the other answers.
@winther My main goal was giving examples of why the student might want to approach an ombudsperson without getting exhaustive. That said, your comment did make me realize I could invert the order of the answer, and make this relationship clearer. Cheers.
In short: approach the professor with a detailed, full and rigorous explanation on why your solution is correct. Deal with it professionally, and base your claims on hard facts alone, not your personal opinions.
Longer answer: I am not completely convinced by your story. That is, I do believe that there might be an ambiguous marking criteria going on in your course, but I don't see how you drew the categorical conclusion that "the teacher doesn't understand what she is teaching". That's only your opinion. The fact your advisor said something about the professor also doesn't establish much. He/she might have said something without thinking much about it.
So I believe you should simply deal professionally with the matter: stick to facts, find out precisely where the marking is incorrect and send an email/contact your teacher. This seems like a quite simple story. You say that "the teacher got angry" when approached. I'm also not convinced this is the full story. People do not generally simply get angry when approached. You need to figure out the precise conversation that led to her getting angry, if indeed.
I've had a total of three teachers over the years with grading issues. Facts didn't matter to any of them.
Again, I am not convinced. What does it mean "facts didn't matter to them"? Obviously, some facts did matter to them. So your explanation is almost surely incomplete. Are you claiming that because of their ego they decided not to admit their mistake? Or perhaps because they are afraid of the consequences of admitting a mistake? Or are you claiming that they are sociopaths who arbitrarily give grades, and then they become opaque to students' complaints? Or what exactly are you saying?
I mean that proving your case didn't matter to them. They're the teacher, they're right, you're wrong.
Again, your explanation is lacking. I believe that this is the impression you got, but don't take what you think is true for granted.
In one case it was totally clear-cut: The professor insisted there was only one way to do something, I had studied a system that did it differently. This same professor was unable to answer a very simple question in class, also despite the confused student asking three times. Another student finally piped up with a correct, one-word answer.
Your story doesn't prove that facts didn't matter to the professor. It proves only that the professor was possibly unaware that there is another approach to the problem, and made a mistake by claiming there's only one approach.
I presented the counterexample to him, he still marked me wrong.
Most universities have some sort of grading appeal process, so you can use that if necessary.
However, if you are wanting to do something a bit more diplomatic, the only suggestion I have is to try and get her to recognise that she is incorrect. Fin the most egregious error in her marking, preferably one that you can point to material that shows she is incorrect. Then you can do something like 'I really don't understand why this ... is wrong and would like to go through it with you'. Teachers usually have office hours exactly for this, explaining what the student did wrong. During that discussion, you can say things like 'how does that reconcile with ...' and get the supporting material out. Or, 'the textbook says ..., but I am having trouble integrating that with ... (whatever she said)'. If you make it about you trying to understand, as she tries to explain it, she may well realise that what she's saying doesn't make sense. Avoid saying 'you are wrong' and make it much more like 'but I can't see how that fits with ...'
This way having a personal tutor assigned by the department (or collage) to each student is very important.
Go to your personal tutor, and explain that you are finding it hard to understand why your answers are being marked as they are. Ask your tutor to explain to you what you do not understand….
Make it all about your lack of understanding, including your lack of understanding of the books.
Maybe it's important, but in many academic cultures it simply isn't the standard. What do you propose if the OP doesn't have a personal tutor?
It is worth knowing that what is taught in coursework or printed in course texts, can be many years behind research frontiers.
If the coursework is in the professor's field of specialisation, there is a very good chance that her knowledge is years ahead of the text.
Google Scholar is your friend.
The OP states that I have confirmation from other teachers that my answers are correct.
@scaaahu other teachers might be in a fight.
@Nemo Other students have similar problems and the OP himself taught some of the materials at undergrad and graduate levels. Everybody is wrong and only the teacher in question is right?
@scaaahu not necessarily, but often in such cases there are at least two groups (of professors, students etc.) on different sides. It's well possible that the persons the OP talks with are just those close to him, who logically belong to the "party" other than the allegedly problematic teacher's.
@Nemo I have no interest to engage in a debate about whether the teacher is right. We are supposed to help the OP to resolve the problem (he does not want to withdraw the class). This answer assumes that the OP is at fault (the teacher is right about her lecture and grading). That's why I had the comment. End of discussion here.
Figuring out whether the OP might be wrong, should also help the OP to solve the problem.
@Dilworth But the question isn't, "Am I correct in thinking my teacher's grading is wrong?". We haven't been asked to analyse samples of the teacher's grading or anything along those lines. The question is, "How to deal with a professor who grades assignments and exams incorrectly?". If we start questioning the OP's axiom (that the grading is incorrect) then the answers become less useful to future readers of the question.
@JBentley, I'm not questioning the OP's belief in his/her axiom. I'm explaining the student the obvious: that he/she might be wrong, and that's why they need to stick to facts and not opinions on what the teacher understands. This way they can solve optimally the problem.
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20075 | Will dismissal from one graduate school affect me applying to another?
I was dismissed from my Masters program due to bad grades. I also have a mention in my records that say that I might have used last years homework. I did not copy and they had no proof that I copied per se. I couldn't care less about my grades at the time and I deeply regret doing what I did. Is there hope for me in applying to grad schools in the future?
Additionally, I am an international student. Can someone tell me if all this will affect my getting a VISA?
Unfortunately, your transcripts are likely going to be required at time of application to any other program, and you can assume that you will be asked about your poor grades during the application process. That said, you're not the first person to have made bad decisions in the past, so I would definitely still apply.
One thing I would strongly advise not doing is attempting to hide the fact you have poor grades by simply not sending the transcript, and pretending it didn't happen. Doing so will almost guarantee career-threatening problems later on when someone finds out what you did (and it won't be hard, there will be a gap of a few years you won't be able to explain, and all the officials at the other university still know that you were there).
I have no idea about the visa.
It shouldn't affect the visa process itself, but will obviously affect the chances of getting an offer letter which would allow for the visa application.
Is there hope for me in applying to grad schools in the future?
Yes, but you will need a convincing argument for why graduate school will go better next time than it did the first time you tried it. It's easy to say "I didn't care about grades and didn't work very hard, but I'll work harder this time," while actually working harder is much more difficult, so vague excuses may be discounted.
You could get lucky and find a school that is happy to give you another chance (perhaps a less prestigious department, which sees potential in you beyond what's typical for their students). You might also be able to give a more concrete excuse for your past grades (for example, if there were external factors in your life that troubled you last time but won't apply this time). Otherwise, the best way to demonstrate that things have changed is probably to succeed at something else. Finding a job and doing well at it can show that you are now more mature and responsible than when you were a student, and successfully taking a few classes part-time can also look good.
So I'd suggest following a two-part strategy. Try applying again with the best explanations/excuses you can offer, and see whether it works. If it doesn't, then you should start thinking about longer-term methods to demonstrate that you've changed.
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40 | Submitting a subset of my work to ArXiv
I've been thinking of publishing a subset of my work in fluid dynamics to arXiv. I realize the following about arXiv:
ArXiv isn't a journal
I would need to be endorsed to submit an article on arXiv
The reasons I would like to submit a subset of my work to arXiv are:
It would only be a subset of my work thereby NOT negating my chances of publishing work in a regular journal.
I would like to disseminate information to the society as soon as possible.
Does anyone have any thoughts or comments about this? Is there something that I'd need to feel uneasy about?
I realize that there has been another question regarding submission of work to arXiv and I read it here.
"Does anyone have any thoughts or comments about this?" is awfully open-ended. It might help to ask something a bit more concrete.
Most journals allow publishing a manuscript that already appeared verbatim on arXiv, so you shouldn't worry about publishing only a subset of your work.
Opinions on when to submit things to arXiv vary both between and within fields. See
To Post or Not to Post: Publishing to the arXiv Before Acceptance
How to use arXiv?
for lots of opinions. You should talk to your advisor/colleagues who can give you a better sense of how people in your field think about this.
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45554 | Research statement for professional versus research master's programs
Are research statements evaluated differently for professional and research master's programs? If so, how do they differ?
Further, I have read that admissions to research programs are more competitive than for professional programs. So can I take admission into professional degree first, and then transition to a research degree in order to increase my odds of admission?
I am an international applicant applying for computer science programs in the US. I do not wish to go for a PhD directly, so I am looking to do a master's first.
P.S. Sorry for asking two questions. But they seem to be fairly related to me.
...and a professional masters degree is... what, exactly?
@Nicholas The one without a thesis requirement.
Does a professional Master's thesis have any research component at all? Is it comprised only of taught post-graduate level papers? If this is the case, the concept of a research statement for a professional master's seems out of place.
Does "professional masters" mean "taught masters"?
@Nicholas I am not sure whether it does or does not include any research component at all.
Since I am an international applicant, I have little knowledge about the various masters programs.
You don't mention what field you're in or what country you want to apply to, but let me answer for computer science in the US.
Is the evaluation of research statement done differently for professional masters and research masters? If so, what are these differences.
Professional masters programs won't ask for a research statement at all.
There are two types of computer science masters degrees in the US. One is the research masters, which requires a thesis in addition to advanced coursework. The other is the professional masters, which is entirely based on coursework, with no research component. Research masters students generally work with faculty advisors on a research project and may even be funded by teaching or research assistantships that include a tuition waiver. Professional masters students pay full tuition (or get their employers to pay for them), and take classes and nothing else.
can I take admission into professional degree first and then make a transition to research degree in order to increase my odds of admission?
In my experience, absolutely not!
Professional masters degrees are considered to be terminal degrees. Because they lack a research component, they are not considered pathways to a research degree.
I am an international applicant applying to US. So I do not with to go for PhD directly.
Why not? At least in my department, a strong majority of PhD students are international, and most of them apply as undergraduates. And I don't think my department is special in that regard.
Well actually I need to support my family. So I cannot spare 4 years of PhD right away. Anyway, thanks for the answer. Just one more thing. Will need recommendation letters for professional masters too?
@spunkpike: In general you will need recommendation letters for admission to any sort of higher education program in the US.
@aeismail Are these to be written with the same approach for both? I realize this is not a discussion forum but I would really appreciate any help..
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42648 | German postdoc salaries (TV-L E14)
What does "TV-L (E14, 100% position)" mean in terms of gross and net pay? What lifestyle does this buy you in Berlin?
This is in the context of a postdoc at a research institute.
Have you seen this similar question: What is a “TV-L 13” position?. It looks like the answer should still be helpful.
That other page tells me that there is a civil servant payscale, but all of the links are to pages in German, which don't translate well using google
Again not a direct answer, but one of the best ways to find out would be to contact the university and ask.
This would be straightforward advice to someone mulling an offer, but is less useful to those in earlier stages of the application process.
I don't think so. It is a reasonable question to ask even before applying. If you contact the right office, you could probably ask and get a general answer without identifying yourself.
Some time ago I answered a similar question about TV-L E13 positions, where I tried to explain how to navigate the civil servant payscale linked in the previously mentioned answer. Mutatis mutandis, the information should be applicable to E14 positions as well.
You are right that TV-L is a civil servant payscale. Postdocs commonly are placed in the E-13 or E-14 scale, where the latter is higher (but usually comes with more responsibilities). The gross pay starts at just under 3579.34 EUR per month for Berlin. Very recently the pay scales have been renegotiated, so I believe it might have gone up a bit. This amount is the first step in the scale, depending on your experience you might start at a higher step.
The net amount depends on your specific circumstances, for example if you are married and if you are a member of a church. For single persons that are not registered with a church the net amount is around 2100 EUR a month. This includes health insurance. You should be able to live decently in Berlin for this money.
The details can be found on the Öffentlicher Dienst website (in German, but you would want the table at the bottom).
Two additions: E14 is usually applied when you have responsibility for people, meaning you are a group leader but not yet a professor (supervising a PhD student although your professor is the official supervisor does not count here). Besides health insurance also unemployment insurance is included and contributions to a pension fund is made.
(This is maybe more suited to be a comment than an answer, but I don't have enough reputation to leave comments.)
About the phrase "100% position" in your question: This means that once you have followed the instructions in other answers and comments to identify the amount of money which corresponds to E14 on the TV-L payscale, then your gross pay is 100% of the amount labelled Brutto, and your net pay is 100% of the amount labelled Netto.
The reason this is explicitly stated is because other types of positions, such as 50% position or 65% position, also exist. I don't believe this is ever the case for postdocs, but it's the norm for PhD students. For example, a PhD student might have a "TV-L (El3, 50% position)", meaning that after one identifies the amount in the TV-L table corresponding to E13, the gross pay is only 50% of that amount.
A tip for reading these German payscale tables: the levels E1 to E15 are related to what sort of job it is and how qualified you are. PhDs and postdocs are at the E13 and E14 levels. For each of these levels, there are sub-levels 1 to 5 or 6, relating to how long you have occupied a position at this level. Over the years, you progress automatically up these levels 1 to 5 or 6
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17988 | How to stop feeling guilty about unfinished work?
My biggest challenge as a PhD student is best summarized by the following from PHD Comics:
"Piled Higher and Deeper" by Jorge Cham
www.phdcomics.com
A consequence of working in research is that the end is never in sight - unlike other jobs, there is always more work for you to do.
I am pretty good at making sure to take care of myself, because I know it's important. I can force myself to go for a run, get something to eat, participate in a regular activity that's not related to academia. But I can't turn off the voice in my head that keeps nagging me about the work that's waiting for me back at the office.
This is especially true when there are deadlines and people relying on me to meet them. On top of my research, I have mentees I should be spending more time with, students we won't be able to hire if I don't get my grant-writing act together, collaborators who keep asking when I'm going to write up that work we did together last summer. If I don't do this, nobody else will; it's not like a normal workplace, where your boss can reassign an important task if you are too overloaded to handle it.
So, my question is:
How do you avoid feeling guilty about all the unfinished (and unfinishable) work in academia?
I am looking for specific, practical techniques based on research and/or personal experience, not suggestions that you just thought of but have never tried.
One technique I've tried with limited success is to make a daily to-do list that is limited to three items, and tell myself that I'm not allowed to feel guilty about not doing things that aren't on the list. It works when I'm not terribly busy... but most of the time it doesn't.
Related questions:
How to avoid thinking about research in your free time is related, but I'm not trying to avoid thinking about research in my free time. I'm just trying to avoid feeling guilty about research in my free time.
Also related is How should I deal with discouragement as a graduate student? but those answers seem to address how to convince yourself that your efforts are worthwhile. I (usually) realize that my efforts are worthwhile, I don't know how to convince myself that I'm putting in "enough" effort (whatever that means).
"A consequence of working in research is that the end is never in sight - unlike other jobs, there is always more work for you to do. " -> As Christina said, your view is very idealized. There is not much of a difference regarding the "State of Done" between project based work and academia. A lot of people do week- or even year-long project work; nothing special about your job in that regard ;) My knowledge of human nature says you are about 25 years old right? This is the age I observed many people seeing themselves in a very special situation (me too) that really isn't. Time will tell you:)
I'm just speaking from personal experience - in other jobs I had I never felt like the work was endless.
@rocinante There is nothing much to be done about your feelings - I really don't think that's true, either
I'm not sure if this question can really be answered here; the source of guilt can be very straightforward or very deep-rooted and varies greatly from person to person, and dealing with those feelings can range from simple self-reassurance all the way to identifying underlying causes through possible therapy. You're touching on potentially deep psychological behaviors. Personally, I suggest taking the "little-kid-asking-why" self-examination approach: Why do you feel guilty? Why? Why? Once you get deep enough and hit a wall coming up with answers, you know you've gotten to the good stuff!
@JasonC I think I got some pretty good answers :)
@ff524 By the way, that isn't necessarily proof that Santa doesn't exist. He might just have a sick sense of humor.
Unlike other jobs? Maybe you need to reconsider this. Most jobs are never-ending, and many are even completely unrewarding. Imagine retail. You will never "finish" retail. There aren't even nice sub-tasks to finish...
@romkyns I'm just extrapolating from my own experience, non-research jobs I've had felt very different to me. I think Suresh nicely explains what I'm trying to say in his answer.
@JasonC: but Santa is defined as knowing whether you've been bad or good; able to give gifts; and inclined to give gifts to those who have been good. So "The Problem of Pain" applies in full. If the thing that gives gifts has a sick sense of humour then by definition it is not Santa giving the gifts :-)
@SteveJessop A reasonable assertion. However, the ISO Santa Specification leaves the details of "gifts" up to the implementation, and therefore does not explicitly prohibit the gift of suffering/pain.
Another resource could be Neil Fiore's book, "The Now Habit: A Strategic Program for Overcoming Procrastination and Enjoying Guilt-Free Play". OP doesn't mention procrastination as an issue, but OP may be able to relate to the 'guilt-free play' side of the book. In fact he does speak some of phd student, iirc.
@eflat I own the book, never got around to reading it ;)
Ha! There you go then.
While I'm here, another stray thought -- the concept of acceptance. One of the things that struck me during one of my forays into GTD, was that having lists of projects and next actions was kinda depressing because one is never truly done. It made sense but one sense of anxiety was replace with another for me. I had to accept that I'm always going to be working on things and have things to do, continuously and always and forever.
Be satisfied and happy with what you are currently doing. For me, this is a direct relief.
Sorry to bring up the old thread, but do you think you feel guilty because your unfinished researches or other academia works?
tl;dr: Keep forgiving yourself and keep working.
I am having the same problem, and only recently it got better.
I have it only for open-ended work (scientific projects, other personal projects - everything which is of type "I should have it done" and the same time it is not closed; even worse when others are waiting for results). It seems to be very different from "normal" work (when someone gives me a particular task) and work with an expiry date.
The wisest (and most successful) piece of advice I found is this one (from Smart Guy Productivity Pitfalls - Book of Hook, which has more good points and is definitely worth reading):
6. Do not overpromise to make up for poor productivity. There's a tendency when we're falling behind to try to overcompensate with future promises. "When I'm done, it'll be AWESOME" or "I know I'm late, but I'm positive I'll be done by Monday". By doing those things we just build more debt we can't pay off, and that will eventually lead to a catastrophic melt down when the super final absolutely last deadline date shows up. Just get shit done, don't talk about how you're going to get shit done.
Also, somewhat related is forgiving yourself for being not productive enough (constantly feeling guilty does not help; not only for me, but it seems it does not work for most of people):
The key finding was that students who'd forgiven themselves for their initial bout of procrastination subsequently showed less negative affect in the intermediate period between exams and were less likely to procrastinate before the second round of exams. Crucially, self-forgiveness wasn't related to performance in the first set of exams but it did predict better performance in the second set.
And from a bit different angle, from Elizabeth Gibert's TED talk on genius
(it's about treating inspiration, but it is similar for everything - no matter how good you are, you won't do everything; so why should you be bothered by missing a few things?):
And [Tom Waits]'s speeding along, and all of a sudden he hears this little fragment of melody, that comes into his head as inspiration often comes, elusive and tantalizing, and he wants it, you know, it's gorgeous, and he longs for it, but he has no way to get it. He doesn't have a piece of paper, he doesn't have a pencil, he doesn't have a tape recorder.
So he starts to feel all of that old anxiety start to rise in him like, "I'm going to lose this thing, and then I'm going to be haunted by this song forever. I'm not good enough, and I can't do it." And instead of panicking, he just stopped. He just stopped that whole mental process and he did something completely novel. He just looked up at the sky, and he said, "Excuse me, can you not see that I'm driving?" (Laughter) "Do I look like I can write down a song right now? If you really want to exist, come back at a more opportune moment when I can take care of you. Otherwise, go bother somebody else today. Go bother Leonard Cohen."
And from my personal stuff (I mean things that I found helpful):
using to-do list only for task (i.e. things I know I can do in a few hour max), not projects (it's depressing to have "finish this paper" on the same list for long months, cf. relevant PhD Comics strip),
underpromise and overdeliver to oneself; i.e. committing to do each day less task than expected (this way, with the same results, it's "wow, I did things from the list plus 2 extra" instead of "I only made almost half of the first point out of 7"; extrapolating one's maximal efficiency does not work...).
Thanks for an answer that isn't about time management, I think I had enough of those :)
@rocinante The guilt is not for working too hard, it's despite working hard enough (by all objective and subjective measures). It's not rational, but people often feel things that are not rational.
There were several very helpful answers, I am accepting this one because it gives a helpful answer and suggests some really interesting further reading/viewing.
Saw this answer referenced in another question, and joined the community just to say how powerful I found "Keep forgiving yourself and keep working." Thank you.
"wow, I did things from the list plus 2 extra" instead of "I only made almost half of the first point out of 7";
I think what also may be important is put the right priorities and split the big tasks to smaller subtasks. Also, there are a lot of suggestions to try to commit to the process, not the end result for the big tasks. Instead of "write thesis", which cannot be done in a day easily, you can create a task "write one page of thesis", which can, and do it every day untill it's good enough.
Of course, that should be applied smartly too, keeping the end goal in sight, otherwise you can get stuck for 20 years writing the same thesis day by day because it's never "good enough". ;)
There are two threads in answers here that I'd like to respond to:
Research is just like any other job. The tools needed to manage guilt are no different.
Yes. and no.
The nitty-gritty of work - deadlines, working in groups, answering to a 'boss' - are the same. That is indeed true. What's different about research work that I think ff524 is alluding to is the "freedom trap". Because research work involves more freedom and more unstructured effort, and there's a direct correlation between output and success (not effort and success of course), the anxiety is not external ("my boss needs this done", or "I can't let my team down") but extremely internal ("I am an inferior researcher if I'm not working all the time" or "someone else is getting ahead in their career while I'm slacking off").
And this is incessant. Every minute spent not working is tied up in internal accusations. And it's exhausting. And that's what we'd like to be free of.
Do I have an answer ? Not really. It's a slow process of realizing that
feeling guilty about work is a meta-worry that doesn't lead anywhere constructive (this realization only works in flashes :))
all the other people racing ahead will also need to rest at some point.
a guilt-free mind is clear and prepared for research (whether it's leisure time or not: as ff524 says, this is not necessarily about partitioning work and free time so much as not feeling guilty when not thinking about work. Indeed, one of the pleasures of being a researcher is that I can think about my work whenever I like, even when day dreaming on a bus to work (ahem).
In that respect, Piotr Migdal's answer about
forgiving yourself and working
is spot on. Guilt is rarely a constructive force, and it can lead you to make bad decisions to compensate. Blowing off that paper deadline ? it's ok. Dropping a fascinating research project because you're overcommitted ? that's ok too. Not spending enough time with students ? Hard to wave off, but it's ok.
But forgiving yourself only works if you trust yourself,
and again the Tom Waits analogy is brilliant. You have to trust that blowing off one paper deadline won't make you a lazy git who doesn't write any papers. That missing one student meeting doesn't make you an abusive advisor. That ignoring a collaboration doesn't make you a toxic personality. That if you can learn to trust in your own research instincts and drive that you'll be able to pick up and go full steam ahead, but this time with less guilt than before.
This is not a time-management answer, and you didn't want one ! So all that I can say is that reducing guilt is a slow process (I haven't figured it out yet), and you have to keep reminding yourself to forgive and trust.
+1 Thanks for expressing my question so much better than I could
To answer your specific question:
How do you avoid feeling guilty about all the unfinished (and unfinishable) work in academia?
You try to come to the understanding that there is always more work to be done, and that this is the way it is, not just in academia, but also in almost every other walk of professional life.
Disentangle the feelings of guilt and anxiety. There is work that you should have done/be doing (e.g. to test an idea fully, rather than assume the result; meeting deadlines) and there is work you could have done/or be doing (e.g. new ideas/extensions).
Concentrate on completing all the work that you know must be done. Set yourself practical goals and list them, marking them off when achieved.
Set out time for the other tasks you know need to be completed. e.g. 2 hours a week for meeting student A, 1 hour for student B, 2 hours for grant writing. Stick to those arrangements. Now add in time for "fun" work stuff - perhaps not directly related to your main goals, but perhaps which interest you at the moment.
Keeping a track of how much time you are spending on different types of task, and seeing how you are progressing in each activity, will allow you to fine-tune your time-management.
Having time set aside for each activity type - and sticking to your timetable - allows you to feel less anxious about the work you should be doing, because you know that you've boxed off time in your schedule to set to work on them. It gives you the confidence to say, okay, I'm not doing mission-critical stuff right now, but it's the time of the week for reading/meeting people/setting up webpage and I know that I'll be back on that task when I've the time allocated for it.
Is this what you do (set aside time for each activity)? It sounds like the kind of thing that is nice in theory, but my actual work is much too messy and unpredictable for.
@ff524: I think my suggestion goes a little further than your daily list. As you say, your list works to get you through day-by-day, However, you are looking for a longer-term solution, some structure that helps you avoid anxiety when some activities perforce have to be missed.
And yes, this is how I run my professional time. I have "default" activities - Research/Teaching/Reading/Lunch with which I block out most of my days. Activities come up randomly, and they are assigned time, overwriting one of the above, based on urgency or workload on the other activities.
@ff524: Lunch is important.
I think I have too much going on for this to work for me - when I'm not too busy and can fit in all the "have-to-dos" the list works for me. When I am too busy to fit it all in, the list (or schedule, or whatever) goes out the window and the guilt starts. I think I'm looking more for mental tricks than better time management and prioritization.
"Disentangle the feelings of guilt and anxiety." - This is about the first thing I did as a grad student
I am currently a sort-of-senior-ish postdoc, and hence in the somewhat awkward career phase where basically everything that does not have a clear other responsible seems to end up in my inbox. The process I use to not get overwhelmed with the sheer amount of wacky tasks that end up in my inbox is rather similar to what Nicolas does. It works for me (most of the time), it may work for you as well.
Basically, every few days, I take an hour to sit down with my calendar and my TODO list and plan. For each task taking more than say 15 mins to execute, I reserve a slot on my calendar. I try to arrange so that each task meets its deadline, and keep some free space for incoming urgent things and some lump time for short administrative tasks not worth mentioning explicitly. When I see that there simply is no way to plan everything so that all tasks meet their deadline, I make compromises, i.e., drop or delay tasks, and (and this is the difficult part) do not feel guilty at all about that. It works for me, because I know from my calendar that there simply was no time to, say, write the paper for this medium-level conference and at the same time write this super-important grant application. The difference here is the certainty from your planning that everything simply could not be done at the same time. There is no point in feeling guilty about something that you ultimately know you could not change.
However, if that happens all the time, you have a different problem. Then your problem is not that you should not feel guilty about not getting your work done, but that you should not bite off more than you can chew (== commit to more than what you can deliver). You say in a comment that your second-biggest challenge as a PhD student is that you are over-committed. It seems like your "second-biggest" challenge causes the "biggest" challenge - you commit to things you cannot do, and hence feel guilty. The fix for that is, again, to plan, and not commit to things you know you cannot do in the first place.
I would also like to stress that pretty much nothing in your situation is particular to academia. In most jobs, it is an illusion that, if you cannot do all your tasks, somebody else will swoop in and have you covered.
Just extrapolating from my own experience. In other places I've worked, the "boss" spreads the work around so it's manageable, or else you're advised to find a new job because your boss has unreasonable expectations. Doesn't work when I'm the boss of me :(
@ff524 Depends on your job / level. Most jobs outside of academia that people with a PhD would do do not work like that, I suppose. EDIT: see for instance the high burn-out rates.
Stop saying "I have too much going on, and nothing will work."
Stop self-defeating is the probably the first step. Of course we have "too much going on," that's what we say when we lose control. Do realize that "too busy" can be a cause, but most of the time, "too busy" is more of a symptom.
Realizing that no one can drink up a whole river
Be it work, research, and teaching, they all work like a giant wheel or river that keep moving. No one can take the whole activity and "finish" it. Once I have realized that I am just moving things along from less to more refined shapes. It's noble to be a more responsible researcher/teacher, but the mindset has to be correctly set before burning one self out.
Use an urgency and importance matrix
Whenever I got a task I mentally assigned it into a quadrant of the the urgency vs. importance matrix. Then when I plan my weeks, I make sure to distribute 2/3 of available time to all the high impact activities. For the rest 1/3, I use it to deal with urgent and low-impact items or emerging items.
Avoid paper-based To-Do list
To-do list can be a confusing way to manage time because the whole process is high maintenance (keeping a list, some sub-lists, and constant correction and update) and frustrating (the list keeps growing, and yes, crossing out tasks feels great, but then you have a messy list.)
I just use EverNote to document my projects and tasks. When they are done, I move the whole index thread to "Archive." Index cards are a also a better alternative to a to-do list. When I am in a meeting or walking around, I put all strayed thoughts onto an inexpensive composition book.
As a side note, capturing strayed thoughts has a side effect on me as well. Most of the time, I kept mentally regurgitating works that I need to do and the long chain of tasks really bothered me. Once I spilled them out onto a piece of paper, then I stopped thinking about them for a while. When I have access to a computer, I change the thoughts into EverNote note page. This simple step empties up my mind to do some other more useful thinking.
Say no, say it a lot!
What about the urgent and low-impact? I just say no. This includes, but not limited to: grant proposal invitation sent to me when the grant is due in 5 days, meetings that really do not need me to be there (but I always attend the monthly staff meeting and faculty research meeting, just to be collegial), etc.
I used to suck at saying no, now I have a lot of elaborated ways to put it. And what's my elaborated way? Just say, "Thanks for the invitation/thinking of me. I am sorry that I can't help this round." And leave it like that.
One great trick for those who cannot say no is: you do not have to answer right there and right at that moment. Tell the people that you'll give it a good thought, and then say no afterwards.
Block your time in your calendar way ahead
Don't start filling in the calendar passively. Reserve your own time many weeks ahead. I fill them up with protected writing time slots. I write the best in the morning and love to do coding in the afternoon so I sprinkle all these little 30-, 60- or 90-minute slots across my calendar.
And I agree with @Nicholas' answer that this is a very useful technique. And this is not something that "sounds like the kind of thing that is nice in theory." I use this and Nicholas probably does too, and it really works. The harder you guard your time slots, the better it works.
No more, just three tasks a day
Leo Babauta's Zen to Done is an inspiring read and I'd recommend to people who think they have no time. I have adopted the idea of doing three Most Important Tasks per day. There are days that I barely got one done, there are days that I finished three by 1:00 pm and then spent the rest reading or learning new stuff.
Become a time freak
I time my tasks with a kitchen timer. I don't strictly follow pomodoro technique but I adopted the spirit of it. The way I operate is that I dedicated a chunk of time to a project, move it forward as much as I can, and when time's up, I consider my job for that project on that day is done. I do not binge work, because binge working is very prone to errors.
One very interesting side story. A colleague was chit chatting in my office and sudden the timer went off! The colleague jokingly asked me if her time is up. I explained to her my system. And oddly... since then whenever she visits me, she would add this question "Can I have __ minutes of your time?" before talking to me. Now everyone does that to me; and I do the same to everyone else.
Time to time, chaos and mess happen to us because we have developed an image of being easy going and flexible, two major magnets for chaotic and messy people. In fact, we don't have to. A good dose of rigidity gets you off a lot of ad hoc committees, "emergency" meetings, etc.
Identify what manifests the guilt
This is very important because the source of the guilt dictates how you resolve it. For me, the major source is fearing that I have upset the collaborators. I once dropped the ball on a secondary analysis and delayed it for half a year. Then this job gradually became low-impact/low-urgency. I decided instead of feeling awkward, I just went up to her after a meeting and apologize for not being able to finish the project. In fact, she didn't care as much as I expected; I felt a lot better having told her my thought.
Another fear is that people may think I am incompetent or chaotic. And for that, I have come to be very comfortable with myself. I resolved this issue simply for two facts: i) I am probably the person who cares the most what I look like in other people's mind. And ii) All other people are also busily caring how they look like in others' mind.
Practicing being mindful has many positive impacts on how I deal with these negative emotions. Now whenever I feel bad/good, I emotionally zoom out and look at the big picture, trace the connections, and examine the dynamics. I feel having this little slight detachment with emotion allows me to better tackle (either to avoid or to exploit) these emotions. Don't just feel guilty, ask why, why, why, why, and why. Yes, ask five times. Usually for me, three to four associations usually get me to the root cause, just like how they can get Toyota to their problems' cause.
Closing remark
I guess none of what I said is new. When it comes to time management there isn't really a silver bullet. From my experience, so far I have boiled down to only one truth: All time management techniques work if you use it regularly and seriously.
When it comes to time management there isn't really a silver bullet - I honestly wasn't expecting this to be a "time management" question
@ff524, nope, it's not. I just shoved a time-management answer to your question on dealing with guilt because of competing interests and lack of productivity. I guess your to-do list example had made me changed how I answered this question. Instead of lamenting how we deal with guilt, I'd rather suggest a more proactive approach to minimize guilt. Anyhow, I wish at least some of the answer will help you. Best of luck.
@rocinante People immersed in their work don't have time to pontificate feeling guilt about not working hard enough. - I really don't think that's true
@ff524, for some people this can be true. For instance, a psychological state of mind known as in the flow can fend out intruding thoughts, though it may not sustain for a very long time, but having this trait time to time can perhaps secure some productivity. I do agree that guilt may still sneak up and hit when we're off working, in the shower, or in all other times.
@Penguin_Knight I really agree with your "mindfulness". Whenever I feel overwhelmed with guilt, or anxiety or stress or some other negative emotion, then I take the time out to start writing what I am feeling and why. It helps me process my feelings and I am usually able to gain some perspective. I have never done this for positive emotions like you suggested. I'm gonna try it. Thanks.
@rocinante at the moment of immersion, maybe not. But certainly around it. And pontificate is a harsh term to use for a question that I personally would love to have an answer to, even after many years of being in this 'business'.
How do you avoid feeling guilty about all the unfinished (and unfinishable) work in academia?
First of all, recognize the difference between unfinished and unfinishable. Yes, you can always do more, but your duty is to do what you promised. This means that learning what your own capacities are and only committing to what you know you can do* will eliminate much future guilt. The guilt comes mainly from the unfinished work that you promised to do, not from not doing other work beyond that. (If you actually feel guilty about not doing things you never committed to, I think you need to reevaluate your worldview. You can feel regret about those things, but there should be no guilt.)
Secondly, the "to-do list." It feels great when a to-do list is cleared, but, the guilt only increases when you fail to clear it. It's really just another form of the failure to fulfil a commitment, but privately. So there are a couple of variations on the to-do list that eliminate that problem.
The "to-mostly-do list" this is a large list of small specific things you plan to do in a bit more than the next day, the point is to make it hard to actually clear the list in a day, but easy to progress through it. That way, since you know the list is more than a day's worth of work, you are more psychologically satisfied with your progress and less dissatisfied with the unfinished items. Also seeing at the end of one day some of the things you'll need to do the next day can help increase productivity the next day.
The timetable: break up your day into small periods of time for each task. You're promising yourself to "work on X for an hour" rather than to "finish X," and you can be satisfied even if you ran into problems and didn't finish X.
Thirdly, I think you're not taking free time seriously enough. It really takes a shift in attitude to think of your free time as time in which you're not supposed to work as opposed to time in which you're allowing yourself not to work. I don't know if anyone can tell you how to make that shift, though.
Of course, all of this breaks when there's a close external deadline (grant/paper submission). Then you just work, eat, sleep, and work until you're done (but no time to feel guilty there).
*Actually, it's more complicated than "only committing to do what you know you can do." Sometimes it pays off to take a risk and promise something that you aren't 100% sure about, but when you take a risk you need to know that it's a risk and be prepared to fail.
I know I'm overcommitted, that is my second-biggest challenge as a PhD student :(
What I found to work best for me is separating work from leisure time. I work in the office and I don't work at home (except for emails). If I have to work during the weekend or even until the morning for some deadline, I do that in the office (it's important that wherever you are this is possible, don't try to force your way in).
When I go to home I don't feel guilty because I don't have my computer (even if I have my files synchronized, just in case), and because I have learnt that if I don't rest properly (at some point, for some time) then I'm not productive and more time gets wasted, so it's better to simply forget about work and doing anything else (or nothing at all).
Everything else is done with two basic principles:
prioritization of tasks. If some people depend on me for some task, I give a high priority to it. If something is unclear, it gets a low priority (it will get clear through time, probably), etc. Closest deadlines get higher priority, etc. It's similar to the important-urgent matrix, but you probably have some subconscious algorithm to assign priority to those things, basically try to imagine what would make you feel more anxious and do it first. Depending on your sources of anxiousness this method will work better or worse for your career, but it will reduce your anxiousness (if we don't consider how career progression would interfere with that).
Don't bite (much) more than you can chew. Sometimes people feel work is just too much because it is too much. This really depends on how much you want to push your limits (of workaholism), but doing so for too long (or any amount of time) is usually a bad idea, unless you are willing to fully sacrifice everything for your work, reaching your top productivity for some time and then suiciding as a disposable researcher. Consider that if you stay healthy and focused you will probably be more productive, and you will be able to provide more value and do more work on each of your hours. So your health and leisure time is not interfering with your work, it's enabling it.
If all of the above fails, there is a last thing you can try. Finish PhD asap (before it kills you), get subordinates (e.g. PhD students) and focus on reading and forwarding mails so that they do all the work. You can do that from anywhere with your mobile phone, like a boss.
+1, though I feel you are in for a nasty surprise once you reach professor level.
@xLeitix at this pace, I don't think I'll ever get to that level, unless life-extension technologies make some serious progress. Anyway, this depends a lot on the person and the institution, in some places all professors are tenured and some people relax a lot when they get tenured. It also depends on "[management and] delegation skills", which are not as easy as I may have implied (in a somewhat ludic tone) in my last paragraph, but I wanted to give hope as a last resource and hope takes its purest form on a carrot on a stick, doesn't it?
I don't want to separate work from the rest of my life, I get the best ideas during "leisure" time
@ff524 I send a mail to myself when that happens, usually from my phone because the computer is off, because I'm not working. However that means your brain is working in the background, you should try to disconnect from work and focus on the people that are with you (or the person), the movie, the game or whatever. The fact that you get good ideas during "leisure" time means that when you are working you are too tired or stressed to have those ideas and you get them when your brain can "breathe", in short, you are doing it wrong, sorry. Get some rest, you will get better ideas during work.
I don't believe that getting good ideas during leisure time means you're "doing it wrong". Ideas come when they come and don't necessarily respect your work/leisure schedule regardless of your rest/stress levels (at least in my experience). When an idea comes during leisure time I choose whether to play with it immediately or just write down enough that I'll remember it next time I sit down to work. I think what helps me not feel (too) guilty is allowing myself "leisure time" where there's no obligation to get any work done, not forbidding myself to think about work during that time.
@Liana is not about any forbidding, that's very, very wrong {ref}. That's exactly the point of separating (e.g. by context home/office) personal life and work, providing your mind a context so that the corresponding thoughts flow naturally (exactly the opposite to forbidding, which is fighting the natural flow). You are not going to enjoy spare time and you are not going to be productive at work if you are too busy on fighting your own brain and your own thoughts.
To grow your research trajectory, you need to prune your least-favorite projects.
In research, you're never, ever going to be able to finish everything (no matter how many holidays you work). You need to figure out how to cut out some of your projects, so that the best ones have enough time, energy, and resources to grow.
In practice, this means re-framing your unfinished projects as successful prioritization decisions.
You started a project, then thought of a better idea. You choose to leave the first project unfinished so you can dedicate your time to the more exciting idea.
You started a project, then found that it was unexpectedly hard. You choose to leave it unfinished, freeing up time for multiple easier projects.
If you make these decisions consciously and deliberately, you can spend more time on exciting projects - and less time on projects that you're only doing out of guilt.
Disclaimer: I don't have psychology background, I have only read the first two answers and skimmed the rest and comments, and I have no affiliation to any product.
I think, psychologically, the only way to stop your guilt is to actually see that you have worked productively. If you have satisfaction on your work, usually when you have a remarkable result, then you can take a rest for weeks feeling guilt-free. Of course, this is not always a case, so you have to find other remarkable points that you can rely on everyday. Ask yourself, what is the last time you feel guilt-free on your unfinished work?
You mention about workplace, so how do employees not feel guilty about their unfinished work, even when they don't ask their boss? They just simply stop working at 5. Can make sure that your work always start at 9 and stop at 5 everyday? If you can stick to a plan, you don't fell guilty anymore.
But leisure time is when new ideas come, and having a flexible time plan is a gift. This noon I studied a book and felt tired and sleepy after two hours. Though I had only worked for two hours today, I know that feeling tired = giving 100% concentration. I rewarded myself a snack, a nap, and an hour of distracting on Academia writing this answer. I know that relaxing = producing, so I'm happy for being in progress.
Once I have an urge to answer yours, I know that if I don't write it to the point of feeling satisfactory, no one will (literally!). So presuming that I will overspend time for unwanted activities today or this week, how can I compensate that tomorrow or next week? To really do that, you need to track and analyze your working time. I find Manic Time (for Windows) and Smarter Time (for Android) are both good apps for this. The latter uses wifi signal to track your room-level location and can improve it suggestion by learning your habit (though not always accurate).
Last word, you will always find yourself feeling guilty. That feeling is normal, don't feel guilty for feeling guilty. The point is to adjusting your plan, and let it be.
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67198 | Can a graduate student friend of mine help me get into a different grad program at the same school?
I have a friend who'll be attending a graduate program in Physics, at a school I would be interested in for when I am applying to grad schools. However, I'm a CS major, so I'd be applying for that.
My question is what can he do that would help at all in making my admission more likely? I know the research he'll be doing is interdisciplinary (Physics and CS) so he'll have some interaction with CS. As a first-year grad student, he won't have much weight, but I'm still curious.
It is highly unlikely that they would have any ability to directly influence your admission to any graduate program. It is plausible that they could help you indirectly, however. They could be helpful for the following:
Scouting Professors/Labs: Finding out more about the interests and goals of the professors and labs that you would want to work with. This would help you tailor your application so that certain professors might be more likely to advocate for you, if they see a good fit for you in their lab.
Gathering Comparisons: Talking to recent grad students admitted to the program and seeing if they wouldn't mind sharing their application packets, so you could see what a successful candidate looks like (and what factors seem to be valued).
Informal Reference: If a professor who is reviewing your application packet has worked with your friend, they might ask them for some details about you. This is highly unlikely in your case, due to them being a new student and in a different department. I provided this kind of background once when my lab was evaluating an acquaintance of mine from my undergraduate program. It is fairly uncommon and would not sway the decision greatly.
Some of these things would have been more effective if they were performed earlier (e.g, gathering comparison CV's), since it gives you more time to beef up any weak spots that you have or to build on your strengths.
There are a couple of places where your friend may be able to help you. First, some programs have admission committees that include a few graduate students from their own program. Depending on the culture in the program, the student involvement may range from administrative/paperwork assistance to direct evaluation of the applicants. Unfortunately this opportunity is usually not provided to a first year student (or a student outside the department, for that matter). Moreover, if your application is not strong already it's hard for your friend to argue for your case in front of the faculty even if he/she really wants to promote your application.
A second possibility is the interview. During the interview/recruitment weekend, student involvement is quite common. You may be assigned a student host who will walk you around and make sure that you make it to your interviews. During social events (such as dinners, poster sessions, etc) you also have a chance to talk with students in the program. Usually after the recruitment the program will solicit opinions/comments from the students. Thus given the already positive relation between you and your friend, he/she will likely give you favorable reviews after the recruitment, making an admission offer more likely. Unfortunately, this scenario will only help you if you can make it to the interview stage in the first place. But if you've already reached the interview stage, the program most likely will give you an offer anyway, providing that you don't do anything stupid during the interview. So overall the effect of having a friend in the program is minimal in this regard.
To sum up: it's better to work on your GPA, research experience, GRE, etc., rather than wasting time trying to find "shortcuts" like this.
Given that the OP is in CS and the friend is in the physics department, it's even more unlikely that the friend will be on the OP's admission committee.
@ff524 Yes that's exactly right. I added this point to my answer.
Having your friend try to get on the admissions committee and push your application is unethical, unless he discloses his relationship with you. If he does disclose it, his "help" probably won't have a positive effect.
@DavidKetcheson you are right it's not ethical but I didn't say it was going to have a positive effect anyway. Also, you do realize that the whole idea of networking is based on the same idea right?
Depending on the school, one common question that is often asked is how likely is this student to accept our offer, particularly with fellowships. This is generally more an issue for the more middle of the road schools, especially ones in backwater locations. If this is the case, then anything you mention that indicates you have ties to the area can be helpful, because it signals more than just a passing interest in the school. In this context, your friend's presence there may be able to strengthen your application by helping you form a coherent argument as to why you want to attend that particular school.
For example, suppose you visited your friend at the school once for whatever reason. If that is true, mentioning that you have been to the school and liked something about the campus or whatever is helpful. If you have spent time at the school or the area for one reason or another and actually liked it, it is worth briefly including, because it helps to communicate your serious intent to relocate your life to that school.
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124069 | What can I do if my paper doesn't fit any arXiv category?
I have a paper (A) that has been submitted to a journal, but is as yet unreviewed, and another paper (B) that cites A.
(The citation is necessary because A includes details of the preparation of a dataset that is used in B. The preparation is not central to B, but it is relevant.)
I am about to submit B to another journal for review. I think it would be useful to have a preprint of A available (and cited in B) in case the reviewers of B want to see it. Posting a pre-print of A on ArXiv seems to be the ideal solution.
BUT, the paper does not fit any of the subject categories on ArXiv. It is in teh area of renewable energy engineering, while ArXiv is largely confined to Physics, Maths, Computer Science.
Should I submit the paper using a subject category that is only incidentally relevant (Physics and Society for instance, or Systems and Control), or is there an alternative pre-print archive with a borader range of categories?
See the question Preprint services other than arXiv (for other fields) for alternatives.
The archive engrXiv is dedicated to engineering. Wikipedia has a list of preprint servers where you might find other possibilities, but the engrXiv is the only one dedicated to engineering, as far as I can see.
There are other solutions to publish preprints as well: your institutional repository or generic archives such as figshare or Zenodo. Both accept articles and will provide a DOI.
You don't need an Arxive paper. The world got along fine with this sort of issue well before the development of Arxive.
For example:
paper A on apparatus: submitted to J. New Apparat.; emphasis on apparatus design, perhaps a little results but not main emphasis.
paper B on chemical: submitted to J. Wierd Chem.; emphasis on chemical info, cites previous work as "submitted".
[Or many other reasons for paper A and B having some relation, benefiting from citing each other, but also from separation. For instance if they are separate chemical findings but in a similar area by same researchers.]
As long as the findings are non controversial, you should be fine. If there is a question of controversy, accuracy (e.g. if you are claiming some really novel method that people many doubt) than sure they may want to see a preprint or even insist on combining the papers. But you can deal with that by just sending a copy of your submission to Journal A. And I wouldn't even do it pre-emptively. Just when/if challenged.
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2827 | How do you cite an internal report?
In the field of numerical modeling, Researchers often times find conference papers or journal articles which cites an internal report as the core of the paper. The main authors may have access to the internal report but what about the others? How does one cite an internal report in doing further research based on the main article?
As an example, This paper and this paper cite both of the papers below -
M. Saeedvafa and R. J. Asaro, “Transformation Induced Plasticity,” (LAUR-95-482, Los Alamos National Laboratory, 1995)
Saeedvafa, M, “A Constitutive Model for Shape Memory Alloys”, Internal MSC Report, (January 2002).
Do you have a non-paywalled example?
Look at the 2nd paper.
When you cite any source, you should give enough that the reader can, at least in principle, read that source for themselves. This information is especially important when you cite something as a source for further information, as it is in your example paper.
This paper presents the framework of such a complete phenomenological model outlined by Sayeedvafa (2002) that provides a description of a wide range of the observed behavior, which are both tractable from analytical as well as computational viewpoint.
For example, citations of technical reports (like your first example) should uniquely identify both the institution and the report, so that the reader knows who and how to ask for a copy. In particular, if the report is available on the web at a stable location, the citation should include a stable URL.
If a source is likely to be inaccessible to most readers (like your second example), you should also cite an accessible secondary source that describes the relevant content in detail. (If you really want to be helpful, the primary source citation should include a pointer like "Cited in [xxx].") Otherwise, you're just asking for the reader's blind trust that the source has the missing details you claim, or proves the result that you claim, or is as important as you claim, or even exists at all.
Citing a paper serves two roles. One is as a reference - a place for the reader to go and check the details. @JeffE's excellent answer deals with this case. For the completeness of the answer, let me discuss the other case.
The other role of citation is acknowledgment, that is, acknowledging that somebody else did that piece of work, rather than the authors. That should be the only reason for you to cite a paper which is not publicly available (for instance, because it is not yet ready, etc.) Some time you can find a citation that says "Author A., Private Communication", which usally means you had a bunch of emails from Mr. Author, and the result/claim/lemma is actually based on what he told you or the draft of his paper that he sent only to you, etc., and you fully acknowledge him for that contribution.
Personally, I never liked citation to Private communication, but they do exists.
"Citing a paper serves two roles." Citing serves a whole bunch of other purposes, too, but that is for another question.
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2178 | What are refereed and non-refereed journals?
What does it mean by publication in refereed and non-refereed journals? Are these terms applicable to conference papers too? Is there any relationship with peer-review?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refereed_journal
That Wikipedia link does not provide the answer directly.
Refereeing is the same as scholarly peer review. (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refereed_journal#Scholarly_peer_review).
In your original question, "referred journal" is a Freudian slip, perhaps on your part.
Refereed journals/conferences are the ones where the published papers have been peer-reviewed.
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19996 | Is it unethical for professional societies to offer conference discounts to members?
There is a recurring pattern I see in conferences organized by several professional associations. Two different conference fees are offered, X for members and Y for non-members, with Y>X. Often, the annual membership fee for said professional associations is less than Y-X, so becoming member is cheaper than paying the non-member fee. For example, for different reasons today I have stumbled upon the pages of this, this and this conference.
I can only see two possible reasons for this practice, both ethically dubious:
to force people to become members, increasing artificially the dimension of the professional association.
to "move" funds from the conference treasure to the association treasure, leaving them available for a larger number of activities.
Often conference fees are paid by research funds, while membership fees are paid personally by the researchers, so this practice also has unpleasant side-effects on their personal finances.
Questions:
Am I overlooking more plausible justifications for this practice? Do you agree with my analysis?
How ethical do you find this practice?
Should I raise the issue with the professional societies I am a member* of?
*: You can probably guess the reason why I am a member. :(
To be clear, are you asking about the practice of member discounts in general, or the specific case where the member discount exceeds the membership dues?
Some of this seems to be a matter of perspective. For example, your #1 could be restated as "Let's provide an incentive for people to become members, in hopes that this will inspire them to become active participants in the association's work, and ultimately benefit the professional community!"
@NateEldredge When I asked the question, my mind was on the case in which the member discount exceeds the dues, but of course the question could be generalized.
@NateEldredge When there are no conferences around, how many of those associations offer discounts for first-time members, "in hopes that this will inspire them to become active participants in the association's work"?
Lots of them. For instance, the American Mathematical Society (of which I am a member) offers a 50% discount in dues for those who have been members less than 5 years. Students, who are probably the largest pool of new members, pay dues which are even lower.
@NateEldredge Kudos to the AMS, but in my experience this is not common. SIAM doesn't do this, for instance. Reduced student rates are a different issue, in my view; it seems a general practice to have reduced rates for early-career participants, since they are expected to have less money to spend. I haven't asked "why are there student and non-student rates", but "why are there member and non-member rates"; in fact, typically you see all four options.
Let's provide an incentive for people to become members...inspire them to become active participants...and ultimately benefit the professional community! — But why should a professional society require me to pay to participate in activities that benefit my research community? To be clear: I understand the psychology; it's the ethics I'm less clear about.
@FedericoPoloni: another example is Sigma Xi: most inductees are students and they have reduced rates. They also used to have special rates for PostDocs/recent graduates and unemployed researchers (it is possible they still do but just is not advertised widely).
@WillieWong Maybe I did not explain myself. IMHO, having reduced conference rates for students is normal, and reduced rates for (non-student) members so low that applying for membership is cheaper is odd and possibly unethical. Nate Eldredge's argument is "it's to incentive people to join and contribute to the community". My rebuttal is "Then why does almost no society have other similar discounts, apart from conferences?". NE correctly provided a counterexample (AMS) of one who does. I do not see any offer like that on Sigma Xi, only student discounts, which are a different matter.
What ethical principle is being violated here? Why is it bad to create financial incentives to be part of a group?
@FedericoPoloni SIAM also offers discounted rates to members within 5 years of the Ph.D. It's pretty unusual to join such a society long after getting a Ph.D., so I think it amounts to the same thing as what the AMS does.
@DavidKetcheson What is being violated here IMO: if you agree with my tentative analysis, then the societies are using conferences as a way to get more funds in their treasures, taking them out of the conference treasures or raising the fees, and banking on the interest of researchers in conferences. The fees would be lower overall if the society wouldn't step in with this move. What you call a "discount" could also be called a "penalty for non-members", with the societies profitting from it. [cont]
In addition, reserachers are encouraged to join even if they are not interested in the initiatives of the society. Whenever the society tries to pull its weight and declares "we are an influent society with 20.000 members", it would be unethical from them not to add "but, actually, 10.000 of them subscribed just to get a conference discount and couldn't care less about our other activities".
Typically the organizations that do this are professional societies. And, as you mentioned, they have many more activities than just running the conference, so having membership fees separate from conference attendance fees allow them greater flexibility to manage their accounts.
Some places allow membership fees to be paid out of institute funds (this depends on the country and the situation, of course). However, many countries also make such professional expenses tax-deductible (after a certain threshold). Obviously it doesn't recoup the full cost of the membership, but it's better than nothing.
However, one additional point to consider is that most such conferences require that at least one of the authors of a presentation to be a member of the society. (Sometimes, this requirement falls on the presenter herself.)
In an organization I was involved in, we dropped the membership fee entirely (it was low, and you didn't get much for it) and just had a conference fee. If you attended the conference, you were a member for the year.
@JeremyMiles: This is what organizations such as MRS, but it is definitely a rarity among larger professional organizations.
So you are essentially confirming my second explanation?
at least one of the authors of a presentation to be a member of the society — What?? To repeat my earlier comment: How is this in any way justifiable?
@JeffE: As a control measure, actually—the APS and ACS already have roughly 10,000 talks per year at each of their annual meetings.
@JeffE: "How is this in any way justifiable?" If we are talking about the "Annual Meeting of Professional Society X", why would we expect to have non-members giving presentations? The point of such conferences is to be meetings (in the naive, non-academic sense) of the members of the society. Why would non-members expect to be able to present at all? The expectation is that the vast majority of attendees will be members.
@OswaldVeblen Because the charge of any professional society is to advance the profession, not the society. (I gave given talks at the annual joint meetings of the AMS and MAA. I am not a member of either society, and nobody asked.)
I find this practice 100% ethical. I don't see any argument to the contrary in your question.
Nobody is forcing you to do anything. You don't have to attend any conferences. But conferences cost money, so if you attend then you do have to pay something. Even then, you don't have to become a member. The non-member registration fee is generally not so high as to be prohibitive.
This is no less ethical than your local supermarket distributing coupons. You don't have to shop there and you don't have to use the coupons even if you do. In fact, in the US many supermarket chains offer memberships that give you discounts -- that's not unethical!
As for your second bullet point, in my professional society I know that conferences actually lose money and are subsidized by other sources of society income (mainly journals). I don't know if that is typical.
It does not strike me as surprising that conferences lose money, in view of my analysis. Let's say that a conference is held each year, the member conference fee is X, the membership fee is Y, and the non-member conference fee is X+Y+Z, with X,Y,Z>0. For the organizing society not to lose money, the live costs should be lower than X+Y. But if you just look at the conference balance sheet, the revenue is X, and this may be lower than what is needed to cover the costs. So it looks like the society "graciously" supports a conference that is losing money. I see it as just an accounting trick.
The non-member registration fee is generally not so high as to be prohibitive. — [citation needed]
@JeffE "prohibitive" is subjective, so no citation will suffice.
You don't have to attend any conferences. — True. You also don't have to get tenure.
Whoa! So now I'm being forced to join a university just so I can get tenure? Geez, these people are really evil.
I think that the question is written from the perspective that the conference is somehow an independent entity from the sponsoring organization. But that feels somewhat ahistorical to me. To have a concrete example, consider a society I am a member of: the Association for Symbolic Logic, founded in 1936. According to their web site,
The Association for Symbolic Logic is an international organization supporting research and critical studies in logic. Its primary function is to provide an effective forum for the presentation, publication, and critical discussion of scholarly work in this area of inquiry.
Of course there are societies much older, and much younger, but presumably each was founded by a group of individuals who agreed that a common organization would help their goals in some way.
The conferences organized by these societies are "meetings" in the genuine (non-academic) sense: they are an arranged time and location for members of the society to gather and confer, like a family reunion. The conferences are arranged by committees from the society, rather than by independent organizers, and the general expectation (and reality) is that the majority of attendees are members of the society.
These conferences are not like a car show where the goal is to draw in a large group of otherwise unknown people. The conferences are usually open to the public (with registration), but the general public is not the main audience - the members are.
This is where the bullet points in the question go astray, in my opinion: they assume that the main goal of the conference is to attract non-members to attend, when in reality the conferences were created to advance the purposes of the society and provide the society members an opportunity to confer and present their work. If an insufficient number of researchers thought that was worth the membership fee, the society and its conferences would disappear.
I think that the question is written from the perspective that the conference is somehow an independent entity from the sponsoring organization. — Speaking as the chair of the steering committee of a conference that is about to vote on whether to abandon professional society sponsorship, that perspective seems eminently sane.
Such is the difference between different fields, and different conferences. For many societies, it would be bizarre that the meeting of the society would somehow vote to drop its affiliation with the society and become "independent". On the other hand, there are also many "independent" conferences that are not affiliated with any society, and which don't have any "member/nonmember" distinction in their fees. Perhaps some conferences like yours grow to transcend the organization that founded them.
The organization didn't found my conference. A small set of volunteers from the research community founded the conference, and then approached the socuety about sponsorship, since at the time that was essentially the only way to publish proceedings. As far as I know, the same is true for every society-sponsored conference in computer science.
These conferences are not like a car show where the goal is to draw in a large group of otherwise unknown people — Again, I find this characterization extremely bizarre. Surely every research area has notable researchers who, for whatever reason, are not society members, along with oodles of utterly mediocre researchers who are. Unless you're talking about one of the Academies, any schmuck off the street can join an academic professional society by paying dues.
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2653 | Determining common knowledge in an unfamiliar field
What is the best strategy to determine common knowledge in an unfamiliar field? I have provided an example below, but I am not looking for an answer specific to that example.
We have an answered question that addresses whether and how common knowledge should be cited. A more difficult problem is determining what is common knowledge in an unfamiliar field. In my answer to the question linked, I provide one strategy, examining introductory textbooks in that field. However, as was mentioned in the comments, not all fields have introductory texts.
As an example, I am working on an institutional grant proposal. The proposed activities have to do with increasing retention rates of freshmen students, particularly in the sciences. We are looking at targeting pedagogical reform in introductory classes and increasing engagement through more and better co-curricular experiences.
My background is in chemistry. I do not know what is common knowledge in the worlds of pedagogy and student engagement/retention. I have been reading books and articles on the subjects, and citation practices have been inconsistent. Some authors provide citations for everything, including broad generalizations and common sense, like:
There are many reasons why an undergraduate student may choose to leave college.
And then others provide very few citations, including for statements that seem like they should have been based on a study:
More than half of all students who withdraw from college are freshmen.
Less than half of the students who declare science majors will graduate with a degree in a science field.
I realize that the former case may be from overzealous paranoia about plagiarism, and the latter case may be an example of poor scholarship, but this is difficult to assess as an outsider.
EDIT: For clarification, I am asking about determining when something requires a citation if I am writing in a field that I do not normally participate in. I know that I should always cite things that are new, obscure, or counter to prevailing thought. I wouldn't necessarily need to cite things that are "well-established" or "agreed-upon". After a certain point, if enough studies have reaffirmed the same result, or if the result has been so widely cited that it becomes well-known, it is pointless to cite it. It is currently silly to provide a citation for "The structure of DNA is a double helix formed by two complimentary strands held together by hydrogen-bonding between the base pairs." At one point, however, it was not silly, because this idea was new.
How can I quickly determine where a finding is on the continuum between new/obscure and well established?
My interpretation of the first sort of citation isn't that it is providing evidence that there are many reasons, but that it is pointing the readers towards further reading on this topic if they are interested.
I would recommend placing citations even for "common sense statements" especially for fields that are in the "soft sciences." For example, statements such as "smoking can lead to lung cancer" and "proportional reasoning skills are not dependent on gender" would require citations to actual studies.
By far the simplest way to get around this problem is to simply give it to a colleague who is more well-versed in the field and have them judge which statements need to be backed up by citations and which don't.
The next simplest way is to read papers on a very similar topic to yours (which, no doubt, do exist) and see what they cite.
On a related note, my advisor gave me the advice of "when in doubt, cite." His point was that the only real downside of an unnecessary reference is added length to the paper. If you get to that point, and the only thing left to cut is citations, then you can start to worry.
So maybe "common knowledge" in not the best term for what I am asking about. Your answer seems to be more about "best practices". I am certainly interested in "best practices" insofar as the example I gave is concerned. My question is really more about what needs a citation, and what doesn't. I can answer that very clearly for chemistry because I have a decade of experience in the field.
@BenNorris - Sorry, I didn't read the context. Answer completely revised.
There is no easy criterium saying where you should cite, when - a review article or a book, and when - you can safely skip citing anything.
Anyway, ask 2-3 guys within that field. If for any of them it's not 'obvious' - you should cite. If it is old enough that there is a book on it - it's fine to cite it. (Alternatively, you can try asking on a respective StackExchange site.)
Moreover, if for you something is not obvious, you should cite it as well (the chances are a reader of you paper won't know more than you). Note that many well-known results (e.g. results of integration or summation) are referenced for the reader's convenience (and to make it obvious that it is not a novel discovery).
Also, one sanity-check may be if there is a well-written Wikipedia page on the subject. If there is, perhaps you don't need to cite it.
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110560 | Shoud I accept an offer as editor of a journal as an undergraduate?
I’ve recently received an offer from a reputable (but not top-tier) journal in my field asking if I would like to serve on the editorial board. I believe they reached out to me based on my publications in the area.
Although this would be great experience and a way to get more involved in the community, I’m not certain if I’m qualified for the role. What would you consider while making this decision?
Welcome to Academia SE. Can you please [edit] your question to add a bit about your academic experience? For example, you mention that you already have publications in the area. How many and how well received are they?
Agree, please include the details asked by Wzrlprmft, and also consider if your work so far has been better received than say, that of your teachers/supervisor. Are ant of them on the board for this or other journals?
No, you should not accept an editorial position as an undergraduate, or as a graduate student. It probably will not be good for the academic community, and it almost certainly won't be good for you. There are multiple clear reasons:
Editorial work is service to the professional community. To be done well, it requires a significant time investment. Early in your career (meaning: until you get tenure), your time should be focused as much as possible on research. Senior people in your field usually recognize this and editorial positions are usually offered to people at the associate professor level or higher.
The journal is probably not reputable. I know I'm contradicting your claim, and I may be wrong in your particular case, but I will be right in saying this at least 99% of the time. Very few undergrads know what journals are reputable. I received a few invitations to editorial boards as a student, but not from any reputable journals. No reputable journal in my field has a student (undergraduate or graduate) on their board. Even if the student were brilliant (or especially in that case) point #1 above would dictate that they avoid this.
You aren't qualified. Again, you may be the most brilliant person in your field, but that's not the main requisite for editorial work. To be a good editor you need extensive experience in reading and writing papers. You need a network of colleagues you know well whose expertise covers a broad swath of your field, who you can invite to review papers. I've never met a graduate or undergraduate student who had both of these things already.
For context, I can think of a brilliant friend who published a lot of papers as a student, won prizes for some of them, and even skipped the postdoc phase, going straight into an assistant professorship at a top-notch research university. He certainly wasn't qualified to be an editor when he was a grad student, and accepting an editorial position before he became an associate professor would have been a mistake, for all the reasons above.
Note also that if the journal invites you to apply for an editorial position (i.e., if you need to send them a CV) then the journal is not reputable and you should stay far away. Respected journals will know who you are and have already considered carefully before inviting you to the editorial board.
You probably should not accept an editorial position when you are a postdoc, and you should perhaps think twice about it as an assistant professor.
Excellent answer, very balanced in taking both editor and community into account.
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121521 | Which is more important in determining author order: time spent or results obtained?
This is in the field of life sciences, i.e. a field in which the order of authors is not determined randomly but reflects author contributions (whatever that means); in other words, being first author is better than being second, which is better than third etc - except for the very last authors, who are generally the lab heads.
We're publishing a paper and two teammates have a disagreement on the order in which their names should be listed. We basically explored several strategies that were at the time all quite reasonable, so there was really no way to determine if one made more sense than another. We found that testing strategies one by one rigorously (one person per hypothesis to validate/debunk) was the most productive way to move forward. Our paper describes several mechanisms that we demonstrated could work for a certain problem.
Team member A tested several hypotheses, including one of the four that made it to the final paper.
Team member B tested more hypotheses (they were working on the project full-time, as opposed to A), and demonstrated that they were not scalable / valid strategies for our purposes. Interesting, useful for us, but not paper-worthy.
Each one of them has a pretty strong claim for having a better authorship position:
Teammate A designed and 100% tested one of the strategies that did work and that we chose to report in the paper, so their contribution is quite obvious. On the other hand teammate B spent more time on the project, debunked working hypotheses (not publishable but it had to be done at some point) and helped with the validation of other designs that worked - a contribution of 40-50% of the work on two different parts of the project.
Obviously results include a part of chance (picking the correct hypothesis/molecule/group/dataset), but time spent on the project is not a perfect metric either (working smart matters more than working long hours).
Without asking for a definite answer, how do you generally weight the importance of "what the paper shows in the end" vs. "the important but not article-worthy preliminary work"? In other words, how do you measure "contribution"? I would like to come up with a rational and objective way to determine who contributed more significantly - at least by the journal's standards.
I feel your question is off-topic, because answers will be "primarily opinion-based: Many good questions generate some degree of opinion based on expert experience, but answers to this question will tend to be almost entirely based on opinions, rather than facts, references, or specific expertise." I haven't voted to close. Perhaps you can edit your question to avoid subjectivity?
Thanks for the feedback; I'm not sure why this question calls for opinions though - at least not more than most authorship-related questions. I'm precisely asking for a rational, objective and neutral way to weight contributions. Don't all questions about authorship order fall under the umbrella of "primarily opinion based" then? See eg here and here
I think you should add your field to the question title; the answer would be totally different for instance if this were mathematics (although in that case it's typical to just use alphabetical order).
@DavidKetcheson I thought the OP said that in the opening sentence.
@scaaahu Yes. I suggested adding it to the title. Otherwise, someone could ask the same question for a different field and it would be impossible to distinguish them without clicking on each one. Notice that the most upvoted answer is (probably) about some field that is not life sciences.
@DavidKetcheson Frankly, this is a tough one (at least for me). If we add the field to the title, it's hard to close as dup of this question if someone asks the same question in some other field. If we leave this question as it is now, the question may be too broad - it could cover all fields similar to life science and others. I don't know. I'll leave it to the OP and the community/mods.
This questions shows beautifully everything wrong with the current system
If you really absolutely positively can't share first authorship, flip a coin and move on with your lives. There will be more papers.
In my field, this would clearly be shared (first) authorship.
As for the exact positions, in my experience one of A and B would also have been spending a lot of time as a de facto project lead that determines the course of the project and does most of the writing. In fact, in my field this would almost always be B, unless A somehow has the capabilities of effectively leading multiple projects and delegating vast proportions of the work in those projects.
I don't place a lot of value on happening to find the right solution for a problem. The way you describe this, it seems almost stochastic: A proposed four solutions and got lucky, B proposed more solutions but didn't get lucky. Obviously the situation and value of contributions changes if B could not have found the solution, but A (possibly because of greater experience) could have.
Two other considerations: first, exact position on a paper can have very different values for different people. A first first authorship can be absolutely vital for scientists who are rounding off their PhD or postdoc, whereas scientists who aren't rounding off could also obtain this in a next project. Second, maybe there are ways to even out the author contributions? One way would be to do another project together and flip author positions for that one. Another way would be that the person who doesn't get author precedence can present the work at conferences for the first year. And maybe there are better ideas that someone in your lab can come up with.
I agree with this sentiment, but what if one of the potential shared authors objects heavily against this (yes, it happens)?
@BasJansen Then you work it out, like adults.
@BasJansen One thing is clearly missing from my answer and that is the role of the supervisor. I agree with JeffE's suggestion that scientists (and other adults) should be able to work something like this out between themselves. The whole discussion should also be guided and, if push comes to shove, decided, by the supervisor.
I think the explorations that failed can be as valuable as the one that succeeded, and should be reported along with the success.
See What to do when you spend several months working on an idea that fails in a masters thesis?
This argues for B as lead author. which, along with the fact that they worked harder/longer might settle the question.
(I am fortunate that in mathematics the convention is alphabetical order.)
Weighting contributions in a fair way can be all but impossible. As you noticed, contribution is a vector with many dimensions (time, effort, results, novelty, and whatnot). All attempts on sorting complex contributions on a single dimension axis will need agreement
not only about the respective extent (which is difficult to measure),
but also about the weighting of the elements (which needs mutual consent, as there is no "correct" answer).
If the authors disagree about ordering of their names, they are obviously assuming different matrices for projecting the contribution vectors to a one-dimensional value (or are greedy).
To resolve conflicts like these, you can always mention the authors in alphabetical order - maybe including the dept. chair (and add a tiny notice to the paper in order to show you did that).
@GürayHatipoğlu if someone needs to be first author "to make it count" (e.g. for obtaining some degree), obviously this question should have been settled beforehand. The prospective "first author" should have made that claim earlier, and see if the others were still willing to contribute on that condition.If he didn't do that... he'll might have to settle with "less" than first authorship! In the worst case, the other authors still might retract their contribution, leaving the would-be first author with a completely different situation.
If we took a generic view of research, it could be argued that both positive and negative results can be worthy of the top billing. However, each paper usually has a single focus. Whoever's work is most closely associated with that focus would be the lead author; everyone else provides substantiating or supporting material.
From that perspective, Person A sounds like the lead author and Person B is a supporting author - although perhaps worthy of special mention in the acknowledgements, subject to faculty policies on acknowledging authors in papers they authored. It might seem unfair to the work B put in, but if B's contribution is "not publishable" as you put it, it would seem odd to publish the work with B as lead author.
@EthanBolker It was just a light-hearted comment :) , though in an intractable dispute about name order, it would probably determine the outcome. I also acknowledge the benefit of having heavy-weights listed among the authors, especially when one is just starting out.
@EthanBolker It's not central to my answer, so I've deleted the distracting introduction.
OK I'll delete my comment.
Who actually wrote more of the paper? If there's a measurable difference in terms of who put how much down on the page, then the person who wrote more gets authorship priority. Nothing gets published until the paper is written, so this can be a good and equitable tie-breaker in this kind of scenario.
Nothing gets published until all the experiments are run either...
Not disagreeing with that, but that's why anyone who ran substantive experiments should get authorship. My point is just that if you perform the task of literally authoring the paper, it gives you a decent claim to first authorship. I usually look at the author order as mapping to "wrote the manuscript," "did lab work," "ran a fancy instrument," and "paid for it all."
But, like I said, "tie-breaker." This isn't about phrasing complete, iron-clad rules, but rather looking for the minor factors that tip the scale one way or another.
You have answered your own question: 'working smart matters more than working long hours.' In your example you state one person 'made a contribution of 40-50% of the work on two different parts of the project', presumably less than the other person. This is telling.
The only metric that is accepted is the contribution to published work. This is supported by the fact that we never include all the contributions by people which made a publication possible; if so then your authorship would be several billion names long [reference every paper written since the mid-20th century].
The only metric that is accepted is the contribution to published work. - But what does that mean? Cf. https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/73480/19607
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109418 | Is it normal that a PhD supervisor requires a student to apply for a grant?
I'm a 1st year computer science PhD student in Poland, who started about 6 months ago. I'm working on a nice project towards a publication. My supervisor recently made an ultimatum: either I will apply for a research grant or we stop working together. This came as a surprise and sadness to me, because in the beginning I had no idea that this would be a requirement.
I'm not keen on signing for a grant, because it's binding for a couple of years (if you abort a grant you need to give the money back), you need to have a plan, write reports, it's a lot of work to even write the proposal down (and it can also be not accepted) and the money to my pocket is almost nothing. Most of grant could be spent on computing resources and conferences. But I could pay for conferences even from my own pocket (I work part time to cover my costs). For computing, there are some resources our group has access to that would be sufficient for my research.
I was thinking for a couple of days about this situation. Is it normal that a supervisor would force me to apply for grants? Can he do that? Should I talk to somebody? I'm feeling down and lost. I'm close to giving up the whole PhD. I mean, I give my time for no money. I was hoping that at least I could get an access to the computing resources. He doesn't have time to meet in person, although I have ask several times before. We talk via email. Before PhD studies I moved to live closer to the university, to have more interactions, but that turned out to be futile.
What's going on here? You don't have a stipend, you've never met your supervisor?
Mentioning what country or region you're in may help you get better answers about how normal this is.
@Azor I don't have a stipend. I met my supervisor 4 times.
@Cactus Poland.
@student I suspect some of the European posters will have seen situations like this. In general it's useful to practice applying for grants, even if one may not get them, and it would be a reasonable exercise for a professor to ask one to draft a grant application. You're in a tough situation, since you're not sure about committing to the content of a grant and you and your supervisor are not on the same page.
Is there a signed contract? If not, what’s “binding” you as a PhD student to this professor?
@aeismail No contract is signed between me and supervisor. I have an agreement with university about PhD studies. On 1st year you choose a supervisor. End of 1st year exam is in a couple of months where you present what you've done and your future plan, aligned with a scientific advisor of your choice. This professor seemed like a good choice because the research interests were perfectly aligned. I don't know a prof with better fit in terms of interests or with a bigger research group in our subfield of study.
Our (US) program requires students to apply for a grant as part of the dissertation prep. It is considered an essential skill of professional researchers and a thought-clarifying exercise.
Are you finding the working relationship with this person satisfying in other regards? It was hard to tell from what you've written so far.
@aparente001 Mixed. I'm satisfied in many regards. Perhaps there are two that I'm not: not much time to meet and this grant requirement (which before didn't manifested).
You should never agree to pay conference costs. At least not until you have exhausted all other options and you absolutely need to be there.
Re the rare face to face meetings -- how do you feel about the email communication? Sometimes this is very effective and one hardly notices that there's little to no face to face time. Sometimes communication problems crop up when it's just email, email, all the time email. How's that going for you two? // Do you have a Plan B in case it doesn't work out with this advisor?
@aparente I feel like the more you write, the more things are left untold and it accumulates over time. Many times I also have like small threads that simply die in email talk or are marginalized. Also back and forth exchange is very slow on email. You also can't show or draw stuff so it's frustrating. I really like personal meetings from time to time, because you can get to know each other better, see someone's gestures, voice tone, it's always relaxed and nice. So I would love to meet more often.
@aparente Yes, I have many options. I can just not pass the 1st year and apply again, I will probably be admitted. I can try to pass it, with the same supervisor (without a grant, but after first year would need to change supervisor) or a different one. Or I can just resign from PhD programme.
So, first of all, in Europe the relation PhD sutudent–supervisor can be detached from the relation employee–employer.
While it is possible to obtain a PhD sitting on a different job all the time, I can only support the urge to move to a grant-funded position. You would have much more time for your research when compared to part-timing for money. I am speaking out of experience.
So, the first conclusion is: you probably need a grant.
Now, for application. Typical funding bodies I know, require the applicant to hold a PhD already. So, it's your supervisor, who needs to apply. Contrarily, a stipend can be granted for a student. I heavily suggest talking in person about this issue.
The second conclusion is: you need to clarify, what kind of funding it is and who would do most of the writing. Talk with your supervisor.
The general rule of thumb is: agree with your supervisor, as he/she has much more experience in the academic questions than you do. There are some common pitfalls and non-obvious issues. For example: where to publish, what kind of a position is better, etc.
Thank you for sharing your experience. To make some facts straight: this is not a typical grant, this one is for beginners, pre-PhD. I would be the person to apply. I could give myself a stipend from this grant (as principal investigator) but it's tiny, I can't live out of that. I would do most of the writing.
I thought the relation will be more like student-advisor (it was most of the time).
@student - What would happen if your grant application were unsuccessful? If it were successful, what other sources of funding would there be, if any? Have you talked to a department administrator?
@aparente If unsuccessful - nothing happens. I will probably need to apply every year or to other funding bodies. If successful - I don't think there will be other funding sources. I haven't talked to a department administrator... I'm not sure to which person you refer to... I'm also not sure that this will help.
What I had in mind was for you to understand the flow chart as well as you can, so that you can make an informed decision. A department typically has some sort of director and some other administrators, such as a dean or director of graduate studies. Your university might identify the administrators in the department on its website, or you might just need to ask around. There are several different types of people you can ask: students (at various levels), professors (young / more senior), secretaries. You can choose who you feel comfortable asking.
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29343 | If co-instructors gave different syllabi with different grading schemes, is this generally considered a valid reason to challenge grade?
Summary: I am a STEM graduate student taking a soon-ending class that was divided into 3 parts each under different professors, Alice, Bob and Carol.
There is a conflict in the grading schemes set forth by the different professors' syllabuses (plural). Omitting most of the details as being too specific, the result is that one syllabus will grade more harshly than the other, and that is the syllabus that they are proposing to use for the final grades.
Given my current grade, I will pass the course either way. That said, I believe I can make a case that the professors should follow the more generous grading scheme, which would benefit me significantly. Is conflicting grading schemes across different syllabi generally considered a valid reason to challenge a grade?
I have edited to try to get to the heart of the question, removing most extraneous detail, and voted to reopen.
@jakebeal Did you have to? This was asked and answered quite a while ago already
@Jack It had been closed due to the detail, and was likely on its way to deletion; editing and reopening means that the question and its answers will be preserved for the benefit of others facing similar situations in the future.
The majority of the question's text concerns minutiae about syllabi and percentages that are unlikely to be of interest to anyone except the OP. The question would be significantly improved by eliding / summarizing this information and concentrating on the core question:
What happens when multiple, conflicting syllabi are given out for the same course? Does the student have a legitimate grievance when one syllabus is being followed but not the other, at the expense of his grade?
I think these are reasonable questions for our site.
My answer to the first question is: yikes. Three different instructors for the same course, three different syllabi, and one of the instructors (the chair!) does not even know about both of the other syllabi? What a mess. In general having courses taught by more than one faculty member makes things harder and necessitates much more explicit, advanced planning. This course does not sound well-planned. As soon as you get talk about which syllabus is more "official" than the others, things are not going well. I don't think there is a standard, easy answer to this question, and I don't see any coherent answer which does not admit mistakes on the part of the faculty. On the other hand I wonder why this issue did not come up earlier in the course: on the first day of class every student was in possession of two contradictory syllabi and no one noticed? I find that curious and am not sure what to make of it.
My answer to the second question is: yes, I think so. If you show up to some higher administrative official with two syllabi in hand and say that you want to be held to the standard of the syllabus you were given first, you have a good shot at getting some traction on this. However I would encourage you to try to resolve the matter as non-combatively as possible: if you are a graduate student in the program, getting the chair chewed out by (say) her dean is likely to have some effect on your course grade, but it may have other, less pleasant effects down the line. I would begin by doing what you have already done: clearly pointing out the discrepancy between the two syllabi and the significant effect it may/will have on your course grade. You should indicate that you proceeded in the course with an understanding based on the first syllabus that you received and that you would like this to be taken into account in the course grade. Give them a chance to do this for you before you escalate the situation.
Finally, the business about the 75 belonging to two grade ranges: in my opinion you look petty by bringing that up at all (look at the reaction your question has received). The purpose of the grading system being spelled out in advance is for students to be sure they are treated fairly and to be able to have some rough means of predicting what kind of performance will lead to what kind of grade. There is nothing that you or any student would have done differently if 75 belongs to one grade range rather than the other. I agree with other commenters who said that the time you spent complaining about that would be better spent learning the material and improving your performance in the course. Mixing legitimate, serious grading concerns with "grade-grubbing" is not a good strategy.
Regarding the last part, the fact that 75 was in both grade ranges suggests that it was a mistake and that the passing is 60 instead of 65 as it was last year, and I was right. Is it not right to clarify the difference between 60 and 65 BEFORE I end up with, say, a 64 for a final grade and failing mark in my transcript (which would lead me to a long appeal grade change process)? Anyway, thanks for the question title edit and simplifying my question. I'll talk to chair Carol again. Btw, it's not 3 different syllabi/syllabuses. Bob followed Carol. Alice had her own syllabus.
Mr/Ms Clark, how do you find this?: goes to office "Hello again ma'am. About the two syllabuses thing...actually I would like to the point out that the syllabus of Dr Alice was given to us a week before the other syllabus. I proceeded in the course based on the first syllabus. Given that, are we still following the other syllabus?" If Chair Carol insists, I'll give it up. I think I can pass if I give it my all this week.
Ms. Clark?!? Your response seems broadly reasonable. As I said, removing all the information about grade cutoffs would probably improve the reception of your question. In any case, I am not involved in teaching the class so such finely detailed discussion of the course grade is neither appropriate nor of interest to me. I will reiterate that -- from a strategic perspective, in particular -- your time is better spent learning the course material than deconstructing the syllabi. Good luck.
Pete could be short for Petra. Sorry for choosing to be safe rather than sorry by being politically correct. http://shingekinokyojin.wikia.com/wiki/Petra_Ral lol thanks so much for the answer and support Mr Pete. I am studying and will spend merely 2 minutes asking about the syllabus after a long consultation regarding the actual exam material. Again, thanks :)
Kind of a late update, but I passed. Hahaha. Chair Carol gave us a problem set that replaced 20 points in the exam. I learned my lesson and consider myself very lucky. Thanks again so much.
@Jack: Regarding honorifics: the nice thing about talking to academics is you have a convenient gender-neutral choice: Dr. And in the case of Pete L. Clark it happens to also be correct. :-)
@NateEldredge Thanks. A good portion of stackex is anonymous peeps so I have no idea if they are male or female, if they have PhDs or what. I don't feel like checking for each time. This isn't my first account, btw.
I apologize for necro posting, but this matter of honorifics intrigues me. I have avoided using Dr unless I was completely certain that the academic in question has a doctorate, which while often the case is not always so (many academics coming from industry do not, instead carrying great research experience considered equivalent to a doctorate). Would it be considered offencive or patronizing to call someone Dr if they turn out not to have a doctorate or is it still polite if perhaps ignorant sounding?
@Vality I wouldn't say it's impolite, offensive or patronizing, but I think it would be weird on Academia SE if you just assumed everyone replying had a doctorate. As for real life, I think it's best to assume faculty members have doctorates if speaking personally. If you are contacting a faculty member by e-mail or text, there's linkedin and other stuff so I don't think you will be confused if you do your research unless say said faculty member is currently ABD yet states a year graduated from PhD, which is what happened to me hahahaha
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/offencive
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37856 | Can my Specialist degree be equalized to Bachelor degree?
I have graduated from Russian university after 5 years of education and got a Specialist degree (Engineer in Computer Science). According to Wikipedia, Specialist is a four-tier degree and stands right above Master degree in some specialities. But despite graduation requirements and due to the duration, I suggest, it can only be put right above Bachelor degree. So the next step I should take is to continue my education to then get Master degree. Is my suggestion right? Or do I think about it wrong way?
If it helps or is necessary, I'm planning to continue education in Canadian university.
What level do you want to enrol at the Canadian university? They are the ones who have to decide if your title is enough requirement or you need to upgrade it.
I want to earn a M.Sc. degree. After all, I understand that the only way to get most reliable answer is to ask a university representative. But I believe I could get useful advice or even direct answer from community, too.
Sorry, but indeed the university folks are the only ones who can answer this question.
There are services, such as WES (www.wes.org), that will evaluate your foreign credentials into US equivalent. I am not sure, if Canadian institutions accept it.
You would need something in the lines of : http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/skilled/assessment.asp to be sure
Since 1997, having a Russian (or rather "Soviet"-style) 5-year Specialist (специалист) degree is formally recognized as the equivalent of holding a Master's degree (cf. Mutual Recognition of Qualifications: the Russian Federation and the Other European Countries); Judging by the fact that, in Canada, one can typically directly enter a PhD program without e.g. doing a Master's degree course beforehand (as is typical in e.g. the USA), you should have no problems fulfilling the formal requirements to enter a PhD program there.
I am in a German masters program, and one of my Russian classmates has a specialist degree (in applied mathematics). I cannot say in generality (i.e. Canada), but it was taken as equivalent to a Bachelor's Degree around here.
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9283 | Grading system: Why A-F and not E?
Why do we use F for failing on an otherwise arbitrary alphabetic grading scale? Isn't E just as meaningful for failing as A is for excellent?
I'm more interested in a response on the history of how the current scale came to be.
(Edit: prompted from the comments below, I am asking about this situation within the context of the American grading system.)
This linked document might be of interest
I taught at a high school that used grades A-E, with E being a failing grade. I would suggest that the obvious reason for using F is because it stands for "Fail."
@PeterJansson That is a great resource on the history but from what I read it is still missing the topic of interest, why F instead of E?
At our university, E is the failing grade.
As Suresh indicates in his answer, the grading scale varies with locale; some regions do use A-E.
Indeed, this is by no means universal. At my undergraduate university in New Zealand, the grades were A-D with D being a fail (there were also + and - versions of every grade including D). At my PhD university in the UK, there were no letter grades.
Okay, maybe I should have more specifically asked "Why, in the United States (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_grading_in_the_United_States), is the letter F used rather than the logical succession E? It's been suggested that F represents the first letter of Failing, but neither A, B, C, or D have these connections to specific words.
My university is in the US :)
I heard once that "E" was historically associated with "excellent", in the sense more than was even required and was a grade better than "A". On the other hand, I was never graded with letter-grades in my life, and I can't quote a reliable source on this so I might be wrong.
@penelope: That's interesting. In the current NZ school system E is the best grade and stands for excellent. I think the next is M for 'merit' and then A for 'achieved'.
For what it's worth, I'm more surprised by the choice of letters over numbers itself.
I don't know the history of the US system (in the UK 'E' is generally used), but if the non-usage has progressed from elementary/high school upwards, one might conjecture that it's to prevent students being able to easily convert an 'F' into an 'E' on a report card.
@AnthonyLabarre agreed! It makes no sense, as one already has to count points anyhow, just give a ratio of acquired pts/ total available pts.
@PeterJansson referenced a great article. This one also discusses the history of grades in the US. Basically, there was an E (A-F) but it was dropped and F retained (likely because it's normal mental connection the Fail).
Sometimes we say "E for effort", meaning good try, still fail. I don't think it's official anywhere.
Just a guess: some courses are on a Pass (P) or Fail (F) system. You may want to have the same letter for failure in the two systems.
Europe has E for barely passed.
I think, and this is really only conjecture since I don't know the history, is the potential conflict with the ESNU system where E stands for excellent. The ESNU was (and potentially still is) used in US based elementary education.
My US high school had a grading scheme where A-D were all passing grades, and E and F were both failing grades (E is between 50 and 60, F is less than 50). I believe the difference was that an E class could be retaken, whereas an F could not.
Since it seems we have trouble finding a true history of the A-F my guess would be the following. Many scales rely oon an odd number scale because then something can be in the middle. It is also then possible to think of C as the center of a normal distribution, if that is how grades should be distributed. We used to have a grading system from 1-5 with no intermdiate steps in schools in Sweden where 3 was considered an ok grade and 1 and 2 were poor. There was also a fail whioch was a dash instead of a number.
By accident or by construction, F became Fail. It is possible that a five grade scale was chosen to make F Fail but my guess is that it was more a fotunate coincidence rather than deliberate choice.
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1678 | Guidelines to follow if my adviser suggests that I work on dead-end projects
I generally chase after whatever my adviser/supervisor tells me to do, although I know that it's sometimes a project that they don't want to spend their time on. I know that I can learn a lot even when I go after such "wild goose chases".
I recently talked to a PhD student though, and he advised me that I should learn when to say "no" to an adviser, to recognize that sometimes those suggestions can lead to "wild goose chases" that aren't worth the time.
What are some guidelines when an adviser wants you to chase a problem that might not be worth its time investment?
I modified the question slightly; please verify.
Yes - that's perfect - thanks! Though I should modify it a bit since I'm not in the situation right now and don't want to give the impression of being in that situation (and certainly don't want to be embarrassed if my advisers find my posts here).
Please do not use comments to post answers. Comments are here specifically to help improve the content of the post; not to answer questions. Thanks.
This will depend upon your relationship with your advisor. Does your advisor solicit your opinions on projects? Does he/she project openness about projects? Does he/she give you several options of projects? Does he/she ask for your suggestions?
If yes, then I think you can have a frank conversation with your advisor. Mention your concerns politely, and ask your advisor for their thoughts on those issues. Maybe your advisor has already given them thought and has some reasons to think it's a better project than you realize, and can explain to you. Maybe your advisor thinks highly of you and has handed you a long-shot high-risk high-reward problem, on the idea that you might just solve it, and if you do, you'll hit a home run. Or, maybe the concerns haven't occurred to your advisor and that might lead to a fruitful discussion about how to deal with the challenges, or might lead to a change in your project. It's also possible your advisor might have good advice about how to mitigate the risks you are most concerned about.
For instance, one piece of advice I got from my advisor was: be ambitious, reach high, but also design your research to "fail fast". Think proactively about what are the most likely ways that the research might fail, and then try to order your work so that if the project is going to fail, you discover that fact as quickly as possible. That's not always easy to arrange, but your advisor might have helpful suggestions for you.
If your advisor doesn't seem likely to welcome discussion about which project to work on, you can still raise these issues, but you may need to be even more deferential and careful about how you raise them.
Some things to avoid: Be very careful to avoid sounding like you are whining. Faculty put a lot of effort and thought into trying to find good projects for their students, and it can be very challenging (you want to find something that they have the skills to succeed at and that they have a chance of completing successfully; but on the other hand, you want to choose an ambitious project which if successful will lead to a good publication, which often means it is hard to know in advance whether the project will succeed or not). My experience is that many students tend to be a bit critical and "picky" about projects, so be careful not to sound ungrateful.
Also be careful not to be too arrogant. Your advisor probably has a lot of experience with research, whereas you are just learning. Therefore, your judgement may be a bit off.
Also, keep in mind that it is expected that many research projects fail. Therefore, you have to be willing to take risks and take on research projects where you're not sure whether you will succeed, and you have to give 'em a good try. You should expect that perhaps 50% of your research projects will be failures, or at least will succeed in the way you initially envisioned. If all of your research projects are a success, either you should maybe consider taking on harder problems, or else you are very lucky to have an amazing advisor.
Moreover, remember that it is important that any research project you take on relate to shared interests. You want the project to be something your advisor is excited about; if your advisor is unenthused, nothing good can come of it. So if you've noticed that your interests seem to be a different than the things your advisor is excited about, your advisor may be trying to thread the needle of finding something of mutual interest.
One last thought: if you think your project sucks, one constructive way to move forward is to try to identify a better research project and propose it to your advisor. If it is truly promising, and if it is in an area of interest to your advisor, he/she might get excited by your idea and encourage you to run with it. Just be careful: since you don't have as much experience as your advisor, you don't have as reliable a judgement about what constitutes a promising project and what doesn't.
This is a difficult issue to deal with. You are correct in stating that (in some disciplines) this can be a significant problem, but as a graduate student, it may be hard for you to argue your case that the project will lead to a dead end.
I see two possible solutions:
If you have a good relationship with your advisor, speak with him about your concerns. He may admit that he's not sure where the project will lead, but he will likely be willing to give you the background as to why he's interested in the project, and where it will lead you. These types of projects are also good opportunities to ask your advisor to introduce you to collaborators with whom you can complete the project, as he's only tangentially interested.
If your advisor likely won't listen to you, then put in the month or three to do the necessary background research to prove your case. Look up the references, research previous findings, contact others who have worked in the field. One of two things will happen: (1) you will change your mind, or (2) you'll build a strong case to present to your advisor as to why this research is not worth yours or his time. If at that point he still wants you to work on the project, then either he has political motivations or he's just being unreasonable, both of which are indicative of larger problems which you should deal with.
Usually proving that sth is impossible is difficult to... impossible.
The answer is far simpler than these. There is exactly one rule to follow: do what will get you to graduate sooner. If the problem your adviser has asked you to tackle isn't going to become a chapter in your dissertation, say "no". A good adviser will direct you in such a way that you make progress to defending your dissertation. A poor adviser will try to get as much cheap labor out of you as he can before your funding runs out.
Don't let your doctoral adviser take advantage of you.
I completely agree with the last sentence, but not the paragraph before it. You're assuming that the degree is the goal of a PhD program, but degrees are just administrative trophies. Focusing on the immediate task (finish the dissertation) instead of the long-term goal (build up experience and reputation as a productive researcher) is short-sighted.
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71125 | Should a professor require students to attend classes well past their listed times?
I'm currently in an undergraduate class that is focused on doing group presentations. This class has a total of around 80 students, in groups of 4. Every two to three weeks we are required to present a 10-15 minute slide show on a specific topic to the class. The issue is our professor does not want people going on different days, because he feels it gives an unfair advantage. On the course schedule the class runs from 1810-1930, however on presentation days he expects all students to sign in at the start of class and sign again at the end of presentations (which seem to run until around 2200).
We've tried to talk with the professor about how late classes are running during presentation days and his solution was to move them to Saturdays from 0800-1200 (but keep the normal class times during the week). He is refusing to break presentations up over multiple days and falls back on the fact he let everyone know this would happen during the first week of class and we had ample time to drop the course.
Is this expected behavior for a large class focused on multiple group presentations? It's too late to drop the course (this wasn't really an option from the start since it's one of the few upper level classes offered this semester), so is this a case of just suck it up and deal or should I bring this up to my department?
For clarification: is it true that he notified everyone clearly in the first week of the course? Are the extended times in the course syllabus?
He notified the class during our second lecture. No, it is not in the course syllabus.
The "unfair advantage" argument would apply to his alternative arrangements as well. I would rather not give a presentation at 0800 on a weekend or at 2150 on a weekday. Early on Saturday people may be rushed trying to get to class when roommates are sleeping in. Late on a weekday people may be falling asleep or looking at their watches to see whether they will catch the last bus.
The usual advice is to first try to work things out with the professor. In more extreme cases, if you can't work it out with the professor, you should move to their immediate supervisor, which is often the department head / department chair.
Different universities have different cultures about professors extending class. At some, it would be viewed as normal, while at others it is unheard of. So you should make sure to take into account the culture of your school in that regard.
With that being said, I think you indicated the professor is adding an extra 150-240 minutes per week (if I read the question correctly). That seems unreasonable, in my opinion, and I do think it is reasonable for you to ask for a better way of handling the presentations. Even if the professor mentioned this in the first week, it is such a large amount to time that it could seem like an unfair imposition.
One option would be to simply email the department chair. Be very brief in your statement: one or two sentences on what is happening, and one or two more explaining how you have tried to discuss the situation with the professor. Phrasing the email to the chair as a request for advice is one polite way to raise a concern: "Here is what the professor is doing, do you have any advice for handling the situation?" That gives the chair a lot of flexibility in responding.
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93953 | How do I remove an article from Scopus indexing?
Due to some technical mistakes, I removed my published article from a journal. But the article was already indexed by Scopus. I need to remove the article from Scopus indexing database as well. Could I get some guidance in this regard?
What do you mean technical mistake? Do you mean that a retraction was issued?
I would suggest you contact them directly
And explain why they should remove the article, with actual proof that it's no longer available in the journal in question.
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47299 | Grad school in science that takes non-scientific applicants?
If you are going for a humanities grad degree, either scientific or humanities undergrad could get in as long as they get good GRE score (I think.)
Not the case for scientific graduate studies, as the applicant would most likely need to be experienced in lab work and have solid scientific understanding, proven by their undergrad coursework.
Would graduate programs in scientific fields consider a person with no scientific background for even a conditional admission?
I've edited your question slightly: asking if grad schools would consider is on-topic, asking which grad schools would is off-topic.
Speaking for the US and as someone with undergrad degrees in the humanities who is now doing a PhD in the sciences, it is hard, but not impossible to make the transition.
First of all, your best bet is Masters programs. Unless you're somehow exceptional (or maybe just very well connected), you'd be hard pressed to find a PhD program to take you when you're completely unproven in an area. However, to start out, there are transitional programs out there (Boston University's LEAP program for engineering is one) to help students move into a science field. Ask around and search online; I'm sure there are at least a few others.
You can also take non-degree courses at local universities to build up coursework in your desired field. For those, most schools don't much care about your background as long as you're paying them. Once you've built up enough background/understanding in your field, you may have some luck applying to Masters programs. I've seen other questions on this site where folks have posted schools that accept students to Masters programs in the sciences despite non-science backgrounds. I'll edit this answer if I can find some examples.
Additionally, once you've built some classroom credentials, you may have some luck trying to work with a professor in his/her lab. Even if you're not a matriculated student, I know of at least 2 faculty who have taken on lab assistants from outside the university. It's not common, but it is possible.
In summary, it's possible, but it will take time, probably some money, and some dedication to make the change. You'd probably have trouble getting in anywhere with zero background, but with some patience you can build that background and get your foot in the door. Once you have that, it just depends on how far you want to go with it.
Yes. You have to be realistic, though. Making such a transition takes time, as you're starting from square one. It also can be financially challenging, as you progress through the education. You may not find a lot of choices at first, but with effort, you can begin to expand your horizons after building your academic reputation.
I suppose my answer is from personal experience.
Two years ago, I began to pursue a full, rich career in physics. My undergraduate degrees, though, were in business and psychology. I had virtually no experience outside of introductory collegiate physics and some calculus I had taken as an undergrad. My work experience did not exactly apply.
Not unexpectedly, the choices for a program were limited. I found a good State university nearby that accepted me conditionally to its Master's program. There are some other students at this school who have had other backgrounds as well - another I know well was an English major. Some of us started from scratch. As conditional students, we had to more-or-less complete the entire BS curriculum prior starting grad classes. That took about two years. Where I am now, it'll take about two more years for the Master's.
My partner is in the same boat, but with mathematics. She held a liberal arts degree. She was rejected for conditional admission, and so began to take classes to bolster her foundations. After a year of study, she reapplied and was accepted. Again, she is working towards her graduate degree after several semesters of fulfilling undergraduate level material.
I have observed others in the same situation successfully enter industry and PhD programs at all levels of prestige and interest. Regardless, those who excelled only did so through a lot of blood, sweat, and tears.
So, yes. It's a long road, but it can be traveled.
I don't know of any universities in the UK which would allow this. The reason is simple: completing even basic tasks in science involves knowing the language of science (often with a lot of maths).
However, there are 'access courses' in the UK which are 1 year, and have much lower entry requirements. I'm not sure where you are (probably the US?) but I imagine there will be similar things around.
It very much depends on your background - it is possible, for example, to end up with a humanities degree, but having taken a fair bit of math and science as part of an interest, or a liberal arts education.
Fields that don't have a strong undergraduate presence may very well accept you - for example, there are very few students coming in with an undergraduate background in Epidemiology, which means that graduate programs are pretty much expecting to train you from the ground up anyway.
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95847 | Can i use the same Method Section for two different papers?
I did a survey on the demand for complementary medicine among patients of the gynaecologcial department here in Munich. We collected a couple of hundred questionnaires and I am currently writing two different papers: one dealing with our findings concerning the cancer patients and another about the results from our patients in pregnancy and after birth. I finished the first one and I am currently sitting on the second one. I am wondering now: obviously, the introduction and discussion sections are completely different, but my method section is more or less the same. Can I simply use my method section verbatim also for the other paper? The papers will be submitted to two different journals in the end.
Copying entire sections verbatim between two papers is generally considered self-plagiarism and/or dual-publication. It's frowned upon academically, and may trigger additional unwanted review by plagiarism-detection software.
However, some disciplines- particularly those in the medical sciences- have come to accept that duplication of text between Methods sections of different papers such as in your situation is inevitable. Check with your adviser to be sure this is OK in your discipline (and potentially the editors of the journals you are submitting to), but copying the core of the methods section should not be objectionable.
Note that there are some good practices to follow when doing so. At a minimum you should provide a citation in the methods section to each companion paper explaining that this survey had multiple objectives when it was designed. You should also be able to provide some text describing why the described methodology is suitable for addressing the central question of this particular paper, and why the results from each of the companion papers don't affect the results of this particular paper.
Please note that duplication of text across other sections, especially results and data sections, is always considered a major academic offense.
Thank you David for your fast reply! i came up with this now
"At the same time, the survey was conducted with patients in pregnancy and childbed, the objective being the assessment of the demand for integrative medicine among patients pertinent to maternity care. The report on these findings is subject of another research paper. The conception and design of the questionnaire were such that it was suitable for both patient groups. Due to different clinical profile and situation, we looked at the two groups separately in order to avoid mutual interference."
Do you think this is sufficient?
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95984 | What is the normal length for a research paper?
I did a survey on the demand for complementary medicine among patients of the gynaecologcial department here in Munich. We collected a couple of hundred questionnaires and I am currently writing my research paper. Since I do not know yet to which journal I am going to submit it, I wanted to adopt a very normal and standard structure/style. I was wondering now whether there are predefined standards of length concerning research papers, in particular regarding word count. I intuitively try to stay under 3000, but would it be ok to exceed that number? Moreover, is it fine to have, for example, a comparatively brief introduction and method section but a rather extensive discussion section? Or do the different sections have predefined standards too?
One of them asked Lincoln, "How long should a man's legs be in proportion to his body?" and Lincoln replied" "I have not given the matter much consideration, but on first blush I should judge they ought to be long enough to reach the ground." — Thomas Lawry, Personal Remembrances of Abraham Lincoln (1910)
We cannot answer this without known which specific journal you are trying to publish. Also, most (all most all?) journals list length limits in the authors guidelines section.
My published papers range in length from 3 to 134 pages, and I don't consider any of them abnormal.
If you have a specific journal in mind -- why not just look at the articles in the past couple of years and average their lengths? Such data isn't very hard to find.
If you're trying to get a paper that you can publish in a journal, then it really depends on the journal, and if it has any specific requirements or constraints. There is no "standard" length for a paper. I've had papers that were 15 manuscript pages, and papers that were 50.
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1651 | Percentage of waiting-list students offered a PhD position
As a result of comments on my earlier question, I am posting another question.
Is there a rule of thumb for what percentage of waiting-list students is eventually placed, or invited, for a PhD position.
This is far too broad to answer. It depends on where you are applying? Which country, for starters? Which university?
I agree that it's very broad, that's why I am asking for a rule of thumb, or just post ad-hoc answers. I am sure people are interested in this.
Rule of thumb is that the number placed equals the number of positions that come available.
I don't see the point in making a new question, it is very likely if one had the statistics to provide the answer to one of these questions they would have the statistics for the other. The numerator in each percent is the same, it is just the denominator that is different. I'm skeptical any such statistics exist on a widespread basis anyway.
The numerator in the first case is the number of students that accept the position, in this case it is the number of students that are offered the position. The difference is those that are offered a position, but do not accept. I know it would be hard to come up with percentages, that is why I said rule of thumb.
I think it depends a little bit on the status of the department/university. High status universities are more likely to be the first choice, whereas lower status universities are likely to be a second, third, or fourth choice, which means that they are likely to get more rejections in their initial round of offers, and hence make greater use of a reserve list.
@DaveClarke That is tautological. I asked for a percentage of total on the waiting list. Also it should include those that are accepted in e.g. the second round but refuse.
Seconding @JeromyAnglim's comment. I think the answer is essentially zero for the top 10 (or 20) American computer science departments. (My department doesn't have a waiting list, for instance.)
No, there really isn't a rule of thumb for this.
For graduate departments that admit on a fixed cycle, they generally have a certain number of places open each year. They admit from their applicant pool a number of applicants that, when all decisions are made, are designed to give them their target number of enrollees. If, for some reason, the number of students who accept is significantly smaller than the target, and there were good students who were wait-listed, they may be offered admission, although this is by no means guaranteed.
For graduate departments that do rolling admissions this is obviously not an issue, as they don't need a wait list.
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43770 | What are the restrictions placed by copyright laws on reuse of figures in dissertation defense?
In some sense this question follows the question: Is it necessary to obtain permissions for copying figures from published articles in your proposal/dissertation?
Following F'x's advice and my own university's very stringent requirements, I have applied for permissions for reuse of figures in my dissertation. I plan to drop the figures, the permission for reuse of which has not been provided freely by the respective holder.
I hadn't given this much thought before, but what permissions are necessary for reuse of figures in a dissertation defense? I mean the powerpoint presentation slides. Of course, clear and prominent attribution is the minimum requirement, but is there a clear law on this? It's become reasonably convenient to obtain permissions from US publishers (copyright.com), but what if the publisher in question is based in Europe?
If you aren't planning to publish you slides, I would advise you to not worry about copyright law in this case. Copyright law applies to your use of material in slides just like it does any other medium, but there is more possible latitude for fair use claims. That "possible latitude" means legal grey area and lots of possible time and money that can be sunk into a likely fruitless attempt to achieve clarity, since many edge cases may have no official legal determination yet.
Thus, my real advice is this: worry about communicating, not about copyright. Nobody at your defense will report you for copyright infringements. More care is appropriate when posting online, but it is still the case that a) probably nobody will care and b) if somebody does care, the expected action will be to ask you to remove the image from the posted slide.
I would say you'd have little difficulty convincing nearly anyone that using a properly-attributed figure to improve understanding in an academic presentation should fall under fair use.
Also, the only people with standing to bring any sort of DMCA notice against you probably either aren't going to be present (unaffiliated authors) or would give permission readily (like a committee member).
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43276 | How to find the ISBN from the DOI?
My question is inverse of the following question:
How can you find the DOI of an article that doesn't seem to have one?
I am looking for the ISBN number (it's a requirement for getting permissions on copyright.com) for the following paper:
http://arc.aiaa.org/doi/abs/10.2514/6.2000-519
I found its DOI to be doi:10.2514/6.2000-519 from the citation data, however I couldn't find the ISBN. Is this typical? In the sense that can there be a DOI but not an ISBN for a manuscript?
Articles don't usually have an ISBN since they are for books. It should be sufficient to give the title of the article you are interested in to copyright.com, which is AIAA's preferred mechanism for copyright license clearance. That being said, searching your article's title on copyright.com gives a null result. As such, you should probably contact AIAA directly, or stick a sequence of zeros into copyright.com's extended request form.
"ISBN" stands for "International Standard Book Number". In such cases, an ISSN may be helpful, which many periodicals have, although it only identifies the periodical, not a particular issue. This particular proceedings series does not seem to have an ISSN, though.
There is an address on the bottom of the page: For permission to republish contact..., so I would do just that.
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7865 | Do extracurricular research/activities in graduate school negatively affect your future?
I'm the kind of graduate student that finds many research topics interesting and wants to participate in lots of student organization activities related to science and academia. But recently, one of my professors warned me against "doing too much" beyond my research focus, both in terms of publications and in terms of extra-curricular activities. As I see it, your goal as an academic is to develop a "specialty", so it is important to focus on one narrow topic and pass over opportunities to research other interesting, but unrelated topics. But can research outside of your particular focus in graduate school really negatively affect your ability to get hired in an post-doc or tenure track position in the future? How can "doing more" reflect negatively on one's self?
Bear in mind that you have not guarantee to get a good post-doc (or any tenure track position) in your current field. So even if doing other things decreases you change to get in this field, it can raise in other fields (and then people look look very differently at "I'm interested in Y" vs "I'm interested in Y and I have already published a paper"). Source: I'm a quantum physicist, doing stuff in mathematical psychology. (Sure, in quantum physics they treat my math. psych. as no more than an ambitious hobby.)
Don't worry, the industry will be much happier to embrace your breadth, and appreciate your ability to talk to people who are not at your level in a specialized field. Doing stuff on the side means that your "main" department won't understand the "side" research, and likewise the "side" department won't care about the "main" research. You will simply fall between the cracks.
Read broadly, publish narrowly deeply.
This is roughly what I've been telling my students. Now all of this depends greatly from area to area, but here's what I believe to be true. Having a broad background in your area might slow you down initially when trying to publish. But over the long term (your entire career), a broad base will help you more - it will let you be flexible about topics of interest, it will allow you to see connections where others might not, and it will help you place your work in a larger context.
But from your question, you appear to be referring not just to "exposure to outside topics" but "activities related to the larger enterprise of science and academia". With those activities also, you should be careful. Maybe choose one or two outside activities and devote your extracurricular efforts there. The advantage is that by focusing, you're more likely to be able to do something meaningful, and it also prevents you from frittering away time in busy work.
Shouldn't that be "Read broadly, publish deeply"?
fair enough :)- good point.
In particular, I'm not convinced that having a diverse publication record is a bad thing, as long as the papers are strong.
well that's the problem: it's difficult "on average" to be diverse and strong. Not saying it can't be done, but having that as a target can be dangerous
The issue is fundamentally that of "categorization": people want to have a box to put you in. "Dr. X is an expert in field Y." Early on, if you're all over the map, people don't have a clear sense of what your focus really is. That makes it harder for them to feel that you're going to be focused on their needs in your next position. Instead, the worry is that you'll continue to be all over the map.
This is also a problem for young faculty: they need to have a broad enough profile that they aren't trapped in a particular "niche," but not so broad a profile that they don't have depth in any one specific field. If someone can't be recognized as "the expert in her field," where 'her field' is somewhat arbitrary in scope, that makes for problems when it comes time for promotions and tenure cases.
There's a whole bunch of research in sociology that supports this idea that being categorized is a key to success in labor markets — especially when you're just starting out. An example many people are familiar with is typecasting in films; early on, it's great for a career.
@BenjaminMakoHill This sound very interesting. Can you provide some references to this research?
In my original comment, I included a link to an AcaWiki summary of "Robust identities or nonentities? Typecasting in the feature-film labor market." You should also check out some of other work of sociologist Ezra Zuckerman whose body of work shows how people/organizations who are hard to categorize are punished and people who are easy to categorized are rewarded.
It's true in an abstract sense that doing more is better than doing less, but there are psychological factors at play here.
Regarding extracurricular activities, hiring committees are unlikely to value them much, and they will come across as a distraction from research. For each activity mentioned on your CV or website, someone may read it and wonder whether you might have written another paper if you hadn't been doing this instead. It's not really fair, but you don't want people to be thinking about this.
But can research outside of your particular focus in graduate school really negatively affect your ability to get hired in an post-doc or tenure track position in the future?
Partly it depends on how good it is. If you add a truly excellent paper to your CV, it should only help. However, research outside of your specialty or done on the side is probably less likely to be excellent, and someone who looks at just that paper may end up with a lower opinion of you than you would like.
So in this case, quality is much more valued than quantity?
Hmm, both are valued, but you need to meet a quality bar from any given job (in addition to a quantity bar). If you apply to a fancy department, they'll want to see publications that impress them, and they won't care how many lesser publications you have if you don't have that. They won't reject you explicitly because of papers that don't impress them, but they might form their opinion of you before they notice there are some gems hidden in your publication record. Different departments will have different standards and preferences, but it generally plays out roughly along these lines.
So I'd recommend balancing quantity vs. quality by taking this into account. Figure out what sorts of jobs might be realistic, and then try to maximize the amount you accomplish at that level. (Of course this is easier said than done.)
I'll echo what the other answer have suggested and add a little more. On the academic job market you want to be able to explain what you do in a way that people can understand in a sentence or two. Your question seems to imply that already understand that having a focus is important and excelling in it is of utmost importance.
There are two ways that work or research outside of this core/focus can hurt:
Peripheral work may leave you with less time to make the core/focus really shine. You may simply have less achievements or publications than you would have if you had focused more on your core research. The issue is not only that people reading your CV might think this. It might really be true!
The second issue is that this peripheral work might be seen as a signal that you are not serious about your core body of research. Do you really care about devoting your life to the field, topic, or question that you are asking someone to hire you to work on? Are you likely to leave your career for this other thing? The core of your work might be seen as less focused than it actually is if it looks like you've got all these others things going on.
This second issue is a real risk, but it's possible to deal with this. Basically, it's your job to convey to people that although your extracurricular work is there — and although it may even constitute some impressive achievements or skills — you don't treat this other work as seriously as you treat your research.
This often means leaving irrelevant stuff off of your CV and website — although there are limits to what you can leave out. It also means organizing your CV so it's clear that the central thrust of your research is your priority. Many people have "selected papers" on your website or other personal materials. You can get to make that selection.
For example, I have written several technical books, served on several non-profits, and given hundreds of talks at (non-academic) technical conferences. I mention these things in brief and in passing at the end of my CV and on other pages on my website reserved for my non-academic work. I don't hide these achievements as I think they speaks to my skills and qualities as a researcher. But I make sure that when speaking to academic audiences, I — quite literally — place the core of my academic work first.
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8873 | On the use of grant funds for extracurricular research
While reading the PUBLICATIONS PRODUCED AS A RESULT OF THIS RESEARCH section of some completed NSF award abstracts, I expected to find papers only within the limited scope of the goals of the proposal. To my surprise, I have found some papers in completely unrelated topics credited to the research grant that funded it. It doesn't even seem like a serendipitous finding or semi-related tangent either, but rather a complete deviation from the grant's intended purpose.
I'm sure that there are other justifications for attributing research grants for publications as stated in this post, but it made me wonder...
How can one justify using grant money to fund research outside of your intended purpose of the grant? Is this a common practice? Are there any negative consequences to using your grant to fund extracurricular research activities? Under what circumstances is it valid to do so and when is it inappropriate to do so?
I've also been funded by NSF's Division of Mathematical Sciences, so I can respond personally. To first-order approximation, the only resources that research grants in mathematics (and similar fields, like theoretical computer science) provide is money to buy food to supply brain cells.
If my brain cells (or my students' brain cells) produce research results during the active period of a grant, I always acknowledge the grant in the resulting paper and I always list that publication in my reports to NSF. It doesn't matter whether the work is directly or even tangentially related to the research outlined in the proposal.
If that seems inappropriate, consider the alternatives: (1) Shut off any part of my brain that is not thinking specifically about the proposed work. (2) Allow myself to think about other stuff, but don't acknowledge the grant if I actually make progress. The first alternative requires irreversible surgery that I am unwilling to perform on myself, and the second is completely unethical.
replace "brain cells" by "CPU cycles".
What's a "CPU cycle"?
@VahidShirbisheh Are you aware of any examples of extraneous research outside the theoretical research areas?
The fact that other expenses are directly related to the proposal does not change the fact that the grant pays salaries, which pay for food. And no, you cannot determine which calories paid for which ideas.
A grant is not exactly the same as a contract. When you propose a set of research tasks, you're basically saying that you hope to make progress on a set of problems with plausible directions. Reviewers fund you AND the work. It's common to hear people say in a panel, "This seems like a hard problem, but good things will come out of funding researcher X".
So at least with the NSF (and I don't have experience with other agencies), there's an understanding that you'll work on topics related to the grant, and that you'll work on other things as well - maybe even to fuel the next grant !
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4791 | Why use unique digital researcher ID?
I recently discover the existence of unique digital identifier for researchers (such as the one proposed by ORCID or ResearcherID).
I never really heard about it, maybe because it is not common in my field (biological sciences) and I was wondering about the interest and use of such identifier.
So my question is twofold:
1) What are the interest of using an unique digital identifier as a researcher?
2) Is it commonly used in the scientific community (by publishers, databases, commitees)?
PS: related but not the same question here
ResearcherID started as a noble cause, and while it is still "free" to register, you cannot really link your papers unless you have access to ISI's Web of Knowledge, which is so freaking expensive that even the research university that I am affiliated with does not have full access to it.
Well, search for publications of a John Smith (no middle name), or a Lee Wang, or any common name, and you'll have a hard time identifying them because of the many homonyms… Publishers and database owners are trying hard to help users, by trying to guess who is who (Web of Science calls this “Unique author set”), but their algorithms don't do very well.
As an example, I have a colleague who has a paper completely outside her main field. None of these algorithms pick it up.
Thus, because a researcher’s name is not unique, many people argue that there is need of a unique ID scheme. (Others disagree: “I’m not a number!”). As a researcher, the benefits are:
easier for others to identify your articles in databases
easier to keep track of your citations, especially for items other than conventional journal articles
possibilities for cool web hyperlinks, like DOI has brought
The Orcid registry was launched yesterday, so noöne uses it so far…
My own concern about it is that I don't know in detail on the ORCID consortium will use the data they will be able to mine. In particular, this worries me:
I consent to the privacy policy and terms and conditions of use, including allowing those who access the database to make commercial uses of the public data.
ORCID was just an example. I updated the question by adding ReseacherID. Any information about this one?
I just registered to try it. Everything apart from name and website has a privacy setting that you can set to "private" if that is a concern. The privacy settings are quite explicit that only "public" data is public (duh) and can be used commercially. So to me their privacy settings look ok.
As well, marriages can confuse name based systems, and rob married people (esp. women) of credit and history.
There are several purposes for proper and trustworthy tracking of individual's publications. Whether we as researchers like it or not, we are gradually more and more evaluated on the basis of our publications output. That is, our grant applications/proposals and other means of funds acquisition are rated, at least partly, against our publications track and a future projection thereof. If you want to convince the hiring, or grant committees and other fund holders, you show your list of publications. The more trustworthy, the better. Hence a reason for a centralized trustworthy publication tracking service. Also, people change names (e.g., by marriage), affiliations, sometimes fields. Proper attribution by automatic algorithms, such as those at work at WoS, Scopus, Google Scholar, or Microsoft Academic Search is therefore unreliable. Having a real-world and trusted tag which I could use e.g., on my papers to identify myself among the hundreds of John Smiths is useful.
Therefore:
1) What are the interest of using an unique digital identifier as a researcher?
trustworthy disambiguation
central trustworthy register
semi-automatic tracking of publications, which however should be customisable by the ID owner to fix all the mistakes/misattributions
citation attribution - often e.g., WoS, attributes citations mistakenly to wrong people, because people make mistakes in references/bibliographies, etc. A central register can help with that.
2) Is it commonly used in the scientific community (by publishers, databases, commitees)?
If your name is unique, it's easy for the committees to check your track by simply googling you, then these guys don't care much. If you are John Smith of this world, than they are not able to do that and would ask you to prove your track record. And that can be painstaking. Even with just few dozen papers published, I myself am not able to get my WoS record correct. So to set the answer straight: currently, not many people use it for other than personal purposes, but many (including myself) hope, ORCID will succeed and the academic community will start to use the scheme and life will get a little bit easier.
The biology equivalent is eRa commons. As that system is strongly linked with NIH funding, it provides a robust system to tie a paper with a particular author that is independent of the author's name and the multiple versions that may be associated with the author.
Where it falls short is that eRa commons isn't associated with anything outside of pubmed and NIH.
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5622 | Finish previous work during current position
I will soon change of lab, moving from a PhD student position to post-doc position. During the last months of my contract as a PhD student, I tried to finish everything I started but I still have a few projects in progress. These projects include collaborative paper with other groups, so I am not the only one involved.
I was wondering what was the general agreement when changing position with unfinished project. I see three main possibilities here:
At the beginning of the new contract, I spend all my time finishing the previous project so I do not have to worry about them for too long (but I do not start right away to work for my new boss)
I spend one day per week (for instance) working for the past project and the rest for the current one
I do not work at all on the previous project during office hours, but rather after work and during the week-end (which I would prefer not to do)
I have to precise that my future boss is not involved in the project I would need to finish. I also plan to ask him the question directly when I start the new position, but I thought a little background about what is commonly done could be beneficial before starting this discussion.
NB: this question is different from this one since it does not concern the ownership of the research, but rather on how to spend the time in the lab.
See also this question (not a duplicate, but related): http://academia.stackexchange.com/q/5193/1033
As an academic working with a couple of post-docs, my rule is you can do what you want with your time as long as you do what is required for the project that employs you.
It is also the case that I know (and indeed expect) that post-docs will have work of their own that they'll want to finish up or extend.
I would not be happy with option 1, but option 2 would be good for me. Weekends are your own. If you spend them writing more papers, I will not object. But please do have some rest and relaxation time.
As a post-doc, you are starting to build your own career, so writing independent papers, and thereby forging your own way, is a good thing. But there are a lot of benefits to be had from integrating yourself in your new working environment, and working too much on your own stuff means that you will miss that opportunity (and possibly make a bad impression).
Besides all the upvotes showing how correct this is, let me stress it even explicitly. What Dave describes is exactly how it should be when the post-doc knows what is expected of her/him, as well as the professor does everything right to train the protege and guide her/him on the path. Thanks Dave.
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23720 | Should I include 'future work' in a paper, when I don't intend to do that future work?
I am in the process of writing a paper that I think introduces a novel concept. There are some related factors (perhaps even foundational factors) that should be worked out in order to perfect my idea. I plan on putting these ideas in a 'Future Work' section of the paper. However, I have no interest in actually doing anything I put there. After this paper, I want to move on to another topic.
Should I include those ideas in 'Future Work'? Should I state that I have no plan to work on them myself, so as not to leave anyone interested in the work 'hanging'?
Don't say "future work", say "limitations of the current work".
related: http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/23240/how-can-i-signal-that-i-dont-intend-to-follow-up-the-items-in-my-future-work
It depends how you phrase it. Do not write This will be shown in a subsequent paper. Do write This and this still needs to be done.
I think it is very informative to inform the audience of the next steps that need to be taken in this research. For example, shows you are aware of shortcomings of work done so far, and it can be useful to refer to in funding applications. However, there can be many reasons why next steps are not actually carried out. It might be your personal interest, but more often than not, project-specific funding runs out, PhD students or postdocs finish and move to new institutes, etcetera.
This is particularly true for PhD theses. The final chapter may be full of future work, which, in many cases, is never carried out.
Remember that your "Future Research" section might inspire someone else to do the work you have outlined. It is very much worth including.
I'd add to this answer, with which I agree, that the reviewers might well ask the author to complete the paper with the missing parts, especially if they feel that the effort required to complete it would not be overwhelming (say around a few months).
Instead of having a 'Future work' section, you could, under the 'Conclusion' section, discuss briefly in what ways you believe the current work can be improved. You do not have to state that you have no plan to work on the ideas yourself.
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2709 | Graduate early with average GPA, or later with better GPA?
I've seen similar questions here, and I wish there was a narrower tag than the broad soft-question and career-development.
I am currently a freshman/sophomore-to-be at a top ten math program in US. My major GPA is around 3.5-3.6, and so is my overall GPA. Due to fast progress in my courses (skipped all lower divs) I will be ready to graduate in a year or year and a half. The question is whether I should do that.
I do not see myself outside of academia, and dead-set on pursuing PhD in math. With my GPA far from being stellar, I was going to take more grad courses to improve the situation. The college is quite pricey, with me being an out-of-state, and so I am not really sure whether I should just graduate and take those courses back home (or apply for masters).
Recap: is it better to graduate early, with an average GPA and no hooks (e.g., research, high Putnam grade, no grad courses), apply for Masters program and save money, or graduate later and improve my record as an undergrad?
How good is your relationship with your professors? (I mean: how good will their recommendation letters be?)
Only 2 courses I've taken were taught by professors. I am really trying to seek attention of one very influential number theorist, and I do not think it's worked so far.
One option is to do a masters, then apply again, and try to go to a stronger school for a PhD. In this case, however, I recommend that when you go for your masters you actually apply for their PhD program (as oftentimes masters students are treated a bit like second-class citizens, e.g., much less likely to get funding). And who knows, you may love the school, and stay there for your PhD after all.
@mixedmath Too much of a giveaway. I wouldn't want a professor to think that I'm after him just because of the recommendation letters.
@user22835: Speaking as a professor: Why not?
Have you looked into establishing residency in the state? I think the difficulty of this task varies substantially from one state to another, but it may be worth looking into.
It is extremely difficult to establish residency in California.
Your answer will depend partly on what you want to do in academia. If you want to teach, but don't really want to emphasize research much, you might do fine to graduate now. However, if your goal is to become a professor at a research intensive school, then you really should go to the strongest grad school you can get into. (Based on your description, I strongly suspect that if you bust your butt for another year or two, in particular working to earn one or two strong letters of rec, you could get into a better grad school than you can currently.)
Yes, I know there are considerations about who you will work with, perhaps geography, potential two-body problems, etc. So, why's it so important to go to the best school you can? Again and again I see that in academia (as everywhere) networking is crucial. Generalizing and stereotyping a bit: the best schools have the best researchers, who know the other best researchers, who have the biggest grants, which fund the nicest postdocs, etc. If you want to thrive as a researcher, you will do well to get into that network. (To a large extent, it's a rich get richer system.) As an undergrad or early grad student, one way you can get into that network is to work with a professor who is a central part of it, and is willing to weave you in. And your chances of working with said professor typically go up with the reputation of the school.
Now a personal digression. Through high school and undergrad I was in a hurry to get to the next level as soon as possible. I skipped 7th grade, finished undergrad in 3 years, and started grad school at the age of 20. I even turned down a year abroad in the Budapest Semester in Math, because I was worried I'd miss out if I waited too long to get to grad school. The sad truth is that I wasn't ready. Maybe you would be; I've never met you, so I can't say.
Eventually (after 8 years), I finished a PhD, and am fairly happy with where my career is headed. However, I don't regret that time in grad school at all. I learned a lot of useful stuff. In fact, I think it's because I took my time in grad school that my career has gone as well as it has. One interesting feature of academia is that you're typically judged by your productivity relative to the time since you earned your PhD (rather than your age). As a result, I encourage you to take your time and learn as much as you can. You'll never again have as much free time as you do now.
I want to add a couple of remarks to Dan C's excellent answer.
No, you should not graduate early, unless your finances force it. Except for cost, there is no advantage to finishing early. Admissions committees will compare you to other undergraduate applicants, not other applicants your age; age discrimination is illegal. They will not care about your grades, as long as they're good; everyone applying to those departments has fantastic grades. I suspect almost all applicants to top math departments skipped their low-level math classes. I assume you'll ace the math GRE, but then so will everyone else.
What sets the successful applicants to top PhD programs apart is strong evidence of research potential. To gain admission to the top departments you must have strong letters from faculty that directly praise your potential for mathematical research in specific, personal, and credible detail. The only way to get those letters is to work directly with faculty outside the classroom. Fortunately, because you skipped your freshman classes, you have room in your schedule to do that.
You mention "out of state", so I'm guessing you're at a big state school (like mine); your classes so far probably had hundreds of students, and many were taught by graduate students or adjuncts. You have to break out of that; you must get to know some faculty. And because you're at a big state school, this is going to require considerable initiative on your part.
Taking graduate classes is a good way to meet faculty, but it's just a start. Do not just sit quietly in class and get an A. Meet with your instructor early in the semester, explain you ambition for academia, and ask about opportunities for research and/or independent study. Be prepared to explain what kind of mathematics you're best at, and what kind of math inspires you. The first prof you talk to is not likely to be a good match for your specific interests; ask them for suggestions of other faculty to talk to. Repeat ad infinitum.
There are many other reasons not to graduate early, which are less professional, but no less important. Give yourself some time to grow up.
Too long to be a comment, and originally written for Math.SE -
Firstly, if you're set on a math PhD, then you will probably never apply for a Master's program. Most math PhDs apply straight to PhD, and these are generally funded (this is all under the assumption that you stay in the US).
The typical accepted candidate to a good math PhD program has a good background in the following:
GPA
Research
Math knowledge
GRE/Math GRE
Recommendations
One doesn't need to be perfect at everything, and everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. The exception to this rule is that you must have great recs - there is a certain recommendation inflation right now, and it seems to me that recommendations are judged just as harshly by what is not said. I say this only because without grad courses/research/high gpa, it might be challenging for one of your professors to speak highly on your behalf. Or maybe not - it's case by case, right?
I cannot speak as to how strong your exact application would be, as I don't know the specifics. Your best feedback would probably come from a mentor or advisor from your department, or one of the professors whom you would ask for a recommendation.
Without knowing specifics, I might also ask: what is the rush for? (rhetorically)
As a final note, I should mention that it might be possible, depending on your school's policy, to apply for grad programs and decide to actually graduate only if you get accepted/have positive feedback. But this is not ideal, as it's sort of a punt. Were you to not get accepted, you wouldn't have set up summer plans and your last year would be somewhat hodge-podge. Yet these are the exact things that would improve your application for the next year.
Food for thought.
The OP mentions the cost of college as a possible reason to graduate early.
Thanks, Qiaochu. Yes, the cost hits me pretty bad, being a recent immigrant of more than humble backgrounds, and the whole package associated with it (e.g.,first family member to have his diploma recognized in US)
I would reorder your list as 1. Research 2. Recommendations. 3. Everything else.
To complement other answers: the "research" issue is volatile. Ill-informed, childish "research" is not a plus in applications to elite grad programs. I think it might be more apt to be able to give evidence of _getting_in_sync_with_ some contemporary serious research, even if one isn't yet able to make one's own contribution. Better to be an apprentice at something serious, than journeyman at something of dubious interest to professionals.
And, the same thing said in a different context: coursework per se is nice, but is (almost entirely) miles away from live mathematics. Thus, the point is not to "bluff" "research", but to get beyond the sterile, formal classroom/textbook mathematics. Live discussions with faculty and presence in seminars are substantive steps in the right direction, without the too-facile pretense that one is doing a big research project in 10 weeks in the summer, based on scant prior information. :)
Being able to have people speak on your behalf, that you have ably moved beyond "school math", and that that's what you are interest in, and have talent for (never mind classrooms) is what will get you into an elite program.
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8274 | Is one or two years' postdoc experience helpful for a (nonacademic) research career?
I just graduated with a Ph.D. in Asia. And I'm considering to look for a postdoc position in US in the field of computer science (to be specific, machine learning and computer vision). But I don't want to go for a faculty position (at least I don't want to at this moment) in the future. I'd prefer to find some research position in industry or some research institute in US. My question is that do you think one or two years' postdoc experience really helpful for a research career, considering it may not be that easy for an oversea student to directly get a research position in industry or research institutes?
Some of the advantages I can think of are:
Postdoc's supervisor's networking with other people in industry or researh institutes
More publications before job hunting
Get to know more people in my area
Hope to hear some advice from you. Thank you very much.
Although CS post-docs are somewhat rare compared to many other fields, you have the right idea that it is a good idea as a stepping stone for further research or faculty positions down the road. If you're willing to take a position and can find one, I don't think there are any downsides if you do indeed continue to publish and make contacts. I would also suggest broadening your search to European positions, as there are many excellent opportunities at outstanding institutions there, as well.
@CharlesMorisset: yup. it's common to see CS graduates go for postdocs if they want to stay in academia. But I'm not sure if postdoc is a good step for my case, as I'm not interested in finding a faculty position in some university.
@Charles Morisset -- my experience is different. I only know a few CS faculty that did postdocs. That said, my definition of postdoc would not include a year in industry, which others may consider a postdoc.
It really depends on the subfield. Postdocs are very common in theory, and very uncommon in systems and networking, for example.
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3378 | How do MIT OpenCourseware and real MIT courses compare?
Are MIT courses much different from MIT OpenCourseWare? I am curious, because as a high schooler, I have some intent to study from MIT OpenCourseWare.
Will this allow me to be more comfortable if I am admitted to MIT?
Also, how are MIT courses so different from those at other places? I heard that these courses are hard..
it is a watered down version. also answers are not available and you can't get support.
I agree that answers are not available and you can't get support, but what is your basis for saying it is a watered down version? My understanding is that OCW is a record of how the course was actually taught (copies of problem sets and other handouts such as notes, sometimes recordings of lectures). It may be an inferior format compared to taking the class in person at MIT, but the actual substance is the same. Am I wrong about this?
yes it is wrong actual course has more. recitations problem sessions etc. also if u are doing a self study questions without answers are useless u can't learn well or see if you are really learning.
MIT courses are more advanced. I got a database class at a midtier U.S institution according to us news rank. MIT course was way more advanced they were coding a db from stracth, however in my institution we were focusing on sql using a programming language. Also MIT course is more advanced then Gatech or UIUC UWA. They usually cover at freshman level what other do at sophomore level.
I am voting to close. While I think there is a useful question here, the current one about how to use on-line resources to prep for undergraduate study does not seem to be on topic.
@anonymousmathematician I think TMNT could be confusing a "watered-down course" with a course that happens to have an excellent professor who can teach the material in a highly understandable way, without sacrificing appropriate rigor. The quality of teaching is hard to find at most places, so students watching the OCW videos might say, "wow, that's so easy to follow, the course must be simple. These MIT kids aren't all that."
MIT OCW doesn't offer "courses". It offers "courseware" — basically textbooks with videos.
Real MIT courses have live instructional staff who answer questions, run recitation sections, and offer feedback (in particular, grades) on your solutions to the homework and exam problems. Real MIT courses have deadlines that force (well, encourage) you to actually work on the course material regularly. Real MIT courses also have a community of other students, all following the same lock-step schedule, that can work together to develop ideas, internal feedback, social outlets, and later professional contacts. Real MIT courses give you an official record from MIT of your performance in the class.
In counterpoint to JeffE's answer, let me also indicate that the materials used in OpenCourseWare have actually been used in the indicated courses. The assignments and exams do correspond to actual materials used at MIT. So OCW courses can give you a sense of the difficulty and workload of MIT courses, but, as JeffE indicates, the experience overall cannot be the same.
As an addendum to other useful information in answers and comments: it's not that MIT or other elite places have some sort of monopoly on information, even if one means bleeding-edge stuff. It may be true that the high-end instructors at elite places are in personal possession of bleeding-edge information, so can put other things in that context. And, indeed, those seemingly subtle aspects can matter enormously.
The genuine action-point is that, by merely "looking at" or having a "participant certificate" in regard to any discussion, one does not certify that one is quasi-effective in use of the ideas... and so on. That is, having paid admission to watch any sort of professional sport, and managing to understand the scoring, one has really no certification that one oneself can play that sport at a professional level.
Sure, if one hasn't ever seen experts play the sport, one is bereft. But, still, just having seen the Kentucky Derby many times doesn't mean that one can run a 3-minute mile.
The positive recommendation from me is that one probably does want significant contact with people who have made/done significant, genuine mathematics. Otherwise, if one is hoping to make research contributions, unless one is The Chosen One, one is stuck in a position exactly analogous to trying to make money on the stock market with just the same info that everyone else has (i.e., no insider info, unlike members of Congress are allowed to use...).
That is, it's not that MIT has better info about entry-level things, it's that the faculty there have access to, and are creators of, high-end, bleeding-edge stuff. As are certain people around the world.
Perhaps surprisingly, then, the point is not the "program", but the people. Their notes can certainly be useful, perhaps incredibly so, but it's still not the live thing.
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30184 | How to tell supervisor too many lengthy meetings are hurting your productivity?
My supervisor wants us to meet 3-5 times in a week with another PhD student of his. Every meeting is on average more than couple of hours. I don't know about the other student. But I feel like we are wasting too much time in meeting; it's hurting my productivity. How can I tell my supervisor to keep the amount of meetings and duration limited? To make matter worse, he also wants us (me and other PhD student) to meet separately besides these meetings. I am spending on avg. 12-15 hours per week doing these meetings.
I can answer questions why I think these meetings aren't productive, but that may turn into rant and I may put them into another question. So I want to keep it short and precise; let's just assume these meetings aren't productive for me.
I would think the number of hours your supervisor is willing to spend with you should be the main source of information here. During your phd your prime goal is to learn not be productive?
@chris "During your phd your prime goal is to learn not be productive?" That sounds like a whopper of a trick question. Learning and productivity go hand-in-hand, and the OP could easily have phrased his question by saying that the 10 or more hours of meetings per week are impacting his learning.
@chris During your Ph.D, your goal is to learn, be productive, and to do research--in approximately reverse order. As one professor I know put it: "One mistake you make make is to learn too much.", with the implication being that the student learnt at the expense of researching.
The point being the situation could be worse if the OP supervisor had no time to spare. No learning and being productive are not the same thing
The point of a phd is to learn how to do research. Full stop. Well you try and do this productively if you can. You will have your whole career to be productive if that is what you think matters
What do you do during these meetings?
I think all the current answers are wildly speculative, as we do know know or can only guess 3 relevant infos: (1) is your advisor also in these meetings? (2) what do you do in these meetings? why does your advisor value them and you do not? (3) how does the other student feel about these meetings?
For instance, you say "it's hurting my productivity". If the purpose of these meetings is to bring the other PhD student up to speed, this may be acceptable to your advisor and you will have a hard time convincing him otherwise.
Too much time spent in meetings with superiors is a common problem particularly in the business world. If you intend to begin a career when you've finished your studies, you should get used to this now. ;)
Several hours, on thrice-weekly meetings? How do you not run out of things to talk about?
I think this is a time to be direct and honest: just say you are spending too much time in meetings and it should be reduced. Say what you should be doing instead. A reasonable person should not be offended and should know that meetings can hurt productivity.
I also recommend considering changing the way the meeting works to align it with your needs. When I am in a meeting, if nobody is taking charge, I will try to be a leader and give the meeting some direction. Remind participants of the agenda. Add the things you want to do to the agenda. But be tactful.
I agree. The way to tell your advisor this is to tell your advisor this. I see no alternative.
Just direct and honest. He is advisor/not a chief, so you can exchange your idea as with a friend.
Volunteer to prepare the agenda for these meetings. The day before, send everyone email asking for agenda items. If you get none, suggest to your supervisor that the meeting be canceled as there are no items to discuss.
If you do get items, make sure "Adjournment" is the last item on the agenda.
Edited to add: There are two groups for whom time is literally money. They physicians and lawyers. I spent my first career working for one such group. I learned that meetings need not be a time sink. As I've said in a comment, the way to make meetings productive is to have an agenda and stick to it. Meetings run by people who know what they're doing accomplish what they are supposed to accomplish and stop. This is what Anonymous Physicist and Dave Clark called "aligning the meeting with your needs."
One of the things that chaps my buns about academia is waste-of-time meetings. Happily, I am low on the academic totem pole and not tenure-track, so I can blow most of them off.
Another edit: I never had a meeting with my own dissertation chair that did not have an agenda. I prepared them and he seemed happy to have them. Early meetings were formal and ended when we reached the end of the agenda. Toward the end we met at a Chinese restaurant and the meeting gave way to lunch, but we never rambled.
Last edit, I promise: What I am suggesting is the difference between telling the advisor/supervisor that the meetings do not fulfill the needs of OP and telling the advisor/supervisor that, but following up with a suggestion that my experience says will improve the meetings and may result in fewer of them.
Is the "Adjournment" item a pattern to delay less relevant topics in the hope they may get irrelevant before wasting time of them?
This proposal seems rather passive-aggressive. I don't know anyone who wouldn't regard it as a clear indictment of the value of the meetings. It would be one thing if the OP were simply a member of a group that had by custom regular meetings, and then the OP has a legitimate right to try to persuade others that they may be meeting too often. But in this case, the OP's supervisor wants the OP to meet 3-5 times in a week. S/he didn't say meet that often "only if you have enough agenda items", so the suggestion to cancel the meetings is clearly against the supervisor's wishes....
....By taking such an action the OP is signalling that he doesn't find value in the advisor's suggestion, but is not doing the advisor the courtesy of saying so explicitly and saying why. Finally, though the question is rather laconic, a close reading suggests to me that the OP's supervisor is himself/herself present at the meetings: "My supervisor wants us to meet..." So there are three people meeting altogether almost every day. Asking for agenda items does not seem like the way to solve this (What's more exhausting than meeting every day? Preparing agenda items for meeting every day!)
Actually, preparing agenda items for an "empty" meeting is very easy. Yes, I assumed that the supervisor was present. I spent 30 years in industry before retiring to teach. The way to make meetings productive is to have an agenda and stick to it.
@VolkerSiegel: The "adjournment" item is a signal that the meeting is at en end. The idea is to do what we said we would and stop, rather than dragging on for hours.
This might be appropriate for administrative meetings but, honestly, it doesn't sound like this is the kind of meeting that's being talked about. Regular meetings involving PhD students are almost always a direct form of research collaboration. As such, the agenda has essentially one item: work together on the problem we're tackling at the moment.
@Bob: My point is that if the advisor is there and is spending at least 10 hours per week on these meetings, very likely s/he finds them useful and does not think that nothing is happening during them. Having an agenda is not an inherently bad idea (in fact it's a good one, in general) but (i) the advisor may or may not want to do this and (ii) having an agenda does not guarantee that the meeting will be useful. Maybe the agenda item is always "spend two hours talking about X", where X is not what the OP wants to talk about for that length of time. He needs to speak up about this...
@PeteL.Clark: You may be right, but I'd bet, if not my last nickel, at least an age-appropriate beverage, that, based on OP's assessment, everyone including the supervisor would like to cut these meetings short. They haven't been because "we've always done it this way." As you say, an agenda is not inherently bad. OP should give it a try.
@DavidRicherby: Except possibly in academia, there's no such thing as an "administrative meeting." A meeting ought to have a purpose, whether it is collaboration on research, status reporting, or policy development. It should be possible to express that purpose in an agenda. If it's not, then probably the meeting is a waste of time. Example research agenda item: "Is it possible to express this concept as two or more genes (instead of one) in a genetic algorithm." That is something people can focus on.
"You may be right, but I'd bet, if not my last nickel, at least an age-appropriate beverage, that, based on OP's assessment, everyone including the supervisor would like to cut these meetings short." Why is it necessary to bet on someone's intentions when the OP can just ask them? The two of us have somewhat different life experiences but are both academics living in the same state in the US. The OP is a student in Bangladesh. I will bet you that neither of us has any special insight into him or his advisor.
@BobBrown "Except possibly in academia" We are in academia. It says so in big letters at the top of the screen!
@DavidRicherby: I know... I know...
@PeteL.Clark: Actually I'm enrolled at a Canadian university, Bangladesh is my home country.
@user: Ah, that's relevant information. Since you have freely volunteered it here, maybe you would consider editing your profile to include it. Also, what field are you in? I am trying to figure out in what context a faculty member would even have time to spend at least ten hours a week meeting with two PhD students.
Since my comments trigger such negative rating, I might as well turn this into an answer :-)
The point I would like to make is focussed on the fact that you complain about your supervisor spending ten hours a week wanting to talk to you. I would like to say, as a former supervisee and a current supervisor, that you should consider yourself a priori lucky. Now it might be that your supervisor is also clueless, this I cannot judge. But think of this in the following way: the PhD is the last time in your life where you are being tought, in particular tought about how to do research, something books are not so good at doing. Should you consider a career in your field, you will have plenty of time to focus on being productive.
Think of your PhD -- and of the time your supervisor is spending helping you go through it, as an investment for future productivity. Of course you will most likely be faced with endless numbers of essentially boring meetings in your life.
You might feel it is already the case, but a meeting with your supervisor should not be of this type. My advice would be change the nature of the meeting, not the number of hours dedicated to them.
On the more general issue of being productive in research, personally I do not feel research is about productivity. Engineering might be, but engineering is not quite the same as research. Some people obviously think differently, which is fine by me.
Is it clear that the advisor is even in these meetings? It's not sure to me from the question - and in reality it seems more likely that the prof. is not there all the time when the meetings happen 3-5 times per week and take multiple hours. I don't know a single Prof. with that much time.
Well I was lucky enough to spend 4 hours a day with my supervisor
It is good that they have the time for their advisees, but you also need some time to actually implement the ideas that came out from the meeting and some time in between to think about it by yourself.
Let's say that if one wants to be an advisor, he or she would better find the time for his or her advisee(s), otherwise there's something wrong.
I think it unlikely that you will convince them to reduce the number of meetings; from my experience, people do not realise that you can do with less, until they have experienced the productivity boost themselves. In my experience, requests for fewer meetings are typically turned down by people who believe in the management model that regular meetings act as engine of progress.
If it is a purely scientific rather than a "waffle" meeting, though, then I recommend, just enjoy it. That's what you are in university for, after all.
But if the meeting is really unproductive (which means, it doesn't advance neither your direct work, nor your knowledge), then this is a classic instance for "manage your manager". Avoid directly criticising the number/style of meetings. Even at more advanced stages than a PhD, one will be looked at a person that is not ready to play ball.
Rather, be proactive: By you deciding what you want out of the meeting, preparing an agenda, preparing a list of expected outcomes, and writing down a mandatory "action list" at the end (which is checked against at the beginning of the following meeting), you can focus the meetings and help organise the thoughts of your fellow participants. You have a certain control of the agenda, this way.
If you push on the action list in a disciplined form, especially if you yourself act with discipline on it, but it not acted upon by the others, it may make the others in the meeting uncomfortable and lead them, in turn, to ask for fewer meetings on their own. Plus, you will be seen as manager/organizer of the meeting, and a disorganised supervisor may actually appreciate that, if it's done in a careful way. Don't castigate others for not doing theirs, just ask them if they have done their part.
Tips on approaching your supervisor:
Offer an alternative to the meetings: Perhaps meeting once a month, or a "lunch and learn". This sets you up as a solution oriented person rather than a "complainer".
Give specific instances of what is not productive. I measure the value of a meeting on whether I changed something I do because of the meeting. If I did not change, then the meeting did not have an effect on me and the value of the meeting is questionable.
Ask for an agenda for the meeting. This will force the person hosting the meeting to organize what they will talk about.
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748 | Tools to assist with upper-division grading?
Are there any commercial or free products that assist professors with grading students? I've seen many K-12 solutions, but these are generally without robust curve options. I've seen a lot of professors that have created their own Excel spreadsheets, but I'd like to offer something a little more standardized.
Easy Grade Pro and Gradekeeper are time-tested K-12 tools, but lack extensive curve-based grading options, like weighting, adjustments for curve compliance (ability to bump grades up but only if you're still within the curve), midterm grades only counting if they help the student, and the ability to switch to P/NP if the student is in a program that isn't included on a curve.
Some of these may be very specific to my institution, but I'm looking for a starting point at least.
Welcome to Academia.SE! Could you perhaps provide links to some of those options, and maybe talk a little bit more about the "robust curve options" you're looking for? It would improve the ability of people to answer your question (one which I'm also interested in!).
I've never found anything except Excel (or its clones) that does everything I want.
It seems like Gradekeeper remains the go-to program. So if you want to do something more sophisticated you probably want to think about working up some macros in Excel. For example, this post has some good example macros. There were three extensive discussions of gradekeeping software on Profhacker that you might want to skim. One on gradekeeping programs in general, one on a neat iPad app called GradeBook Pro and one that focused on a few cloud based apps for grade keeping. None of these seem to really do what you want, and with any of these you probably want to talk to someone at your institution about any policies they might have, particularly for something like a cloud app or an iPhone app regarding where student grades are kept and FERPA.
+1 for the comment about the need for privacy. In most cases, it will probably be verboten to store grades "in the cloud" without extremely strong encryption in place.
...even with extremely strong encryption in place.
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5277 | Why use version control systems for writing a paper?
I am following the advice of @Piotr Migdal in Is there an internet Git-like repository for collaboration on a paper?, and I want to ask about version controls: how beneficial are they (specially under LaTeX settings) for writing papers compared to Dropbox and SugarSync?
I have been using SugarSync for almost a year with no pain.
Usually, I create the paper folder and invite other authors to join, so we can see and edit the last version of the paper.
I use version control for all my code, but not for the manuscripts. I tried it once, but it was too difficult for my collaborators.
Three words for you: three-way merge. Even if one does not use version control, I think that every academic writer should learn how and when to use a 3-way merge tool. It is a life-saver; much more fast and precise than doing the work by hand.
See also: What are the advantages of using version control (git, CVS etc) in LaTeX documents - TeX.SE.
tl;dr: Version control is harder to set up, but makes it safe to work on the same file, and makes it easy to track history (i.e. previous versions).
Pros and cons of syncing files
Yes, the biggest advantage of things like Dropbox (I use it as well for backuping and synchronizing my files) and SugarSync is their easiness.
They may work for collaboration on files, but:
they are not meant for two people editing the same file at once (no merge functionalities - so one guy changing a file can overwrite changes made by other guy, even without knowing that),
you get no history, i.e.:
did anyone worked on that file I want to work know?
did anyone added or modified any other files?
which changes were made?
can I go to a previous version, the one I sent to my supervisor?
Depending what you do, it may not be an issue. For example, if only one is editing tex file, while others are only reading or uploading figures - it's perfectly fine.
And also, look at my answer on Simplest way to jointly write a manuscript? with a not technically-inclined collaborators.
Version control
Version control systems require some technical skills.
Two the most common version control systems are Git and Mercurial (with the second one being more Windows-friendly and, arguably, easier to start).
Both by standard comes only with command line access, but there are some graphical interfaces as well (I really recommend starting with SourceTree).
So, if the collaborators are techie, just teach them how to use it. If not - there is a way around.
You can keep track of version control by yourself, without engaging others (I'm doing it just now with 2 collaborators).
Just you start a repository inside folder you share (the examples are with Git):
cd ~/path/to/the/folder
git init // start git repository inside this folder
git add . // say git to track all files inside it
Now, every time you or your collaborator make some changes (e.g. add some files, correct typos, revise a chapter, ...) you do:
git commit -a -m "Fixed typos in Seciton 3"
Later, you will be able to go back to this version; and also compare, e.g. the current version of your file with the previous one (by default - by line, here - by words):
git diff HEAD~1 --color-words my_file.tex
See also:
Got 15 minutes and want to learn Git?
git + LaTeX workflow at StackOverflow
Writing the PhD thesis: the tools Part I
Collaborating with LaTeX and git at ShareLaTeX blog - a great and comprehensive tutorial
What are the advantages of using version control (git, CVS etc) in LaTeX documents - TeX.SE
https://tex.stackexchange.com/search?q=version+control
And real world example from using diff (it makes my life so much easier :)); commit messages in Polish, but I guess you get the idea:
Otherwise (a strip from PhD Comics):
If two people are editing the same file using DropBox, DropBox created "Conflicted copies" rather than try to merge both changes into the same file, thereby avoiding damaging the file.
@BenNorris Thanks, I fixed it. Actually, I was thinking about overwriting files (so one's changes are lost as they are overwritten by someone else).
Ah. My collaborators and I use the "track changes" feature of MS office products. I am uncertain if open source word processors have a similar feature. In this case, I recommend date stamping.
Also, I totally sympathize with the PhDComics strip. I ended up with so many edits after "Thesis-Final.doc" that I ended with "Thesis-DoubleFinal.doc" after awhile.
@BenNorris I'm not much into version control systems for MS Words documents (as I use LaTeX or for some short no-math articles - GoogleDocs). So maybe for doc files MS tools suffice (or are the best option); I don't know. Especially as tracking non-code files (so not only archiving, but looking at differences etc) may be tricky with Git (I don't know if it is possible in an easy way); for Mercurial it is possible, see http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6374469/svn-or-mercurial-version-control-of-word-documents.
If two people are editing the same file using DropBox, DropBox created "Conflicted copies" rather than try to merge both changes into the same file, thereby avoiding damaging the file.
How can it tell when that happens? The two conflicting versions could be hours or even days apart. This is impossible to do without analyzing the content carefully (and sometimes even analyzing it).
@FedericoPoloni - The phenomenon I describe only happens if two or more people are editing the file simultaneously.
Do not use git unless you're a computer scientist, and you have a lot of time to waste.
@Kaz I'm not a computer scientist and for me it worked.
One awesome fringe benefit to using version control for a paper: Suppose your print out a copies of version n of your paper and give them to collaborators for comments. A while later, when you're on version n+10, some of them get back to you, with their changes. With version control (at least with Git), it's easy to enter their changes against version n and then apply them to your current version.
I use SmartGit to access Git. It's a lot easier than messing around with the command line, and free for non-commercial use. I found it's automatic connection to BitBucket didn't work correctly though, so you have to cut and paste the link.
I'm not entirely sure how dropbox and sugar sync work, but their main aim is not to monitor change, but to keep files in sync over a multitude of platforms and to provide backup. In addition, a good version control system allows you to keep older versions, but also to comment on the changes explain why they where made. The version control is also guaranteed to keep the chain of change of a tex file even over very long periods of time (say submitting to journal a, getting rejected, submitting to journal b, getting reviews, new version, acceptance: such a cycle could easily be 1.5 years).
Also, in a Version Control System (VCS) you decided when you want to save a version, in dropbox I can imagine that the system makes that decision. Being in control yourself is important, for example to be able to generate a difference file when resubmitting a paper (see also my answer to this question on TeX SE).
Using a VCS you can also collaborate easily with people. Just create a private repository at bitbucket (supports mercurial and git), arrange for the other authors to have read and/or write access to your tex files in the repository, and they can change the paper or add to it. The VCS will take care of the merging.
I use Mercurial myself for version controlling papers. However, for version controlling a tex file, a VCS might be overkill. I would still recommend Mercurial though.
For one tex file is is not an overkill - see screenshot from my answer and judge for yourself :).
+1 Really good answer! There are two things I miss here, though: 1) it's better to split a big file into smaller ones, this can be easily done in LaTeX. 2) When two people want to work realtime on the same file I recommend to put a multi-editor layer before the VCS. C9 or Google Docs are good examples.
I had to create an account to this Stack Exchange site as well just to give +1 to this answer. :) The nice part about Bitbucket is that there also exists a nice Android client for the site, allowing you to monitor changes to your repositories from anywhere (provided you've got an Android smartphone). VCSs in general are great because they save the author information for all the files in them on a per row basis. Tex files work well with VCSs because they are plain text files, unlike, say, Word documents, where you'd need to use Word's internal versioning features.
@jmendeth for an academic paper I would not split up in subfiles, for a report or book I would.
@PaulHiemstra of course, I wouldn't neither for a paper. But I was speaking in general. :)
I always use SVN for my papers for exactly the reasons above. Also, when in a rush(you know us students..) and you save something and shutdown the computer it could be that the file is not completely synced with dropbox.. With SVN or other VCS you must explicitly commit your change, making sure it is actually uploaded.
@jmendeth I would split up anything but a short paper into multiple files, especially if I'm working with a VCS. It allows people to work on different sections of the document without having to go through the merge process. But also simply because tex files can get quite long and verbose, especially if they contain tables or graphs
If people work on different sections, the merge will also be trivial.
Given the praise received by version control systems in the existing answers, I’ll play the devil’s advocate here for a second and underline what I think is a very important point: it strongly depends on what your co-authors are comfortable with.
I use version control for most of the projects I do on my own, from code to papers. However, you have to realize that not everyone is familiar with this paradigm, and those who are familiar with it may not be familiar with a given piece of software (I myself am a heavy Subversion user, but have never used Git…). This is particularly true of people who don't develop software, as those tools come from the field of software development. So, check out what your co-authors use and what they are willing to learn. The great thing about a simple synchronization solution (such as DropBox) with no version control is that its learning curve is flat: just agree on a few rules (date-stamp all files, add initials, always send an email when you have created a new version). Anyone can understand that in a minute.
Finally, I'll add another remark: the need for tracking revision history in the short term needs not necessarily require that you record the revision history for the posterity. For example, my incremental backup system (Apple’s Time Machine) creates snapshots of my files history every hour for a day, every day for the past month, and so on. This covers some of the need for tracking older versions in the short term.
+1 for the know your collaborators message, but if you are collaborating with LaTeX (vs say Word) users as the OM suggests, they are likely to be more open to the idea of VC (I would think) so it is probably worth making the case.
You can also move to a solo workflow when working non-VCS-users: you exchange papers via e-mail with your collaborators, and as soon as you receive them you run a git commit --author="..." on your private git repository. Alternatively, you put a git repository in Dropbox, and tell your co-author to just ignore the hidden .git folder.
how beneficial they are (specially under Latex settings) for writing papers compared to dropbox and SugarSync?
I am a long time user of version control systems, in fact everything I have (my $HOME folder) is backed up in a VC.
I tried hard to use various version control systems for writing many (10+) research papers all of them written in LaTeX. My experience with using VCs for writing research papers is however mixed, if not outright negative. Besides the easiness of synchronization with a VC, the main problem is merging the updates. Unlike source code of programs, merging LaTeX is not that straightforward mainly due to line breaking issues. Secondly, even though I have no problem with various VCs, my co-authors (very heterogeneous mix of people) not necessarily have experience with the one I use, or use different one outright, or have no clue about this stuff. Add the quirkiness of setting up passwords, ssh tunnels, installation of client-side software etc. and you see that all in all, using a VC is not a smooth experience (at best).
Recently (3 papers so far), I gave a try to Dropbox and I am pretty pleased with the result. While it does not solve all the issues, it seems to me to solve at least some:
almost zero set-up, also layman have no problem installing the client
no explicit sync, everything just works instantly (no svn/git/bzr/... add/remove/move/... command line stuff involved)
merging issues are about the same as with a version control system - even with a vc in place I always tended to send explicit write lock notifications to co-authors by e-mail, or IM
dropbox has some rudimentary version control, for my purposes it's pretty sufficient. Writing papers is not about branching, right?
moreover, no repository setup is necessary. You just share a folder with a selected group of co-authors and that's it. Nobody else can see it. Few clicks, almost zero hassle.
As you see, my advice would be to stay with Dropbox-like solution. For my purposes, at least, it turned out to be the best solution so far.
As a follow-up to comments received: consider also the requirements you have for writing a research paper. Why to use a heavy-lifting solutions, such as a distributed version control, when we are speaking here about 1-10 text files, a handful of images and possibly a repository of data (binary, or text blobs). Do you really need to go through all the hassle with a DVCS for that? Maybe, if your research is rather a special case, most of the time, I guess, not. To me, easiness and accessibility to laymen of solutions such as Dropbox by far outweighs the advanced technological features, such as branching, tagging, etc.
Can you choose yourself which old versions are saved in dropbox? You would want to for example keep the version you submitted to a journal for creating difference files, exactly that one.
@Paul Hiemstra: I speak about using dropbox solely for the purposes of collaborative writing. Additionally, I always store the text in my own $HOME folder, which as I said, is versioned separately. But to answer the question, upon a milestone (submission, revision 1,2,...) I always create a separate folder and store the milestone version there. After all, it's about the same as e.g., Subversion would do if you create a tag - it's a separate folder in svn anyway... Remember, a paper is a small piece of data (few kB), not a *GB code base.
merging LaTeX is not that straightforward mainly due to line breaking issues.
I'd rather say that merging in LaTeX is not that straightforward if your co-authors insist in changing randomly the line breaks in the file. It is sad that dynamic word wrap hasn't found its way on everyone's desktop in 2012.
“merging LaTeX is not that straightforward” – The way to handle line breaks in LaTeX, since code VCS are all line-based, is to have each sentence on a separate logical line. Modern text editors handle this smoothly and it makes the organisation of the document much more logical, and handled gracefully by VCS. — “Writing papers is not about branching, right?” – wrong. In fact, branching perfectly suits trial-and-error work, or work on separate features/sections concurrently. This is perfect for editing papers.
@FedericoPoloni: you are right about the inconsistent linebreaking. However, people are free to choose their tools and that might influence the formatting of their LaTeX source (e.g., some like to use LyX, or a fixed line width, etc.). There also might be good reasons against using dynamic word wrap - some people simply don't like it and find it confusing. Is it a reason not to write papers with them? Or to spend time in (mostly) futile attempts to teach them the "right way"?
@KonradRudolph: I do not want to start a flame about these issues, still there's one important non-technological point here. I don't know with whom you write papers, but my experience shows that not everybody is technologically skilled like me. Just installing and understanding e.g., git is hard enough for some, not speaking about wrapping their heads around branching. Did you try that one on a professor over 50? How about colleagues from humanities? Good luck with DVCS and branching. I better write a full paper and collaborate via good old e-mail attachments in the meantime.
@walkmanyi I appreciate that point. As somebody with purely biological collaborators, I think that this might actually be the real killer argument: collaborators may flat-out refuse to use this technology. So no matter how many beautiful arguments for it we find, we still cannot use it.
@walkmanyi I agree, sometimes you have to come to terms with non-techies. In the other post I just wanted to point out where the real problem lies in my opinion. Hard line-breaking hinders not only the ability to use a VCS, but basically any automated processing of text, starting from searching for two consecutive words in the paper.
@walkmanyi, whatever collaborators use is irrelevant, just handle your end of the mess under version control.
I strongly recommend using version control for writing a paper because my advisers have never been very good at using computers. They often edit the wrong versions of documents and then send them to me. Then I have to figure out what they changed and manually reenter it into my latest version. I work around this problem by keeping track of what version I emailed to them and then comparing what they sent back to me using release tags.
Don't assume the boss will ever use your version control system. He doesn't need to. But it's still extremely useful to use version control! Our papers are prepared in MS Word because that's all that the boss knows how to use, and that's the file format the journal wants. He often forgets to use the "Track Changes" feature, but you can use the "Compare and Merge Documents" under the Tools menu to determine what he edited. (Just "merge" it with the version you emailed, and the resulting document will display the differences using the "Track Changes" highlighting.) I never have to compare timestamps or worry about which file is the latest version, and even when MS Word destroys one of my figures I know that I can easily recover it.
You can keep all of your raw experimental data, post-processing code, figure files, and lab notes under version control, too. Then you can backup the whole repository and be really sure that you'll never lose anything. I apply repository-wide tags to indicate when I do new experiments, which helps to keep the code in synch with the data; this answers the old question about which method was used to generate the figures. ("Was it method A? We last used that six months ago, but it could've been similar method B that we started developing around that time. Maybe we used A.1? Great, we'll have to do it all over again...")
You can use the repository-pushing feature as a type of distributed backup system. I use TortoiseHg (a Mercurial GUI for Windows) to push/pull the repository to a USB flashdrive to carry between my home and work computers and also to a network share as a backup, and I never overwrite the wrong files or make extra copies of the files. By the way, forget about using the branching and merging features -- they don't really make sense for binary files, but it's valuable to know whether they got accidentally changed. Mercurial works quite well, even with huge binary files in vendor-proprietary formats.
Summary: Real world science experiments produce too many files to version manually, and the boss might not be very tech-savvy. Version control fixes these problems, and you'll never again have to sort through filenames with random dates hardcoded in them.
+1 for real world situation. :) My boss can't use anything else than Word, too. I'm using LaTeX to write my dissertation and still thinking about how to handle this.
While I use LaTeX, there's no way to get the boss to use it. "Track Changes" in Word is just too important to him. Maybe you can both compromise and use LyX (www.lyx.org).
I do not have experience with what I'm about to suggest, but it might be helpful. Use both; use both Dropbox and some VCS. How? Well, in the Dropbox folder that you want to share, start a git repository (see @PiotrMigdal answer). As far as I recall you can exclude a directory from being synced in the Dropbox, and you should exclude the .git (hidden-)directory since it is of no interest to your collaborators.
This way, you and you collaborators can easily share the data over Dropbox and you personally can enjoy benefits of real full scale VCS.
However, as always with shared-digital work, one of the most important issues is to set the guidelines - they should be clear to all participants.
This is a dangerous suggestion. If someone messes with the .git folder, it can be irreversibly damaged. Git has sharing built in and this can be automated Dropbox style. Use this instead. Not this easy, but way more secure.
@zenbomb: I see the problem. You could exclude the .git directory from the Dropbox sync.
There is a way out - use bare repository on DropBox which is the remote of the actual full repository which is located somewhere on your drive.
Although unrelated to the question, I must mention that this solution is flawed. You cannot exclude a directory on your local Dropbox folder from being synced with the online Dropbox account. It is the other way round which is possible.
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10898 | Why conferences are the main venue for CS research?
Based on @JeffE's suggestion here, I see many CS researchers care mostly about conferences deadlines. Even when they want to read papers, usually they check the recent proceedings of different conferences.
Having a paper in IJCAI or AAAI for example, worth more than publishing in many ISI indexed journals with good reputation. I have no hard evidence for this but being in touch with CS research, I see little discussion about journal publications. why is that? is it good for the spirit of research in the CS field?
I don't form the same conclusion you do from JeffE's comment. Specifically, I don't see where it says that CS researchers care "only" for conferences. More significantly, the comment wasn't directed toward an established CS researcher, but toward an undergraduate student. Walk before you run?
@J.R. I know its a strong only statement and I didn't literally mean it since obviously there are many journals (i.e. TKDE,VLDBJ, JAIR, AI Magazine) has high number of submissions. But taking the general view of many CS researchers I met, they really look after top conferences submission deadlines.
@J.R. I have edited the question to be more specific.
There's a reason CS folks cite when we obsess about conferences. The claim is that the field moves so quickly that conferences are more effective than journal for fast turn-around, and so better reflect the speed of developments.
I think this statement is partly true (conferences do have faster turnaround than CS journals) but misses the point entirely (there's no reason journals CAN'T have faster turn around time).
The real reason is the usual one. We got used to having conferences be the primary source of dissemination, and have no pressing reason to change. Having said that, the arxiv is more and more becoming the first choice of reading material and "hot off the presses" material, so I suspect that your question will become more and more moot as time goes on.
there's no reason journals CAN'T have faster turn around time — Yes, there is. Thorough checking of correctness is incompatible with a short reviewing schedule; checking every detail takes time, and referees are busy. (This argument doesn't apply in subfields of CS where proofs are less relevant, of course. And I'm very well aware that referees take longer than they have to.)
@JeffE: I think there are very few CS papers that an expert cannot check for correctness in, say, 2–3 months (and if you are too busy to do that, just say "no").
For me "faster" = "< 1+ years". I think, as @JukkaSuomela says, that there's no reason journal reviews can't be completed in 2-3 months. Consider also the new reviewing processes for VLDB (more experimental) and ICML (experimental + theoretical)
Just to add some points to @Suresh's answer which already lists the most important reasons (at least in my opinion).
While it is true that brand new results are usually published in conferences due to their speed compared to journals (there's no reasons that journals couldn't be faster, but, as things currently stand, they simply aren't), there are still valuable papers to be found in journals.
The first type of papers I usually read from journals are extended versions of conference papers: once the author gets his idea published fast in a conference, if it is a Really Important Thing, there is nothing stopping him/her to take some time and publish a detailed version in a journal.
The other type is overview papers whose value is not in a vast number of new contributions, but usually are the first ones systematically putting a chunk of knowledge in the same place, and possibly giving a new view of already existing techniques/structures/whatever.
This, plus the fact that you can often get away with having less data in a conference paper – it's okay to publish a "preliminary finding." The bar is a little lower, and thus easier to clear.
@J.R. exactly. A paper in the conference might explain the technique, give some implementation tips and be purely theoretical or give a little bit of experimental data (and, label the work as "yours"). Then, in the journal, you would add proofs or formalizations to the technique, expand on any tricks for implementation and/or give a pseudocode, as well as extensive experimental results.
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79119 | Can I still participate in conferences, while I'm no longer an academic student?
Can I still participate in conferences and use the university name, while I'm no longer an academic student at the university?
As I could not complete the study, but I'm still interested in my unfinished research and want to continue it somehow! is it possible to use my university name in the paper?
Generally speaking, it would be okay to use the university's name if you conducted the research there and you're not currently affiliated elsewhere. Where it may become problematic though is if you're still conducting the research whilst independent of the institution. When you say that it's unfinished, and you want to continue, what do you mean? Is it just writing the paper that needs done?
You could try to get an association/adjunct nomination (without salary) from the institution to keep the affiliation.
First part of the question:
unless specifically stated by conference organisers, nothing prevents anyone without specific higher education affiliation to contribute to conferences.
If organisers want to know more about your situation as they review paper submissions, they can always get in touch with you before they shortlist selected papers.
Second part of the question:
Your study circumstances are not relevant to assess the quality of your potential conference contribution.
Maybe it depends on your academic field, however there are many conferences where you can see individuals who contribute or a poster who are listed as 'independent' or 'independent researcher'. Just serves to show that quality research is not conditioned by any institutional affiliation.
Using the name of a university you are not affiliated with in any role is a deception. You should not feel compelled that you have to have your name coming with a university's name to increase the potential for your paper proposal to be accepted.
That is a great answer, all I can add is to suggest that you are cautious around how you frame the use of your institution's name; if it could suggest that you have an affiliation when you do not, then I would recommend that you opt for independent researcher as the best description of your circumstances - I have done that in the past and it's been fine.
I wonder if there are universities out there that would love to "sponsor" an independent researcher temporarily in order to get their name mentioned in conferences. E.g. "Wow, I didn't know there was a Remote College of the Ice Cap of the Rural Fishermen's University of Far-Northern Arctic Tundra Alaska, and wow, they even sent a student to this conference all the way down in Miami!"
How does one source such a university? Is it time well employed? What's the benefit for an independent researcher to become affiliated with an obscure university name that brings no additional clout? Or what's the point of claiming an affiliation in the first place? Just because independent research is shameful?
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82795 | Falsely accused of cheating in college
I finished up a final exam right before the holidays, it was 10 questions, fully mathematically explained questions, and just after the holidays, I got an email from my professor saying that I am being investigated for cheating and have a meeting with my professor next week.
Apparently the guy I'm being accused of cheating from is a guy that sat in the same row as I did and he had some questions that had NEARLY the exact same text. This guy was my friend, but that's because we entered the classroom and sat in the same row, I had absolutely no plans of cheating,
I don't have that kind of thick skin and would never pull that mess - especially in college. Apparently my friend and I had some similarities between questions that suggested that we cheated, whether it was a collaboration or whether one cheated from another.
The problem is that I have no clue if my friend looked at my paper or was trying to cheat from me but I can be sure that I was not cheating from his work. I was doing my own thing during the exam period. If I get the exact same test with the same questions, I would get about 90-95% of the same answers I did for that final exam if I remember my material still, which I hope I do because I actually studied my best for it.
Anyways, I'm just curious, what exactly should I do when confronted - should I just tell the professor everything I just wrote here - Like what was going on. I'm getting anxiety over the fact that I might fall in to deeper pit if I sound aggressive or say things that might turn against my favor. I am willing to retake the same test in front of the professor on the spot to prove to the professor that I will get more or less the same result. On top of that, the professor allowed everyone to bring in a double sided piece of paper with information about the course on it to help us (like a legal cheat-sheet) during the final exam, and my cheat sheet covered about 9/10 questions on the test. What fricking reason would I have to cheat off of someone else?!
On top of all that, I took 3 different courses last year that pretty much covered 90% of the math course I took this year, and a lot of people didn't take those courses in my field. I took a course that covered probability, another that covered linear algebra and another course that covered proofs, all of which combined to create 9 out of 10 questions from that test. I knew all my material going in. What should I say or do? I don't want to spook the professor in to contacting the dean because this is phase 1 in the scholastic offence book - to contact the student first before deciding anything else to make sure there is enough evidence to continue further. Should I just say everything I wrote here?
Am I the only one who finds it weird that you are being asked to meet with the professor directly? I thought universities have academic dishonesty panels to deal with this. At least at my university, any suspected cheating is to be reported and dealt with through proper channels to avoid problems of "he said, she said" and professors choosing favorites...
At my school the instructor is required to meet with the student first before making any formal accusation. The panels come in at a later stage.
Let things take their course, just...don't speak to your professor using the language you used posting this question.
@SeanEnglish For instance, in my country, cheating is usually handled directly by the professor, very rarely one refers to a panel.
"I'll take the same test - or another test with the same material - right in front of you to prove I know the material and don't need to cheat". Just my 2c but keep the other student out of your reply and keep any sort of negativity about the professor out of your reply. "I know the material and I'll prove it" would be my reply.
Note that allowing another student to copy after your paper is typically considered academic dishonesty, and from what you describe this is probably the issue at hand.
As a complete aside, posting on public forums requires a kind of formal writing. You ought to watch your language -- it doesn't come over as particularly professional.
@WolfgangBangerth: If I were in his(/her) shoes I wouldn't give a %$@! whether I'm appearing "professional", I'd be flipping out as hell and I'd want to just figure out ASAP how not to get wrong $h!1 like this on my transcript before it's too late. Cut him some slack instead of talking down to him, he needs help dealing with his professor right now, not with online etiquette. And someone already pointed out his language to him with respect to his professor, so repeating it isn't necessary.
@Mehrdad -- lack of professionalism in any situation is never a useful strategy.
@WolfgangBangerth: Did you read my comment? I literally responded to that in the first sentence.
Unfairness and wrong accusations make the blood boil, not just yours. The more it is important that you cool down and stay polite and collected. Now accumulate evidence that supports your case.
The things you write here make a good start.
Bring the "legal cheat sheet" with you and explain that you wouldn't have to cheat in any case with everything that was on there.
document that you took extra courses which covered large parts of the material
offer to give a test (unlikely that they will take it up, but who knows)
The things would demonstrate that you have no incentive, and probably no need to cheat. Of course, you can say "hell" and "sh*t" and "fr*cking" and all these things, but what you need is proof which these pieces of evidence provide. Do you have other indications that support your statement?
What reasons do they have to assume that you copied from him? Is he usually better? Are you usually doing worse? Do you suspect he told them you copied? As Ran asks, did you help the other student? (because that can create a problem, too)
This is a great answer. Another piece of evidence that might help are other grades you've gotten in this class: doing exceptionally well in one exam might be suspicious, but if you've been doing well all semester that's less unusual, and also removes some incentive to cheat at all. I'd also like to reiterate that it sounds like you have a solid record and very little reason to cheat: if cheating did take place, it seems unlikely to me that you were responsible, and I think your prof would agree.
did you help the other student? "That could create a problem" depends on how you help the other student... if he studied with his friend - throughout the course or within the final weeks - and they had the same base knowledge and methods? That's one thing... if he helped the other student by sitting within viewing distance... that's another thing. There are gimmicks to answer some math problems that may not be commonly used. Two of you used it? That's unusual... cheating? Well they studied it together...
@WernerCD Well, of course, I intended to say "during the exam". The only other "did you help" case that could create a situation like that is if both use the same cheat sheet - but again, that would work in favour of the OP, because then the source of the coincidence would be preparation rather than help during the exam.
@CaptainEmacs Yeah, that's why I mentioned rarely used tricks in mathematics. If 100 students take a test and two students used the same rare method to answer the question? Considering the OP has taken other classes and knew 90% of the material going into the class... For example, if I took a programming class with my brother... I'd show him things 95% of 101 programmers don't/won't know. When we both take the test and use the same advanced features - because I taught him - it might be suspicious.
@WernerCD happening to sit within viewing distance is not grounds for cheating. If the guy behind you secretly peeks at your paper are you responsible? I would not think so. After all. Prove that you were even aware. Suspicious, sure, but it's not cheating on your fault. The professor should've noticed someone peeking at your paper or at least shouldn't blame you for the incident.
If you didn't cheat, then you don't need to worry. The professor will probably summon both suspected cheaters to his office in order to understand exactly who cheated and who did not (or, whether or not they collaborated together).
Just talk to the professor and tell him you didn't cheat (not by copying other people's answers nor by letting others copy from you). It is usually easy (for the prof) to learn from this conversation which student knew the material and which student did not. However, the Prof may still wish o verify you did not "help" the other student cheating from you.
"If you didn't cheat, then you don't need to worry" - I generally think your answer is measured, but I think this statement may be overoptimistic. OP should collect evidence and have it ready to not forget essential points while being angry.
@CaptainEmacs: just to avoid misinterpretation, the OP should make sure that they do not become angry in this conversation. It is natural to be stressed or even offended by such an accusation, but maintaining a professional attitude will serve them much better than losing their temper.
It is often that the guy who cheated won't show up.
This answer suggests that the prof is a mind-reader. "It is usually easy...": what planet are you from? The only way for the prof to make progress here is to have both students sit a similar exam under strict supervision.
@TonyK Which might fail to, given that the cheater now had 2+ weeks to study the material by himself...
@Bakuriu: If both students pass, then it's Mission Accomplished, isn't it?
@Akavall: I'm not sure about how "often". I have been witness to students appealing (formal procedure at the highest level of the university) in cases where the evidence was overwhelming.
You don't know it is about answers similar to a person that happens to be a friend of yours. If you voice that it makes you look bad.
I got a good grade because I know the material. Here is my cheat
sheet - it covers 90% of the exam. I have the following background
classes. Exactly what I am being investigated for?
I would not even discuss this with your friend. If you are asked if you discussed this with your friend you want to be able to say no. For sure don't ask your friend if they copied off you. If asked you want to be able to say I don't know.
I upvoted because of the last paragraph. Not discussing this with the "friend" is important here.
You need to explain yourself to the professor as best you can. It would be extremely useful if you can keep your cool during the meeting - try not to become agitated, raise your voice, use impolite language etc. Keeping calm will leave you with the largest amount of mental resources to argue your case, and will minimize the risk of antagonizing the professor (which could lead them to become agitated and start making irrational judgments) and escalating the confrontation.
In addition, you might want to consider asking the professor if you can bring a friend to the meeting - someone whose presence can help reduce your anxiety, and who is well-spoken and can help advocate on your behalf in case you become lost for words or are having difficulty putting your points across during the meeting. At my university students accused of academic dishonesty can ask for a hearing, and they have a right to bring a friend (or in extreme situations even a lawyer, though I wouldn't advise that in your situation), so I think it's likely that the professor will recognize that this is a reasonable request if you ask politely.
Good luck!
Let's assume that the two exam papers are similar to a degree that is highly unlikely or impossible due to chance. From the professor's point of view, there are two possibilities:
Collusion between the two students.
One student copying without the knowledge of the other.
However, it is difficult for the professor to distinguish between these. Further, if one student is innocent, it is difficult for the professor to know which one.
It is difficult for the professor to resolve these issues through a conversation. Some professors may try, so it is reasonable to have a plan; however in the end an innocent and a guilty student could say the exact same things.
The only truly decisive outcome of such a meeting is a confession. That is what the professor is hoping to achieve. Since you are innocent, you need to persuade your "friend" to confess to copying, AND to say that you did not know about the cheating. If you and this person both give this same story, you may still get out of this mess without any consequence. Point out to your "friend" that a full confession might lead to a reduced punishment.
If your "friend" refuses this request, and denies cheating, then I am afraid it is likely that you will both be punished. As for the nature of the punishment, that depends on the university policy, as well as the professor, as well as the professor's judgement. Taking the test again is a possibility, but by no means assured.
Don't agree. What if the friend some says he tried to coerce me to take blame? Stay away.
If your friend wants to lie, he can say that regardless of what you do or don't do.
The difference OP honestly say they did not talk to the friend about it. I think they are better off not talking to the friend period. But I still like your answer overall.
J. Robert Oppenheimer, the physicist who headed the technical side of the Manhattan Project during WWW II, talked himself out of a charge of attempted murder of one of his professors while at Cambridge; see Gladwell, M. (2008). Outliers (Amazon Kindle ed.). New York, New York: Little, Brown and Company. He did it by AVOIDING confrontation, which is what you must do also. Go in with the attitude that you want to help the professor get to the bottom of the situation. Ask him what you can do to help him solve the problem. Also, you need a knowledgeable friend: Your parents certainly, a lawyer who has worked with the school in similar situations, the Dean, a favorite professor, a school counselor; research it, Google or Bing it. Don't go in unprepared! If the thought of paying a lawyer for help scares you, then think of the consequences if they expel you or even put a cheating charge on your permanent record. This is real; this is a part of your life. Take it seriously. If you enter a field for which there exists professional help, like an illness or DUI homicide charge, then you would seek professional help. Now is no different.
One last thought, remember what the college and its staff want. They want to educate you -- to lead you out into the world of adults with the skills and attitudes to solve problems. In a very real sense, these people earn money in proportion to what their students learn and can use.
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30694 | What is minimum GPA for getting PhD in Germany?
I'm in the last year of my MSc in computer engineering and I want to apply for a PhD in Germany. I have a reasonable resume and have a published paper and my master GPA is 16.5/20, but my bachelor GPA in not so good, it is 13.5/20.
Can you tell me how much is this important? Do I have any chance?
As flo said, it totally depends on the university.
In principle, you can become PhD student at any German university if you
Have someone eligible (normally a professor in the department) who declares that she/he will supervise you, and
You meet the requirements from the examination regulations for the PhD.
In the majority of cases, the examination regulations can be found on the web. Many departments do not list a formal "grade" requirements, but some do. Typically, the grades are only given in German style, so there is room for interpretation when translating foreign grades. GPAs are pretty much unknown in Germany. Admission officers will look at the grades (e.g., A-F, where F means fail) and if the institution where the grade has been awarded is "OK". Summary grades are expressed in the same system as the individual grades. To make this part of the answer complete, as you are probably aware, it is normally a requirement to have a Masters degree before you can start with a PhD.
Structured programs, such as graduate schools, typically have their own rules on top of these. Again, standard vary, and you should be able to find some information on the home page of the respective graduate school.
Yes,Thank you, I get my Master degree until September and I know that my thesis is powerful and sort of unique.It's my hope that with a such thesis I can impress Admission officers and they don't look at my low GPA in bachelor.
Hi @alihakimi - are you planning to apply for a structured program? If not, the admission officer will only do a "bureaucratic" check that will yield "satisfies the requirements" or "not" - everyone who satisfies both requirements is admitted and the thesis topic typically makes no difference. The person to impress is your future advisor in this case, because she/he has the limited supervision capacity (and also the funding that you are probably looking for). As already said, structured programs are a bit different.
Hi @DCTLib. i am looking for both structured program and individual program just related to my thesis and my interest.and yes I am looking for some funding. so that i understand from this argument that this work is totally charged with supervisor and i can impress her/him with my research work and don't be worry about my GPA.is that right?
For unstructured programs, this is correct as along as you fulfill the minimum requirements outlined by the department. Well, at least this is the case in every examination regulation that I have seen. As already written, structured programs normally do care about grades and have their own rules.
thank you my friend for your consideration...you helped me a lot.
This totally depends on the university. There is no common rule for all German universities. Having good grades in field related courses may be the most important part, also the thesis being field related won't hurt either. Other than that it can depend on the university, the faculty, the chair, the potential supervisor and so on.
Thanks for your answer.That you say is right but because of my bachelor GPA I have so anxious that it torture me.
@alihakimi Don't worry too much about it - if there are hard conditions about the grade, they will usually be applied to your master's GPA.
The exact requirements depend on the specific federal state ("Bundesland"), university, department and professor
Each federal state of Germany has its own university law ("Landeshochschulgesetz"), and that may impose limitations on the admittance to a PhD program, Additionally, each university can impose additional rules, and so can the department (usually "Fakultät") where you want to apply for a PhD. Finally, you must be accepted as a PhD student by a professor and he, too, may have additional requirements for accepting you.
In the end, you'll have to contact a department representative (usually the at the examination office/"Prüfungsamt") to check the formal requirements. Make sure you tell them your degree, GPA (and preferably also the interpretation of that GPA on the German grade 1-5 scale) and the country in which you graduated. This person should be able to check whether your are applicable to enter a PhD program, not only based on their department rules, but also based on university rules and state law.
You'll also have to contact the professor that you want to act as your PhD supervisor, and apply for a PhD student position (this may be a teaching position, a research project position, or a simple unpaid agreement supervision).
hum..then I think I understand this from your comment that I don't lose my hope and keep working,with this resume I can apply and having hope for getting Admission.
Yes, exactly. One more point: German universities usually only care about your highest academical degree. So once you got your Master's, they won't judge you by your Bachelor's degree anymore. They may not even want to see the Bachelor certificate. An issue you may underestimate, though, is getting German universities to formally accept your non-German degree. While usually possible, it may require multiple formal steps such as an official translation of your degree certificate and some form of proof of equivalence to the German Master's degree.
I don't think I have a such problem about proof of equivalence my Master degree because as long as I know universities of Germany have no problem with IRAN universities. but yes, I need official translation of my degrees for apply. @Robert Buchholz
Adding a detail to the other answers given.
According to what I have seen and heard at the (German) university I'm a student at, your Bachelor's degree is probably almost irrelevant as long as the Master's is okay.
I think you won't need to stress out over a low score there. Personally, in the unlikely case you're asked about it, I would try to point out the improvement since then, and how you plan to continue that improvement.
Also, at my university there is a grade translation table, which can be used to map between Germany and pretty much every other country. You should inquire if your targeted university has something like that, too.
thanks for your answer @mafutrct.It's so good.may i ask you what university you study?I saw your profile and I'm glad that both of us having the same field of study ;-)
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5928 | How does the pricing system of degrees in England work?
I am considering studying a master's degree in England, however, the price system is quite unlike the system in the US, at least in wording, so I am uncertain how to estimate the costs.
The schools I looked at listed the fees in one of two ways:
Cost (2013-14)
£3,000
or
Fee
UK/EU: £1,000
Part-Time: £500
International: £4,000
Part-Time: £2,000
Most schools require that master's degree students complete four 30-credit modules, each taking 8-10 weeks, depending on the school, as well as one 60-credit dissertation.
Under the price system used in England, how can I estimate the total cost of tuition for an entire master's degree?
Do schools in England often apply additional costs, such as registration fees, technology fees, renovation fees, or special course fees, as is typical of US schools?
Most UK Masters degrees are a single year. Even if for some reason you get an extension (e.g. to finish your dissertation), you will only be charged tuition for the taught year, maybe a small fee for remaining registered. But the International fee will just be it (unless you are from the EU, in which case the home fee is it), and normally includes any bench fees.
Note the fixed tuition costs matters less for Masters students, but is a huge win over US degrees for PhDs – you normally only pay 3 years tuition even if you take 4 or even 5 years to finish.
A part time degree will probably take about twice as long and you will have to pay the fee for double the number of years. If you are legally allowed to work in the UK, or you can telecommute to a part-time job in your home country, this can be a win. Though keep in mind that the cost of living is very high in the UK and will probably exceed your tuition even if you are full time.
Anyway, UK universities are very keen to get Masters students, if you just email the contact for a university they will give you full numbers.
Part time study as an international student in the UK for an American citizen is likely not possible due to immigration rules. Getting extensions can also be difficult. The university will happily give you one if you have an extenuating circumstance, but the UKBA will not. This means that as long as you can complete the degree from outside the country you are fine.
We have a US PhD student telecommuting home -- no problem if you aren't actually being paid in the UK. (Only the USA & North Korea care if you work both in & for another country, incidentally.) The fourth year doesn't require an extension anywhere I know, and generally the fifth is not hard to get either, but may cost a little. Suspending or taking longer can get hard.
First work out whether the price you're given is per module (such as is done by the Open University) or per year (common for most other universities).
If the former, find out how many points you'll need for the degree you want, and the number of points per module. And calculate accordingly. So if it's £1000 per module, one module is 15 point, and you need 90 points, then your total cost is £1000 x 90 / 15 = £6000
If the latter, multiply the fees by the course length. So, for example, if it's £2000 per year part time, and will take you three years to do it part time, the total fee cost will be 3 x £2000 = £6000.
As you've seen, the fees will vary depending on whether you're a UK/EU citizen or not. International is lazy shorthand for non-EU. There may be a residency criterion as well as a nationality criterion (e.g. Bachelors degrees at Scottish universities).
How do I multiply the fees by course length?
@Village updated with illustrative calculations
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5951 | How to notify admissions that one quit another program?
I completed one term of a master's program before finding it was not what I expected, so I promptly quit. Now, I am sending fall application letters to other master's programs, for which I will be a paying student, but am uncertain how to mention this previous program, or whether that is even necessary. I do intent to send a transcript, as I want to transfer a few credits, however, should I mention this elsewhere in my application? Place a line on my CV? Mention this previous program in my application letters? Offer an explanation upfront describing why I left the program?
I found generally useful advice in Is transferring to another university an option for an unhappy PhD student?, but the answers do not explain what etiquette one should follow in reporting such a situation.
For your CV, don't focus on the fact that you quit the other program, but that you attended it for one term. As such, it would fit best in the section where you list your past education. Definitely send your transcript, because it shows that you achieved some things during that term, and will also count into the evaluation of your current knowledge.
The more delicate aspect is of course how to explain your quitting without full completion of the other program. However, I don't think that it will be a very critical aspect of your application. Such switches happen a lot, for various good reasons, and reviewers of your application will not automatically view it as negative if you don't push them in that direction. If you have good explanations for switching the program, you can put it in a motivation letter. For example, how, during the other program, you discovered that the program you are applying to know fits much better to your interests and skills. The CV wouldn't be be a good place for such reasons. If you can't offer an explanation that gives your application a bonus point, don't try to discuss around it in your application documents. But be prepared for questions in this direction in a potential interview.
If you can't offer an explanation that gives your application a bonus point, don't try to discuss around it in your application documents. — I disagree; I would view the lack of any explanation as a red flag.
I agree that not mentioning it is best; frequently, such information will never come up, and it is not necessarily germane to your application. However, @JeffE demonstrates that not everyone feels this way. Perhaps it is a bit of a crapshoot.
The important thing here is that you realize that you do need to report this information to schools to which you will be applying, as it will matter in their deliberations over your application. That said, you do have some degree of latitude in finding the best way to inform the schools of this. If they have a "special notes" or "additional information" question in the application, that might be a good place to put such information. Otherwise, you would want to mention it somewhere in the cover letter (if you get to include one) or personal statement (if you don't).
However, this information should be provided by you; don't leave it for the people writing your recommendation letters to mention. That will just raise more red flags.
Also, be careful how you talk about your previous program. The mere fact that you left another graduate program will already raise a red flag. Open criticism of your previous program, even with as mild a statement as "it was not what I expected", is likely to raise it further, even if the criticism is well-deserved. Nobody likes a whiner.
Actually, I was just thinking of making a similar comment. The admissions committee will be worried that your leaving indicates a problem with you (maybe you are overly picky or perpetually dissatisfied, or have trouble completing projects) or raises the likelihood that no program will be a good match (maybe you have unrealistic ideas of what a master's program should be like, and you won't find any program suitable). So you should be careful not to say anything that could reinforce these ideas.
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21672 | Are there any aspects of PhD work that do not translate well to distance learning?
In another question about distance PhDs (Do any schools offer teaching or research assistantships via distance education?), I received several comments noting that PhDs on-line are of inferior quality to on-campus PhDs. If what is seen of PhD work from PHD Comics is accurate, PhD students seem to spend much time working independently. So, what aspect of a PhD cannot translate to the on-line format? What aspect of the process cannot be effectively conducted via E-mail or any of the other various forms of on-line communication?
Are there any aspects of PhD work that do not translate well to distance learning? It's a little flippant to say "all of it." But it's not far from the truth.
Can you edit to specify whether this is a STEM PhD or a non-STEM PhD you are talking about? I believe that would make a somewhat significant difference for the answers you will get.
For non-STEM fields.
@Village: It's an important distinction; in STEM fields, it is basically impossible to do a distance-learning PhD, because you don't have a laboratory, and so you can't do research, and so you can't publish papers, and so you can't create a thesis, and so you can't get a PhD.
@DumpsterDoofus - sometimes your entire lab can be an average computer.
A general answer is that a lot of PhD training is informal: it involves things that are taught by example, by osmosis, by noticing someone doing something wrong and correcting them (or right, and praising them). This kind of informal training is much more difficult in online interactions. Some examples are given below...
One specific aspect that does not translate well to online learning is the cross-pollination of ideas via proximity.
A big part of training PhD students involves putting a bunch of smart, talented, hardworking people together and letting them learn from, motivate, support, and bounce ideas off one another. A prerequisite for this is proximity; you just can't have the same kind of interactions over email. Some research centers are explicitly designed to encourage this. At the Bell Labs facility in Murray Hill, NJ,
Some of the hallways in the building were designed to be so long that to look down their length was to see the end disappear at a vanishing point. Traveling the hall’s length without encountering a number of acquaintances, problems, diversions and ideas was almost impossible.
(Source: New York Times)
The research center I currently work in was built with a long hallway with this in mind, specifically to foster collaboration between students in different groups!
Another thing that does not translate well is learning scientific communication and mentoring skills. As a PhD student, I have many chances to practice speaking about my work to other graduate students, professors, and undergraduates. I also get to mentor M.S., B.S., and high school students in my lab. These skills are much more difficult to learn over distance.
A third thing that does not work well over email and Skype is learning the etiquette and standards of the field. This is something that isn't explicitly taught (usually) but that students are expected to pick up by osmosis from spending time with other academics and others in their field.
ff524 provides an excellent answer—although I think there are several other important points that are not discussed there.
Experimental work cannot easily be done via long-distance arrangements, unless one happens to be near another research institution with the necessary equipment and support staff to enable the research to take place.
It is also worth noting that online interactions are still not ideal for rapid development of new ideas and discussions. For instance, suppose during a conversation with your advisor, you want to make a quick sketch and show it to her. If you're meeting in person, you can easily develop the figure on paper or on a whiteboard (or similar), and adjust and make various comments. Such an exchange is extremely tedious online—to the point of being almost counterproductive.
To experimental work, I would add library research (which will be more relevant for a different set of fields). Note that there is a huge difference between academic libraries and non-academic libraries for research purposes.
@MarkMeckes Can you elaborate? I do all my literature searches online...
@Ajasja: If you're in the humanities, or in many other fields, you may be referring to archived documents, original materials, monographs, and other works that are simply not available online in any format. (For one paper I worked on as an undergraduate, I checked out a book from our university library that had not been checked out for 110 years prior to my doing so.)
@Ajasja: I also do all my literature searches online, but things vary a lot from field to field. aeismail's comment makes the point I had in mind.
This is meant to be in addition to your other answers, so will refer to them a bit.
First let's take your clarifying comment: "For non-STEM fields" I work in a STEM field, but have spent time discussing related issues with postgrads working across the university. Many of those in non-STEM fields seem or feel rather isolated anyway compared to those of use in a research group which works closely together. This is partly due to the organisational structure and funding situation leading to fewer PhD positions in some fields, as I understand it, both of which will vary between universities and countries. This could go either way - it could mean that remote working takes away the last vestiges of academic human contact, or it could mean that your tucked away in a corner of your own home alone, rather than a corner of the office. This relates to ff524's answer as well, though I'm coming at it more from the important aspect of getting through a rather strange life for a few years rather than learning academic or transferrable skills.
How much library research (wrt aeismail's answer) is necessary offline will vary hugely with subject - in my case very little, though access to textbooks at all but especially the early stages must not be neglected. They may not be realistically available for you to buy. Access to a more local university library as a visiting reader may be possible, but it would be unwise to rely on this and you may not be able to borrow the books.
You need a supervisor who's not just willing, but enthusiastic about the idea. I wouldn't want to be a supervisor's first remote student - let someone else iron out the difficulties first. You need to be on the same wavelength when it comes to collaboration tools, which means in practice you need to be happy to work with the tools your supervisor wants to use. This is a minor issue when you work in the same building, but becomes critical when you're widely separated.
I would like to stress a bit more the role of "motivation" as in the answers of ff524 and Chris H., specially in the emotional aspect of it. I would say that doing a PhD has an implicit feeling of isolation: in general, you become an expert at a really narrow field compared to the whole human knowledge (I love how Matt Might explains it in his Illustrated guide to a Ph.D.) and that makes sharing your experiences/thoughts harder (how would you share your troubles and toils with your girlfriend?)
Even if there is no one in your research group doing anything related, the fact of sharing a space (not even talking!) with other people going through the same processes is comforting somehow.
Intuitively, adding a layer of physical isolation on top of the experience would make it less stimulant.
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135445 | Using up grant money before a deadline
I am aware that grants often only provide the earned money over a certain period of time. And if the money is not used up by the end of that period you lose access to it. Are there ways to effectively spend this money so it does not go completely to waste?
Note: A previous version of this question asked about setting up shell companies, which is why some answers address them. That part of the question was removed.
Despite all the double-speak, this is essentially what HJF is
One important option is to ask the funding agency for a "no-cost extension" to the period of the grant. This is just asking for more time to do the research without asking for additional funding. These no-cost extensions are frequently granted by NSF, DOE, and other funding agencies in the US.
I think there are lots of people whose full time job it is to answer this very question. They are smart people. They are busy all day long. They still make mistakes. I do not think it is a question for which you can get a useful answer on stack overflow.
@StrongBad So, what you’re saying is “set up a not-for-profit org that gives out grants to researchers in your field, then donate the remainder of your funding to it”?
@BrianBorchers I totally agree with that comment and think you should make it into an answer. It is the best answer to the "circumvent" question.
@nick012000 HJF doesn't give out grants, they manage them. It turns out that part of that management looks an awful lot like money laundering and let you spend money after a grant ends.
Things to do (to the extent allowed by the terms of the grant)
Buy work laptops or other equipment.
Visit someone, send a student to visit someone, or invite a guest.
Depending on how quick the "quickly" is, go to a conference or organize a small workshop, or a summer/winter school.
Hold a networking event with your research group, or together with another group of possible collaborators, possible or actual.
If you have suitable publications, buy golden open access for one of them.
Things not to do
Try to get the money to yourself (except NSF grants in USA and summer salary). Try to keep it for later. Try to use it on something out of scope of the grant, like personal benefits without scientific value.
One might summarize it as "Things to do: accelerate spending on expenses acceptable under the terms of the grant." E.g. computer purchases are not necessarily allowed.
@Anyon Added a general disclaimer. I believe some specific ideas are useful here, given the question.
Isn’t PI summer salary (a common and completely allowed expense on NSF grants) a form of “trying to get the money to yourself”? Conversely, as far as I know NSF grants in my discipline do not generally permit using grant money to buy laptops these days. This answer seems factually wrong.
@DanRomik The question does not specify NSF, and a work laptop of mine has come from grant money.
@DanRomik But I added the NSF expectation.
You are allowed to spend grant money on exactly what the scope of the grant allows and nothing else. If you have leftover money you may ask for extensions in some cases. Departments have personnel whose job it is to help with this exactly. If your department doesn’t then ask a senior colleague or the department head. Misuse of grants is at best an ethical infraction and at worst grounds for immediate termination. I’m not a lawyer but specifically funneling money to a shell company sounds criminal.
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2057 | What references must be acknowledged in a paper?
This question came up from a discussion on meta.MSE.
My question is:
Do we need to search MSE (or blogs, math forums, ...) to make sure someone hasn't already proven a result when writing a paper?
What if we are already aware of a them (so no need for searching)?
Is not citing such a post in these two cases considered plagiarism?
As I understand, the common practice is to check standard reviewed reputable publication venues (journals, conferences, maybe arXiv) and also with experts in the area to make sure a result is not already published nor a well-known folklore result. No one is going to search all over the internet and check every post that Google returns and citing other resources is very uncommon. I think checking MatheOverflow can be considered similar to the later (checking with experts) (also see this discussion on MO but that doesn't seem to apply to a site like MSE. I am not going to cite a discussion with some random person on the street (not a professional mathematician) who claimed to have a solution or an idea for a solution for a problem (which is not passed peer-review process and I might not want even want to spend time understanding or checking the correctness of the solution).
What are the accepted practice for checking originality of a result?
What is expected from authors regarding this before making a paper submission?
Some clarification since there seems to be a misinterpretation of the question about being academic honesty. The question is not about posts that
you are aware of,
contain a complete rigorousness solution (not just ideas), and
you are confident the solution is correct.
example for tcs.se: refs to cstheory in the literature; it would be great if other academic/research sites had similar examples (eg MO.se etc)
As best I understand it, the clarified question is this: if you are writing a paper and find a posting on the internet that contains ideas on your problem (which may or may not be correct, may be difficult to understand, and in any case do not seem to constitute a complete solution), then should you cite it? Let's assume you are making no use of the ideas, since if you are then you obviously need to cite the posting (regardless of whether you developed the ideas independently).
In general, you must cite it anyway. Of course, there are exceptions. If it's obviously crackpot work, then you are free to dismiss it as worthless. (Andrew Wiles didn't need to cite thousands of crackpot "proofs" of Fermat's Last Theorem.) If it's really only tangentially related to the problem you are working on, then it may not be relevant enough to cite. However, it absolutely does not matter at all whether the work is peer reviewed or formally published, who wrote it or what their credentials are, whether it is complete, how easy it is to find, or whether it is difficult to understand.
You don't have to endorse it, and citing a paper does not in any way indicate that you feel it is correct. If you rely on the paper, then that's an endorsement, but mentioning it is not. For example, you could write "Several authors have studied this problem, including..." and give citations to them. Then readers can decide for themselves what to make of these contributions. They will understand from the form of your citation that you feel these works are closely enough related to be worth citing, but not important enough to your paper to discuss in detail. You can also say something more skeptical if warranted.
One reason you don't see these sorts of citations very often is that this situation doesn't often arise. (I've never seen a post on mathoverflow or math.stackexchange that I felt I should cite in one of my papers.) And even when it does arise, the citation may be as a personal communication rather than giving a URL. (It's much better to give a more detailed citation, so other people can find and learn from or evaluate the posting, but I guess an uninformative citation is better than none at all.)
As for due diligence in searching for prior work, there's no simple rule. You should search everywhere you feel there might plausibly be something to find, and you should consult with experts on anything you feel unsure of. It's certainly impossible to search the entire academic literature, let alone the entire internet, so you'll be forced to make compromises compared with an ideal world. For most purposes, non-academic internet sites will not be relevant enough to be worth searching carefully, but I guess it depends on the situation.
+1 for However, it absolutely does not matter at all whether the work is peer reviewed or formally published, who wrote it or what their credentials are, whether it is complete, how easy it is to find, or whether it is difficult to understand.
In my opinion, "personal communication" belongs in the body of the paper or in the acknowledgments, not in the bibliography (where it is out of place and useless). It's just mean to make people flip to the end of the paper only to find out that there's no way for them to access the source in question.
This is a question of academic honesty and due diligence.
If you did not arrive at the result yourself, but got it from someone else (either on SE or a homeless man on the street) then it is your responsibility to not claim credit for the result. Of course, in the case of the homeless man you can get away with claiming credit, and in most cases for SE, too. However, it is simply not honest.
If you arrived at the result by yourself, then as a research you should provide due diligence and check if the result is already known. This usually consists of checking the standard sources (i.e. published papers, books) and the communities which you are a part of. "Folklore" in mathematics is vast, and MO, math.SE, and cstheory are all becoming part of it. If you are aware that others arrived at a result before you then you should mention it in your paper (either with a full citation, if applicable, or with an acknowledgement).
However, just like you are not expected to search the back-log of every journal ever published, you don't have to scour the whole internet, either. If you want precedent of this: consider all the results that were published independently in the west and the soviet union during the Cold War. It would have been unreasonable of the scholars on both sides to be fully aware of the work of the others.
+1 If you got the result from someone else it is definitely expected that you mention them in the acknowledgements section.
Thanks Artem. Do you have any evidence to support the claim that math.SE is becoming part of the community of professional mathematicians? That is part of what I am asking.
@Kaveh I don't understand what kind of evidence you would expect. From consulting the top user list Math.SE has a number of practicing mathematicians (albeit less then MO), it is a community devoted to mathematics (although not necessarily at the research level), and it is a community your participate in and (I assume) know to provide good answers, occasionally. Communities don't have hard boundaries, and it is better to be more inclusive than less for something as important as giving credit where credit is due.
Evidence like how common people cite MSE in their papers. For comparison, there has been mailing lists where famous mathematicians were involved but I don't think I have seen much citations to such posts. Part of the issue is that what can be cited and part of it is what I need to check. You are assuming that it is known that there is complete solution on MSE and you know it is correct. One my questions is are we expected to check MSE? (I personally don't, do you?)
I don't think that it is a clear cut issue about academic honesty issue. Part of the problem I see that even if something is posted somewhere and you are aware of it, it doesn't mean the post is correct. This is even more so when the post is not a complete rigorous solution but only ideas on how to solve the problem with details that needs to be worked out. It might be the case that one can find the solution using those ideas but it is not a priory clear from such posts that this can be done. Would you consider citing such posts in your paper?
Note that this is part of the rational for having peer-review process, to check for correctness. Even citing arXiv papers (without considering who is the author of the draft) is not common. If some well-known expert working in area X tell you something about X you can be pretty sure that it is correct and one can even cite that as personal communication. I don't think this applies to someone who is not an even a professional mathematician which accounts for many if not most of the posts on MSE.
@Kaveh I think you are getting caught up in the mechanics of procedure and beauracracy to the point that you are losing the point. If you are aware of a result or did not arrive it at by yourself then cite it to be honest it doesn't matter where it came from. If the result is wrong, then don't cite it. I have no interest in having a long comment discussion with you though, since I see you already had an equivalent one on math.SE.
@Artem, I think you are misunderstanding the question and not answering the question I am asking. I suggest that you reread the comments above again a few hours later. ps: please watch the language you are using.
In my experience (straying from my home discipline into interdisciplinary subjects) the far more common case is that I think "this is so obviously a problem, for sure someone must have written already about it". Till now, often it turned out that a) often someone had written about the problem [though b) often without solution], but b) I never even guessed close to useful search terms - I learned keywords present in my own words at a conference, asking around, and a few years later I tend to stumble over 2 or 3 completely different terms that were invented in some other disciplines.
@Kaveh -- I happily cite arXiv all the time. When I search, I usually use Google, and all sorts of stuff comes up. Anything that's helpful (and otherwise meets standards for citation), from personal communications to non peer-reviewed drafts, I cite. I think the reason that random websites aren't cited isn't because they shouldn't be, but because they're rarely helpful, as Anonymous Mathematician points out in a separate answer.
@Lev, thanks. I think Anonymous Mathematician's answers my question.
Certainly this question touches on some topics that are controversial. However, there should be absolutely nothing controversial at all about citing papers on the ArXiv.
I think due diligence in searching the literature includes:
Talking to at least one expert in the field
Looking through the bibliographies of any major papers closely related to your paper to see if any of the titles look relevant.
Searching on google scholar or something similar for papers which cite any papers closely related to your paper.
Searching on google for some of the key terms in your paper.
The last of these would pick up math.SE, but also often picks up lecture notes, slides, wikis, and other things which would not come up through more traditional academic sources. If you find something clearly relevant then you should cite it. Furthermore, you should do these things before getting too far into a project.
That said, no matter how much due diligence you do, you're going to miss stuff sometimes. 5 years after my first paper was published, it was pointed out to me that Osterle gave the same argument in Seminaire Bourbaki (1987/8:165–186). More recently, one of the 3 main results in this paper follows from a 15 year old result of Popa. Searching what's known is incredibly hard even if you try your best. But that's no reason not to try your best.
The result in your first published paper, An alternate view of Mason's theorem, 2000 is essentially an observation I made 20 years prior about Wronskian estimates. In fact it shows up (then and now) on the first page of web searches for "Mason abc", because it is excerpted on the MathWorld page for Mason's theorem. So I was perplexed when I saw it published with no citation. Did you never google it?
In 1998 Google had just been founded, was unknown and certainly didn't include newsgroups.
Of course "google" is generic for "web search". Such web searches circa 2000 (and much earlier) returned links to said MathWorld page on the first page of search results. Anyone who did a web search on "Mason's Thoerem" or "Mason abc", etc. cannot help but have stumbled upon said MathWorld page on Mason's Theorem.
Certainly then I didn't really know what I was supposed to do, and didn't follow these practices. (Though I do now!) But I did run the paper by Serge Lang, and read the papers he suggested to me. I didn't even have internet access when I came up with that argument and showed it to Lang, although by the time I submitted it I did (and so indeed I am responsible for some of the blame). Anyway, I've been meaning to put the paper up on the ArXiv at some point and add a note mentioning Osterle, if I get around to that (requires finding some old files) I'll certainly also mention your post.
Is that 20 a typo for 2? 20 years prior would be prior to Stothers.
Anyway, I think this situation actually illustrates the point reasonable well. You weren't aware of Osterle's prior argument (even though it's in the mathworld bibliography for ABC), and Serge Lang and I weren't aware of your post or Osterle's talk. Nonetheless had any of us been aware of the others we should have cited them even though one is on a newsgroup, one is published lecture notes, and neither was a peer reviewed journal article.
I discovered it in the early eighties (iirc when reading work of Mason). Then I was an MIT student member of the Macsyma group, researching effective methods for algebraic computation. Due to such, I was well aware of Wronskian-related techniques for measuring algebraic dependence. It is rather obvious to anyone with that background (but certainly not to most high-school students!) Anyway, it makes sense to me now that you explain you had no interent access. Nor do I expect Lang would have done a general web search circa 2000 to look for prior work.
In case you don't know the history, MathWorld started out as Eric Weisstein's Treasure trove. He included (without citation) many results from around the Web, including the math-fun mailing list. Said MathWorld entry on Mason's Theorem is excerpted almost verbatim from one of my 1996 math-fun posts. The references are probably all from my post. Later he started adding (some) attributions when it was commercialized.
I didn't know what Wronskians were at the time. My entrance into the problem was that the only way I knew how to find repeated roots was by computing gcd(f,f'), and thus the only sensible thing was to start with a'+b'=c' and try to simplify things. At any rate, I apologize, I got more credit for that argument than I deserved, mostly because "high school student" makes for a good story.
It's a very nice achievement for a high-school student, so whatever credit you got you certainly deserved! I had wondered if perhaps a mentor familiar with these techniques had steered you in the right direction. I'm very pleased to know more about the history on your end. If you should ever write more on it please feel welcome to ping me and I'll be happy to try to dig up more of the history.
In my experience I think the accepted practice is searching the peer-reviewed literature in your field. I'm not saying results published on websites/MSE, etc. aren't valid, they just aren't part of the expected search. Anyways, I don't think peer-reviewed journals would react well to web citations.
Two exceptions may be in didactics (referencing good learning platforms) and in citing a particular implementation of a software. Another point: in my Diplom thesis I did cite e.g. the AI-FAQ (in addition to proper papers, and in a non-computer science field), and my supervisor emphasized this as positive.
In my experience referees have no objections to citations to websites. I've linked to MO in a paper and put wikipedia in a bibliography in published papers (and of course the arxiv dozens of times in every paper). Indeed, referees would be committing academic misconduct to ask that a genuinely relevant citation be removed solely because of medium.
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24514 | Improve software code when reviewing paper
When reviewing a manuscript describing a new software tool, reviewers are often asked to assess its utility, quality, novelty, ...
I was wondering if, in addition to the classic comments on the manuscript, it was appropriate to make suggestion to improve the software functionality in itself (if the code is provided with the manuscript)?
This would be in the case of a software that is not good enough for publication (basically it does not do enough), and for which small additions will make it better. The comment on the code would therefore not be related to the coding "grammar" but ratter to improve the software tool usability for the final user.
I'd say that of course it's appropriate to offer suggestions if something strikes you about the code. I'd rather ask whether reviewing the code is expected from the reviewer or whether he will only be expected to look at the manuscript.
@StephanKolassa - Why don't you post that as an answer instead of a comment and get points for it?
In my opinion, if the authors emphasise the developed code as one of their research outputs, and make it public, the reviewers not only can, but should consider it as a material for review, and comment on it. There is a delicate balance, though, to strike.
It is important to check that the code does what is promised in a paper (sanity check). More importantly, it is essential to check if a typical reader of the journal can do the same, and can benefit from the code made public. This includes basic documentation, compile instructions (if any), well-written run-files for each of the examples from the paper, and clear guidelines how to adjust them for other problems.
On the other side, remember that not all academic researchers are necessarily as brilliant in code-dev, as the guys who read Stack Overflow. It may be not appropriate to request that the code is developed and maintained to the highest standards of the modern IT community.
I agree that all academics are not computer scientist and that "academic software" should be expected to meet the highest IT standards. However, I also believe it is not a reason to publish poorly designed software.
The definition of "poor design" is subjective. Early Blas/Lapack source codes, for example, may be considered ugly and poorly written from the perspective of OOP community.
@dmitry_savostyanov Let say a "little added value" for the scientific community then :)
I would suggest not to comment on code, unless:
The code is broken in some way, such that it does not perform what it is supposed to do (e.g., a bug in code changes a critical algorithm)
The program itself is unstable due to deep-rooted code smell
Commenting on code in a review seems to me akin to commenting on someone's mastery of a given language in a review. If their usage of the language is so poor as to make the paper unreadable, then you can suggest they use a proofreader or translator. However, in most cases, it doesn't affect the paper, it just makes it harder to understand. With code, it may not get them past a <insert hi-tech company here> interview, but if it works as advertised, it's good enough.
And what if the proposed code is not good enough for publication (it does not do enough), but some minor improvement make it publishable? (I edited my question to make it clearer)
@Wiliam - I would suggest that what you describe is not a code issue, that's functionality (or "utility", to use your term) issue.
I edited the question.
@Wiliam - Now I don't understand the question. Reviewing code is one thing, reviewing the functionality of the software is completely different. It's a back-end vs. front-end review. Which as you asking about?
Well, I mean proposing modifications in the code to improve the functionality. So, changing the code, but not because it is poorly written, but because it lack functionalities.
+1 - For stat. software the first bullet point can easily happen even if the code provides the correct solution for the original author's data, but may not behave appropriately for new data. Sometimes it is just a functional limitation of the software that isn't made explicit (e.g. this program runs out of memory if you use a sample of 10,000 cases instead of the 200 in the authors example).
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8808 | Author did not make the major changes asked during the review process
I recently had my first paper to review. Since it was the first one, I took great care to be as constructive as possible and to formulate correct and accurate questions / suggestions. At that time, I recommended two major changes for the paper and a couple of minor ones (figures, typos, ...).
I just received the revised version of the paper, with the response to reviewer. One of the major changes I recommended was not fully taken into account by the authors. They did provide a very short answer, but it did not convince me. I read the new version of the paper carefully, to see if the content was changed to fit my suggestion, but it was not.
I am wondering what I should do now? Should I resend the same suggestion, pointing out it was ignored by the authors? Or should I let it go and tell the editor all the other changes were done according to my review? How should I tell the author they did not take my suggestion into account without being rude?
Is your review anonymous?
Sorry for the 'answer' but I don't have enough 'credit' to comment this link. I realize it's a different situation but you may find some good information in the answers and comments.
See also “Asked again to review a paper when the authors don’t wish to modify it”
@NateEldredge yes the review was anonymous, but I did see the other reviewers comments.
@F'x, thanks for the link. I did saw it while writing my post and I found some good informations, but I though the situation was a bit different so I though I might add it anyway :)
It is necessary to keep in mind that your review is likely not the only one, there should at least be a second reviewer. On top of that, thee editor can make suggestions to the author on what must, should or could be changed. I completely agree with the points in the answer of Charles, I also find it strange that you apparently did not receive an explanation to why or how your suggestion was not changed from the authors. It is, however, common that reviewers and authors disagree but what is right and wrong is another question.
What you should do is to reiterate what you think is necessary and if possible support your statement with more arguments. Since it still is up to the editor to make choices and there are also likely other reviewers to consider, you will never have the full picture yourself and you can only provide your view. It is possible the paper will go to publication without your points being met.
In some cases (journals) it might be possible to write a "Letter to the Editor" where one brings up the remaining questions. Such letters will be published along with an open response from the authors. Since you are relatively new to these processes, you could discuss the paper (after it has been published(!), if it is) with colleagues and consider writing such a letter alone or with someone. It is, after all, an open scientific discussion with differences in opinion.
Thanks for the advices. I totally agree that I might never have a full picture of the whole publication decision, although I have seen the other reviewers' comments. The question was more related to what was the right way to respond as an single reviewer, without being influenced by the others..
If I were in your situation, I'd talk to my supervisor before taking action. All of the advice you already got here is quite sound, but it is also a fact of life that people who are new to the review process tend to be more strict than average. I would thus ask someone else in the field whether your suggestion seems reasonable, and if it does, then I would write about it to the editor.
I'm writing this from personal experience - I'm also new to the review process, and I tend to overestimate the importance of the points I'm raising. My own current solution is actually to go easy on the authors once the revised version is in, as a way of balancing this tendency of mine out.
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3522 | Choosing a title to hold upon completion of a doctoral degree: "Dr." vs. "Ph.D."
Possible Duplicate:
EU Ph.D. in Germany: Calling yourself “Dr.” or “Ph.D.”
I'm asking this question in relation to my doctoral studies in Germany. However, my question may be relevant to regulations in other European countries.
At the university where I pursue my doctorate, I have the choice between two titles. Upon successfully completion of my dissertation and all related examinations I can decide which title I want to hold: "Dr. rer. nat." or "Ph.D.".
In Germany, the traditional title is "Dr.". From what I understand the title "Ph.D." is being introduced at many universities for reasons of comparability with degrees from other countries (especially with the US and the UK). I'm guessing, the reasoning is that holding a "Ph.D." will improve your chances when applying for (academic) openings internationally. However, I have also been told that the German "Dr." has an excellent international reputation and may give you an edge over "Ph.D.".
EDIT: A couple of years ago, legal steps were taken so that a "Ph.D." issued by other European countries is automatically recognized in Germany (as long as the issuing institutions are eligible) and may be "translated" to "Dr." in Germany. There is also a question related to this here. However, a "Ph.D." issued in Germany may not be "translated" to "Dr."! Therefore, I have to decide for either one and cannot use both.
Hence, my question is: What are the advantages and disadvantages of either title with respect to academic careers in Germany and internationally? Is a "Ph.D." seen as less distinguished by German academics? How is the German "Dr." perceived by academics in other countries as compared with a "Ph.D."?
From my reading the question you mention asks whether "Ph.D." titles obtained outside of Germany may be "translated" to "Dr." in Germany. The question is therefore related but refers to a different matter.
My title (after finishing my doctorate in Germany) is Dr.rer.nat. I use, especially internationally, Ph.D. consistently. I have yet to notice any problems from this.
That's an interesting approach and would lead me to think I should go with the traditional "Dr." so I could use it in Germany and "Ph.D." internationally. I am still wondering, however, whether that is appropriate, since I keep reading it is not. I know for a fact, that in Germany it is illegal to use the title "Ph.D." if you received a "Dr." from your university.
I have edited my question to clarify the difference to the prior asked question. I would appreciate a review of this decision.
@energynumbers as pointed out in my previous comment, I believe I have updated the question to highlight the differences to the alleged duplicate. I would appreciate a review of the decision. For what it's worth, I this question has received several up-votes since it was closed, which I believe indicates that others are interested in further answers.
If you're taking responsibility for society, rather than merely teaching or using mastery of your field, use the term "Dr.".
I'll add a bit of a legal perspective into the game. Disclaimer: I hold a Dr. rer. nat. from Germany, though lived and worked in several other countries in the EU.
Firstly, personally I think, that "choosing a title" and seeing it as an important issue, is largely a German/Austrian/(Central European?) specialty. After all, why should your title matter outside academia, where the difference is anyway largely understood around the world?
Secondly, even when you hold some title from country X, you are not automatically eligible to use it across the border, even given there exists an equivalent one in the other country. Rather, there are legal procedures which lead to a formal recognition and proper translation of your title. So for me, being a "Dr." with a title from Germany, to be able to use either "Dr.", or "PhD" in other EU countries, especially those east of Germany, I would have to either undergo a formal procedure called nostrification, or, in selected cases, if the university is granting an equivalent degree in my specialization, they could forgo the nostrification hassle and they could recognize it right away (rather and exception to the rule). Either way, you need to obtain a formal certificate from the state, or at least the university, stating exactly how your title translates to an equivalent title in the other country. Only then you can use the title freely. To top it up, the whole matter is regulated by bi-lateral international treaties between countries exactly stating which title holders are eligible to use which titles in the other country and how. See for example the treaty on grades recognition between Czech Republic and Germany. There even is a full website in Germany on all this (mostly for foreign title holders wanting to use them in Germany).
To sum it up, there is a whole lot to simply using an academic title in a country different from the one you obtained it in. This can be straightforward in countries where the culture doesn't care too much (in my experience e.g., Netherlands), but in countries where the title can be legally a part of your name (not sure whether it still is the case), such as almost whole Austrian-Hungarian empire heritage countries, this can be a big deal.
My point is the following: It's probably irrelevant which title you choose. If you want to be precise, legally speaking, somebody probably already translated your title to another one (which you can't choose) which you should adopt in other countries.
Apart from all that above, I regularly see people approaching me in e-mails, or letters by both "Dr. XYZ", as well, as "XYZ, PhD" - not speaking of those not checking the background and virtually promoting me to levels I do not belong to (yet). Again, the precise title doesn't matter that much after all.
Later edit, on a more anecdotal note:
the precise title doesn't matter that much after all
Well, except when you want to use the title for things like skipping a queue when visiting a doctor and being treated very respectfully by all the nurses (Germany), or when encountering police, getting away with only with a warning and avoiding a fine for speeding, or other minor trespassing (countries eastwards of Germany). I have first-hand knowledge of such incidents, so my advice here would be to 1) go for the fanciest possible title, yet it should be widely recognized by general public, and 2) if your country of residence allows it, include the title on your ID card, passport, social security ID, whatever else, so that you can wave it when necessary :-D.
+1, this answer is very enlightening. The final paragraph is particularly surprising, I never expected this to actually happen.
As someone living in Germany right now, I can attest that there really is very little difference between PhD's from countries like the US, the UK, France, and Australia, and doctoral degrees from inside Germany. In many cases, German universities are looking for people with international experience when hiring, and thus the external experience with having a degree that isn't a "Dr.rer.nat." or a "Dr.-Ing." can be helpful.
However, as mentioned in the above link, it now is acceptable for people with PhD's to call themselves "Dr." inside of Germany. It may not be allowed for someone with a PhD degree from inside Germany to call themselves "Dr."; however, the inherent advantage is relatively small, I believe.
Moreover, if you are outside of Germany, the possession of a doctoral degree is probably more important than the actual title of the degree: in the US, I don't think you will be treated differently holding a "Dr.rer.nat." than the PhD.
Thanks a lot. Your answer was very helpful. And to add to it: I'm know for a fact, that a Ph.D. from inside Germany may not be "translated" into a "Dr." in Germany. This is precisely why I'm trying to decide which title to choose.
If you're planning on staying in Germany, then go with the more recognized title within Germany. If you're planning on spending most of your career outside, go with what's recognized more easily in the rest of the world.
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121262 | Outsourcing trivial authorless work
I have worked on a problem for close to two years. I feel I have an adequate theoretical solution. However I feel to get some backing on the theory I need some quantitative hard computer data. It is only a few days work of programming. Would it be ethically wrong to recruit an undergrad for a few days volunteer work without pay to get the computer crunching part done and not mention him as a coauthor and only mention as acknowledgement? This is only for time reasons as I am not familiar with tools required. Everything will be given as cook book to the interested programmer.
Clearly, the answer is yes. You feel you need the result to support your work. Do it right.
Be clear about the credits from the proposal. As long as it is mutually agreed upon beforehand, preferably in writing, and it can't be construed as an abuse of power, it shouldn't be ethically problematic. The undergrad would still be working for free, which is far from ideal tho.
How do you know it's only a few days work? What are the limits on you implementing this yourself?
Why don't you want to credit them? Given that you need this and they provided a significant contribution they deserve to be coauthors.
Why would an undergrad volunteer to do something for you for literally no benefit for themself? And second, are you really sure that they'd turn out good enough work that you could trust it without spending an equally long chunk of time verifying it yourself?
Why not add them as an author? What's your reason for not wanting to do so in the first place?
In the area where I live, the seasoned programmer earns ~ 100$ per hour. In addition to this I have noticed that people do not become seasoned programmers out of a sudden, it takes years of work to become a seasoned programmer.
Given that this website started from a user base of programmers/software engineers, I suspect asking a question that devalues their work to have some bias involved :p
How seasoned? If a good undergrad CS major would do, then it's probably OK, but you need to pay them. I won't do it without being paid.
It might be helpful if you specify your level. If you are a professor, this could be a good opportunity for a student to earn a letter of recommendation and get something for their resume. If you are a grad student, I can't see why they would even agree to do this, much less why it would be ethical to allow them to.
Not to pile on - but "a few days work" in practice means it will take somewhere from a few days to a few weeks of continual work. When its someone else's time, more than 5 minutes would be pushing the meaning of "trivial". I'd say unless you could get someone to provide the code on stack exchange for unicorn points, its probably more work than could possibly worth an acknowledgement - which has the approximately same street value as 1 up vote here :)
It is typical in academia to abuse undergrads for that. professors seems to get by with this - albeit most often with minimum wage. But that does not make it more ethical ...
If by “cook book” you mean design doc, you are plainly undervaluing the developer work involved.
Well now we know that you don't do your own software.
@Freeman: If you wish your own conclusion to be heard, write your own answer (summarizing what arguments lead to it). It clearly doesn’t belong in the question and is irritating to the reader. I know that in some cases, post-mortem information (e.g., “the plagiarising paper was retracted”) can be interesting to some readers, but this is not the case here and even then, it should be clearly identifiable as such.
One aspect that has not been brought up is this: who would own the resulting software? Would the student be able to sell licenses to this software to other researchers, possibly after making some modifications? Would that constitute theft of your initial cookbook instructions? Do you own the software? Does the institution that funded your research own the software? This might be trivial. It might not be.
Can you may tell us your own experience in coding? I cannot get rid of the impression that you have no clue at all, is that true? Therefore, you may make a completely wrong estimation of the amount of work involved in coding and, most importantly, to what can go wrong!
My personal experience with this: either you know enough about coding and just implement it yourself or you don't know enough to even make the slightest estimate to what it takes. Did you get a second opinion (probably from a colleague that is better at coding) on how hard the implementation truly is?
@Azor Ahai : I might do something like this without necessarily having pay. Assuming everyone will only do things for pay is too reductive. And keep in mind the OP is suggesting to ask , which means that the person can refuse the no-pay terms if sie so pleases. However, I agree with the others here that credit should definitely be given.
@The_Sympathizer Did I mention pay?
@Freeman. – Please do not engage in edit wars.
Hi I am coding this myself.
@YemonChoi What a shame trying to throw mud on me. Look it is not as if MO is solving RH for me. It just basically solves some useful problems where I lack knowledge (plus only 33% of questions were ever answered and some in hindsight are just reference point queries). Hope that helps and if there is a recommendation that you 'can' make positively let me know.
@YemonChoi There is a reason users make communities they join hidden. By abusing and revealing other communities you belittle the value of trust in this site.
A lot of people here are probably from Stack Overflow, and therefore are professional programmers who feel they have a sort of stake in this (including myself). It would be interesting if this question could have been written in a more hypothetical / notional way. For instance, if the work to be done wasn't programming but some other skilled labor the OP did not have direct experience in, and then to ask the same question amounting to what value someone's contribution in that area would be worth. I don't know if that would change the mix of answers (or not).
@DaveInCaz I doubt it would change the answers much if at all. Comparable work like skilled lab work or help with statistical analysis probably would get essentially the same answers which with some variation seem to all say this merits more than an acknowledgement. Something like grammatical editing would probably not be comparable and not merit more than acknowledgement, but also would not take "a few days".
You seem to think you won't get published without the computer work, yet you also seem to not translate this into respecting how important the computer work is to your paper. If it's that critical then you have a co-author. Remember the co-author has to stand over the validity of their work and if you didn't do that work you cannot be sure it's valid. If you want all the credit do all the work. Even the best undergrad programmers know a lot less about programming than they think they do, so that's a very risky route for critical coding.
Rather than proposing this to an individual, which should be interpreted as coercive since there is a power imbalance, you could publish a call for help, describing what you need and what you offer. Be clear that it is only an ack on offer, not authorship, and no money is involved. Ask for people to apply. You can choose among those who offer to help. Some probably will, but if not, you should consider something more substantial.
If there is a learning component, you could describe that in your "call" as well. It might make it more interesting, even though there is no academic credit involved.
Let me respond, indirectly, to some of the comments here by people who seem to think I'm suggesting an unethical course of action. Actually, all I tried to do was assure that coercion wasn't part of the OP's actions by suggesting an open call for assistance with little reward.
If I ask someone to mow my lawn and there is a power imbalance between us it is coercive and thus unethical. If I put out a general call for someone who would be willing to mow my lawn for no return but my thanks, it is no longer unethical. I hope that is recognized.
In fact, professors are on the "losing" end of exactly this sort of arrangement. Society has asked us to dedicate our lives, and often fund our own education, to educate the next generation. The tangible rewards are actually few. I earned, over a 45 year career about half of what I'd have earned working in industry (I actually have anecdotal evidence). Society asked me to do this, offering thanks and (often) respect, but not actually a "fair" compensation. Society depends, in fact, on lots of people being willing to take this deal, finding that the rewards are other than monetary or power or ...
Most of you reading this, and most of you disagreeing with me, have taken this deal or are in the process of preparing yourselves to accept it. While I'd like a "better" deal, I've never been unhappy with the deal as long as I had the respect of my peers and as long as I felt I was contributing.
Not every relationship needs to be strictly transactional. If I ask for assistance, offering only thanks but little else, I don't expect any particular person to accept, but I depend on the fact that those that do will find, somehow, their own rewards in helping.
Another analogy is precisely what happens on this site. People ask for help. There is very little offered in return for that help and yet other people - you and me - are willing to help and get our reward however we can. Sometimes the respect of our peers is enough.
I recognize that the current question may be a bit different, but I don't see that I'm suggesting finding a "sucker" if a student accepts such a request and finds in his or her own way a reason, educational or otherwise, for doing so. Those who are grant funded should, of course, build in funds for such things, but not everyone is. Many faculty at undergraduate institutions are required to do research but not compensated for it. You are paid for teaching and for being supportive of undergraduates and helping them grow and advance.
I also recognize that some here believe that any help on a paper should result in co-authorship. I think that is misplaced. I agree that those who contribute to the intellectual content of a paper should be recognized, probably as authors, but if someone works at my direction, then it is a different situation. Should someone translating my poor language skills into a polished paper be a co-author? Should my first Calculus instructor be a co-author in every Analysis paper I write?
Note that I didn't, and don't, know all of the details here and so can't actually comment whether as student writing code to validate a theory has contributed to the intellectual content (My field is CS, actually). It may be or not, depending on the level of direction, which I don't have evidence for. Creativity should be recognized, certainly. Don't guess that I think otherwise. There are situations in which authorship would be appropriate and others for which an acknowledgment is sufficient.
But if an undergrad believes this would be a valuable experience in itself and decides to apply, does it make it ethical to not give them authorship status nonetheless? Just because the terms are clear beforehand does not mean the deal is fair.
It's still unethical if you find a sucker willing to submit.
I agree with @einpoklum. Just because you make it clear up front that you are going to have someone do work and you won't make them co-author does not solve the ethical problem that arised in the first place. OP accepted this answer probably because it is more comfortable, but a good answer should definitely address this (see iayork's answer).
Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat. Additionally, some flags have been raised on some overly aggressive comments. Please keep it civil, folks.
The fact that to a seasoned programmer the work is easy doesn't have anything to do with it. As you describe it, this is work that's required for the publication. Without it, you don't have a paper. With it, you do. Therefore the programmer contributed significantly (critically) to the paper, and therefore the programmer should be an author.
The fact that it's quick and easy for a programmer simply means that programmers have spent significant time and effort learning skills that you don't have. If you consider the work trivial, then go out and learn the skills yourself, and do the work yourself. If that's too much work, then put an appropriate value on that work and offer authorship.
An example in my field is histopathology. I can take tissue slides to an expert who will look at them for five minutes and provide an interpretation. That expert becomes a co-author, not because of their five minutes of work but because of the decades of experience behind it.
Collaborators shouldn't need to run a bloody gauntlet and engage in hand-to-hand combat to become co-authors. If they provide a skill that contributes significantly to the paper, that should be enough.
Extended discussions in the comments have been moved to chat. Please check whether your concern hasn’t already been mentioned before writing a new comment. @iayork: Please try to implement important clarifications into your answer.
@Freeman I also do not see why the OP does not want to acknowledge the programmer as a co-author. Any contribution is a contribution. A contributor as a co-author. What are you going to loose? Since you made this question, you already has feeling that there is something wrong in not acknowledging the programmer. Most theorists unfortunately, because they do not have practical experience, they think it is trivial. Implementation is not trivial at all. It also require effort and most of the time reveal flaws in the theoretical part or articulate the theory which seems dummy without it.
"this is work that's required for the publication" wouldn't you say the same for a translator?
@mehrdad just about every possible silly counterexample was already put forward in the discussion, which was removed as too long. All were irrelevant. Please don't start again.
Seasoned's programmer's rate would probably be $100-$1000 per day. This, assuming that your estimation is correct (dangerous assumption) means you are asking for a volunteer to provide you with $500-$5000 of free labor(assuming that the work takes 5 days).
I also find it strange that you mention time for a seasoned's programmer, but want to hire an undergrad - the difference in the time required to finish the job might differ much. And no work is "Trivial" if it requires "few days" of expert's work.
Undergrad's work might also be of lower quality because of his lack of experience - what if the program is faulty and returns wrong results? How would you know that?
Ultimately it comes down to how you arrange it - you might find someone willing to do it for free. I suggest considering potential gains (is undergrad contributing $2000 in his time not enough to become a co-author?) and threats ( what if the work takes much longer? what if the program has bugs? what if the undergrad can't do it? ).
It's a pretty small and elite group of programmers who make $1000 per day; conversely, $100 per day is not much above minimum wage in some places in the US. So realistically, I think that range could be a bit narrower, like $200-400 per day for an average competent professional software developer in the US.
@DavidZ I didn't want to try to account for all the different variables - experience, technology, location... I provided approximated rates so that I would have some numbres to show. Entry level software engineers at the big five earn 100k+ USD per year, that's more than 400 USD a day, and they are not experienced. Bottom line is, they are not pennies.
@DavidZ $100/hour is actually a pretty low consulting fee for a seasoned programmer out in The World, especially in places like California. And 10 hours of work per day for a short-term project isn't outrageous either.
(2 comments up) Well, the "big five" tech companies and others in tech hubs are not representative of what programmers make in general. If the OP is in one of these areas and has to pay a rate competitive with what those companies are paying, then yes, you have to go beyond $400/hour, but even then, $1000/hour is very high. And in a lot of other places the salaries are a lot lower. (1 comment up) @JeffE I suppose you're right in that consulting fees can be 2-3x higher than salary, I didn't consider that.
In comparing employee salaries and contractor rates, the contractor rate has to come out considerably higher for equal compensation. $100K/year with paid time off, continuous employment, and assorted benefits is far better than $50/hour straight cash. $400/day is quite low. $100/day is ludicrous.
Would it be ethically wrong to recruit an undergrad for a few days volunteer work without pay
"Ethically wrong"? Some answers say it isn't (though I disagree)
But that is the wrong question to ask
However, I feel [that] to get some backing on the theory, I need... computer data.
You've worked on a problem for two years.
You're going to trust "a couple days" free work from a random undergrad to prove it?
If you don't know enough to code it yourself, how do you know the code is right?
In other words (and this isn't meant as harsh or flippant) if you can't tell me how you will be able to tell the difference between these two outcomes:
A person taking your assignment and coding something which produces the answer you expect
A person writing a program which will prove or disprove your theory
...then you don't need the code, do you?
If it turns out you think #2 is correct, but later someone proves that #1 is what really happened... that's bad.
This is only for time reasons as I am not familiar with tools required. Everything will be given as cook book to the interested programmer.
This information was added after I wrote my answer. I answered with the assumption that OP was getting an undergrad to do the code because s/he lacked the knowledge.
While I agree with the latter part of your answer, the first sentence is so wrong that I have to -1 you. It's terribly wrong. If you edit that out I would definitely upvote the fine point regarding verifying the code.
@einpoklum Do you mean where I say, "Maybe not" to it being ethically wrong? If so, please note I put that there because others have argued that under the right circumstances (agreement in advance, etc.) it would not be ethically wrong (at their institution / their field, presumably). I consider it wrong, and wouldn't advise it on a moral basis - but there are other answers here that say how to make it right ethically, and they seem to have valid points (regardless of my feelings). My main point is code correctness - sidestepping ethics because I doubt OP will care my opinion on the ethics.
“I doubt OP will care my opinion on the ethics.” OP specifically asked whether it would be ethically wrong. This suggests that they care about your (and everybody else’s) opinion about ethics. It’s fine if you don’t want to comment about it, but you did actually state an opinion (“maybe not”) that suggests that you don’t feel strongly that it’s unethical, so your response to einpoklum where you now say that you “consider it wrong” makes you sound inconsistent. My suggestion is to edit your answer and either remove the ethics comment or give a clear statement of your position on this.
@J.ChrisCompton: So why not edit your comment into the answer, instead of the "maybe not"? Replace it with "in my opinion, it is, but \n this is not the right question etc."
@DanRomik Yes, the OP said he wanted my opinion - but I think he is at least worried that it might be wrong and came here to get people to tell him how to make it okay. Notice the answer he accepted basically told him how to do what he wanted in the first place. Communicating my thoughts sometimes goes wrong, for example "Maybe not" was intended to say to everyone "That's not ethical to me, but you might be able to do enough lawyering prep work so no ethics board could actually find against you on this issue." Anyway, changed it. Hope it sounds consistent now (as I haven't changed my mind).
@einpoklum "Why not edit your comment into the answer?" because I still read it the way I meant it. But when DanRomnik joined you in taking it the same way you did, I decided to change it. See what I wrote previous comment for what I meant to convey when I said, "Maybe not."
Thanks, your position is clearer now, which I think makes for a better answer. Upvoted.
I don't quite understand this answer, as it seems to suggest that there is no way for a code-illiterate person to make any use of computer-generated output, since they cannot verify what the coder did.
@NuclearWang OP added the part "This is only for time reasons" after my answer. Certainly a code-illiterate person can use computer generated output in general. Can a non-coder use results from Microsoft Excel or SAS - absolutely! (And we don't know how those are coded.) But the question seems to be whether a non-coder can use output from a custom built program, which is built by someone who isn't a specialist (the undergrad) to verify a unique hypothesis... maybe not. (Again, the additional info that OP is able code it is new info)
I don't suppose it's unethical so long as you are clear in your expectations and proposed reward (which is effectively nothing), and the other party fully understands what they are getting into. This could easily become exploitative, however, as you are hoping to get someone to work for you while offering really nothing of value in return. If you are a professor or are some other type of authority figure over the student, I'd tread very carefully here, as you could be exerting undue influence over this person.
I notice that you plan to approach an undergraduate student about this, which could very easily be seen as preying on someone who doesn't know any better. If you have a really interesting problem that's so cool to work on that someone should be happy to do it for a simple "thank you", why not approach a true "seasoned programmer" instead of an undergraduate student? If true professionals find your proposal unpalatable, I'd say it would be unethical to try to hoodwink a less experienced person into the deal.
Nicely said. If you offer to pay, it is fine. If you offer co-authorship it is fine. I would have taken either as an undergraduate programmer. If you have department approval and offer course-credit it is fine. But if you use a position of at least apparent and possibly actual authority to pressure a person that is at least apparently subordinate into it with then it is unethical and could be illegal depending on the details.
"I'm looking for a sucker undergrad who's willing to do work I really need done, and for which I'm paid for, while receiving literally no reward." <- If OP made this clear, and someone showed up, I don't see how it becomes legitimate.
Would it be ethically wrong to recruit an undergrad for a few days volunteer work without pay to get the computer crunching part done and not mention him as a coauthor and only mention as acknowledgement?
Yes. Perhaps it wouldn’t be the most terrible ethical offense, but if forced to choose one of the two words “no” or “yes” to answer the question “would it be ethically wrong?”, I’d go with “yes”.
The reason why it’s wrong is that you are going against established conventions of what authorship means. You think that by offering a student some other sort of reward for doing part of the work involved in publishing a paper, whether it be an acknowledgement, a letter of recommendation, or the opportunity to add another experience to their CV, then it is okay to not list them as a coauthor. But this is wrong, for two reasons: first, there is a clear power differential at play here that makes it likely the student may be tempted to go along with your scheme even without really finding the arrangement very fair or agreeable. In other words, it’s exploitation and an abuse of authority (of a sort we hear about all too often on this site unfortunately).
Second, and perhaps even more importantly, it is not just the student you are offending against. The scientific community has an expectation to be given honest and accurate information about who contributed meaningfully to the creation of the paper. And, by current conventions at least, “several days of work by a seasoned programmer” is more than enough to be counted as a coauthor. I find the idea of you reaching a private agreement with the student to deprive the community of that information by having the student give up authorship rights quite problematic, even overlooking the separate issue of exploitation. Imagine for example if rich people started paying famous academics to collaborate on research with them, giving them a high salary with the agreement that the famous and super-talented person will give up their coauthorship rights. Is this just a private transaction between two consenting adults that doesn’t hurt anyone else? No, of course it’s much less innocent and is harmful, since it deprives the community of information it needs to function effectively, and goes against agreed-upon norms of what’s acceptable.
Now, of course, in your situation you are actually the person who will have done almost all the research, and that’s fine. The student being a coauthor doesn’t mean that they will get half the credit for something you worked on for two years. It would be completely legitimate for you to make it clear to people what each coauthor contributed in any way necessary (by writing it in the paper, or in your CV or publication list, research statement etc). You absolutely deserve to get the correct portion of credit, and there is an honest way to make that happen. But as for coauthorship, the student programmer should get it, since they will have contributed time, creative thinking and a technical skill that’s quite nontrivial (at least, nontrivial enough that you yourself don’t possess it) to the project, and those are the accepted criteria for being a coauthor.
I would +1 you for mentioning an offense against the community; but I think you're being to lenient with your downplaying of the inethicality (sp?) of OP's suggestion.
@einpoklum thanks, glad you partially agree. I did say it was unethical, it’s just less unethical (and less obviously unethical) than some other things I can think of. Actually I noticed that my answer was the only one that brings up the community aspect, so it’s nice to see that someone took notice. :-)
You've inspired me to expand my answer accordingly, so now there are two.
It would be exploitative and quite unethical, yes.
It is only a few days work of programming.
You'll know that after the programming is done. Preliminary estimates of programming time are typically much lower than actual effort expended, not to mention the significant amount of not-actual-programming overhead we tend not to account for.
Would it be ethically wrong to recruit an undergrad for a few days volunteer work without pay
So, you want someone to do work you need for your research - for which you yourself are paid, and for which your university is funded - without the person doing the work getting paid?
You bet this is ethically wrong. Ethically, morally, and in some countries also legally.
It should also be noted you would not just mistreating that student. You would be:
Legitimizing younger, inexperienced researchers not getting acknowledged for their work.
Legitimizing students not getting acknowledged for their material contribution to the work of people higher-up the ladder.
Legitimizing exploitative employment practices in academia, where it is unfortunately quite common to squeeze unpaid work out of people who depend on the system in various ways.
So your suggested act would be offensive both to the academic community at large. If I were in your university you could expect harsh action from the nontenured academic staff union upon us finding out you've done this.
to get some backing on the theory I need some quantitative hard computer data... and not mention him as a coauthor and only mention as acknowledgement?
Since this data is necessary objectively, it will also be necessary to present it, to some extent, in the paper. And this necessary part of the paper will be generated by that undergrad programmer. ... Sounds like a co-author to me; and you cannot drop co-authors.
Also, while it is sometimes legitimate to ask people about whether they want authorship or not - when an undergraduate is involved, there's a power and knowledge imbalance which makes it unethical to ask them to give up co-authorship.
What you could do - if you like - is describe the extent of his/her involvement; but even this may be impolite (depending on the conventions in your field of research).
This is only for time reasons as I am not familiar with tools required.
So the co-author will even utilize some expertise which you do not have? An even stronger co-authorship.
If not for time reasons, I would have written most papers in most scientific fields all on my own. I just need enough time to become familiar with all of that stuff.
Everything will be given as cook book to the interested programmer.
That would be nice and a good idea regardless of who writes the code. However, an unethical, immoral, and exploitative act is not excused by a related socially-beneficial and commendable act.
Oh, and, just so you know - implementing something to just work for a paper and implementing it for publication so that other people can use it to is a significant difference in the amount of work necessary.
I also very much agree with @DanRomik's observation that you would be committing an offense against the scientific community, not just the undergrad; and with @JChrisCompton's observation that you're ignoring the issue of verification/trustworthiness of the code.
You make quite a few, perhaps unwarranted, assumptions. In many undergraduate institutions in the US, the professor is paid to teach, but still expected to do research. There are no grants involved and no pay for the research. It is just an expectation. Any pay would come out of the professor's pocket and he/she may not be especially well paid to begin with. In such an institution, all of the students are undergraduates, and in many cases they have fairly close relationship with their professors. Not everything there needs to be transactional as you seem to prefer.
Likewise, two years of work at such an institution is nothing like two years at a top research institution. It is done in odd moments between classes and during summer "breaks". There are no university funds to support it, maybe not even for publication fees.
To clarify, when I said OP’s actions would be an offense against the community I meant something specific: that OP would be depriving the community of information about who contributed meaningfully to the paper. That’s different from what you are referring to in your answer about legitimizing exploitation and so on. (By the way, can’t you accuse any wrongdoer of offending everyone else by legitimizing wrongdoing of that particular sort? This hardly seems to be worth mentioning. The main thing that’s wrong with doing something wrong is that it is wrong, not that it “legitimizes wrongdoing”.)
"the professor is paid to teach, but still expected to do research. " <- that means the professor is paid to do both, without getting proper recognition for his/her research work. This warped arrangement is due to the collective weakness of faculty which should organize across universities to struggle for better working conditions overall. "No grants for research" <- Research funding should also be a struggle. What you're describing is every stratum passing the buck, or perhaps, carrying forward the exploitation, to the next stratum. Totally unacceptable.
Authorship
(Ethical) academic authorship is independent of other forms of rewards, so it doesn’t really matter here whether you pay somebody or not. The crucial aspect here is whether your programmer made a creative contribution. Now, what is creative is somewhat fuzzy and difficult to assess, but a good litmus test can be obtained from considering what a non-creative contribution would look like:
It always produces the same result with respect to your research question. (Irrelevant or unavoidable differences like the programming language, statistical fluctuations, etc. are excluded.)
It follows a clear established protocol.
Understanding your research question yields no advantage to the contributor, e.g., in form of assessing the plausibility of results (also see J. Chris Compton’s answer).
If this applies to the contribution you seek, then it is likely not creative. However, as others noted, this is very likely not the case here.
Payment
Your programmer is very likely not helping you for purely altruistic reasons, so there must be something else you have to offer.
I can only see the following options:
Scientific credit (authorship). This requires a scientific contribution, which you excluded to be the case.
Formal payment. You also excluded this.
A prospect of recommendation letter, good grades, thesis projects would imply an abuse of power and in some cases bribery. This could very well be compared to just receiving money from the student.
Getting insight into the scientific process would be in conflict with your claim that this is a trivial task.
Sidenote
I often found that tackling a research question from another point of view yielded valuable new insights or perspectives in unexpected ways. Given that you spent two years on your question, investing two days in programming will almost certainly be a worthwhile experience on average.
This is the best answer. Either this is truly "crunching" (akin to buying a microscope or feeding the rats) -- in which case it should be paid or otherwise remunerated -- or it is a creative contribution, in which case it deserves authorship. Whether the student consents to be exploited is irrelevant. I could maybe see a case if OP were willing to let the successful student continue to collaborate with him and earn authorship on future papers (as well as a LoR), but no evidence this is the case here.
Is the output of the computer program going to be included in the paper? If so, that output has an author, and that author deserves credit. But who is the author? Is it the computer? Is it the program? Or is it the programmer? I think it's the programmer.
If the output has no intellectual merit, why does it add value to the paper? Would including the program input instead of the output serve the reader equally?
Contrary to popular belief, programming is intellectual activity. It deserves respect.
I don't think is unethical if you provide something of value of exchange to the prospective student. Will he gain an understanding of some theory that he/she's interested in as part of the engagement? Be upfront at what you're offering to your prospective collaborator.
If you just want a free coder then yes this is unethical. This is pure and simple exploitation, and abuse of power from your side. Would you like to be on the other side of this exchange?
ps. Check the regulations of your institution!
I am a software engineer. There's a story that has always resonated with me whenever a friend asks for "free" software development
The story goes that Picasso was sitting in a Paris café when an
admirer approached and asked if he would do a quick sketch on a paper
napkin. Picasso politely agreed, swiftly executed the work, and handed
back the napkin — but not before asking for a rather significant
amount of money. The admirer was shocked: “How can you ask for so
much? It took you a minute to draw this!” “No”, Picasso replied, “It
took me 40 years”
Even though I am no Picasso in the software world, the overall message is the same and applies to any professional. A good story to consider when asking for "free" help
Blog Link to story
In many institutions, it is common for undergraduates to help with research, either paid or for credits. It is not necessarily unethical to post your project and ask for help, but you have to consider what the student is getting from this experience.
Authorship might reasonably be off the table, but at the same time the undergraduate might come with some interesting insights/get more involved. You never know.
Regardless of the authorship or financial aspect, there is some form of payment that, for some, is invaluable: the experience and the advice. For most undergraduates, getting involved in research (especially if they are actively interested in pursuing such a career) can be tough.
However, you should consider that undergrad less as the one doing the dirty work and more as your mentee. You are, after all, more experienced than him, and you could provide some useful insights into academia or into your field. This comes of course at the cost of you spending some (possibly rather fun) time with the undergraduate, sharing your knowledge.
To put is shortly, if you find somebody willing to be just a coding monkey, it's not necessarily unethical, but adopting the coding monkey as a (possibly very short term) tutee is a win-win situation.
Would it be ethically wrong to recruit an undergrad for a few days
volunteer work without pay to get the computer crunching part done and
not mention him as a coauthor and only mention as acknowledgement?
It's not ethically wrong if the engineering contribution is too tiny, compared to the whole contribution of the paper.
In fact, it's very common that professors/researchers hire several undergrads/interns to work on engineering a tool, and only list them in the acknowledgment. (I can provide many examples).
However, it is ethically wrong if the engineering contribution is substantial, and you don't list them as co-author. Whether there contribution is enough for co-authorship depends on your judgement, but your judgement can be wrong.
If you read the book "7 habits of highly effective people", one of the habit is always thinking about win-win solution. You can't just expect somebody to work for you for free. It sounds unrealistic.
"You can just expect somebody to work for you for free." I think you meant to write "can't" or "cannot".
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89179 | How to list an unfinished PhD on a resume
I started studying my PhD with a federal scholarship that was supposed to sustain all my expenses and allow me to study without the need to work. Long story short, between family and mortgage payments money was scarce. My relatives helped with some of the expenses, but after 2.5 years, there were just too many pressure from financial problems, and I was not having a good progress in my investigation, that my advisor and I decided to suspend the PhD and that I should focus on getting a job.
To that extent, is it a good idea to emphasize that I started a PhD but was not able to finish it, or will it create a bad image about me not ending what I start? Should I wait until they ask what I did for those 3 years to tell them I didn't finish it? The PhD is in my CV, as started but not finished. Should I keep it that way or should I erase it?
To note for the possible answers is that I already have a Master degree in the same specialty as the PhD, and this is happening in México.
Generally speaking, something unfinished is better than a gap. What are you going to say you spend these 2.5 years doing if asked in an interview you got omitting the information? Also, it is better to have something unfinished that helped you get relevant experience than nothing (officially nothing).
Also see: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38201/how-should-i-state-a-phd-dropout-in-my-cv/38203#38203 Never lie, and never sell it in a negative tone.
Some US institutions would consider awarding a master's degree or at least a research certificate in lieu of a PhD for someone in your position. Is this an option?
I suggest you make sure this is posted with a username that will not be findable by potential employers. (If you haven't already done so.) Because you don't want to project "wasn't able to finish" or "not making good progress with my research."
This situation happens to people and it is often challenging to figure out what the next steps are. So, be happy that you are making the step to pick up the pieces and move forward!
You should definitely include the PhD program on your resume, especially if it relates to fields that you are applying to. Where you most likely want to address this issue is in your cover letter. If you are transitioning out of academia altogether, you can give professional explanations for leaving a PhD program where you wouldn't have to explain the personal challenges you have faced. For instance...
"I realized during my doctoral studies that I prefer more hands-on work that would be offered in industry positions."
"I enjoy my field very much, but am looking for positions that offer more stability and consistency in my schedule and pay than in academia."
Those are just examples. If you are seeking a position within academia that does not require the PhD, you can use similar explanations ("I have learned that I'm better suited for administrative positions" or "After starting my doctoral studies, I realized that my passion lies more with teaching than research.") I'm not sure if this would be different in Mexico or not. I hope this helps!
The reasons I gave sounded like spin, because they were generic. The point was to give a perspective on one way to handle the situation, with the intent that their cover letter would be more personalized. I understand that the real and personal reasons are quite sympathetic. The point of my suggestion was that maybe the person doesn't want to talk to a potential employer about their prior financial stressors. Also, just because you and I may find this situation sympathetic doesn't mean that all employers would.
@dan1111 - Yes, of course OP needs to look for a positive spin! Why sell yourself short?
I think that representing your reasons for leaving should focus on opportunities and current challenges. Employers want to know why you left your prior opportunity AND why you want to seek new opportunities through them.
@dan1111 - I'm all for giving a reason. As a potential employer I would not react well to "wasn't able to finish" or "was not making good progress with my research." Do we really have any disagreement here? I'm not sure we do. Perhaps we just feel differently about the word or the concept of "spin"?
Leaving a job because it does not pay enough is perfectly acceptable. And that is what grad school is: a job. On your resume, you should treat it as a job, with a title and responsibilities and accomplishments, just like any other job.
As much as possible, present it as a staff researcher position (but don't go to the level of lying), rather than you being a student. If they ask about why you left, emphasize the financial considerations, not because you are greedy, but you had obligations that had to be met. Don't emphasize any difficulties you were having with your research.
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32739 | Conflicts with colleagues as a postdoc - reason enough to start looking for the next job?
I have recently started as a postdoc at a well-regarded foreign university. I like the place and I have no particular problems with my professor (even though his style isn't exactly to my taste, but I could live with that and take the difference as a learning opportunity).
However, I have a major problem with my fellow postdocs and other junior colleagues. I get the feeling they're just too full of themselves -- but whatever the reason, the situation is that I simply want nothing to do with them. Given that our research group is the only group at the department whose research I could plausibly participate in at the moment, this leaves me with practically no opportunities for fruitful daily scientific interaction.
I'd like to return to my home country after a couple of years of postdoc positions abroad, so I'm feeling some pressure to get the most of my time. I have often heard that the most valuable thing you get out of postdoc positions is the contacts you make. If this is the case, I'm probably wasting my time at my current job. On the other hand, my current institution has much more resources, scientific activities and opportunities to meet distinguished visiting researchers than pretty much any place else I might get to.
So the question is: what should I prioritize when deciding whether to continue at my current job? Is it worth tolerating intolerable colleagues for the opportunity of working at a prestigious and well-endowed university?
I'm sure a recommendation from my current professor would weigh a lot when looking for the next job, but I'm also quite sure I haven't been able to prove myself to him yet.
(Copied from an answer posted below by the original poster:)
I was deliberately vague about the nature of my issues with my colleagues, but I do understand it's relevant.
Of course, it might be just culture shock, as someone suggested. On the other hand, I do feel there's a very unpleasant group dynamic in my research group.
We're conducting research on the beetles of Borneo. I used to be in a group that studies the beetles of New Guinea, and we often have guests who study the beetles of Java or even some other island. But the general atmosphere among my colleagues is that only Borneoan beetles are worth studying. My earlier work is considered definitely useless and irrelevant - and this was also told me explicitly, right after I had presented my work.
The professor seems to share the attitude in some respects, but he's old and experienced enough to understand that even though he might himself care only about the beetles of Borneo, others might still care more about beetles elsewhere. My junior colleagues just think that if it isn't Borneo, it's bullshit.
If I isolate myself, I will have problems learning about Borneo. If I try to learn about Borneo from my colleagues, I'll have to endure constant putdowns of my own interests and earlier work.
(To anyone who actually studies beetles: I'm sorry for using you as an example.)
It might help if you say more about why you find them intolerable and want nothing to do with them (beyond your perception that they are full of themselves.)
What Trevor said - without knowing more, we can't say if it's you or it's them, and we don't know whether this problem would follow you everywhere you go.
..."is that I simply want nothing to do with them". Although this is totally your right, we can only choose our friends and not our colleagues. Is not a way to actually collaborate with those "buffoons" on a strictly professional level, without actually having any connection on a personal level?
I have often heard that the most valuable thing you get out of postdoc positions is the contacts you make.
I always thought the most valuable thing you get out of postdoc positions is the research experience and the research papers. The contacts/connections would be the by-products after you conduct quality research.
You said "I'm also quite sure I haven't been able to prove myself to him yet.". If you leave now, you wasted all the efforts you spent to apply for your current postdoc job and the time you spent on the job so far only because you don't like your colleagues?
I understand you are at a well-regarded foreign university. My guess is that many of your colleagues came from different cultures/locations than yours. That's probably why you feel that they are intolerable.
My advice: concentrate on your research (which is your job). Work with your professor and those colleagues if needed. Do your best.
Edit after the OP put in some more details:
Your example sounds like you are in the wrong group in the sense of research direction. I don't quite understand why you went there in the first place. But, you are there now. I would try to stay there for a while if I were you. I would collaborate with my colleagues. I would learn beetles of Borneo from them. I would show them why beetles of New Guinea are also worth studying. I'll do my best. If it still doesn't work out after a while, then I'll quit and find another postdoc job, the right one this time.
+1 just for mentioning the cultural differences. Specially since it seems a generalised perk.
Even if you have a good postdoc, you should keep an eye out for one that is even better. However, if you stay in your current position less than a year you may be viewed as unreliable by future employers. (US perspective)
-1: This is very generic (not specific to the question about interpersonal issues at all), questionable advice without almost no supporting explanation.
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