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13908 | Do sample solutions increase student 'productivity'?
I'm not 100% sure whether this belongs here, but since I am a PhD student (teaching) in the TCS/Algorithms department, I'd like to know what fellow, maybe more experienced, teachers think.
The question at hand is whether we should offer sample solutions to all our exercises for, e.g., a Data Structures & Algorithms lecture.
I am convinced that this would be a highly beneficial service for our students whereas my advisor is against it. Here are the pros and cons that we came up with:
Pros:
Students have access to high-quality answers when they don't understand something.
Our expectations on verboseness, conciseness, depth of proofs, etc. can be communicated more clearly.
A student can individually study using the solutions and is not forced to attend the tutorials if this is not his preferred style of learning
We (the professor/tutor) have a clearer idea of what solutions to expect since we have to work the problems ourselves.
The tutor (me) is more free in the design of the tutorial. Without sample solutions, the tutorial basically boils down to writing the sample solutions on the blackboard. Otherwise I can't be sure that everyone has at least seen the correct way how to solve it. Little interaction is involved.
Cons:
It costs time and/or money.
Students may stop being engaged in the exercises since they know they can always look at the sample solutions.
Students may stop coming to the tutorials.
We can't reuse exercises from past years since students might have access to (and use) past sample solutions.
If we do it once, the students might expect we do it for every lecture.
To be clear, in both cases the students are expected to solve the exercise sheets on their own, and they will be graded. I'm merely interested in what to offer after this has happened.
I think that's all. Optimally, I would like to find some kind of empirical study that proves that sample solutions increase the "productivity" of students. Data always wins. However, so far I couldn't find anything like this.
To discuss the points mentioned above, my general opinion on these matters is that if we can offer more services using little work, we should always do it. If someone really misuses it (as stated in the cons), he or she will notice that this is the wrong approach the latest in the exams. My advisor, however, wants to minimize the time spent on lectures and have me rather do the research relevant to my PhD. Since I have to do the solutions anyway, the overhead for providing a sample solution is maybe 2-3 hours/week.
What do you think?
Tutorials? Tutors? We don't have them where I teach. This sounds like a U.K.-specific question.
We have teaching assistants, who run recitations. But in the U.S., you generally can't give the solutions out before the recitation because the exercises count towards the grade. This (and the terminology) is why I thought you were in the U.K. Giving out solutions after the exercises are due is extremely common.
With regards to some of your cons, once you get into college, my observation is that if students stop caring (jsut look up the solutions) they're either going to quickly learn how bad of an idea that is by bombing a test, or will otherwise get weeded out. Most students who don't make an honest attempt at their work don't graduate, and I don't feel bad giving them the decision to pass or fail.
One more (in my experience) often quoted disadvantage is that students won't necessarily read the solutions, or not to the degree they should. Having the correct answer to file in their folder, they forget to sufficiently file it in their brain. If they watch/listen to you writing out the solution, they are likely to process it at least on some level.
Some teachers will distribute solutions only on paper (not electronically). This allows them to use the same questions year after year. Their mode of thinking might be along the lines of, "The solutions are always out there somewhere. If a student is going to go through the trouble of tracking down an old student and using their answers, they're beyond my help."
This is a topic that educational theorists are regularly waging war over. The internet has only worsened the situation, as it often doesn't even matter which choice you make: students will just pop onto a stackexchange or another forum to get the answer, or use google, etc. That's what I think you actually need to discuss and worry about. There's a limit these days to how much you can stop exercise problems making their way onto the internet and getting full solutions. An educator's task is now set at getting students to use those responsibly and properly.
I have three types of exercises in my algorithms classes: homework problems, exam problems, and discussion problems. I'm not entirely sure which you're asking about.
I release detailed solutions and grading rubrics for all homework and exam problems, in part for the advantages you list, in part to speed up grading, and in part to better calibrate my own expectations for the students. (If it takes too long for me to write up the solution, the problem is probably too hard for them.) I take them all down again at the end of each semester. I don't actually mind if students have access to my old solutions—as long as they write in their own words and cite their sources—because homeworks are only a small part of the course grade. (Students who are stupid enough to submit my old solutions verbatim, typos and all, are not quite publicly fed to the wolves.)
On the other hand, I deliberately do not release solutions for discussion problems (which we discuss in, you guessed it, discussion sections) because the solutions are not the point. The point is to practice finding the solution. I know students are adults, but it takes a lot more discipline to practice hunting when someone just regularly hands you the meat. Also, some discussion problems reappear later on my exams.
But this is really an individual choice. I know plenty of algorithms instructors who don't give students solutions, and others who hand out solutions on paper but don't distribute them on the web, and others who distribute them on the web but behind a firewall, and others who beg people like me to please for the love of god stop giving away homework solutions because coming up with good algorithms homework problems is really really HARD.
Update: Starting in 2017, I now regularly release solutions for my discussion problems, typically a few days after each discussion meeting. (Just like homework solutions, I take these down at the end of every semester.) Perhaps as a result, these discussion problems are now effectively fixed from one semester to the next -- in a typical semester I replace 5%-10% of them -- and discussion problems almost never appear on exams. (I should also clarify that discussion problems do not contribute to the final grade.)
I also include an extra solved problem in each homework, with a complete grading rubric. Again, these solved problems rarely change (as opposed to the problems the students need to solve, which change every semester).
In both cases, the idea is to provide concrete examples of the structure, precision/formality, and level of detail expected from their own work. Realistically, once the discussion sections are over, unsolved discussion problems are not as valuable as the solutions; students are busy! And I have lots of other unsolved exercises in my lecture notes for students who want unsullied practice.
Writing all those lab solutions (just over 100 pages of text) was a lot of work, but now it's done. The net effect of releasing all these solutions seems to be positive—more clearly for teaching evaluations, but also for student performance.
In addition to other good points made, let me say that (in mathematics, at all levels) I myself make many "model solutions" and put them on-line.
Obviously the availability of model solutions has positive potential... The issues are the genuine downsides.
One reason for my decision to take this approach was that, especially in upper-division and graduate-level mathematics, enthusiastic students acting in good faith often put either flawed or misguided solutions on-line, and other students look at those, ... thus "learning" low-quality versions.
Another reason is according to an over-simplified reasoning: important examples should not be left to students to mess up, and unimportant examples should not be used to waste students' time. I realize this is over-simplified and has implicit hypotheses, but after 40 years of watching people diligently spend time on exercises _without_thinking_critically_ about any sort of larger picture, I am ever more fond of this pseudo-principle.
Yes, a fundamental objection is that on-line solutions allows laziness/cheating/whatever. And, yes, as JeffE noted, in some venues it's hard come up with good "training exercises". Thus, I can certainly envision scenarios in which a cyclic putting-them-up, taking-them-down could be justified. However, dedicated lazy/cheating people can maintain copies ... And so on. Thus, in effect, it is impossible to prevent laziness/cheating in the face of even modestly motivated lazies/cheats. Thus, I reason that elaborate strategies aimed at foiling laziness/cheating, at the expense of making people acting in good faith have to jump through hoops, etc., are bad.
In mathematics at least, I'd claim that many traditional contexts for "exercises" are somewhat missing the point, anyway, so that moving away from the weekly problem sets wouldn't be so bad! That is, to make a large number of "exercises" feasibly do-able by nearly everyone in every class, and in a short period of time, the issues must be contrived, not natural. Students understand this, even if only subliminally, and many of the "successful" ones have managed to squelch their critical faculties ("why are we doing this?") to be more economical in their approach to these fairly-random exercises.
Or, at the opposite end, there are the occasional much-admired slim texts where 2/3 or more of the things one needs to know relegated to exercises! Crazy! In this case, the student's disadvantage is even worse in some ways, because the issues are more real, and there're even fewer "model solutions available", and they may come away with deeply flawed or misguided pseudo-understandings.
At least in modern mathematics, I think that the inarguable "engage with the material" is too often denatured, to something like "try to prove all the theorems yourself". Supposedly, the side information of knowing assertions of true theorems is enough of an advantage. But this is a strange presumption... proof mechanisms, concepts created to enable proof mechanisms that are humanly comprehensible, are as significant as the bald assertions themselves, I think.
So, to advance collective human understanding, putting "models" on-line is good. Yes, there are downsides, and hazards, but this is just the new reality.
"Training exercises"?
I learnt English (as a required subject) in a non-English-speaking country for nearly 11 years. We were asked to solve millions of artificial multiple-choice exercises instead of to learn how to use English in real contexts. (Perhaps mainly because those English teachers don't have practical English skills either...) With hindsight, this kind of teaching/learning is extremely inefficient. Maybe the same idea applies to mathematics, which also has a language component.
@ZhouFang, indeed, despite math-culture tradition to pretend that mathematics is independent of ambient natural languages, while one could write denatured formal-logic mathematics, this would be very inefficient... and unreadable, too. Especially, such writing would stupidly fail to take advantage of all the information compressible into natural language effects: suggestion, insinuation, contraposition, etc.
As a CS major who had to take 2 theory classes, I really appreciated the prof who handed took class time to explain and solve each question after the assignment (he didn't hand out the answers so he could reuse them). The prof would usually hand out 3 or 4 questions Monday and solve them Friday (after you turned in your answer).
He would basically act like he was doing the assignment, and was very good about not skipping steps. He'd also explain why he wanted to see the answer in the format, which help several non-theory students (like me) learn how to appropriately write proofs.
At least in America, CS Theory is generally a difficult subject because the rest of CS education is very applied and students are generally unprepared for it. Especially in this course, going the extra mile for students is noticed and appropriated, and will provide a counter-point to the theory prof. who calls students idiots and gets in yelling matches whenever a student ask a question (which also happened to me).
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155433 | How can I counter a student response saying "Why are we bothered to reinvent the wheel when proving mathematical identities?"
I am teaching an undergraduate mathematics course to software engineering students. I often ask my students to prove some mathematical identities as their homework. The identities could be, for example: trigonometry identities, Laplace transform identities, Menelaus', Stewart's, Ceva's theorems, etc.
One special student often just copies other works obtained from the Internet without doing any effort to prove them by himself. When I asked him, he replied "Why are we bothered to reinvent the wheel?". I have not replied yet and I will do later.
Could you give some advice for countering his argument?
This question is probably better at [matheducators.se], actually.
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The question surely has sense for the Math Educators site, but there is also mathematical content and possibly more general content for academe... I upvoted, and do not think it should be closed.
I'm now wondering what kind of a course is being taught that includes such a diverse range of topics, from elementary geometry through relatively advanced calculus.
@KevinArlin: I also teach (among others) Gauss-Bonnet theorem and how to derive quadratic formula $x_{1,2}=\frac{-b\pm\sqrt{b^2-4ac}}{2a}$ to them.
@user69652 So the course has no specific remit within mathematics? It sounds like quite a smorgasbord.
@KevinArlin: Yes. But it is not too important for my question.
Someone said:*
When you reinvent the wheel, you end up learning a great deal about why wheels are round.
And that is really the point. When you’re at university to get a degree in wheels, you should fully expect not just to be told that wheels exist but to be asked to think deeply about them so that you develop an understanding, at the deepest level, of why they work the way they do. That is literally the whole point of going to college.
*Source: something I read recently somewhere on the Stack Exchange network. The quote is from memory, I can’t find the exact source now unfortunately.
Maybe this statement? https://blog.codinghorror.com/dont-reinvent-the-wheel-unless-you-plan-on-learning-more-about-wheels/
@user111388 not quite, but thanks for the link.
That is a really good quote for exactly this situation.
@TobiasKildetoft yes, and actually I vaguely recall bookmarking the thread with the thought that this is a quote I’ll want to use at some point, but I’m not finding it at the moment.
@DanRomik Perhaps this?
@GoodDeeds good one! But no, that’s not it either I’m afraid :-|
I would add to this quote 'and you learn how to explain why wheels are round'.. Formulating logical proofs in mathematics requires the same high-level mindset that formulating a logical argument for a debate or project pitch does, so it can be a very effective way of practicing the logical thinking that's required for effective communication.
In mathematics, the point of understanding how a theorem is derived is NOT to understand a particular theorem. It is to understand what constitutes the CONSTRUCTION of such an argument in an unambiguous and COMPLETE framework. To know the steps to complete a particular proof is meaningless in the mathematical postgraduate/peer reviewed ecosystem. The whole aim is the understand 1) what you need to prove 2) how to prove it thoroughly to demonstrate you achieved the goal you set about.
I think this is an exceptional answer for students who want to continue in Mathematics. I however hated doing proofs in my discreet math course required for my software engineering degree, I also still to this day do not understand why I had to do them and they have never helped me my professional career. Similar to @Graham's answer below, a tie in to why this is taught to software engineers would have benefitted me a huge amount, since I don't doubt the benefit exists, I just still don't understand it.
@jdf I think that’s an important and valid perspective, but at the same time I’d hazard a guess that doing proofs helped to teach you to think more logically and ultimately made you a better software engineer, in the same way that practicing musical scales and studying “boring” music theory helps to make a music student into a better musician. And this despite the fact that many students hate those activities and don’t understand why they can’t just spend their time practicing playing the songs/pieces they like. But your point about the need for good motivation (“tie in”) is very true.
When I first read the quote I actually thought you meant that reinventing the wheel is a bad thing. "learning a great deal about why wheels are round" sounds like "learning a great deal about why gloves are in the shape of hands". They're round because round things can roll! I guess I'm the only one who doesn't think this quote does a good job of addressing the issue.
ie, you can learn to do math, or you can learn to understand math. Which you are after, depends on what your interests and goals are.
@Behacad: Should Dan Romik add that you ought to also end up learning why we use spokes in wheels instead of having solid wheels? And why spokes and not a grid mesh? And why tires on wheels? And for the advanced classes: Why we use a differential? Why use low gear for low speeds and high gear for high speeds? ...
Re-inventing the wheel in education is about the process of re-invention, and not about the resulting wheel.
The student seems to have the misconception that mathematics is about "facts". Early education stresses elementary facts a lot, so this is pretty natural.
But mathematics is about understanding relationships, not memorizing facts. If you don't know why something in mathematics is true, you really don't understand it. The proofs in mathematics are more important than the theorem statements, actually, as the latter just capture the essence in a simpler statement.
Until he understands that it will be difficult for him to advance as a mathematician, assuming that is a goal. If it isn't a goal, then he has little incentive to change.
This is the appropriate answer if the students are actually Math students, but it applies less if they study a different subject, in which they eventually become mere end-users of Math results. For example, the central limit theorem has manifold implications in all sciences and in everyday life. To understand it, it's not important at all to understand its proof.
@lighthousekeeper I think their program is irrelevant here. They are in a math class, presumably run by the math department rather than run by the department of their program (in which case I would wonder why unnecessary things are being taught). I'm an EE and we take mechanical dynamics because motors spin. We were literally told that's the reason why. We take it in the course taught by the ME department but we don't go in and ask why friction and springs are taught when EEs don't need it, because it's a class taught by the ME department.
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I was that student. And the reason is mainly not because I was a bad student, or a bad engineer (a 2:1 degree and 25 years in industry should answer those points). It was because my lecturers were bad teachers. And yes, you too may be a bad teacher right now, without realising it. The difference is that you've seen this student's question as a challenge to improve your teaching, and that's something you should be proud of. What matters for all of us is how we learn to do better.
You're teaching engineers, who are without exception practical people. (Or the good ones anyway. I assume you want your course to produce good engineers.) Remember that they aren't at university to become mathematicians, they're there to become engineers. If you want them to learn a subject which seems of no real value to them, you need to convey the value in doing it. It seems you haven't managed to get this across.
To divert slightly, think of The Karate Kid. How does Mr Miyagi teach Daniel? He gives him apparently pointless exercises to do. Daniel puts up with this for a while, but eventually tells Miyagi to shove it. Miyagi then demonstrates that there was some value to the exercises after all. The thing is though, this isn't the only way to learn, nor actually the way which works for most people. Go into a regular dojo, and you get taught how to block and punch by, well, blocking and punching.
You've got the Miyagi method though. You've given them seemingly pointless exercises to get practise in basic techniques. Now your Daniel has called you on it though. So what's the application for that technique? If it's widely used, what's even one application for it?
For concrete personal examples, we spent ages at university learning about phase lead/lag networks, PID controllers, and so on. What we didn't do was get an actual motor and position sensor, and actually control something. The result for me was that it didn't really stick, and I've had to relearn it all at work when I've had projects which needed it. Practicality and relevance are the keys for engineering.
You mention Laplace. Have you had them do any DSP? It doesn't get more hands-on with Laplace than filters. And that step response? That's what happens when your wheel hits a bump, or someone pops the microphone. Do you get a (Butterworth) ringing or a (Bessel) smooth step? And which do you accept, if the depth of filtering is also important?
There are lots of ways you can go which makes your subject relevant. All you need to do is find them. This may require you to talk to the engineering staff to find how they use these techniques (per @KevinArlin's comments), to give you examples you can hang your lectures on. If it means students they'll be teaching or supervising later have a better grasp of these basic techniques which they'll need, I'd expect them to jump at the chance.
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I'm a mathematics graduate currently working in computer science and data analysis. In my experience it is difficult (if not impossible) to memorize every single aspect of mathematics, especially for identities which could be combined with one another in various complicated ways to produce infinite results. Instead I find it useful to start with the most basic parts for which I have a deep understanding and put them together - in essence "reinventing the wheel" - until I have my desired result.
Years after taking a certain course, I have found myself working on projects that need certain identities and facts (I've needed a surprising amount of geometry and trigonometry for processing image data). There is no way I would remember them all, but I can still remember the basic parts and the process needed to put everything together. Sure I could look it up (as long as I remembered the name or enough details about the identity, which isn't trivial), but that is not always an option...
Even more important, there are times when I am working with very well known identities or processes, but I need to put two things together, add something new, or make a change to get a slightly different result. If I only ever used what could be easily looked up, I would be out of luck in this new situation. But hopefully after "reinventing the wheel" many times over, I will have developed the problem solving skills necessary to tackle the problem.
Do that enough times, and complex things like "the wheel" become the basic parts for which you have a deep understanding, and you can use it to build greater and grander things, a "car" for instance.
This post illustrates the distinction between getting a degree and getting an education. Unfortunately too much emphasis these days is on former, and not enough is on getting the latter.
You can tell the student the following:
The goal of homework is not to prove new things that the instructor doesn't know, but rather to give the students knowledge and experience in using the tools given to them. This is called "learning" - probably your course/institute has some goal the students "learn" something. You could refer him to that.
It's the same when a teacher teaches: The teacher does not reinwent a wheel but rather tells/shows known facts. Yet schools, universities are important.
This is also not related to mathematics or university. Most likely, the students had to learn a foreign language (or their own language) at school. Then they had to apply it (by speaking or by doing grammar exercises). Here they also do not invent new things (as one could say a novel does), but deepen their knowledge.
Counter by
Having the student consider why a musician or athlete practices routinely, and
offering an unsolved problem to prove as an alternative.
Together these points should prove compelling, assuming the student's objections were truly sincere.
This is what I would do, which is a good argument for it not fitting the role of "what a professional educator should do".
@wizzwizz4: You might make a better professional educator than you think. ;-)
Other than the "roles" thing, there's a certain kind of person that would not quite get that the unsolved problem wasn't an actual task, and would not admit that they couldn't solve it, and would either burn out or drop out trying to solve it.
@wizzwizz4: I suggested offering, not assigning. Elaborate that challenging problems, some never before solved even, await but will first require mastery of the basics.
I know. It's probably not on you if you get that sort of student, though.
Possible downside to (2) is that the student may submit garbage and insist that it's a proof that you don't understand, or something (crank-style). Related, I had a possibly learning-disabled college student who discovered the Collatz conjecture mentioned in our textbook, and kept submitting nonsense and asking if it was a proof, no matter how much I recommended that he stop.
Feynman cut to the heart of this issue in The Feynman Tips on Physics:
I have a few moments left, so I’d like to make a little speech about
the relation of the mathematics to the physics—which, in fact, was
well illustrated by this little example. It will not do to memorize
the formulas, and to say to yourself, “I know all the formulas; all I
gotta do is figure out how to put ’em in the problem!”
Now, you may
succeed with this for a while, and the more you work on memorizing the
formulas, the longer you’ll go on with this method—but it doesn’t work
in the end.
You might say, “I’m not gonna believe him, because I’ve
always been successful: that’s the way I’ve always done it; I’m always
gonna do it that way.”
You are not always going to do it that way:
you’re going to flunk— not this year, not next year, but eventually,
when you get your job, or something—you’re going to lose along the
line somewhere, because physics is an enormously extended thing: there
are millions of formulas! It’s impossible to remember all the
formulas—it’s impossible!
And the great thing that you’re ignoring,
the powerful machine that you’re not using, is this: suppose Figure
1-19 is a map of all the physics formulas, all the relations in
physics. (It should have more than two dimensions, but let’s suppose
it’s like that.)
Now, suppose that something happened to your mind,
that somehow all the material in some region was erased, and there was
a little spot of missing goo in there. The relations of nature are so
nice that it is possible, by logic, to “triangulate” from what is
known to what’s in the hole. (See Fig. 1-20.)
And you can re-create the things that you’ve forgotten perpetually —if
you don’t forget too much, and if you know enough. In other words,
there comes a time—which you haven’t quite got to, yet—where you’ll
know so many things that as you forget them, you can reconstruct them
from the pieces that you can still remember. It is therefore of
first-rate importance that you know how to “triangulate”—that is, to
know how to figure something out from what you already know. It is
absolutely necessary. You might say, “Ah, I don’t care; I’m a good
memorizer! I know how to really memorize! In fact, I took a course in
memory!”
That still doesn’t work! Because the real utility of
physicists—both to discover new laws of nature, and to develop new
things in industry, and so on—is not to talk about what’s already
known, but to do something new— and so they triangulate out from the
known things: they make a “triangulation” that no one has ever made
before. (See Fig. 1-21.)
In order to learn how to do that, you’ve got
to forget the memorizing of formulas, and to try to learn to
understand the interrelationships of nature. That’s very much more
difficult at the beginning, but it’s the only successful way.
It is a very good response. However, it is not an answer that students will want to hear! :)
For the last student who asked me this, I pulled out Gradshteyn and Ryzhik (my copy from 1992). My first line (in joke voice) was "Alright, get to memorizing."
Then I flipped to page xxiii and pointed at the text leading up to "We then kept only the simplest formula." Then jumped to page xxiv to the line "Thus, before looking up an integral in the tables, the user should simplify as much as possible the arguments ... in the integrand."
The student responded that there exists software containing the entire book. I replied with my experience : "There are only a few pieces of software whose marketing departments make this claim. To date, none of them have been correct, as I have found fairly simple integrals that each version of each piece of software I have used fails to integrate."
If you can't bring your work in to a form that can be found in references, you are crippled compared to someone who can. This may involve algebra, trigonometric identities, Fourier, Laplace or other integral transforms, the Cauchy integral formula, et c. If you don't understand those tools and how they work, you will not understand when you should or should not be using them. This knowledge comes only from practice.
Good tables are worth their weight in gold.
My answer would go along the line:
It's a bad idea to blindly believe everything you read. We all know that there's
a lot of nonsense out there in the internet. So you better be
able to judge yourself, and this exercise is part of teaching you how
to evaluate whether some mathematical claim is true or not.
Maybe it would raise motivation to have the students decide whether some claim is true or false, and to present sound reasoning (proof) for their answer.
So what if the student says he checks it before copying it? (Many students do.)
Doing math is different from 'knowing math'. With knowing math I mean memorizing formulas and concepts. We all probably have experienced this in an exam that contained math: you think you know some formula but when you're in the exam you notice you don't actually know how to implement it in practice. Proving identities is one of the best ways of getting some hands on practive with the material. Even though it might not be the most direct way to practice with it. One benefit you get by proving those identities is that you better know when you are allowed to apply these identities because now you know exactly what conditions are required to make the proof work.
A second argument is that proving an identity is an effective way to remember said identity. Personally proving a formula about 3 times over an extended time is enough to memorize it for me.
I'm still a student so I don't know how important it is to be able to make proofs in your career and this will probably vary a lot depending on your department. (it is very important in the maths/physics department though)
Let me formulate a contra-answer to the one from Graham:
I am also a mathematician, and I have worked as a software engineer for several firms. One of them had created their own development environment, which generated a whole bunch of binaries and one textfile. All those automatically generated things together were the actual product.
After six years, I was assigned as a functional tester, and one of the things I did, was parsing, reading, grepping, ... the automatically generated textfile, and my colleagues were completely astonished of the amount of bugs I found while doing that.
But most of all, I was astonished by the fact that litteraly no-one (we were several hundreds of colleagues) had ever thaught of reading that file as a human being: people were so focused on the fact that that file was auto-generated that they did not even think of doing that. My insight went as a shock through the company!
Therefore I'd like to encourage you continuing what you are doing: try to increase the insight of your students. They may resent you for it, they might even claim hating you for it. But later (I was about 35 years old), there might come a moment where that insight comes in very handy and for the rest of their lives, they'll love your for it!
+1 I think this gets to very important aspect of these "When will I use this?" questions. Well, I have no idea what work you'll do, what job you'll get, or even what occupations will exist in 5-50 years. All I know is that gfor almost all of us there will be one day where the need for math knowledge will be an emergency and make or break you (if not actual life-or-death consequences).
I agree with your student.
I have a PhD in physics and used math as a toolbox. A wonderful, useful, shiny toolbox. The kind of toolbox where you know that in order to find the roots of 3x^2-9x+2=0 you would find delta etc. I do not care how it was found, because this is a tool (I am not interested how a screwdriver is built either).
This is really, honestly not to diminish the value of your field. Someone had to invent these tools in the first place.
My son is going through 2nd degree polynomials as we speak. I had to suffer through the whole proof part and he knows that at the end of the day, it is three formulas he will blindly use.
One thing you could consider doing - and this is a very useful exercise: to set up a problem where blindly using the formula will make them fail, because the formula has an introduction part ("If x belongs to ..., then (formula)"). This will probably not make them study the proof (who knows) but will teach them a valuable lessons on limitations.
And someday, as they will be engineers, they may remember that story with limitations when building the bridge you will walk on. This happened to me (not with a bridge, fortunately) and helped me to always remember that models have contraints.
What I am trying to say is that the proof may not be the most valuable thing to teach them.
This is one of these cases where I would appreciate very much a comment on downvotes to understand the thinking of the ones that do not agree.
Because you need it to pass the exam.
Call my cynical, but that's the ultimate reason. Not wanting to reinvent the wheel is often very reasonable, e.g. if you were asked to prove Fermat's Last Theorem, you would be foolhardy to attempt to prove it yourself instead of searching up Andrew Wiles' proof.
The great benefit of attempting to prove the identities yourself is that you become familiar with the thought process, the basic equations, and so on. For example with trigonometry, one might see an expression involving sin^3(x) and think of converting that one of sin(3x). Without this insight, one might never make progress. Working on similar proofs before helps provide this signpost when it matters during the exam.
If the student is capable of learning the proofs enough that they can prove similar identities, under time pressure & in an exam setting, then there's nothing to worry about. Whether they get to this stage by working through someone else's proof, or by figuring it out themselves, isn't important.
I wouldn't call the first sentence cynical, but I would say that it showcases a lack of sensibility for questions such as: What is the purpose of education? How is it supposed to make the world better?
I would not tell the student sentence like "if you were asked to prove Fermat's Last Theorem". Nobody ever will tell you "Prove Fermat's Theorem" in real life and stusents know this.
Examples like this are mathematically sound but make the instructor sound like they are in an ivory tower. This might reinforce the idea that the education is pointless.
I wouldn’t call you cynical, but I would call this the most uninspiring answer imaginable to the student’s quesrtion. I hope if/when you are either a teacher or a parent and your student or child asks you a “why?” question, you make a little bit more of an effort to think of something that’s not only factually correct in a “gotcha”, technical sense, but actually helps your student or child develop their inner creativity and sense of curiosity.
@DanRomik I'm of opinion inspiration is overrated - it's what makes people do things that aren't in their best interests and come to regret it later.
@Allure hmm, ok. Well, best of luck with that philosophy, I’m sure there are contexts when that makes some sense. But given what you’re saying here, perhaps I’ll call you cynical after all...
The last name is Wiles, not Wile.
I was that student
NOTE - Since I posted this there has been a similar answer by @Graham - However Graham's answer is so much better explained than mine that I have upvoted it and recommend it over mine.
Not as an undergraduate but before that in secondary education.
I resented doing chemistry and physics experiments because they were printed in books that we had to work through. As far as I was concerned, they weren't experiments because experiments are discovering something new, not repeating what had already been done. Instead I would do my own experiments at the back of the class.
I refused to learn a proof for Pythagoras' theorem that we were supposed to one year. I ended up having to prove it almost from scratch in an exam.
I rarely did maths homework because I had "understood" it when it was explained in the class and didn't feel the necessity to demonstrate the fact.
I did pass the exams in these subjects - barely.
By the time came that I was expected to apply for university I was so fed up with education that I wasn't interested. I ended up going to music college instead. It was only years later that I decided to pick up my studies again. I was working full-time and simultaneously did a part-time degree. By this time I was more mature. I worked hard, followed the rules and got a first and went on to do a Masters.
I really don't think anything could have changed my mind at the time. I was lazy and a rebel.
I suspect that this student is similar and has got by so far by surviving on natural ability without rigour. It may be that he will be more suited to researching one specific difficult problem and will make the effort at that time to put in all the necessary work. Think Andrew Wiles.
Suggestion
If like I was, this student is a lazy rebel (and somewhat immature), it will be difficult to motivate him to take the standard route. The best I can suggest is to find something that really motivates him and show how following the course will aid him in achieving that.
Nice answer, upvoted. But I don’t think Andrew Wiles fits your lazy rebel stereotype, nor that a student who thinks proving identities is a “bother” is likely to become anything like a future Wiles (although he may succeed in other ways). So that particular analogy isn’t very apt.
@Dan Romik - Neither of us know what he will become from being a budding Wiles to sleeping on street corners! My point about Wiles was that he, from an early age, had a narrow focus that he saw as important - so much so (I believe) that every bit of maths he learned was to that end. He had more motivation than just a teacher saying "Do this because it's what everyone does." He did it because it all led towards his life's work. That's why I'm suggesting finding a focus for this student so that learning isn't just a scattershot approach but a means to an end. It may or may not work.
Maybe your student is seeing only the traditional aspect of the proof: a mean of verification, validation, conviction. If this is the case and the student believe the identities are true, there is no reason to bother to prove them. Then, you could try to explain and work with the other functions of the proof: explanation, systematisation, discovery, communication and intellectual challenge. See this paper by Michael de Villiers. Here are two quotes:
Who has not yet experienced frustration when confronted by students asking "why do we have to prove this?"
The question is, however, "what functions does proof have within mathematics itself which can potentially be utilized in the mathematics classroom to make proof a more meaningful activity?" The purpose of this section is to describe some important functions of proof, and briefly discuss some implications for the teaching of proof.
Since they are software engineering students, ask them if it is still relevant to understand different sorting algorithms. After all, there are libraries.
The answer, of course, is that one should be able to understand how one's tools work, at least when one has reason to look. I recall a bug where a programmer was unaware that quicksort was not stable.
I don't understand your point. The students might say "yes, understanding sorting algorithms is important to us but not mathematical identities".
@user111388, they might say "why should I understand this? I just call .sort() and it would be quite unprofessional to reimplement the wheel. Existing libraries are better than anything custom for the project."
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181771 | How can I survive a postdoc's probation period?
On Tuesday, I will be starting a postdoc at a highly prestigious UK institution. I have already been a postdoc for a year at a lower tiered institute, and I believe the probation was not much of a concern mainly due to that very reason. Additionally, a very nice and friendly PI and a casual (yet productive) environment, did not make the probation period much of a concern to me.
However, the current position that I will be starting is at my dream project / institution, and the environment seems more tense and fast paced (and add to that a bit of imposter syndrome). For this reason, the probation period has become an irrational cause for stress and anxiety. I suppose what I would like to know is what to avoid at all costs to ensure that this period passes without any issues.
Note: The probation period is six months and postdoc contract is three years.
Does this answer your question? How to effectively deal with Imposter Syndrome and feelings of inadequacy: "I've somehow convinced everyone that I'm actually good at this"
You shouldn't worry about "surviving the probation period". Your goal should be to do a good postdoc - overall, not only during or primarily during the probation period. After all, what is it worth to make it through the probation period, if you're not doing well in the rest of the postdoc - would you be any better off in that case?
Overall, I thus wouldn't worry too much about it - at least not more than striving to do a good postdoc altogether. It might even be that the probation period is a legal requirement for any kind of contract (not just postdocs) in the UK.
(One more comment: Given that you don't state at all how long the probation is, it is hard to give any concrete advice: The relevance of a one-month probation is quite different from a 6-month or 1-year probation.)
Thank you for your useful advice. That is very true, however, I have come up with this crippling anxiety for somewhat of an irrational reason. Also you have a good point regarding the probation period; I can confirm that it is indeed 6 months (the post has been edited to reflect this).
Yes I noticed the mistake as soon as I inadvertently edited your comment. I have included the period of contract as well.
I wouldn't be too concerned with a 6-month probation - just make sure that after you start, you get engaged soon in the topics you should work on during the postdoc (again, might be very field- and supervisor-dependent how specific that is), show interest and independent thought, be engaged, contribute to scientific discussions in the group ... all the things which you (hopefully) anyway do as a postdoc. But it really depends on the subject.
Thank you very much for your input and the swift responses! May not seem like much, but very helpful.
Just be yourself. Pretending to be someone else for 6 months won't work, and then you don't want to work for 3 years with someone who wants to have (and after the probation believes they got) someone else than you are.
Don't worry about the probation period. This is mostly a formality.
Probation periods at UK universities exist mostly for policy reason (because the University imposes them on all employment contracts). They exist to have the legal option of terminating a contract, in truly problematic cases. They are not a tool (at least not for postdoc hires) to evaluate the quality of a hire.
In practice terminating a postdoc contract creates a lot of hassle for your supervisor. Not least because, they have go through the hiring process for a replacement, which will probably delay whatever project you are supposed to work on by a year. Moreover, if your position funded from a grant, there may not be enough money left in the grant to offer a full three year contract to your replacement, making it harder to find a high quality replacement.
So, unless you do something that makes your supervisor actively want to get rid of you at all costs, you will probably make it through probation.
The phrase that stood out for me in your question was "... an irrational cause for stress and anxiety". It seems that you are pretty much on top of your professional game, but that the mental stress is the main problem in its own right.
Have you considered talking to a coach/therapist? Professional help for anxiety is not reserved for people diagnosed or burned out. A few sessions might give you better insights than you can hope to get here.
Most importantly perhaps, enjoy and have fun. You have got your dream position at a prestigious institution. It seems that the imposter syndrome gets more intense the higher the prestige, but try to find comfort in the fact that out of all other potential candidates, the chair has your name on it. And in academia that is almost always for a reason. If you bring that confidence in your own ability with you into your work you'll most likely have a great time.
"It seems that the imposter syndrome gets more intense the higher the prestige": That's the point, isn't it?
It's your dream institution and your dream project, but this is just a patina over the work and the working environment you will be living in the next 3 years. And this patina is unfortunately not that relevant, in the long term.
Why?
If you are interested in the academic career, the postdoc is much less relevant with respect to what you do as research than the "management" aspects (i.e. applying for funds, delivering the bureaucracy on time, supervising younger guns, etc...).
My advice is to think of the probation period as a mutual evaluation period: they are evaluating you, but you are also evaluating your new workplace.
Focus on the first "long-term" deadline (1st year project report? 1st year paper? whatever), work towards that goal, at the same time be yourself, be open, be curious, try to get in touch with the research of your peers in the department .... and then after 3 months make your decision.
I think you will need 3-4 months to scratch the patina of your new working environment. If, after three months you are enjoying the project, the working environment, your work-life balance, the place and the project, it is unlikely you will be performing so badly that you do not pass the probation period. It is very easy to assess if a person is enjoying the work, it is very hard to assess quality of a PostDoc work after 6 months, and no one has the time to do that, so the evaluation will be on your motivation to keep on working on the project for 3 years [1], rather than on some metrics.
If you are not enjoying it, just focus on yourself and work hard towards getting your own funds for your own project, make your own plan B. If you have no academic interests, use the remaining months to sharpen your CV for your exit to the private world.
[1] pay attention not to corner yourself in a hole. They hired you for 3 years to work on a certain project, however your CV in 3 years down the road will benefit if you showed some independence in getting funds, supervising students, etcetc ... keep your possibilities open.
I agree with most of the answer, but very strongly disagree with the first sentence "If you are interested in the academic career, the postdoc is much less relevant with respect to what you do as research than the "management" aspects". Maybe that's field dependent - but when, if not during a postdoc, do you want to produce lots of research results, rather than wasting your time with bureaucracy? So, to the OP: This is the time to excel in research. Once you are a professor, you will be caught in bureaucracy, supervision, funding, etc.
@user151413 to put it simply: I absolutely agree that being a postdoc is the best time to do research, and it will be most likely the last thing you will do in the academia, if you do not prepare your professor career. Sad but (nowadays) true.
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9902 | Practical Tips: Mathematical research and discoveries
How to behave when you have the feeling of working on something innovative? What to do if there is a chance (even the 1%) that your
work is leading you to something original?
For example what if I don't know mathematicians I trust to ask? Is a good idea to talk about your results (even if are not real results) to someone?
Question:
What do you do if you have this feeling?
I'm looking for a list (or links to related SE questions/guides/books or others)
of practical tips to use while studying a certain subject you
have the feeling of having found an innovative approach that can
provide a new solution.
I am interested too in books about the mathematicians' way to research. (I think is related)
I already asked this question on Math.SE but was closed two times. Here the link to MathematicsSE
What do you mean by trust? Is this question related/duplicate?
@DanielE.Shub yes this qeustion is a bit related thanks for the link . Anyways that was only an example, my qeustion was more general.
There is an art to balancing "diverging" and "converging." By diverging, I mean using your intuition to figure out what "should" be true - what you think you can prove, if you try. Converging means actually proving it. You don't want to get too far out there into the unknown without proving milestone lemmas to anchor you down, or you may find that much of your research is predicated on a false assumption. On the other hand, forcing yourself to prove every little thing while suppressing your imagination simply won't lead to interesting research.
@AlexanderGruber yea, that is one of my problems too, if I try to formalize all I my ideas, the work becomes long and more i continue and more i lose the meaning of what I'm doing, but I'f travel with fantasy I continue to find a great number of ideas and connections and I come in a huge landscape of conjectures... Do you know some reading about this? there is maybe some point that I must remember while working in order to find a balance between "diverging" and "converging."?
@MphLee Actually, the terminology "diverging and converging" comes from my previous career in design. I don't know a good place to read about this, but it is a relatively common topic of conversation in art school. The rules on when to diverge and converge aren't set in stone and are a little different for most people; however, my rule of thumb is not to get more than about "two steps ahead" of what I've already proven before I try to converge. (After all, sometimes going back and proving the conjectures helps you think of new ones, too.)
0. To give original contribution to the understanding of mathematical objects is what mathematician do, and talk about all the time. There is a priori no need to fear for ideas being stolen; if you want to play secure, you can publish a preprint to ensure priority.
Given the wording of your question, I assume that you are an amateur mathematician, and that you feel that you may have found something about an important, well-known question. Sorry if this is not the case.
As most mathematicians, I receive demand for advice of this kind from time to time, so here is my usual answer.
Be prepared to have made a mistake,
be prepared to have found something known for a long time,
be prepared to have found something that will not attract interest.
This may sound very negative, but these are the worries that are much more likely to be relevant than seeing your contribution stolen. I have seen recently an amateur publishing on viXra after seeking advice from me, that was afraid of having her ideas stolen. It turned out that her contribution was a few hundred years behind current knowledge.
Researchers in mathematics only succeed in advancing knowledge because they spend much time learning their specialty and keeping up with what is being proven, and we do sometimes reinvent the wheel (I got scooped by 130 years once, realizing that Camille Jordan already solved a cute problem I was interested in), or make mistake, or do things that do not interest our colleagues. It is tremendously difficult to avoid this pitfalls when you don't have access to the literature, don't have colleagues to speak with about your research, don't have a regular seminar to listen to, don't have had a PhD advisor to guide you through your first problems.
So, for a positive piece of advice:
4. learn the field you are interested in (e.g. read books, from the point you are in your knowledge to the field you are interested in). Be prepared for this step to take much time.
1,2,3 are all very true. And sometimes, re-inventing the wheel can result in a highly cited paper. E.g. "Preferential Attachment" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preferential_attachment) was re-invented several times (1925,1955,1976 etc) but still managed to get 16,787 citations as a Nature Paper in 1999.
@Benoît Kloeckner In order to be more concrete, I talk about me: 1st I don't know if my question is know, but I know that I never saw something similar (and I searched keywords), I feel to have found a way to look in this direction like a new theory, but more I work on this idea and more I undesrtand that I must study totally (at the first look) different fields because are all linked. So In thit moment I'm seriously asking myself if is good to ask someone or not (because I do not have many theorems):
if I don't ask probably I'll stay forever on a fake problem building useless and wrongs constructions (or already known with other names) and anyways very slowly, If I do and there is a good idea, an expert mathematician can do 100 times faster what I was going do and "cut me out" forever.
But I must remember that my question was more general too, was more about pratical sides of the whole process, from the beginning to the pubblication. But thanks for the answer Is very usefull.
@MphLee: if you feel that someone else could easily appropriate your ideas, there is even less probability that they avoid 1.2.3. : innovative mathematics are often (though not always) hard to understand for everyone, possibly (but not necessarily) except for its author.
Another point: you are reluctant to discuss your ideas, but it is often more difficult to get people interested in them than likely that they steal them from you.
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11295 | Balancing between students who do homework and those who do not
This other question is about assigning videos as homework and this one is about what to do when students do not do their homework. However, there is another question to ask which is similar, but I think different, from these two.
If you have a class of 70 students and you assign some homework on which you will base the following class, and 40% of the students do not do the homework, that subsequent class becomes quite unmanageable. If you proceed as scheduled, the 40% will be lost, they cannot contribute, and eventually become distracting for the rest of the class.
If you do not run the class as scheduled, the students who did the homework the first time will see there is little benefit of doing the home and little cost of not doing it. For this reason, in the past, I have been quite strict. Students who did not do the homework get kicked out and marked absent (too many absences and they automatically fail the module). The problem with this approach is that kicking 40% out leaves me with a very high failure rate and in the end I just end up taking time which would otherwise be free for me to do as I wish and I must dedicate that time to these students who failed (for whatever reason).
So, I find myself in a difficult situation. Kicking students out hurts them but hurts me too. The problem is that I value my time much more than they value theirs so it ends up hurting me more than them. If I don't kick them out, my schedule gets destroyed.
How can one find balance in the classroom when a large percentage of students do not do the homework? Is there a way other than simply removing large chunks and failing them? Is thee a more enlightened way?
Important Note: In my modules grades are pass/fail - I do not have the option to simply lower their grade.
I must say you're not alone and I feel your pain. I have professor friends who told me the very same thing. They told the students the final exam problems would be from those homeworks. Still, more than half don't do them.
Are there possibilities to make certain tasks mandatory in the class? If so then the pass/fail will be directly affected by doing/not doing the tasks.
@PeterJansson The 'stick' I have available to me is simply to mark them absent with the understanding that too many absences means an automatic fail. The threshold is quite low so marking them absent just a few times will fail them.
If 40% of the students aren't doing their homework, and you rely upon students doing homework for your pedagogy style to work, then something is seriously wrong.
You have two options:
(1) Make homework dramatically more appealing.
Put much more effort into the homework--make it fun! E.g. calculate strain on an iPhone screen instead of a aluminum sheet; don't have someone read a novel but rather ask key questions about it such as to list all the times some character/historical figure expressed defiance against the state.
Institute quizzes that are drawn directly from the homework. Do them practically every day. Staring at a blank sheet of paper and not knowing what to do is a lot more uncomfortable than hearing you babble about something incomprehensible.
Change the grading scheme so homework is most of the grade (if you're allowed).
(2) Make homework dramatically less necessary. (Note: usually not an option for mathematics.)
Do the key problems on the board in class instead of assigning them as homework. (Assign a similar problem as homework, possibly after you've done it in class.) Not possible for literature review, of course.
Rely upon in-class participation instead (if you have the personality to make it work, and the homework is of the right type).
Don't make the learning environment one which requires the students to do the homework in order to understand most of the next lecture. Lecture on the important points, review at the end of one lecture and the beginning of the next, and go on. They might not develop their skills at doing problems, but at least they'll have some hope of following for a while. Probably won't work with literature, but almost everything else can be quite successful.
Your point (1) is helpful but your point (2) doesn't help me much. The goal of getting the students to do homework is to progress their learning outside of the classroom. If they do not do the homework, I will spend more of the limited class time covering the basics which means less learning for the class overall.
@earthling A friend of mine read this answer. He pretty much agree with you. Point(2) is not an option for him(he is a math professor). The 2nd and 3rd bullet of point(1) are helpful. But, he had to teach much less than he wanted to. The end result was that the strong students learned less. It's a trade off between the whole class learn more vs. strong students learn more. He asked me to tell you here(he doesn't have reps to write comment.
Don't make the learning environment one which requires the students to do the homework in order to understand — I cant imagine any worthwhile class that this suggestion wouldn't make worthless.
@JeffE - It's very subject-dependent. I can't imagine a math class where you could understand without doing a fair bit of homework. On the other hand, I've been in several biology classes where homework helped a little but wasn't essential: the lectures were masterfully delivered in a memorable way and contained all the important factual material.
@earthling - Unfortunately, if 40% of your students aren't doing the homework and making it more appealing doesn't work, you are pretty much obligated to do (2), disappointing as it may be. I'd love to be able to just teach the best and most motivated students; it's much more rewarding. But that's not (usually) the job description--you're trying also to instill basic competency and familiarity in people who have the class as a prerequisite, who aren't particularly passionate but would like to learn something, etc. etc..
@RexKerr: I will resist the No True Scotsman urge.
I use online quizzes (Moodle, but other options exist) to test knowledge (multiple-choice) prior to course lectures. This applies to point (1) by making it more appealing. The quizzes require reading, and students get two attempts (highest score is recorded). Cuts down a lot on basic material I have to deliver; allows classes to be more applied and interactive.
"I will spend more of the limited class time covering the basics which means less learning for the class overall" -- just to check, you are working within the student's "time budget" for the class? If there aren't good guidelines and clear expectations how much time the class will take, then a student who thought they signed up for one hour class a week and actually gets one hour class and two hours reading, can't necessarily conjure another two hours a week out of nowhere for the benefit of more learning overall.
... basically I'm saying maybe there's a general problem that students can't (or aren't) planning their workload accurately, nothing particularly to do with the work you're giving them. You can't have all the professors competing to make their homework the most attractive so that the students skip someone else's. You all want them to do all of it.
@earthling - I think Steve's two comments above are for you, not regarding my answer.
@SteveJessop - Students typically have considerable flexibility in their schedule. Those who work as well or are parents may not, but most can cut back on some inessential activity in order to participate more in a worthwhile class. I don't think budgets are fixed--make it more engaging and the budget will grow (and not necessarily at the expense of other classes).
@RexKerr: You seem to assume it's impossible to reach the upper reasonable limit on inflexible time demands on the students. I don't teach at a university, but the test I applied here is just, "what if everyone said that?". Students are left with free time for a reason, and that reason is not for essential course workload. If every class is a few hours over expectation then (to over-simplify) the chess club dies. All I'm saying is to check whether the class is advertised accurately. If it says "3 hours a week" and it is 3 hours a week, no foul.
... if it says 1 and is 3 then we don't get to act surprised if the majority of students don't make the time, regardless of how interesting the material is, because we chose to pull a bait-and-switch ;-) Advertise it as 3, more of our students will be prepared to do the essential work. Or advertise it as 1 and make the extra 2 hours optional. Or if there's no mechanism to advertise time (all classes are assumed roughly the same), then stick to the university's idea of a reasonable workload per class.
Well, you've stumbled upon a key and age-old pedagogical issue, and one that doesn't have an easy answer. I would urge you to find an "80%" solution (meaning, don't try to solve the problem completely), and then work to within the parameters of that solution. Kicking out 40% of the class isn't tenable for your long-term job security, I assure you. Assuming your question is in regard to a collegiate class, then you do have the option to fall back onto
this is your education that you're paying for, so it's up to you to take it seriously, which means doing the work.
As a first-order solution, you can make sure that not doing the homework will affect their grades significantly so that they do fail, and then let them know this on the syllabus, on the first day of class, and regularly. Students who do not do the work will feel the pain when they receive their final grade. You also have proof (no completed work) when parents and administrators come with questions.
What this solution doesn't solve is the group that
eventually become distracting for the rest of the class.
This is possibly the hardest part of the puzzle. I have four suggestions:
Re-organize your class so that those students cannot be distracting. If large-class participation is the issue, then start forming smaller groups, and give the participating members the ability to police the disruptions (e.g., have each group grade individual members' participation).
If possible, find a way to weed out those students before they arrive in your class--you may be able to do this via a more strict prerequisite requirement (e.g., certain classes, or certain grades within previous classes).
Make the homework more manageable. On the one hand, this seems to be giving in to the problem, but if they're not doing the work and have a reason other than "I don't want to," then there may be a way to give different assignments that they will attempt.
Find out what classes they've had previous to yours, and ask the instructors of those classes whether they had the same issues. You can get a lot of good information about certain groups of students by talking these sorts of issues over with other faculty. If you do find a faculty member who successfully dealt with those students, ask for suggestions, or, even better, ask if you can observe a couple of classes to get a feel for the types of strategies that teacher uses.
Thanks for the ideas. A number of issues exist in implementation. First, the students never pay their own tuition - parents do. You'd think the students would care about wasting family money but the 'trouble' students don't seem to care. Pre-req's are not a workable solution as this area is not under faculty control in this program. Other teachers seem to have the same problem and just give less homework. I have to think about your point (1). I'm not sure how to implement that. Anything suggested reading on that point?
@earthling Interesting. If the parents pay the tuition, you may have some leverage to contact the parents about their children. This may be illegal if the students are above a certain age (i.e., you have to deal directly with adults and can't discuss grades, etc. with parents of adults), but this may be a good place to start if you can. Then again, that's more of a high school solution, not a college one. As for the other teachers: do they give less homework because they've given up, or because they have solutions that work?
@earthling As to ideas for point (1), I don't know enough about your class to suggest reading. You might start with a Google search for "pedagogy small group discussions" or "pedagogy turning lectures into small groups.", and seeing if you can find results that fit your class.
The teachers do not give homework because it is easier to stand-and-deliver then fight against a large percentage of students who do not do the homework. So, I would say they have given up.
@earthling they have given up. That's too bad, but not surprising. It sounds like you're at an institution where learning isn't a particularly valued outcome, at least for the classes/students you're teaching. That said, you can buck the trend, but it will take fortitude and the willingness to make changes to your classroom that may mean longer hours planning and even more frustration. There are ways to combat institutional apathy, though, and asking these types of questions is a good start.
@earthling I've been thinking more about this -- what exactly are the ramifications if a student fails your class? I assume this would set them back somewhat? Is failing even a punitive measure?
+1 for "Kicking out 40% of the class isn't tenable for your long-term job security, I assure you."
@ChrisGregg Failing means paying a fee to submit the assignments anyway. This can only be done once. Most students have 2 chances to pass. Students who cannot submit (too many absences) only get one chance and that does require a payment. If they fail on this extra chance, they must take the subject again but they can remain with their classmates for the rest of the program, they just must re-take the failed module again (and pass) before graduation.
@earthling I see -- that may explain the apathy, anyway.
Disregarding that life is not fair, I've always found the fixed format of school unfair. Most ppl do not have a learning type that suits school perfectly, and a significant number of really talented ppl is a total unfit for the system of listening 8hrs, and then doing homework. Personally, I've always had to use my spare time to learn stuff; I've got to do it myself. Actually, this goes so far that this cost me quite a few school grades, despite the fact that this is the kind of learner perfectly suited for lifelong learning ...
... (so a perfect fit for quite a few higher-up jobs). Often, I found teachers/lectures explanations incomplete and non-saturating, plus I couldn't keep my attention up as would have been required. I am a total self-learner, and I am great on that, and in the meanwhile outperform some of my old teachers/lectures. So, from personal experience, making homework something that affects final grades significantly will sieve out too many talented ppl who need their spare time for actually learning, instead of doing homework. IMHO, sanction the troublemakers, but not flat out every non-homeworker.
Oh, and what I observe now on new students around their 30s, those who worked a few years, and now want to climb up the ladder, homework can be really bad to them, despite their potential. People 30 and older often have more Real Life problems than twens, some have children, some have parents that need help, or funeral, finance is often worse (no support by parents or state). That's of course whining for them on one hand, but factually this lowers the callable potential you could profit from.
Your approach of kicking out the students who didn't do the home work is rather draconian, and while seductive as a zero-tolerance policy, is likely to cause more harm to you than good.
Is there a (strong) positive correlation between student completion of homework and final grade for the overall module/unit/paper? If so, I suggest that you appeal to the students' self-interest by showing a plot of this correlation to your students at the beginning of your course, and throughout the course.
Regarding what to do during class, I would make frequent reference to the homework along the lines of, e.g.
"If you attempted the homework exercise, you would know why this line of the derivation follows from the previous line so I'm not going to go into it here. This sort of thing often comes up in exams.",
"The homework exercise was the first part of a past exam question relating to this topic. We're going to explore the topic in more detail now",
"The homework exercise asked you to think about why this next piece of argument might be flawed."
What I am advocating is a policy where you strongly advise students to complete the homework, so that they are in a better position to understand the material and which appeals to the student's desire to pass the exam/test.
Completing the homework is not a necessary prerequisite to understanding the material of the present lecture, but would be very very useful to the students indeed when it comes time to revise for the course.
Is there a (strong) positive correlation between student completion of homework and final grade for the overall module/unit/paper? - The module is pass/fail. Yes, the students who do the homework pass and most of the students who do not, end up failing. Those who fail sometimes drop and move to another school which they view as more lenient.
Here's one idea you could try: Have the students go to the front of the entire class, and either solve a problem on the board, or else explain something from the homework assignment.
Your goal would be to create an activity where anyone who completed the homework should have no problem completing the task, but those who did not do the homework stand a good chance of struggling mightily.
Make it an in-class game of sorts by pulling names out of a hat.
If students come unprepared, at least they will be more nervous and less casual about it. Perhaps that might increase your participation rate.
You might also do something like this: any student who doesn't turn in an assignment gets their name written down on five more index cards, which are subsequently added to the hat, thereby sharply increasing the likelihood that they will get picked in future classes. Make sure the students are well aware of that practice.
a small alteration to the algorithm: start doing this stand-up tasks after the first assignment, and only use names that have missed/failed assignments. This is sharper :)
I doubt that many will agree with me, but this is what I would do if I could:
(1) If someone can't participate in a class because they haven't done the homework, just ignore them and continue the lesson. If they get lost, just tell them that would have been learned if you had done the homework, and move on.
(2) Don't kick people out of class if they haven't done their homework. (But do kick them out, of course, if they become disruptive because they keep asking about things they should know already.)
(3) Calculate their grade however you will. But allow an "alternate grading" that emphasizes midterms, finals, and other tests; on the grounds that if they get a good grade there they obviously know the material; even if they hardly show up and/or never do homework. Those who choose this alternative should also face a short oral exam to ensure they really understand the subject matter and haven't just memorized the details without being able to show how they got there.
I sympathise with your predicament, but disagree with your methods. One thing that strikes me as strange about this question is that you appear to be sufficiently in control of the class to be able to remove 40% of this cohort from the classroom, but you worry that you are insufficiently in control to prevent these same people from disturbing the class if they are present. I would have thought that if you are sufficiently authoritative to do the former, then it should be possible to allow people to stay, but prevent them from disturbing others. In fact, I would have thought that this would be substantially less effort than going to the trouble of physically removing almost half of the class.
The reason to raise this incongruity is that (at a tertiary academic level) it is generally a good idea to present the students with resources to learn, and let them decide whether or not they benefit from these resources. It is best to grade students on merit rather than effort, and a student who is able to master the material should not fail the course simply because they have declined to learn it in the manner you have specified. University students are adults, and they should be expected to make use of the provided resources in whatever way that allows them to learn the subject, with knowledge being the final test.
Removing students from the class means that they are denied one of the resources for learning the material, on the basis of having eschewed another resource (the homework). Moreover, the fact that a student can fail the course via these "absences" means that a student who is able to learn the material through self-study --without doing the homework-- will nonetheless fail, even if they have mastered the subject matter. With the greatest of sympathy, this strikes me as a case where the instructor is testing compliance rather than knowledge.
It might be worth exploring whether there are ways that you can allow students to remain in your class without letting them disturb the class for others. This might mean imposing a moratorium on asking questions if you haven't done the homework, but even then, that is less of a loss than being required to leave (and then marked absent and possibly failing). This approach would have the benefit of allowing students to learn from the resources that they determine to be worthwhile to them, and to be directly exposed to how difficult it is to follow your class when they have not done the homework.
Thanks for your insights. The challenge is when you design the in-class time to be based on the pre-reading and large groups of students refuse to do the reading, they cannot participate in a meaningful way. They end up chit-chatting with their friends which builds to a low roar making it impractical to have a proper discussion with the students who did the reading. It is nice to think that "there is a way" but I do not know the way (hence, my question). They don't ask questions because they know too little, having refused doing the reading. These are always the weakest students.
Okay, that is a better explanation of the problem, and you have obviously made a bona fide effort to explore other options. If I think of a further suggestion to contemplate, I'll add it here.
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37095 | Why do people hang up papers on their doors?
This has been puzzling me for a long time, I have seen professors and other academic people hang up their research papers on their doors. What is the purpose of this?
My first guess was they were announcing some important papers related to a class they are lecturing, so students can look at them without disturbing professor. This doesn't feel right because there are not many papers studied in a typical class and there is internet to announce these things.
As the time passed I started thinking it is a way of advertising. But, this also doesn't make sense because web pages exists to serve this purpose and few people come to visit the office physically.
Maybe this practice is limited to my country, but any answer is appreciated.
Which country are you talking about?
What? I see all kinds of things on office doors but haven't seen research papers...
I heard that there is an office in my department where rejected papers of people inside that office are hung on the door... I guess that different people have different ideas about how to decorate their door
So people can read them, of course.
@JeffE maybe in case you have to wait at the door, as a passtime.
I would like to add that another reason may be that the alternative of hanging reviewers is typically frowned upon.
If you hang them on the window, they block out the light.
In addition to Massimo's question of where is this happening, in what departments? all? I have never seen this either.
@ff524: Indeed, and that is by no means specific to academia compared to other workplaces.
One of my professor has a photo of him in defensive position with boxing gloves and a nasty look, over which it's written Are you sure that it's office hour?
In Germany, to my understanding, this was a long-established and traditional practice for quite a long time before Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to a church door. Wikipedia cites “Oberman, Heiko, Luther, Man between God and the Devil” for the statement that doing so was “according to university custom.”
I've seen them mounted onto a board specifically dedicated to papers, but never on faculty doors.
because web pages exist ... agreed, but this custom predates the internet. Some of us here are old enough to remember back to those days.
The internet is wide and expansive, and there is no need for students to visit the pages on which a professor might post papers that she just happens to like (as opposed to those which are actually being assigned). So posting such papers on office doors might actually garner a wider audience (at least among the student body) than just posting them online. For example, this was pretty common practice in the Physics department at my school; my favorite paper posted was the unified theory of Superman's powers.
In addition to the reasons mentioned by others, I think there may be something of the big-game trophy hunter about the practice: "Behold, visitor, I am a mighty scientist, capable of hunting the fearsome [prestigious journal]!"
...or the near-extinct [generous funding agency].
If you have worked hard on a specific research question and finally have your peers approve of your work through a review process, would you not want to display the result? Basically, it is one way in which to show any passer-by that, yes, something is actually accomplished within the walls of the office. I have seen many variants on the topic. I have seen a world map with journal article title and abstract tied with a string to a point on the map where the work was done.
Essentially, it is an analog analogue to a web page or site such as ResearchGate where you highlight your recent publications, in this case, of course, to students and peers in the department rather than a wider audience. The main purpose is, as you also point out, better served by a web site. But, if you end up waiting to for an audience with the professor, you may actually look at the posted paper and get to know something you would not necessarily otherwise check out. So, I think the main purpose now is "just" to display something that has taken time and effort with some pride.
On a side note, I worked in a lab where PhD Students were "suggested" to keep their latest poster in some wall close to their desk, which turned to be quite useful every time a visitor arrived. Papers may not be so "visually catchy" at a first glance. On a side (joke) note, robotics departments can become cool places to visit if this kind of demos become standard, not so much for others, like epidemics research.
I've seen just the first page printed rather large so the abstract is easy to read before as well.
There's often a good reason to post something on an office door: many academic buildings have long corridors of similar looking office doors, so posting something on it helps an office stand out. It doesn't really matter what; once your students (or colleagues!) have found your office, it's easier for them to find it again, because it's easier for most people to spot visual cues like the paper titles and even just the arrangement of papers rather than the door number or remembering it's the third door.
As for why papers, I assume a combination of being proud of the accomplishment and hoping one might catch the eye of a passerby, student or colleague. The audience who sees it is quite different from the people likely to look at the list of papers on a website.
For the same reason that a house has pictures of the family living it, or a photographer who has some of its fine prints in his studio. Everyone is proud of what accomplished, so he/she displays it. Also, office walls need decoration as any other human living environment, so why not hanging the papers or the posters? They can also function as "wall of memory" or as "talking bibliography" of an academic's career.
I used to see this all the time in my undergraduate university, so I know just where you're coming from. While I never asked specifically about them, I may have an answer based purely on my experiences.
Whenever I had a meeting with one of my professors, I would usually arrive a couple minutes early and the professor would usually be finishing up their previous meeting with student/colleague/phone conversation. Obviously I wouldn't want to intrude until they were finished but I did want to be able to go in as soon as they were done, so I would loiter outside their office until I could go in. If the professor had some of their research papers up on or next to their door, I could scan the titles and quickly learn about some of the topics they were interested in and what work they had done recently. This wasn't something that I would look up on their website, it was just something I could quickly learn about them in two minutes and file away for later. If they've published on something I was interested in, I could mention it in our meeting. If I was utterly confused and had no interest, no harm done. I always thought of it as a way for professors to market themselves to students who don't see them very often and are more acquaintances to the professor or department. Or perhaps like magazines that medical offices put in the waiting room - they're not supposed to send a message, they're there to pass the time and if you're in the mood for it you can learn something.
So in short, I think the papers are there to reach out to the audience that wouldn't look at your website and doesn't know a lot about your field, but may be interested either in your work or in learning something new about your field of study.
What kind of departments? and what country/type of school? Conference posters I commonly see on doors, but research papers never.
The school was in the United States and I used to see papers on doors of biology, math, neuroscience, and physiology professors. The school had conference posters up in general hallway areas, but offices were tucked away from the main hallways so there usually weren't many posters. Also usually the posters highlighted undergraduate student research, not the research of the professors.
Interesting, I'm in the US (in math) and have never noticed this. I'll need to keep an eye out. (By the way, by conference posters I meant posters that advertise a conference a professor may have a personal interest in, not student research posters presented at conferences--indeed, those are usually just up in hallways or bulletin boards.)
It might also be worth mentioning that this school was focused on teaching undergraduates, particularly those in the health professions. The papers may also have been there to show focused students what a life in academia (versus applied medicine) was like.
Thanks for the clarification on the conference posters - I was clearly thinking of research posters!
Who can say for sure but the professors in question? It may simply be a cheap and considerate way of letting interested colleagues or students have access to a hard copy, avoiding both the inconvenience of continually being asked to provide one or the awkwardness and waste that comes with offering a copy to one who doesn't wish to read it. A habit retained from a pre-digital age, perhaps.
A long time ago in an Oxford college far away, the majority of my peers attempted to confine academic work to a couple of busy hours mid-morning, leaving the rest of the day free for the usual business of undergrads (traditionally smoking, drinking or various means of working up a sweat). The hours 9-12 were when most of the undergraduate assignments were handed in, new ones were handed out, lectures were attended and tutorials were grimly endured by all parties. To avoid constant interruption during these busy hours when they were frequently tutoring, several tutors would keep the doors to their rooms firmly shut and only communicate with the wider world via the envelopes pinned thereon. Assignments for students to collect, student essays awaiting appraisal, reading lists and wotnot, would all pass through the vertical mailbox system on the outside of the tutor's door.
My experience is that this is mostly done to communicate new publications and general scientific progress to the rest of the department.
Specially in larger departments that cover different sub fields, this is a way to externalize what everyone is doing. Posting the abstract/first page of a published paper in the communal area was encouraged and widely adopted in my previous Computer Science department.
Although most researches also post newly published papers to their website, having these new papers on their door or in a communal area (kitchen or water cooler) is a nice way to share what is going on in the department. I rarely check my colleagues' websites, but I enjoy reading abstracts or the first page of their papers when I encounter them.
In addition to the other good answers, four good reasons noone's mentioned yet:
Not every student/research partner/ visitor will have an academic login or online access to journals/JSTOR/proceedings/whatever, or in that discipline. That stuff costs big bucks.
Especially people from industry, prospective students, auditing students, people from other departments/disciplines [1], high school students, visitors, journalists, friends and family of any of the above.
Even if they have online access, they may not know the keywords to search or their correspondence across different disciplines. Huge example: the terminology in data science machine learning vs statistics is seriously not standardized. Ditto EE/CS.
Or be aware of developments in related fields, e.g. Neural Nets, SVM, HMM, clustering.
[1] For example EE and CS academics [in Europe] almost live in different universes, which is sad because they miss a lot of valuable stuff from each other. Ditto, mathematicians, statisticians.
Anyway this practice seems perfectly fine unless the degree of self-citation gets excessive/ silly/ petty/ vain. Also, it's customary not to just display your own, but your grad students'/ co-researchers'/ other key papers.
It beats the usual Calvin and Hobbes.
I agree. It sounds somewhat ridiculous and archaic. My first attempt at an answer would be pride/arrogance or desire to impress.
You know what I would do? If I were a professor on the same cell-block as the other professors, I'd deliberately not hang anything up on my door except my business card with my own personal web site address where all my papers are located.
My door would look more orderly and professional because of that.
This answer includes what you prefer to do instead of why people do hang up their papers on their doors.
Why not a QR code leading to the web site address and a calendar with the current year (currently "2015") in big print?
"Archaic" would be more appropriate if it referred to something predating the lifetimes of the professors. It seems inappropriate for merely predating lifetimes of college students.
@Trylks : because most journals and almost all conferences will not let you freely redistribute your publications. A QR code to a paywall is worse than useless.
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23 | How many physician-scientists pursue academic tracks?
The National Institues of Health (NIH) funds Medical Scientist Training Programs (MSTPs) also known as MD/PhD programs to create a group of researchers whose work more rapidly effects medical practice. For example, they would help to develop new diagnostic tools, drugs, or surgical procedures.
It sounds good, but how many of the students actually pursue this track? Does anyone know of data about the NIH's return on investment besides the somewhat dated data about three New York programs?
Thanks for your time,
Mike
Also, this comment probably also applies to DVM/PhD programs (still NIH funded, but also sometimes NIFA (National Institute of Food and Agriculture).
@OldTroll: You're completely right. I didn't think of them, so thanks for catching that.
I have no idea how you'd find hard data on the program itself and its results, but as an idle musing I checked how many full time faculty members in the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health's Dept. of Epidemiology held an MD/PhD or DrPH. The department was chosen as a very good department in a very good school with a strong medical school that I'm not affiliated with.
Ten of the 94 listed faculty members were MD/PhD or DrPH's. Little under 11% of the faculty. And that's not including other possible "physician scientists" like MD/MPH degree holders...if you do that the number rises to 23 faculty members with an MD degree in a related, but non-clinical research department. Nearly a quarter of the faculty total.
Of course, this is only a very crude proxy for how many physician-scientists pursue academic tracks, and even the representation of clinician-scientists in research departments will likely vary wildly by said department. That being said, I've met a considerable number of them in my graduate school career, either entirely in academic settings, or balancing research with practice. It's absolutely a viable path, though not an easy one.
As another data point, here is the list of alumni for the UNC School of Medicine's MD/PhD program: http://www.med.unc.edu/mdphd/fps/alumni-1 . That should give you a decent glimpse at where those particular graduates go - it looks like a fair number ended up in research or hybrid positions.
I'm a student enrolled in a MD/PhD program in Canada. I don't know about NIH very well, but our experience here is that it is very difficult to continue research. I agree with eykanal: it takes a lot to be a great clinician (and being a mediocre clinician is very hard on one's conscience). 50%+ of students rethink their decision during their first year of medicine and do not begin the PhD portion of the program. Only those who begin 80/20 in terms of devolution (80 research, 20 clinician) seem to be able to continue the research path, with considerable sacrifice of their clinical skills (fewer clinical elective during both medical school and residency), as well as many more years of education.
Once done, however, the career path in academic medicine is relatively good. The PhD really helps with those jobs and their attendant excitement and opportunities, although they often pay significantly lower than a pure clinican job.
I know that in the States, the culture of MD/PhD's is more pronounced than in Canada, since there's a massive amount of NIH funds. I heard that nearly a quarter of the class in U of Pennsylvania at least begin as MD/PhD's (don't quote me). Dropping out of the PhD is harder, because you have to give up your funding. I expect that many of them are able to complete the program, but few manage to continue in the research path.
Many of the professors who are MD and PhD's often complete their PhD separately from the MD - they either had it before the MD or got it afterwards. Materially, it's a more difficult path, with less funding and guarantees, but there's less room to regret and it's easier to cut one's losses, since it's 2 big decisions, not 1.
I don't know where you'll find hard data on this, but from experience working at a hospital/university center (University of Pittsburgh, a subset of which is the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center), very few MD/PhDs end up doing full-time, or even half-time, research. Being a clinician is very demanding on one's time, and doing meaningful research requires a significant time commitment. Many of the MD/PhDs I know ended up dropping their research work due to a combined lack of progress and time.
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76777 | Is it common for advisers to have not understand a funded project?
I'm a graduate student in computer science engineering in South Korea.
My adviser (a professor) told members in my lab to write a proposal to get a fund (from government or a company). Finally, we got funded and started an R&D. In the project proposal document, my adviser has been listed as a chief of research (a director). And (unoffically) one of the lab members has been named as a chief of hands-on workers.
We have two meetings. One is a project meeting and discussion only with lab members. And another is a report meeting with a chief of hands-on workers and my adviser. In the report meeting, he reports the result of the project meeting. If there is any unresolved issue, he got mad.
A problem that I think is, my adviser has no idea of any knowledge related with the project, literally. The project requires a cutting edge theories and techniques, but his knowledge stays when he became a professor.
He just hunts a fund and if he got a fund, he doesn't care afterwards.
Thus, his anger does not help to resolve an issue. He doesn't know why the issue exists and why it is difficult to resolve. Even if we explain about it, that does not help, next week, he forgets and gets mad again. In the report meeting, we can't expect any helpful comment from my adviser.
Even worse is, when it is the time to report a result of the funded project to the funder, my adviser has to present the result and answer to questions. But as I said before, he has no idea of the project. So, we teach him about the project for a couple of weeks before the presentation. But do you think it will be effective teaching months-long R&D in a couple of weeks? No, the presentation goes bad and the next funding will be unclear.
Is all of this is due to lab members who are not smart enough? Okay, if it is a personal research, my adviser may not have enough knowledge than me. But, this is a lab project and he is a chief. Then, at least, he should have a similar, comparable level of knowledge with lab members, in my opinion.
Does this commonly happen in other labs, universities and countries.
Does he have to be the one presenting the results? Can't it be one of you?
That depends on funders. There are three cases. (1) Strictly prohibited, (2) granted with evaluation penalty, (3) granted without penalty. But in most cases, (1) and (2).
Leadership, project management and smart work cab not be found in every body and in your case they were all missing in your professor
No, this is not common in general. See if you can find out the secret of his success in getting the funding (grant money). Then write a grant proposal, with a different professor, whom you respect.
(comment converted to answer)
No, this is not common in general. See if you can find out the secret of his success in getting the funding (grant money). Then write a grant proposal, with a different professor, whom you respect.
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18143 | Is there a problem with citing the original source instead of the source where the information was first found?
I'm writing a Bachelor's Thesis.
I found a seemingly convenient way of making my research paper successful, but I'm not sure if it counts as plagiarism.
This is mainly concerned with the methods section.
I have gathered many research papers that use the same methodology but discuss different topics (it is not about the literature review). I read the method section and take notes of how the author presented the information, the discussion raised, the sections included.
If it is relevant to my research paper, I follow the same ideas. I take the information cited by the researcher; I mean good information from experts. I do further research on good quotes that are in the research papers I read, use them in my research paper, and cite the original source of the quote, which I also read, but I do not cite the research paper where I was first introduced to the information.
Is this plagiarism?
I don't cite the research paper where I found the quote because it is irrelevant to my topic. It only uses the same methodology. Moreover, I do further research on the information and usually cite the original source or a source on research methodology.
Are you reading the papers that are the original sources of the quotes you are using? Or are you only reading those quotes where they appear as cited quotes?
Consider the following situation: I have found a relevant quote in a journal article. I search for the original source and read the quote in its context and learn more about the general idea. I do not cite the journal article but rather the original source of the quote.
Plagiarism is to make someone else's work as your own. Research is constantly building on other people's ideas, exactly as you describe. As long as it is clear what is yours and what is theirs, you are fine.
@Davidmh, Wouldn't the curation of references considered someone else's work which you take?
@Pacerier no, the same way you don't cite Google Scholar because you found the papers there (does a much larger curation of sources).
@Davidmh, So do you mean that you are against both the answers posted below?
Related: 1) http://www.bmartin.cc/pubs/08interfaces.html 2) https://www.uow.edu.au/~bmartin/pubs/94jie.html 3) https://ell.stackexchange.com/questions/71463/is-it-called-sale-copy-or-business-plagiarism-in-english-language#comment259271_71484
You are correctly citing the original source of the idea/quote (which you looked up and read in context, as you should).
You don't (usually) have to cite the paper that exposed you to that original source. The purpose of a citation is to
give credit to the originator of an idea/quote
tell readers where to look to verify your claims about that idea/quote
In this case, citing the original source satisfies both purposes and is sufficient.
An exception is a review paper, which doesn't add new research, but collects and comments on relevant sources on a subject. In this case, the curation of materials is the novel idea contributed by the review paper. If you then go on to use the collection of sources you found via that paper, it's often appropriate to cite the review paper also.
Similarly, if you use the interpretation of the original source found in the secondary source, you should also cite the secondary source.
Regarding "If you then go on to use the collection of sources you found via that paper, it's often appropriate to cite the review paper also.", so you are saying that we should cite wikipedia since it is a review paper which curates the materials needed?
Your first two paragraphs is utterly at odds with https://www.google.com/search?q=plagiarism+of+secondary+sources
Following @ff524 's suggestion, prompted by my answer to a question about whether Wiki should ever be cited ... :
It is my opinion, based first on a principle of honesty and open-ness, that one should acknowledge sources one has used. Thus, if you use Wiki or a survey paper or an expository paper to understand a primary source, and/or to locate a primary source, cite Wiki/survey/exposition and the primary source.
Note that I do not advocate citing Wiki/survey/exposition alone, and this is for more than one reason. First, one should mostly refer to primary sources... although in mathematics a primary source may be long ago, obscure, and inaccessible, so difficult to locate and not usable by many of your readers. Second, it is hard to gauge the authoritativeness (in reality, not in status) of Wiki/surveys/exposition, so corroboration is invariably necessary. In fact, the same need for corroboration applies to almost any source, refereed or not, despite various mythologies.
Nevertheless, "at this point in time", any bibliography that includes Wiki, URLs, or unrefereed material will often be stigmatized by referees and by many readers. This is not completely insane, as a hold-over from a time when a bibliography that included anything other than well-known, refereed journals was truly the sign of a crank. To my mind, the reality is much changed, and will continue to change, but, for those who find themselves in a situation demanding conformity to that old standard... well, maybe you have to do it.
This enforced dishonesty about "how one found things out" is very disturbing to me, as, in fact, Wiki and surveys and exposition are often very useful to give pointers to primary sources, to bring up keywords and people and old sources that more standard sources omit. I acknowledge Wiki and the other sources in bibliographies.
The "solution" to the problem of being both honest and conforming to an old standard would seem to dictate never looking at Wiki, or any unrefereed source. Crazy. But one might find oneself effectively pretending to do so?
You should note that it was "cited by" if you didn't go back and read the original source. You have no idea if the person citing the source did so correctly or took it out of context. "Cited by" tells the reader that you have not read the original source, and that is important information in nearly all cases.
Plagiarism is lack of attribution. You always need to cite your sources, period. If you are only paraphrasing or summarizing what someone else said, you only need to cite the relevant book/article/thesis/whatever. If you are citing someone verbatim, you also need to indicate the page numbers. If you do not do this, you are going to get in trouble.
That said, you are not obliged to cite everybody who has said something relevant, especially when working on popular topics where everybody and their mother have said something. You can always write something like "see Smith 2000 and Thompson 2001, among others", or if you prefer the original source, "see Smith 2000 et seq".
I don't think this answers the OPs question
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9651 | Professor withholding course grade until submission of conference paper
I have recently been told by the professor of a particular course of mine, that our final grades will be withheld (given as an "Incomplete" which is later replaced by the final grade) until we individually submit our semester papers in the course to a conference.
This has a few issues to go with it:
I defended my MSc and passed, however without this credit I will not receive my degree this semester.
I do not want a low-quality publication on my record, especially since it appears past students in the course published in pay-to-publish conferences.
I am far, far from an expert in this field. I took the course to learn about the subject and have only been spending the last few weeks on this research paper. To give more context, I don't even have a publication in my PhD work yet and I am 2 years in.
The situation prompts two questions from me:
Is it ethical for the professor to require a student to submit a paper to a conference for a course? (This requirement is not mentioned in the syllabus.)
Is it allowed for a professor to require this? Are there any rules or regulations in the US (state school) to prevent it?
@CharlesMorisset That deadline is months away! Graduation is only 2 weeks away.
@AustinHenley I'm pretty sure you can submit before the deadline (obviously, noöne ever does it, but you can)
Or we can arrange a conference for you. Let's hereby create the Stack Exchange All-Academia Transdisciplinary Multinodal Conference for the Advancement of Humandkind. It suits your needs perfectly: multimodal means you can run a conference node in your living room if you want; transdisciplinary means we don't care what you study; and obviously, we advance humankind by providing you with a degree. Who's in?
@F'x, can we get a journal special issue for it?
Can you submit to a journal instead of a conference? In that case, I suggest this one: http://www.universalrejection.org/
This would not be allowed under our regulations for at least one reason. You need to contact the student ombudsperson at your university to find out what the official rules are and ensure that your professor know this.
@Aaron: Now they have a conference too! http://www.universalrejection.org/conference/
@AustinHenley you might be interested in this article, written by an individual whose students were facing a similar ridiculous publication requirement http://smritiweb.com/navin/education-2/how-i-published-a-fake-paper-and-why-it-is-the-fault-of-our-education-system
In case you are in computer science, you are lucky: this can help you to prepare your paper for the Journal of Universal Rejection: http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/ ;-)
I am a professor at a state school in the US, and American professors are currently the targets of a lot of undeserved grief (e.g. it is currently fashionable to believe that we are "lazy" and work much less than a full "business week"; that is not only a mistake but likely a dishonest, politically motivated mistake). So keep that preamble in mind when I say:
This is one of the most unambiguously unacceptable behaviors from a course instructor that I have heard.
Let me try to count the ways (but there are so many that I may get tired before I finish):
1) One of the most basic understandings between the student, the instructor and the university is the duration of the course. By a certain extremely public, agreed upon, well-publicized deadline, all of the coursework must be complete, and by a slightly later date that your instructor has been carefully informed of, the course grades are due. Planning to defer submission of the course grade after this date is just not the way the American academic system works.
2) Giving a grade of "incomplete" is not withholding a grade: it is assigning a certain kind of unsatisfactory grade. [Once in college a rather elderly professor literally did not submit any of the grades for the course I was taking. It was a little strange -- in these days we actually received transcripts in the mail over the break so the inquiry was less immediate than it would now be -- but he apologized and submitted the grades very soon after the start of the next quarter. That's withholding a grade.] In order to assign an incomplete, the student must not have completed the official coursework.
3) The instructor is not suitably respectful of the obvious problem which can occur if you assign students' grades too late: you may prevent them from graduating. Many American universities have policies to expedite final coursework and grading for (would-be) graduating students. Moreover, in the universities I've been involved with, beyond the written rules there is an unwritten culture that as an instructor you should think twice about any course practice that interferes with a student's timely graduation. (Sometimes it turns out the student fails your course and therefore does not graduate on time. That's "okay", but most of instructors would indeed think more carefully about assigning a failing grade under these circumstances and feel honorbound to convey the failing grade to the student sooner rather than later. What if their parents show up in town only to learn that the student did not actually graduate?) This practice is not hard to understand: one of very few commonalities among American academics is that we were all students at one time, so we should have some sympathies for the student perspective.
4) This course requirement is unusual and potentially problematic, and it is not listed on the course syllabus. I think that the whole point of the course syllabus is so that instructors cannot totally change their course requirements / grading schemes in the middle of the course, and that seems to be what is happening here.
5) Teaching a university course is not like playing a game of Truth-or-Dare: it does not give you authority to compel the student outside of the classroom and the dorm room / study carrel. Submitting a paper to a conference is a real-world action with real-world ramifications (the OP is rightly aware and concerned about this). It is creating work -- possibly rather pointless and frivolous work -- for other busy academics and/or professionals. It is setting a student up for harsh critique even up to the point of ridicule. It is also bullying a student into publishing something they didn't actually want to publish.
Okay, I got tired. What should a student do in this situation?
Talk to the faculty member in question.
This is an in-person conversation. You should think carefully both about want you want to say and how to behave in such a conversation. Your goal is to convey the specific problems and hardships this course policy will impose on you. (You don't want to frame it as an ethical or hypothetical discussion.) Be calm but very specific. Bring in a copy of the course syllabus and refer to it at some point during the discussion. Bring in a copy of an academic document that says you need to have your grades by a certain date in order to graduate. Say specifically: "I'm concerned that this course policy will jeopardize my graduation. Can we address this?" If your instructor says "Don't worry about it right now" then explain why you are worried about it right now. Talk about your family's travel plans, talk about the financial implications of having to enroll for another semester....
(The point of the above strategy is this: I imagine that your instructor likes this course idea from his perspective. Clearly he has not taken the time to think about it from your perspective. If you make him see the negative consequences, he is much more likely to repent.)
You should not be brushed off in your meeting: this is a serious matter. If in the course of the meeting you don't see things working out to your satisfaction, you should let him know that you intend to talk to (e.g.) the department chair about it.
By the way, apparently this took place almost a year ago. What happened??
I agree with what Pete says. At my school (US, small, private, undergrad), the syllabus is viewed as a contract. The student, and the faculty memeber, are bound by what appears in it. So, if there's something I want to do in the course, it had better be in the syllabus or I am out of luck. Grades are due the Monday after final exams end. There is a significant process involved to submit an incomplete, and an even more significant process to change a grade. The same thing goes in our graduate programs. It continues to amaze me the things professors think they can get away with.
I never updated you with what happened 7 years ago! I spoke with the department's graduate coordinator who told me to take the path of least resistance: submit the paper and withdraw as soon as final grades are submitted. I did and got an A. (Also an update, I'm now in my third year of being faculty myself!)
This is highly suspect behavior—particularly when it is not published in the original course syllabus, or written down anywhere.
In general, however, this requirement seems highly impractical—most conferences operate on a schedule far longer than a typical semester. Therefore, it would seem that almost every student's grade would be held up waiting for the work to be accepted.
While I can understand (perhaps) the logic behind such a move, I don't agree with this. A scientific conference presentation is a serious undertaking, and should be an option, not a requirement!
However, whether it is allowed will depend upon your university's regulations. You should check first within the department, and escalate only if necessary.
(However, under such circumstances, if there are no proceedings published, and no formal record, I would be entirely comfortable leaving such a presentation off of my CV.)
It's a little odd to require something that is not mentioned in the syllabus. I understand that things can change in the course of a semester. But this is a rather draconian requirement and as such should have been specified up front in the syllabus.
If (as appears to be the case) the professor is willing to "soften" the requirement, then this entire question might be viewed as an overreaction.
Your two reasons strike me as very intelligent and responsible:
1. I do not want a low-quality publication on my record, especially since it appears past students in the course published in pay-to-publish conferences.
2. I am far, far from an expert in this field. I took the course to learn about the subject and have only been spending the last few weeks on this research paper. To give more context, I don't even have a publication in my PhD work yet and I am 2 years in.
I recommend drawing them to your course instructor's attention, and requesting him to guide you in finding a low or zero-cost relevant conference to which you could submit an abstract without spending too much time when you are busy working on your PhD.
At my university, submitting an article based on the student's research is a graduation requirement. The idea is (a) to get graduands familiar with the different demands of presenting research to a conference (probably something that would benefit you since you have moved on to doctoral studies), and (b) to get more of the Masters level research out into the research literature which in many cases tends to never get beyond the university library (something in the interest of the "knowledge economy" and also beneficial to the public image of relatively young universities struggling to gain acceptance in their own nations and in the wider international arena.
The concern you raise about some of your contemporaries taking the short-cut of submitting their work to "pay-to-publish conferences" is particularly hazardous with regard to the objective (b), and your professor may find it instructive to reflect on the wisdom of your reluctance.
Your question is missing the following info. Obviously, you have approached the professor and talked to him about the specific issue you are facing: your paper is ready, you could submit it to a conference, but what you really want is to be able to get your degree this semester. There is no reasonable expectation that, if all the work is done, you should just postpone your degree waiting for an upcoming conference.
So, the missing information is: what did he answer about your specific issue?
I was looking for a more general answer to the question of ethics and that requirement being allowed. What he basically said about it: don't worry about it right now. :) But I am freaking out!
Why are you freaking out then? The requirement is to submit not get published per se. I know of professors who have this requirement in certain courses as well. Its meant to be a good thing, not a some punitive measure.
@Shion It isn't that I think the professor is bad or doing anything wrong, I am just new to this idea and trying to get others feedback based on my intuition that it is unethical.
Agreed. Ethics has multiple cultural norms and definitions. IMHO, I don't think that this particular requirement is unethical. I am sure others will beg to differ and they have that right.
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9540 | What do I need to ensure my presentation will go smoothly?
From a technical stand point, what do I need to show up to a conference with (in general) to ensure that my presentation will go smoothly?
Two things I can think of:
Presentation remote
Equipment to connect my laptop to the projector
The remote is simple enough, it just needs to work with my computer and be reliable. Connecting my computer to the projector is not trivial since a lot of laptops don't come with DVI or VGA output any more (mine doesn't!). What kind of output do I usually need, DVI or VGA? Do I need something like this which supports all output methods (seems like over kill but might be a good investment)?
Is there anything else to make sure I am prepared to deal with the technical aspects of a presentation?
If you have the time, try connecting your computer to the projector at least once before you do the presentation. Even if you have all right adapters, there's always something that doesn't work and could have been fixed by simply invesing a few minutes beforehand.
This book will prepare you..http://www.amazon.com/Life-Is-Series-Presentations-Influence/dp/074326925X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1366663663&sr=8-1&keywords=Life+is+a+series+of+presentations
I give most of my talks using only chalk on a board, then the most important point is probably to pick the right, readable colors chalks before the talk.
@BenoîtKloeckner I have never heard of a conference providing chalk boards.
@AustinHenley: you probably never heard of a pure math conference (except ICM), I guess. My comment was half a joke (I now it is not very relevant to the current question) and half serious (to remind people that different field may be wildly, weirdly different one from another).
From less esoteric to more (I've seen all these things happen):
Make sure you know how to "send the image to a projector". Not all laptops do this automatically, and I'm surprised at how many people don't know how to do it. I've also seen people be confused by the mirroring feature on Macs.
Verify that there's a power outlet or some place to plug in your laptop. Driving a projector eats power, and you don't want to drain your battery during the presentation
Turn off screen savers. at the very least it's annoying, and sometimes the screen saver does wonky things to the projector display.
Turn off your notifications (mail, facebook, twitter, skype...). It's amusing for an audience (but not for you) if during a job talk they all get to see a subject header of the form "Interview at University X" where X is not where you're at :)
Make sure you have the right display converters. Usually something that converts your laptop to a VGA is standard. Macs are particularly difficult in this regard.
Watch out for resolution issues. Most laptops are smart enough to drop resolution to deal with a projector, but sometimes they're not.
Keep a backup copy of the slides in a portable format (PDF or PPT) on a usb stick. In the worst-case you can always borrow a laptop (from the previous speaker even) and load up the slides. Dropbox/a web page is ok but not great because it requires an internet connection.
And above all, as David M. R. says, check the setup beforehand if you can. Even that doesn't guarantee a smooth presentation, but it eliminates a lot of the potential problems listed above.
Or you get Skyped by a friend during a presentation (I've seen this happen).
Re point 4: several modern OS's have a "guest mode" or "guest account", where none of your programs will be configured to poll for notifications. This looks like a good occasion to use them.
Re: #7 - I would also make sure to have at least one hard copy of the slides, and I'd keep a copy on Dropbox (despite the warning). If the projector breaks and your laptop dies, etc., you can always present from the hard copy slides.
@ChrisGregg Really? I can't remember the last time I saw an overhead slide projector at a conference. Do they really still exist?
@JeffE -- True! I guess I wasn't clear; you could give the presentation from the slides as in you could talk from the slides. I don't know how effective it would be, but at least you wouldn't stand there and say, "um, well, let's see...we worked on this..." Although I could easily give my elevator speech extemporaneously, I'd be hard-pressed to give a 20-minute talk without some notes, especially on a detailed topic. Either way, this would not be my first choice for giving a presentation...
Also, with the rise of widescreen laptops AND widescreen projectors, it can be impressive to have multiple versions of your slides ready for different aspect ratios. For beamer, use the aspectratio option set to 34, 169, or 1610 (this last one is the aspect ratio of a Mac Widescreen monitor, for instance).
I haven't seen too many widescreen projectors though.
Also: use high contrast colors on all slides - otherwise the slides may be hard to see on the projector.
@TomA: But not too high-contrast, or the visual clutter will overwhelm the content of the slides. Test your slides on multiple projectors beforehand.
Re #7: is ppt a portable format? I regularly see borked presentations because they are being shown on a laptop with a different version of Powerpoint. Not to mention machines running OpenOffice and/or Linux. My advice would rather be convert your ppt to pdf for presentation, always. In most cases you lose nothing, in some you lose only the slide transitions (which is a positive thing in my eyes), and only in some minor cases you lose actual functionality.
In addition to Suresh comprehensive answer, and understanding you are referring primarily to the technology, would add the following which concerns the presentation:
Do not include media (video, sound etc) in your presentations unless absolutely necessary. If you do, make sure in advance (before the conference or some time before your talk that everything will work. This is particularly true if you need to switch platform from whatever you use to whatever the conference might run (unless they let you use your own computer (which is rare).
Make copies of your presentation in alternative formats. for example. if you make a presentation in PowerPoint, save it also as PDF (and make sure the PDF looks ok). Moving PowerPoint files between Win and Mac can be far from trivial. Not even PDFs are fool proof, particularly if media players need to be involved.
To add a technical item:
Be aware that older projectors may not resolve the color space you have in your presentation. This may render certain colours invisible and make other look identical. Therefore be careful and avoid choosing too many similar colours in plots etc.
Good point about the colors. that's often a problem.
+1 for "Make copies of your presentation in alternative formats." I would also suggest having those copies in multiple places. Have your .ppt and .pdf on your presentation laptop, AND on external storage, AND in dropbox.
The other answers are all great. Also keep in mind:
If you don't know what kind of room you'll be presenting in, keep all the vital info in the slides on the top half or top third of the slide. You never know when you'll get a room where the screen is at the same level as the audience seating. When that happens, no one behind the first row will be able to see the whole slide.
When microphones are provided, do a sound check before your presentation starts. Use the microphone.
Be prepared to present on a machine other than the one you bring. Have your presentation materials on an external drive AND in the cloud.
If you created your presentation on a mac and you'll be presenting on a pc, or vice versa, try to do a practice round on that operating system. Even if both OS's are running PowerPoint, certain features or slide transitions might not be supported.
In addition to Suresh's and Peter's advice, there is one other unlikely scenario to consider. Be prepared to give your presentation without the assistance of technology. Depending on the venue, if the projector fails, it may take longer to get a new one in place than you have to speak. If the talk is for an interview, being able to seamlessly switch to the low-tech version is a big plus for you. If you are at a conference, then the attendees at your session will still get to hear about your work. If the presentation is your thesis defense, then you absolutely must be able to continue in the analog fashion.
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34636 | How to focus on a single area during PhD?
My PhD supervisor says that I am overly curious and spend too much time studying lots of different area. However, he does say I am generally doing well and on the right track.
I am usually keen to meet new researchers, and I also spend time helping other PhD students to understand papers, even if they are not directly related to my field. I tend to keep studying a topic until I feel I fully understand it.
This has led my supervisor to believe that I am not working up to my true potential and just moving among areas too much. I have asked him directly and he says I just need to focus on one thing at a time, which I have started doing. I am just curious as to whether it is normal for PhD students to change and be immersed in different topics frequently, or am I just thinking too much? What strategies can help with staying more focused?
As a side note, I think everyone suffers from this to an extent since working on a new problem is fresh and exciting. You are not alone!
@AustinHenley This is an important point. In general, scientists tend to be curious. One of the disadvantages of this is that new, (for you) unexplored topics often hold more allure than learning all the ins and outs of a single topic. Yet this is what you need to do to get a PhD.
The main point of a PhD is to learn how to be a scientist. Involved in this is to focus on the work that needs to be done but also to pick up the necessary skill to solve the problem. As an advisor, I would get nervous if a student kept moving into new areas without a plan as to what these would be useful for. So from that perspective, if a student made good progress on the research, diversions would not be a concern; without progress, it would be a problem. Where you stand in this is not for anyone to say except based on a discussion between you and your advisor.
During my own PhD, I spent a fair amount learning tools that were only of marginal use in my own work. I am now very happy I did because as now a long-time faculty member, I have come to realize that the time I had as a PhD student to immerse in topics, is hard if not impossible to recreate after the PhD. I therefore advise PhD students to use their time wisely since the tools they learn during their PhD make up the core of their future toolbox. Contacts with other researchers and research directions is a similar issue in my mind. BUT, I always had in my mind that I needed to show progress and stay with my own research tasks as a priority. Balancing between the core work and forays into other areas is a necessity.
From your question, it does not sound as if you have a good balance and I therefore think you need to discuss the thesis work more with your advisor to make sure it is clear and structured to you. Only then will you be able to see your won progress and judge when you are on track.
In terms of ways of keeping focused, I think it's important to keep in mind that it is your job (as in, full time employment) to produce a cohesive block of research. Learning other things is also part of the job, but a smaller part. It might be helpful to allocate specific bits of your time to different tasks you need to do - eg spend some mornings reading new stuff related to your thesis, afternoons on doing the actual research, Friday afternoon reading whatever you're interested in (I'm not saying this is the right balance, just an example).
There's nothing wrong with being curious - that's crucial for being a successful research scientist. Your supervisor telling you that you are overly curious is with respect to completing your PhD studies in a timely fashion.
You have started to discipline yourself and to concentrate on one topic at a time. There is a potential problem of finding interest in a number of topics on first look, and superficially getting involved, then getting attracted to something else before completing something substantial in your previous topic. As Peter notes, the PhD is the formal process of finally demonstrating your capacity to be a scientist. Part of that is dedicating yourself to a topic, addressing it with all the skills expected of a professional scientist, presenting your results and drawing a suitable conclusion. You need to do these things. I think your supervisor is concerned -- rightly -- that you are unlikely to do this if you continue to allow yourself to be distracted.
Strategies - Discuss with your supervisor a topic that you agree is mutually interesting and shows promise for research. Have that topic more in the forefront of your mind as you go about your work. Write it down and stick it to your computer monitor. Ask yourself if what you are doing is more or less likely to further your progress towards achieving what you need to do to be awarded a PhD.
During the first or second years it's fine to do that, venturing around for areas.. this is important as this is the literature review phase. But towards the final you must focus on your experiment and write up. And focus towards that. This includes deactivating your Facebook or delaying checking email until you write something in your thesis.
deactivating your Facebook seriously?
why not? it's kind of a distraction too
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5300 | Methods for finding graduate programs for specific areas of research
What types of methods are available to students today who want to find a University for a Master, PhD, or postdoc program that supports the student's obscure/specific area of research?
For example, I am looking for PhD programs that specialize in software engineering metrics analysis and process improvement. I have looked at the websites of about 15-20 universities that offer PhD's in Computer Science. Sometimes, I'll find "software engineering" listed vaguely as a research area, but as I research the publications and activities of the faculty, there will be just a single faculty member who does work in an obscure aspect of software engineering, like applying CASE tools to data modeling, validation of aeronautic systems, etc.
in an obscure aspect of software engineering — Careful! Almost by definition, most researchers work in obscure aspects of their fields. (That's your goal, too!) If a topic isn't obscure, it's probably too well understood to be a good research topic.
http://academia.stackexchange.com/a/455/213
Look at affiliations in papers.
When I was looking for a PhD position, I systematically did an extensive literature survey. I didn't really read the articles, looked mostly at the abstracts, but I particularly looked at affiliations. At the time, I simply wrote down all academic institutes I found that were in Europe. In a more extended version, one could somehow assign a score based on the number of papers coming from a certain institution and the impact of each paper.
The big advantage of this is that one will find mostly groups doing active research in the field. Whether we want it or not, published peer-reviewed papers are (at least in my field, atmospheric sciences) the method for determining impact. I won't find groups that fail to publish using this method, but I probably don't want to do my PhD there anyway, so nothing is lost from my perspective.
For my PhD I ended up staying exactly where I already was, but now I'm about to do the same for finding institutes with a post-doc. It's one degree more complicated now because of the two-body problem, but even there: my significant other and I both make such a list, then we'll plot them on a map and look at pairs that are close to each other. But it all starts with:
Look at affiliations in papers.
I've tried it but with little success. As: not being deep into field yet means not knowing many related areas (and publications), affiliation changes with time, not every institute has open positions, and when I don't know any common contact, (sadly) the answer is usually lukewarm. So - to learn institutes: yes (hence +1), to be considered there - it might be not a sufficient condition.
Papers have affiliations? Wouldn't it be better to google the authors directly?
Papers have authors and authors have affiliations. Surprisingly, not all academics are easy to google. I've had occasions where I wanted to find out the current institute of the author of a 10-year old paper, and finally found it only by looking at a new paper he co-authored; google didn't tell me the answer (and I'm not bad at googling).
Surprisingly, not all academics are easy to google — At least in computer science (the field in question here), if you can't find someone on google, you really don't want them as your advisor.
@JeffE Hard to google ≠ no web presence, as they might just have a common name or be the victim of a search-engine-unfriendly university website (incompetent webmaster teams exist). But the OP asks for a list of institutes, then why go paper → author → google → institute if the institute is already listed with the paper?
To quote Piotr: "affiliation changes with time". And if a CS professor relies on a search-engine-unfriendly university website, you really don't want them as your advisor (or their university as your affiliation).
It does, but quite likely (1) the institute will still exist even if the author has moved on and may still be of interest, and (2) if the author is still in academia, the systematic literature survey will find his newer papers and therefore the newer affiliation.
As for your second point — in my field, many famous scientists (P.I. of big projects, prize-winning nature publications, etc.) maintain no web presence at all. If I try to Google one I happen to know, I get Wikipedia and many items in online news sources, but the institute website lists solely a phone-number and e-mail address. Most scientists I know don't take the time to maintain a personal webpage and don't pay someone else to do it either. I think they should (and I do for myself), but I'm in a small minority. I guess it depends on the field.
A surprisingly effective method (I've tried it) is mailing the people working in your field of interest, something like: "I'll be applying to grad school, I'm interested in areas X, Y and Z. What places for PhD studies can you recommend?" At worst, your email will get ignored [1]. Often, however, you can get quite detailed answers even if you don't know the person you're writing to. Esp. if you are specific in what area you'd like to work in - some people are eager to help prospective grad students.
[1] To avoid being tagged as "spam", send the mails one-by-one even if you're mailing a larger group of people at once ;)
I do this method, but not in email. I ask on the relevant subreddit, and you will be surprised by the suggestions.
In the CS field, Microsoft academic search, google scholar and DBLP are good resources to give a general overview of different pioneers in the field.
Also, look for the research interest of the faculty members and the research groups in the department.
One last thing is: follow with the top conferences in your area (i.e. ICSE) and see who's doing something interesting to you. Then search for them; see how their past students are doing.
Is it better if we look for plenary talk or keynote speakers?
I have just been going through what you are describing. There is no specific way to go about it. I will be painful and daunting when you don't start from any specific point. I can tell you what I did:
Location: if you have certain preferences that might help you make some preliminary decisions. For example initially I decided on certain countries/cities and looked at all major universities there. Then I extended the range to locations that were not a preference. I did find some nice programs , for example in Alaska, but I could not force myself to apply there, I just can't imagine living 5 years in Anchorage.
Publications and google scholar: I am in ecology so what I did was going into google scholar and type certain species with which I would like to work and a few other keywords "conservation", "GIS", "spatial modeling", etc. I read the abstract and the authors affiliations. I also limited the search to the last 5 years because people change affiliation and also I want to look at latest research. Then I only investigated the ones that were in places/universities where I want to go or interested in.
Specialist groups: not sure how this translates into computer science (even if I am a computer scientist myself), but there are special groups that work with certain species, that was another great source of people.
Job posting websites: this came in later but I did manage to find a few positions that were related to what I wanted to do. For example the ecological society of America as a bulletin with PhD position advertised by university directly, nature.com, findaPhd.com.
Ask people in the field about good research labs, they should know a few.
I know these are mostly related to ecology but should give you some ideas. I also wasted time going through school's websites one by one and unfortunately there was no way around that. It was time consuming and not the most productive way but I didn't want to have any regrets or places I missed. Also, I know have a personal database of labs I like for my future career and I will have to do minimal research for my post-doc, etc.
The relevant professional societies may maintain databases of graduate research.
For graduate programs in chemistry in North America, the American Chemical Society maintains a database of graduate research.
The database is searchable by faculty name and institution. However, there are fields for specific topics in the faculty search. If you leave the name fields blank, you can search by topic. For example, a search of "repeating sequence copolymer" gives one hit - my PhD adviser.
If you are looking for a very specific project in chemistry in North America, you can find it. It's not perfect. A search for olefin metathesis doesn't find Robert Grubbs, who received a Nobel Prize for his work in it.
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8578 | How to physically handle hundreds and hundreds of papers
I have a bit of a meta-question about academics.
I am a graduate student and teaching assistant. I often find myself flipping, organizing, and searching through stacks of hundreds and hundreds of sheets of paper, whether I'm grading, reading, or doing research.
I seem to have an issue where my hands get dry quickly, and I find myself licking the tips of my fingers to get better friction. Sometimes I have to do this quite often, and I am wondering if there is a better way. I tried using hand moisturizer, but that wears off.
Are there special gloves, lotions, or anything that can help with flipping through huge stacks of paper?
unless you have acquired a particular liking for the taste of paper (or your finger), I suggest you use a digital library manager (preferably one that allows you to categorize and keep track of your lecture notes as well)
@posdef this would not be useful for when you are grading papers, since they are seldom submitted electronically.
@ArtemKaznatcheev true, I had not thought of that... However, one could scan those papers to a single PDF (easily doable on most office-grade multi-function printers), then annotate/review/grade the papers, and print out the PDF. If there are really so many papers so that handling them is a significant problem, digitalizing them is a viable option
We are looking into converting our assignments into more electronic-friendly versions, but we aren't there yet, and there are many, many papers to grade in the meantime.
@posdef: Just getting that many papers into a scanner will require a lot of handling. All the bulk scanners I've used have a nontrivial jam rate. And in the case of things like exam papers that will only be handled one, I doubt that digitizing will be worth the time.
@posdef: You're suggesting exactly the opposite of the grading workflow I find most effective: Print out the electronically submitted files, mark them up by hand, and then scan them back in (which is easier because they're all on the same paper stock).
You ask for a tool that would make flipping through papers easier, but you could greatly reduce the need for this tool by eliminating shuffled stacks. Use folders and filing cabinets or boxes (sometimes called "banker's boxes") and group related papers together, and you won't have to flip through as much. Also, papers in vertical folders tend to spread out so that they are easier to flip through and retrieve.
Some 20 years ago before all the electronics changed our ways of dealing with stuff, post and bank employees who had to deal with piles of paper (or banknotes) throughout day used a device which was essentially a piece of a wet sponge in a small bowl. They had this on the desk and whenever were about to touch paper, they would simply brush their fingers through it. Something like that could help you... To construct it, I would use a plastic travel-soap container and a small sponge for dishwashing.
Later edit: Indeed, this is what I had in mind.
An alternative to walkmanyi's wetting solution would be to employ rubber finger tips.
On the plus side:
They protect from drying out of the natural oil from your finger tips, and protect against paper cuts.
On the negative side:
Well you are wearing little caps on the tips of your fingers and you lose some tactile feedback. I imagine it would take some getting used to.
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89105 | How to get a TA for a thesis
I’m writing an academic paper for a B.Sc.
We only have the professor and a PhD student from another university plus random friends and volunteer collaborators helping us. We were not specifically assigned a TA for our project. I think that it would be much better if we had a PhD student as a TA who could help us instead of only meetings with the professor.
My professor has eight groups in the course and a TA maybe wouldn’t have that many groups. Can I just write to a PhD student in the faculty and ask for help? I was already rejected once when I asked another professor.
"We were not specifically assigned a TA for our project." - is that the usual thing that happens in your department/at your university/in your university system, that students writing their B.Sc. thesis get assigned a TA?
@O.R.Mapper Not that I know, but I think it would be logical part of Ph D work and also time-efficient so that we can speak with a TA instead of the professor.
Well, tutoring BSc theses is a part of PhD candidate work in some places, but in that case, it's usually the PhD candidates who devise the BSc thesis topic themselves rather than the professor. Thus, I am not sure describing such an apparently rather different situation would be helpful as an answer to this question.
With that said, didn't an earlier version of this question refer to the BSc thesis? Is this about a paper within the BSc now, or about the BSc thesis?
@DjDac Time efficient for you and maybe the professor, not for the TA. (Speaking as a PhD student who spends way more time taking care of bachelor students than the "TA time" which is actually assigned to supervision of a bachelor student for our groups budget.)
While I was trying to find out your localisation by checking your profile I realised that it actually includes a link to your bachelor thesis. Which confuses me even more. Have you already finished your thesis? Is this a draft (which I would advise not to publish in this way)?
@skymningen Yes it is a draft with deadline this week. What is it that you don't agree with?
I am in no position to agree or disagree, I just would advise (me, as a person, not based on law) not to publish a bachelor thesis draft online. Hearing that, with the deadline being this week... it might be too late for you to search for an additional reader, as it is way too little time to read and comment this for the first time for someone who has probably a lot of other work to do. Which might be the actual reason why they turn you down.
@skymningen We wanted comments and got very good suggestions. I have restricted the access to only invited collaborators now who already started commenting and making suggestions. We had help from three Ph D students and the professor but I would have liked to have a meeting or two with the Ph D student instead of the professor because the Ph D students are very knowledgable.
Where I work there is actually some part of what you want implemented.
Professors have assigned teaching duties for their group, which usually include supervision of bachelor and master students.
This means we have to supervise X students per term to meet the requirements for our group (I have no exact idea what happens if we don't, but I think it will end in a reduction of our budget.)
Compared to what we "earn" for teaching a lecture of one hour per week, the assigned points we get for supervision of one bachelor student though are ridiculously low, basically accounting for less than 20 minutes spend per week. Also, if we have more students (which we usually do), we do not get additional budget assigned.
How much time you spend with a bachelor student depends a lot on the stage they are in with their thesis, but also on the needs of the student and the type of project they do. It has always been more than 20 minutes for me. I am not sure, how you would account for this with a TA. Also, they would not necessarily have the in-depth knowledge of a topic that is needed for good supervision.
Quite often, universities offer short courses or even "counseling" hours for the general writing and organizing you work part of a thesis. You might have to look out for that if that is what you need. Sometimes there are even senior students setting up "bring your work and we will all talk about the problems you have" hours for bachelors (or people having trouble with academic writing in general, also before starting their thesis work).
Because re-reading your post, I think you are actually doing your first writing (course report, academic homework, something we would call "seminar work") and not your thesis.
Certainly there would be many benefits to having a TA assigned to assist with your project, and in a perfect world that would be great. The main problem is most likely: money.
TAs need to be paid, and typically a university allocates assistantships based on the number of courses that need to be taught. TAs for independent studies are almost certainly not in the budget.
You might argue that the cost would be offset by savings in the professor's time. Ah, but professors are salaried, and very often they are asked to supervise independent studies on top of their regular teaching and research duties, for no additional pay. So that savings in time may not translate into any savings in money.
You can certainly ask a graduate student if they would like to help you, just out of the goodness of their heart, but unless your project is exceptionally interesting, I think they'd likely say no. Grad students have lots of responsibilities that are directly tied to getting paid and staying on track toward finishing their degrees, and your project isn't one of them.
If there is a grad student with particularly relevant expertise, you could ask to have just a single meeting with them. Requests like that are more likely to be accepted, when a limited amount of time is involved. Or, you could offer to pay them by the hour (out of your own pocket), as for private tutoring.
In any of these cases, before requesting any kind of help from a grad student, make sure the professor advising you knows and approves. They may give you guidelines on how to make sure your work remains your own, and that your consultation isn't considered to be cheating.
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105416 | Why one must score 75 % just to pass the course
I take a computer hardware course at KTH Institute in Stockholm in Sweden. The exam is day after tomorrow. The score required to pass is 75 %. I'm used to passing at 50 % and I wonder why the score is set so high to just pass the exam? Is it arbitrary or some method?
Update
You can find the exam if you google for "KTH IS1200".
Perhaps they want you to learn the material covered in the course.
Your instructor is the best person who can tell you what her or his methods are. We can only guess what her or his motives are. It may be that it is a multiple choice exam and the instructor wants to correct for the chance that someone who answers randomly finds the right answer.
Surely you knew the grading criteria when you signed up for the course? Why is it suddenly a problem? Has it been changed just prior to the exam? If not, then you have to grit your teeth and get on with it...
Because the teacher has decided that 70% is too easy and 80% is to hard. If they set the threshold to 50%they would ask more hard questions. I am not sure what more explanation you could hope for.
@JonCuster BTW I scored 85 %. First attempt.
Congratulations!
The passing percentage for a course is fundamentally arbitrary, and different countries and institutions have different traditions.
It should be clear that it's meaningless to talk about the passing percentage in isolation, since it's a percentage of something. An exam with a passing threshold of 75% isn't necessarily harder than one with a threshold of 50% - the difficulty also depends on the questions, the amount of time given, and so on.
+1 for "it's meaningless to talk about the passing percentage in isolation", which one would think is too obvious to have to say, but maybe not. (I say "maybe not" because I was expecting to see something in the original question about why this specific 75% is so different from the other 50%'s, and didn't.)
@DaveLRenfro: I would think so as well, but that hasn't been my experience. I once witnessed an online discussion where (high-school aged) students from different countries realized that their countries had different thresholds for A's. The were a lot of comments along the lines of "I would have gotten an A if only I'd lived in such-and-such country" or "wow, it must be so hard to get an A in your country if you need to get 90%", but no one pointed out that the exams might vary as well as the thresholds.
This reminds me of the high school to college transition where (in North Carolina, during the 1970s) in high school you had to score at least 93% to get an A, but in college you only needed to score at least 90%. I seem to recall some people saying this was because college tests are harder . . . (Yes, but lowering from 93% to 90% didn't come anywhere near to closing the gap.)
At the end, I scored 85 %. My friends didn't make it.
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63204 | Ethics on shortening project in grant application to raise chances of success
I am currently writing a PhD grant application, and I completed the first draft. The project is ambitious, but I and my advisors think feasible, but my advisors told me that it is quite dense and could be daunting for the grant reviewers, who may label it as unrealistic (which is a criterion of admission) and thus they may reject it.
I have no problem in working on simplifying my research project's description to make it more concise and readable, but my advisors suggested to strip half of the project, in order to raise the chances for it to be accepted. But they told me that of course, I can do the rest of the project too with the grant I will get, I just shouldn't mention that in the application.
Is it ethical and honest to "sell" a research project based on only half of its description and goals? Not only that, but also the logical reasoning and the bigger goal get totally lost, so are these worth losing against displaying a more realistic target? To me, it seems like reasoning that the end justifies the means...
I should mention that almost all the ideas for the research project are mine (the advisors helped me with naming the methods I will use, but the concepts, bibliography and goals are my own), and I was really motivated by the original whole project.
Why would you think this is unethical? Who/what might be wronged by this? You said it seems like "the end justifies the means" but what do you think is wrong about these "means"?
@ff524 Because I'm going to strip half of the original project, the one which I will be working on. It's true that I will anyway work on the first part, but I wonder if changing the project's goals just to raise the chances of success isn't a bit a lie by omission... In other words, I will work on other stuff than what I will be funded on, is that really ethical?
Although there is certainly no ethical problem here, there is something worth following up on. You, as someone who has not yet begun a PhD project, have proposed something that your advisors tell you that veterans in the field will find unrealistically ambitious, and that it would look better if you only proposed to work on the first half. Your confidence -- even worry! -- that you will do much more than the first half is the premise of the question. While you needn't worry, I think this is a discrepancy well worth exploring further. What do you know here that everyone else doesn't?
@PeteL.Clark They didn't tell me that the project I had was unrealistic, but that the reviewers may find it unrealistic. They told me they were confident I could do more than just the first two parts.
@gaborous: I see that you have edited your question to clarify that your advisors find it realistic. Good! I still wonder why they think a project they view as not prohibitively ambitious will likely be viewed as such by the reviewers, but much more idly: I don't know anything about who the reviewers are -- I was thinking in terms of reviewers for government research grants, who are veterans in the field; for all I know, the reviewers for your PhD application may not be -- and how they behave, and it sounds like your advisors do. (Also good.)
@PeteL.Clark I don't really know, I tried to ask but they didn't answer directly my question. Indeed, the reviewers may be veteran but not exactly in our field of research (which is quite specific, there's not a lot of lab in the world that are working in this field), so I also believe this may be the reason, but I'm not sure.
Asking for a grant to do A, and doing B, is clearly unethical. Wanting to do A and B, and being told that A is work enough for the grant proposal by much more experienced people, and insisting in trying to work on B (or writing a proposal for A and B) isn't unethical, just foolish.
Yes, of course this should not be a problem. The funding agencies want to see projects that are on a realistic scale. If it will probably not be possible for you to achieve your main goals, given the time and money allotted to the project, that certainly makes it seem like a poor investment. Conversely, the funders know that if you reach your projected goals early, you are going to use the remainder of your funding to extend the research further. So you should try to set achievable goals in your proposal, but if you manage to exceed them, nobody is going to be unhappy.
Naturally, cutting major tasks out of your proposal is going to require some rethinking of the justification. If the projects you think do have time to complete are less interesting by themselves than the later projects you will need to cut, they you still need to explain why they are important stepping stones toward the ultimately most important work (even if you won't be getting to that work yet). It can be subtle to get this right, but think you would be wise to trust your advisor's judgement about how much to include in your proposal.
Do you think I can briefly mention further goals in case I complete the target goals earlier in the application? (is it an accepted practice?)
You should certainly mention what future work can follow on from what you are proposing to accomplish. However, in my experience, it may be a bad idea to suggest that you can actually accomplish significantly more than you are proposing. It may come across as an invitation to cut your funding. This probably depends quite a bit on the funding agency and division, though. I would recommend being fairly circumspect about what you might accomplish beyond the explicit goals, and I would try to talk with somebody who has gotten funding from the same source before, to see what they think.
Thank you for all your answers, really helpful and dead on the spot.
Consider the inverse situation (exaggerated for the sake of the argument):
You propose a project that you know is unrealistic. The grant agency hypothetically approves your project, and the project runs out of money before any interesting findings are made.
In this case, I can see an ethical issue, since the project was "sold" (as you say) with a larger promise than what could be delivered. By contrast, I see no ethical problem with "underpromising" and "overdelivering".
My advisors were quite confident that I will be able do more than the first 2 parts, so the point is not that the project is unrealistic per se, but that it may look like unrealistic to reviewers.
@gaborous, if your advisors are so confident you can complete the complete set of tasks with the resources from the grant (time and money), they would be extremely foolish not to insist on proposing the full set for the grant. People evaluating your application will be able to do more or less the same estimate of results possible, and will just reject the application if it seems to fall far short of what is reasonably possible to accomplish.
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27135 | Is PGCHE more valuable that PGCE?
There have been a few questions relating to PGCHE certificates, including:
How is PGCHE by distance learning viewed relative to in-class?
What is the purpose of peer evaluation of teaching?
University Teaching Certifications for Different Countries
As far as I understand, the PGCHE is more specific to higher education (hence the HE). However, there is another more general PGCE which deals with education overall (not limited to higher education).
Given that the PCGHE is more specific, do faculty selection committees value the PGCHE as a 'better qualification' when hiring a lecturer or do they simply consider that someone has specific training in teaching and there is no significant difference? Does this vary by country?
In the UK community colleges are not part of the higher education system and the US equivalent of a small liberal arts colleges essentially do not exist. That means the vast majority of UK universities hire for "research excellence" and hiring committees are really only interested in if you can teach a needed module and that you will not be awful. The PGCE, unlike the PGCHE, would not satisfy any university requirements and therefore I don't think hiring committees would consider it at all.
As for the PGCHE, while many universities require new members of academic staff to obtain one, The universities that I am familiar with offer the PGCHE curriculum in house via the School of Education. Since it is presented to new staff as a hoop to jump through, I know of no one outside of university administrators and schools of education that think the PGCHE, in any form, is of value. Further, while I have seen many job adverts where a PGCHE is a "desirable" qualification, I have never seen one where it is "essential". During hiring, we briefly consider the presence/absence of a PGCHE, but never more than that.
Overall, I would say that the PGCE is useless for getting a job and the PGCHE is only marginally more valuable for being hired. As a PGCHE is. Requirement once you have the job, it may be beneficial in that it would make your first year, or two, easier since it is one less thing to do while you are drowning in new teaching, admin, and setting up a research agenda. The disadvantage of this is the PGCHE course was one place where I met new faculty members outside my school.
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34428 | How much time should be allocated to supervising undergraduate researchers?
I recently asked this question about how many office hours per week are common for undergraduate lecturers but then I just read this one about supervising research done by undergrads. This got me thinking that perhaps my previous question was going in the wrong direction.
I have >300 students in 3 different subjects. 200 of those students are in one subject and that subject requires students to do extensive research. My challenge (explained in the question linked above) is that I seem to have too little time to properly support this many students.
These are business students so there is no lab. The research is reading the literature, finding data, integrating the two into some meaningful insight.
So, my question is, when supervising undergraduate students who are doing research, how much time on average, per week, per student, should this consume of the supervisor's time? 15 minutes? 30 minutes? 1 hour?
Edit: To put this in perspective, the students are not writing a bachelor thesis. However, they are expected to put in about 100 hours of non-class time (after the class time has finished) doing their research and writing it up. The final product is about 4,000 - 5,00 words (so far less than a thesis).
Please clarify what the research entails. Is this on-hands research or a research paper built from citing sources on the web and from the library?
The research entails identifying a company (e.g., Exxon) and researching some key areas (which change every semester but one example could be climate change) that impact the company, finding relevant data and theories (from books, journal articles, etc.), integrating relevant data and company history in order to give some useful insight, recommend some action for the company, etc.
..."to put in about 100 hours of non-class time (after the class time has finished) doing their research" Are everyone has the same assignment or they all deal with the same subject?
I guess it's obvious, but my answer in the linked previous question is really meant for when you have 2 or 3 undergrad research projects to advise, not 200.
@Alexandros Each student has the same key areas (though they usually have 4-5 areas and they must choose 2 of them so there is some variation) and each student has their own company. The subject is a final-year subject before graduation.
One person cannot possibly supervise 200 undergraduate research projects per semester of any substance. This sounds more like a term paper with a research component than 200 fully-fledged research projects. When I did undergraduate research, it was a 20-hour per week job that I got paid for, and even then my supervisor and I rarely met for more than half an hour per week.
There are only 168 hours total in one week, and only 40 working hours in a week. If you spent your entire job meeting with all of the students every week, you could give them 12 minutes each. This is clearly impossible. 200 students is so many that giving them each a 30-minute kickoff meeting to discuss their initial idea at the beginning of the semester would take you two and a half weeks. This would put some students at a serious disadvantage over others by potentially delaying their project start or leaving them confused about what is required of them.
If these are not much more than a term paper, then one person can probably do this by putting the assignment together on paper or in email and only answering questions during normal office hours. These kinds of assignments have clearly articulated goals and guidelines and apply techniques as laid out in lectures and homeworks. If you want a more substantial, independent project, then you need TA support, at least 6 and as many as 20 TAs to cover 200 students.
Thanks for your answer. I'm not sure term-paper is appropriate for them but it is also not a full-blown research project. I've added some details to the question to clarify.
Based on your edit, I think my answer still stands.
If I wanted to boil your answer down to one sentence, would it be fair to say "About 30 minutes per student per week?"
God no! That's 6000 minutes per week or 100 hours. There are only 168 hours total in a week. When would you sleep? That's 2.5 weeks of full-time work, per week! And that's just for the 200-student course. It doesn't even count the other 100 students. YOU CANNOT POSSIBLY DO THIS ALONE.
My advice is to hand out a detailed assignment description and to be available in your usual required office hours at whatever the university requires for your teaching load. Do not set individual appointments for all the students. It's not possible.
I appreciate your concern. I am trying to find a solution going forward, not just for this semester (this semester is almost over anyway). The question is, how much time should I reasonably allocate to each student each week? If this number is 30 minutes then I can do the math and see how many students I can support. If this number is 15 minutes, then the number of students I can reasonably support is different. This is why I'm pressing for a single number.
I think the project is too easy/short for you to be devoting direct contact time to each student each week. I recommend 0 minutes of dedicated time per student per week.
Let us continue this discussion in chat.
You should not be meeting with students individually each week. Even committing to once each semester is a stretch and seems suspect to me.
I think that the real question is whether you are advising the students in the role of a research mentor, or whether you are merely supervising their independent work, as with a term paper. In the former case, meeting less than 30 minutes per week seems like poor advising to me. In the latter case, it is more reasonable to only meet when they have specific questions, and not to have scheduled individual meetings otherwise. So it is necessary to decide what role you want to have in the process (or are required to have) before you can decide how much time to spend.
I can relate how long I spend, in my own experience. My experience is in mathematics and computer science, which may be different from other fields.
When I wrote my PhD, I usually met with my advisor for about 1-2 hours each week, unless there was a special reason to have a second meeting.
I work at a department with a master's program. When supervising a master's thesis, I expect to meet with my advisee for about the same amount of time, about 1-2 hours a week, unless there is a reason to meet a second time.
Similarly, when I co-authored a paper with a strong undergraduate student last year, we met for about 2 hours a week for a semester and a half. Part of this was instruction by me about the area, and part of it was research meetings to engage with our problem.
When I advise an undergraduate "senior project", I set up a meeting for one hour per week with each student I advise. These projects are "research light" at my institution, and can even be expository for some students. But at least one senior projects I have supervised developed into a different co-authored paper, so some real research is done as well.
In every case, I expect the student to work for several hours between each of our meetings. When they are writing, I require them to send a draft at least s day before we meet, so I can review it. When they are writing computer code, I also require them to send that a day before we meet as well. This helps me keep the meetings productive - we can talk about challenges they have encountered in the research, or about my feedback on their work, or about future plans, etc., with a minimal amount of wasted time during the meetings.
Each time I have a meeting with a student, I try to make a plan before it begins about what we will talk about. Of course, if the student has something more pressing to discuss, that takes precedence over my plans. But I try not to waste and meeting, because that leads to having to meet again that week or to slipping deadlines, both of which I want to avoid if possible.
Of course, you cannot possibly meet for one hour each week with 200 students. I find the even four personal meetings per week is more than enough to keep me occupied - both in terms of time and in terms of mental capacity. So you will need to find a way to economize, and give less personal attention. You might try organizing group peer review sessions.
Frankly, I am surprised you can even grade the 200 papers that are written - if you can manage 30 minutes per paper all day long that is still over 2 weeks of grading!
If you have any say at the department, you might propose having the students work in groups; 50 groups of 4 is much more appealing than 200 groups of 1, both for advising and for grading.
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34152 | How many "office hours" are common (or standard) for full-time lecturers?
In situations where one teaches purely undergraduate students (20 hours per week, 16 weeks per semester, 2 semesters per year) how many hours per week, and how many weeks per year, are people normally in their offices? Does this number change after the main teaching semesters complete?
I have just finished my fall semester and I find my normal office hours cannot handle the demand from the students. I'm a bit torn. On one hand, I want to support my students as much as they care to be supported but I must balance my own needs. I have plenty of other things to do besides teach (I have to prepare for the spring semester and that will take me significant time, I have marking to do, etc.). More office hours means less time (thus less quality) for prep (and other various tasks).
When I consider what my peers do, I see they often do less than the school requires of them (I am not interested in following their example). With > 300 students, it seems the only way to really satisfy the demand is to be there 20 hours per week...which leave me little (no) time for my other tasks.
My goal here is to try to identify what is fair to all involved.
Edit: I've posted a follow-up question to this one.
With >300 students, could you delegate at least some of the work to a TA? Perhaps require that every issue should first be discussed with a TA, and then be available yourself as "second-level support"? The concept of multiple support levels is not new.
@StephanKolassa Oh, I love that idea. Now, if only my school had TA's.
As some answers seem to make assumptions on this: What sort of requests mainly fill your office hours?
@Wrzlprmft The #1 request is to give them guidance on what they've written in their assignment so far. The time does seem productive (for them) but it takes me about 30 minutes per student to give them meaningful guidance.
You didn't say what sort of class you're teaching. But for most courses, writing a set of problem sets or FAQs or whatever is more efficient use of your time.
smci is right - if you have to explain the same thing to more than a few students, there is a better way. Even just sending an email to the whole class saying "hi folks, I notice several of you are having trouble with problem X. Try bargling the
Can you encourage students to seek tutoring from other students in the class or students who have taken the class before? A lot of schools have free tutoring provided by the dean's office or some other academic body.
I suggest a peer-review or writing-circle exercise in class to cut down on the needed writing feedback.
My undergrad university held regular "helpdesks" in a classroom - where one or more teaching assistants and sometimes the lecturer were present. They essentially functioned like an extra (and optional) tutorial class, and the more proactive students would come in and work on their assignments, discussing among themselves and asking questions.
This allows you to spread time a bit more fairly among students than at an office hour, where one student might take up a lot of time and leave others waiting at the door. Answer one question, and then move on to someone else.
Perhaps you could try a similar strategy?
5 years ago, when I was an undergraduate, almost all homework support was performed by TA's, leaving the professor's office hours for bigger, usually comprehension, issues that were far more 'one-on-one.' We also had large-group tutorials that were far more designed for question-answering. Occasionally the professor would be there too.
While I am certainly open to new strategies, I'm also wondering how many hours per week, and how many weeks per year, lecturers are normally available to their students outside of class.
Office hours for 300 students with no TA is clearly not going to work; certainly not if you try to give 30min to each.
You didn't say what sort of class you're teaching (quantitative? qualitative? creative?). But for most courses, writing a set of problem sets/ FAQs/ lessons learned/ whatever is a far more efficient use of your time.
These students are doing business management analysis, not math. So, I cannot give them problem sets and let them check themselves. I do give them a rubric but have not been very successful getting all of them to use it properly.
What are their assignments? Essays? Reading assignments? Do you use multichoice quizzes to test reading and comprehension? Is the instruction language English? What % of their issues are stylistic/grammatical vs subject-matter?
Assignments are reports, based on their own research. None of their issues are language issues they are all issues with application of theories, which theories are relevant, etc.
You mean you have to grade 300 individual assignments? Can you not somehow standardize assignments? or make them easier to grade?
I usually grade 300-600 per semester (1-2 assignments per student). Each is about 10-15 pages. Yes, it's a lot of work...which is why I feel I cannot give 20 hours per week to office hours. I have been unable to make standardizing work (and I have not see any other business teachers do so either).
Sorry this is outside my domain, then. No chance of getting a TA?
I could get a TA if I paid for it myself. How many hours do most educators work per week, and how many weeks per year, meeting students outside of class?
You might consider assigning more of the "real" learning to the students outside of lecture.
Save class-time for particularly tricky topics, interesting examples, etc. Make sure to leave plenty of time for questions. Encouraging your students to interact in class can be tricky in a large classroom (you'll always have the student who just must ask a burning question, that turns out to be a restatement of what you just said in an incredulous tone of voice). I'm not sure where in Asia you work, but it's my understanding that in many Asian cultures there can be reticence to look like you don't understand in class. Perhaps to discourage that attitude you could consistently remind your students that if they already understood the topic they wouldn't need to be there.
If the above works you'll have a lower volume of students in office hours.
How many “office hours” are common (or standard) for full-time
lecturers?
Since no one's given a direct answer the title question, here is mine: 3 hours per week is what's required as a full-time lecturer at my large, urban, community college in the U.S. This holds true throughout our 12-week semesters, and no office hours are required outside teaching semesters.
Personally I feel that office hours should be a resource of last resort (I teach mathematics). I feel that students coming to office hours is a sign of something having gone wrong in the process; I try to arrange it so that all necessary material is available outside of personal meetings; and generally very few students come to my office hours (most days: none). Office hours should represent slack in the system to solve outstanding problems, not an overtaxed resource.
Presumably your institution also has some minimum specification for office hours? I would definitely take this as advice for how much time they expect on that task, and try to align it with that minimum as closely as possible. Back-calculate from there what assignments and time with students are possible per person. Possibly institute some kind of peer-review of the papers between students as feedback before you get them on your desk for grading.
As a mathematics professor, I go out of my way to encourage personal meetings during my office hours and at other times. If I was at a SLAC, I would be expected to do even more in the way of personal meetings. So the opinions about office hours, and the requirements, vary greatly even in the same discipline.
You say that the majority of your time is used to "give them guidance on what they've written in their assignment so far."
For each assignment, give your students a copy of the rubric you will use to evaluate their final work. Require students who want guidance to have applied the rubric to their work so far before coming to see you. Students will be able to answer many of their own questions, and you will be able to focus on the areas where they really need help.
Of course, that wasn't the question you asked. At my institution in the U.S., we are required to hold office hours for at least five hours per week during regular semesters and not at all during the time between semesters. (Those who teach in summer must hold summer office hours.)
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180452 | Under which conditions can a person use the title of "Professor"?
Is it enough to hold a contract as professor (be it a major university), to use this title in official communications?
What are the rules (also unwritten rules) in your country?
I am interested also in European and Asian countries, besides North Americans.
I am also interested to know the rules in Germany.
Be warned that Germany, in particular, has no sense of humor with respect to use of academic titles. Misuse can be a criminal offense. See details in this answer: https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/180455/16183
I think this question can have too many answers. Hundreds, in fact...
@einpoklum: That's absolutely right. For instance, in Mexico, profesor is the normal word for any teacher. What we would call a professor in the USA is called a catedrático in Mexico. Basically, there is no general answer to this question. Educational terms and habits are very different from system to system; you just have to see how it works in a given place.
@Heinzi Well, you'd have (PhD) students without a title ;). - At the same time being modest is never a bad thing. There is no obligation to list titles or degrees. However if hotel staff are extra helpful because of a title, then the hotel should be avoided: there should be no distinction based on some (in the end arbitrary) title between guests. Guests in the same hotel should be treated the same by default. Edit: As a side note, this may also be an Austrian peculiarity... - I remember an article in "Zeit Online" 10+ years ago about titles and restaurant reservations...
@DetlevCM In Germany that‘s not the case. The job is "Hochschullehrer" and "Professor" is a title.
Unfortunately, under too many conditions…. This leads to considerable confusion and charlatanism, especially on the part of “wanna-be” professors
You will be mocked left and right if you try to do that in Spain.
I'm at a North American R1.
The water is a bit muddy because depending on context "Professor" can refer to different things:
a formal job title, specified in your employment contract (this will be something like "Assistant Professor," "Professor of Practice," "FancyPants McRichDonor Distinguished Professor of Chemistry," etc.);
a general class of employment ("person who teaches at a university");
an honorific used by students when addressing anybody who teaches in a university classroom. This usage is acceptable regardless of whether the teacher's job title includes "Professor" anywhere in it and regardless of whether or not the teacher holds a PhD.
There are no formal rules about what you can call yourself (in North America) but the standard practice is:
in formal communication (including letters of recommendation and anything else that's signed on university letterhead) you should use your exact, formal job title.
in informal communication to students, or anyone else who would be expected to address you with the "Professor" honorific, you can call yourself "Prof. Fabio."
informal communication to people outside of academia is a grey area. I would use my formal job title in an email signature; but would call myself "a professor at University of X" in the body of text if I teach classes at UofX, regardless of job title.
I held the official title of "Lecturer" while teaching and did not bother to correct students who chose to call me "Professor" when associated with my class. I never would use it myself, however.
w.r.t. usage by students: Not just "university" classroom but also colleges (i.e., 4year program only, no graduate program). In fact, not just by students there, but also can be standard practice with the faculty themselves. Unless by saying "university" you were being inclusive of "higher" education and not excluding colleges?
@davidbak yes I mean all higher education. Not just places with a PhD program
Especially with relatively new undergrads, it is highly likely that nobody has explained the system of academic titles and hierarchy to them and that it's just something they're expected to learn through osmosis. They may well not know the difference in titles of address between a grad student instructor, lecturer, or professor and may default to calling anyone in charge of a class "Professor" whether that's their title or not.
In Britain, when I applied for a new passport and gave my title as Professor, I was asked to provide evidence of entitlement, in my case a letter of appointment from my university. Without that formal letter from a recognized academic body my claim would have been refused. To claim title without formal appointment or recognition seems like fraudulent misrepresentation.
This is incorrect (or has changed). See the official guidance (https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/959788/Titles_V7.pdf), and especially "You must not:
• ask a customer to give us evidence of their professional title
• check the customer’s title with an appropriate body or online sources"
Very, very few titles in the UK are protected. You can call yourself almost anything you like, providing you are not using the title fraudulently (q.v. Gillian McKeith)
@MartinF In the UK, "Professor" doesn’t denote a qualification but an academic staff grade – the most senior one. So, in the UK, an academic whose title is "Dr" is someone who’s got a PhD, but hasn’t been promoted to the highest academic grade, while an academic whose title is "Professor" is someone who probably (but not necessarily) has a PhD, but who has been promoted to the highest grade on the university pay scale. https://professors.leeds.ac.uk/what-is-a-professor/
@JackAidley My experience was correct when I applied for a passport. Even now, the recent link says *You, the examiner, must make sure the personal details page and observation are correct if the customer has a professional title because they are a:
• doctor
• professor
• actor
• member of the armed forces
• member of parliament" This "must make sure the details are correct". This seems to imply that incorrect details are not acceptable.
@Anton The correctness concerns not the truthfulness of the information, but the exactitude of the information as it should appear on the passport and recorded in the database, as the instructions following that paragraph show. But claiming a title without any reasonable support may still be an offence, especially if there is an intent to mislead and generate undue benefits.
I was surprised to find out that it is even possible to put "Professor" on your passport. There is normally no space for a title on a British passport, but you can apparently get it added to an extra "observations page". This also permits e.g. Stephen Manderson to have an observation saying "The Holder is also known as Professor Green".
In Germany, there are two possibilities to become a professor:
As a postdoc, you either
work as an assistant professor for some years and then apply for a professorship, or
write a professoral dissertation and apply for a professorship.
If you then are appointed, you are a professor.
So basically, yes, it is "enough" to hold a contract as a professor. But it is really difficult to get this contract. You need to master several steps - PhD thesis, postdoc, assistant professor or professoral dissertation. And even then, it is not sure you will ever get an appointment. There are many researchers who fulfil all qualifications, apply for one professorship after another and never get appointed.
A "professoral dissertation" is a habilitation?
The answer is not yet complete. "Außerplanmäßige Professuren" are missing as well as being awarded the title for holding something like a junior research group leader position, which enables the respective department to assign the title "professor" in some states. Also, junior professors on a tenure track can be awarded tenure, which also grants the "job title". To be nitpicky, most professors do not actually hold a contract as a professor, but are formally awarded the position. The contract signed is only for the resources of the professorship, but not the professorship itself.
...finally, the postdoc phase is optional, and in the case of a professorship in arts, even the habilitation or assistant professorship are optional (at least in some states) - there, demonstrated excellence in arts can be sufficient. Also, positions that are deemed equivalent to junior professorships (such as having been an Emmy Noether research group head) also count as qualifying.
This answer is incorrect. Assistant professors (Juniorprofessoren) can definitively use the title "Professor" in some states. For example in Hamburg: "Juniorprofessorinnen und Juniorprofessoren führen während der Dauer ihres Dienstverhältnisses die akademische Bezeichnung „Professorin“ beziehungsweise „Professor“."
Worth also noting: in Germany, unlike many other countries, you do not keep the title Professor after you retire.
@JackAidley That doesn't seem to be universally true. The NHG law of lower saxony contains in §27: "Wer als Professorin oder Professor unbefristet beschäftigt war, darf den Titel auch nach dem Ausscheiden aus der Hochschule weiterführen". And that makes sense because of the sentence afterwards: "Die mit der Lehrbefugnis verbundenen Rechte bleiben bestehen." - so a retired professor is still allowed to do professorial teaching (if desired).
If you are visiting Germany from another country where "professor" is a less exalted title, German academics will still refer to you as a professor. I found it amusing when I was visiting one of the Max Planck Institutes, that during the talks there, the only "professors" in the room were myself and a Nobel Prize winner.
And also that "professorial dissertation" is actually called a habilitation.
Australia: The norm here is that you only use the title "Professor" if you are a full professor (i.e., you have a Level E academic position at a university). Applicable titles here are:
Mister/Miss/Misses/Ms (Mr/Miss/Mrs/Ms) for an academic with no PhD at levels A-C (i.e. no special title compared to an ordinary person);
Doctor (Dr) for an academic with PhD at levels A-C, or any other person with PhD;
Associate Professor/Reader (Assoc Prof/Reader) for an academic at Level D; and
Professor (Prof) for an academic at Level E.
This classification is formalised in the federal government classification of academics in Australia (see e.g., Higher Education Academic Salaries Award 2002 (Cth). I am not aware of any specific rules on using these titles in correspondence. However, use of an inflated title (e.g., using "Prof" when you are not a full professor) would be misleading behaviour and could constitute a breach of academic honesty rules. In any case, if you were to use an inflated title here it would reflect badly on you.
(One thing that often happens in academia in Australia is that foreign academics/journals email you as "Professor" even though you are not a full professor and would not use the title yourself. This derives from the broader American use of the term. When this happens you have to decide whether to correct the person on the other end of the communication, but this can get monotonous, so many academics here just ignore the disparity and allow foreign academics/journals to incorrectly call them "Professor".)
And note that many disciplines or possibly even a whole "school" wouldn't have a Professor at some universities. It's a very high rank indeed.
Yes, that's possible. It's fairly rare but some smaller schools would not have a full professor.
I stopped an Australian panel moderator from introducing me as Professor while I was still a young-looking student at a conference. I think he was just being nice to me and my supervisor, but I never raised the issue.
Yeah, that is annoying. It is not being nice to address you by a title you haven't earned; it's just awkward.
In the Czech Republic, a professor is only a person that was confirmed for the professor (prof.) degree by the Scientific Comittee of their university and received the degree from the President of the country. Or people that hold similar full professor degrees from other countries.
The holders of degrees equivalent to an associated or assistant professor can not use the "professor" title. Associate professors, after their habilitation, use the "docent" (doc.) title. Assistant professors are simply "doctors".
The whole system continues the traditions from the past Austria-Hungary.
Unrelated usage exists at "gymnasiums" - a specific type of secondary schools similar to grammar schools. They are selective and prepare mainly for further studies at universities. Here all teachers are called "professors" informally, regerdless whether they are doctors or not.
This is again an old tradition going back to the times of the Austrian empire or Astria-Hungary.
BTW although the role of the President of the country is mostly ceremonial, the current president is known for refusing to appoint several professors for various reasons. Those who tried to sue him do not have their title yet.
This is the case in Poland, with one difference: a university can grant a docent the title of extraordinary professor (it's a local title that is temporary and facultative—it's tied to employment at that university). Those nominated by the Academy of Sciences and accepted byt the president are—somewhat counterintuitively—called ordinary professors.
These terms (řádný profesor, mimořádný profesor) existed and were common in Bohemia as well, but in the times of the Austrian Empire (as positions, not degrees). I now confirmed that the extraordinary professor position actually exists in the current law as well, mainly for experts from other countries, but it is very rare and is not used as a title in full, as it used to be.
Britain
In Britain the title "Professor" is used only for select senior academics. Usually they are either heads of department or very senior researchers. To be a Professor you must have been appointed to a specific professorship (chair) by a university.
If you are a college or university level teacher then you are usually referred to as a "lecturer".
It would be a serious social error for a student in the UK to call a lecturer "Professor" or "Prof" when they aren't a professor. Undergraduates usually address lecturers as "Sir", "Madam", or "Doctor " if they need a form of address; doctoral students may get to use first names or other informal forms.
A very serious social error. They would think you were American.
Most universities have a mechanism to be promoted to professor rank without being appointed to a specific chair - for us its just a set of criteria to meet like any other promotion (although very tough criteria, that include external references etc). Also "lecturer" refers to researchers as well as teachers in the UK.
I'm from a regional US school with an almost split personality of small liberal arts undergrad and huge health sciences postgrad, and I've observed something here that I've never seen elsewhere: students call anyone with a PhD or MD "Dr", and everyone else "Prof." This bugs me greatly, in part because I did my time as a postdoc where I would have been ROASTED for calling myself Prof, and now I actually merit the title, I want to use it. I really don't feel it's appropriate when the lecturers get called Prof, especially if they don't have doctorates. I actually had one of my research students (!!) shyly tell me one time he just learned that I had a doctorate, and he thought that was really impressive - because he assumed I didn't since I signed my emails Prof instead of Dr.
My theory is that it's the med school's fault, that the MDs prefer Dr to Prof, and it's rubbed off on the rest of us. Don't know if this applies to other, similar universities, though.
I guess the stereotypically-German system of using both titles together, i.e. "Prof. Dr.", would make sense. The idea that one subsumes the other does seem context-dependent, and it sounds like you're in an area where the preference is non-uniform.
@mim - Similar experience at a similar school, but without the med school. Ph.D. holders were called Doctor while those at tenure track without doctorate were called Professor. In spite of being a (full) Professor, I used to have my students call me Mr. Students often referred to Lecturers as Professor, but nobody corrected them, generally. In correspondence, say for reference letters, I would always use my actual rank at the time (Asst. Prof., Assoc. Prof., or Prof.).
In the US I’d say that there’s no reason to care. Anybody who has had or has a university or other scholastic position position with “professor” in their official HR title is literally entitled to use that word in their formal address. But to what end? Ego inflation seems to be the only value. It might get you higher on a reservation list at a fancy restaurant, but those days seem mostly gone. Some grants are limited to academics within a few (1,2,3, etc) years of their PhD or postdoc, but I haven’t seen “professor” be a requirement, especially given the differences across the country in when that title starts being used (Assistant, Associate, etc?).
France
The general rule is that the title of Professor is associated with a position of "University Professor", for which you are nominated by the President. So you have to have the required "technical" prerequisites (a special diploma, an agreement of a special national body, ...), and have a position ay a university (or equivalent).
Then of course it gets more complex, we French being the holders of the "how to make bureaucracy complicated" prize. This includes the "but there is always a way" sub-prize.
You then have medical doctors that award themselves the title of "Professor" if they are the head of a department in a hospital (no matter if they have any relationship with academia or not).
Finally you have teachers who are called "professors" like everywhere else in the world, except that we do have a "professor in a school" kid of affiliation, legally defined (you are part of a special corpus of administration)
I think in school the title "prof." applies only starting from a certain level - perhaps, when they specialize in a subject; otherwise it is "maîtresse".
@RogerVadim: it is Professeur des écoles, a regulated body within the French administration. In terms of casual naming, you have "maître/maîtresse" (the way you refer to someone usually in kindergarten or primary school - despite them being often Professeur des écoles), or "ensiegnant" (usually in an indirect form (votre enseignant sera absent lundi), or "professeur" (mid or high school). It heavily depends on regions and on schools. (EDIT: sorry - I did not realize you were French, so the info is for the others :))
Actually I am not French, but living in France - so your clarification is quite useful!
When you say "nominated by the President" do you mean President of the university or something else (President of the State)?
@davidbak: by the French President (of the state)
The UK
The traditional scheme of academic job titles in the UK was Lecturer, Senior Lecturer, Reader, Professor. Nowadays many universities use the alternative scheme of Assistant Professor, Associate Professor, Professor. However, the title "Professor" is still only used for full professors (who would be a professor in the traditional scheme) or emeritus professors (retired or semi-retired academics who were previously full professors).
Someone whose job title is "Associate Professor" would normally be referred to as "Doctor X" (assuming they have a doctoral degree; this may be accompanied by an additional title e.g. "the Reverend Doctor Y").
These are not official rules in any sense I know of, but merely the way things are done. In any case the person might not bother to use their academic title outside of an academic context.
I'm not sure I'd say "most", although it is becoming more common.
Swedish usage:
A "professor" in Swedish is a title used for a person employed at university level with responsiblities for an area. To be hired as professor you need to have completed a PhD (or similar) and generally have to have a comprehensive portfolio of published papers (or similar).
The title as such is not protected in any way, so anyone may be free to use it without any legal consequences.
Other titels used when employed at university are:
"Docent" - requires you to a have higher scientific level above a PhD, generally at least four years after PhD.
"Lektor" - has a PhD.
"Adjunkt" - lower academic degree, often master.
"Doktorand" - employed to do PhD studies.
You might find postdocs as well.
In the Netherlands, the title was reserved for those who had the academic rank of Hoogleraar. This is a top rank and equates to the UK ranks of Reader (Hoogleraar 2) or Professor (Hoogleraar 1). The lower ranks of docent (lecturer) universitair docent (university lecturer) and hoofddocent (senior lecturer) are translated as lecturer, assistant and associate professor. However, they are not entitled to call themselves "professor" or use the "Prof." title.
This appears to be changing. It was that only hoogleraars could promote Ph.D. students, which was the justification for restricting the title. Recent rules changes have meant that by special dispensation, some hoofddocenten ("associate professors"/senior lecturers) can have promotion rights. I have seen some of these using the Prof. title. I am unclear whether this is legal or not. The title Professor is protected under Dutch law, and it is fraud to use it if not entitled.
In Flanders, a similar rank system exists, but docenten (lecturers) of all grades can have promotion rights. If they do, then they can use the title Prof. However, they could not leave it unqualified when written in full without being fraudulent. Use of "Prof." is specific to whether the academic is allowed to by the (main) supervisor of Ph.D. students or not.
If you are referring to yourself in any formal setting, use only titles that have been officially conferred. And qualify them as needed: associate professor, for example. In the US it is common to use the term informally for yourself in casual conversations and such.
For referring to others you can use the term in a more generic sense most places and in most situations as a synonym for a university faculty member. Some places are more formal (Germany, Austria) than others (US). US students do this pretty regularly, for example, to refer to their instructors.
If you have a title from one country/culture that isn't common in another, then you can give your official title, as given and suggest it is similar to a title from the place you are communicating with. But don't assume your translation is official in any way.
Mainland China and Hong Kong (I didn't bother looking up Macau or Taiwan):
In mainland China:
Hou Yifan, the record holder for youngest female grandmaster, is said to be a 'professor' at Shenzhen university. But I doubt e has a PhD.
Therefore, in mainland China, you need not have a PhD to have the title of 'professor' unlike places like Hong Kong (ironic?) or some parts of the US where having a PhD is necessary but not sufficient to have the title of 'professor'.
According to several sources, Hou Yifan is indeed a 'full' professor, instead of assistant or associate professor. I'm unable to find a profile on shenzhen's website. Or even like a list of faculty members that includes h.
In Hong Kong:
I've checked all the maths departments in city university, chinese university, hong kong university of science and technology, hong kong university and The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and not a single person is professor or even assistant or associate professor without a PhD. Meanwhile there are many PhD holders who are merely 'instructor' or 'lecturer'.
At least last I checked in early 2021.
In the Philippines:
Not entirely certain. Professor is often used colloquially to mean 'teaches at a university', but technically I've yet to see a faculty member's profile where the person is said to be 'professor' (without qualifier; see next) without a PhD.
In Cebu:
In the mathematics department of the university of san carlos in cebu (not to be confused with the university of south california, as the old joke goes), several faculty members (see for yourself) are considered 'assistant professor' without a PhD. None of the faculty members there appear to have a PhD, and no one is considered associate professor or (full) professor there.
In Manila (the capital):
I've yet to see an 'assistant professor' in, say, the mathematics departments of the university of the philippines or ateneo de manila university without a PhD though.
Edit to add:
In my experience, in the Philippines, any faculty with the position having the word "professor" (asst. prof., assoc. prof., prof.) may be called "Professor." In the past (in the Philippines), it was possible to be a professor even if you didn't have a doctoral degree. So it was more prestigious to be called "Doctor" (which requires having a doctoral degree) rather than "Professor." Usually the term "Professor" is used when the person does not have a doctoral degree. – Joel Reyes Noche
In my experience, in the Philippines, any faculty with the position having the word "professor" (asst. prof., assoc. prof., prof.) may be called "Professor." In the past (in the Philippines), it was possible to be a professor even if you didn't have a doctoral degree.
So it was more prestigious to be called "Doctor" (which requires having a doctoral degree) rather than "Professor." Usually the term "Professor" is used when the person does not have a doctoral degree.
@JoelReyesNoche colloquially yes, but officially?
I don't have official information. That's why I didn't answer the question and why I didn't edit your answer.
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57050 | Is sharing R code for a dissertation consider to be plagiarism?
I'm working on my individual dissertation in finance. This thesis tests the low-volatility factor on European markets. The core methodology is creating Fama and French portfolios, testing the new low-volatility factor with the Carhart model and a transaction costs analysis with R.
A friend of mine, who is also writing his thesis this semester, uses the same metrology to test the existence of a new momentum factor in the European markets. Therefore, we developed the core R code together. Although our dissertations are completely different, since we both test other factors, we do use the same code. Would you consider this plagiarism and how do I cope with this issue?
I would not think so, for instance no one would ever consider it plagiarism if you used the base lm(..) function for linear regression - or some other function. I see your concern, so I would advise that you run this by your advisor. Perhaps you should simply mention somewhere in the thesis that you co-wrote the code with student X.
You might consider releasing the code on github as an open-source project. It could add to your citations if it is picked up and used by others.
Just clarifying that the code was a result of joint work with X should be enough to get (very) clear of plagiarism territory. Usually, huge fractions of thesis material were created with co-authors, so why should code be special?
@AaronHall Thanks, we put some thought to this and we are willing to make this an open-source project. However, I'm wondering if there is an alternative to Github which is more focused on finance / factor investing and/or MATLAB?
Plagiarism is copying someone else's result and presenting it as an own result. It doesn't seem you're planning to do that.
In general, there shouldn't be a problem to use a jointly developed software core for research in your and your friend's dissertation. Research is a lot about collaboration, so I'd view that rather positively. But it will be important that you distinguish results that were obtained jointly from individual results, and that you agree on that beforehand to avoid potentially difficult discussions down the road. Things to clarify would include:
In how much detail do your dissertations need to describe the jointly developed core, and how much overlap is acceptable there? That is something you need to discuss with your advisor as well. It may be problematic to include a substantial amount of jointly written text in the individual dissertations.
Is there potential for a joint paper that you publish independently of your theses to describe the core software? In your dissertations, you can then simply refer to that paper and avoid overlapping text there.
Can you agree on specific contributions that everybody made to the software, have each of you focus on that for his dissertation, and refer to the friend's dissertation for the other part?
I think your answer pretty much covers it. There is one more point though - acknowledgement. Most dissertations have space for acknowledgements which can be used for thanks with regards to collaboration. Also, in the case of a PhD in the UK at least there would be paperwork where details of collaborative work are supposed to be entered.
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16650 | Approaching faculty members I don't know well to solicit career advice
While researching career opportunities, I have stumbled upon an alumnus of the school I am currently at, who is a relatively new faculty member there. In a sense, this person's career is what I want my career to be like. It seems like they could offer me very valuable advice.
However, I do not know this person and do not know anyone they know. I thought I might write a polite email to them asking for advice, but I'm not sure what the prudent way to phrase it would be. And on that note, whether prudence would preclude even doing such a thing.
What's the polite way to ask a professor how to get a job like theirs (specifically, at an institution such as theirs)?
Faculty are people too :). But seriously, there's no harm in sending them an email. I've had a number of such feelers from students and I always take the time to talk with them. Btw, I suspect you mean "strange" as in "is a stranger" rather than "has unusual personality quirks" ?
@suresh Thanks, yes, I meant it in the sense that he is essentially a stranger.
Send this person a brief e-mail, explaining the followings:
How you found out about him/her, and give a 2-sentence introduction of yourself.
That his/her career path and/or research interests overlaps with or inspires yours very much.
Ask if you can have a phone conversation for 15 minutes to answer some questions. You can also ask for a meeting if he/she is nearby.
List the brief questions that you plan to cover. Don't be too broad. Think if these 15 minutes are really the only time that he/she will be willing to talk to you, what would you like to get out from this?
Provide 4-5 dates/times for him/her to pick, and invite them to suggest some dates if none of them works.
Avoid asking for reference letter, inside contacts, or any kind of favor beyond just formal career advices. He/she may not feel vested enough to do that, and if you push, he/she may close up. Also, don't attach any CV/resume; that would look like you're looking for a position.
And also don't ask "How did you get a job at an institution like this one?" Zoom out and ask for the job search process he/she went through. Ask him/her to elaborate on the thought process and how the pros and cons were weighed. Once the topic gets going, you can probe a bit further, but the focus should be on the faculty member, not the institution.
On the date, be on time, and honor the 15 minutes (or whatever you both agree upon) limit. At the end of the meeting, ask if you may ask for his/her opinion very occasionally through e-mail in future, and then establish the mentoring relationship from there.
When you got home, follow up with a thank you e-mail.
The tricks are:
Don't ask them to write back. Replying e-mail on this kind of issues takes a lot of time and thought, plus he/she may not know you well enough to know if the recommendations are suitable for you.
Make it low stake. At most they'll lose are 15 minutes.
Make it thoughtful by listing highly relevant questions. This shows that you really did look at their work and know something about it.
I would add: meeting is strongly prefered over phoning, certainly from my experience (couple European countries). People don't seem to like "meetings over phone" here.
I've received emails from students before soliciting advice, or even sending me resumes asking to work in the lab. More often than not they had spent very little time even becoming familiar with our research or looking into the university. If you want a busy professor to give you advice, you need to earn it by proving that you're serious.
Get familiar with the research
Look at the professors CV (this can show you the path they took)
Know exactly what you want to ask, and make sure it's clear.
Consider asking a student in their lab what they did (presumably they have a similar goal)
EDIT: As a general rule, if English is not your native language have someone look over your email for grammar mistakes.
If your question is of the form "how do I become a professor at the prestigious university X?", then I don't think that it is worth contacting this professor. But if this professor has an interesting career that no one else has, then I suggest that you follow the steps that the others have suggested.
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935 | How to act as an editor?
I have been on both the author and the referee sides, but I was wondering how editors approach their task. In particular, to what level of detail do you read the paper you assign to referees, and when (i.e. before or after receiving the reviews)?
From conversations with a mentor who was the editor-in-chief for a major journal, if you take the responsibility seriously, you need to have enough of an understanding of the papers assigned to you to figure out which referees will be suitable for a paper, while not taking so much time to read it that you can't process all of them for lack of time. As mentioned above, you need to at least a "high-level" read of the paper before assigning it to the referees. If the paper comes back with mixed reviews, it probably requires a careful re-read; if the reviews are uniform in recommending for or against publication, then it may not be as critical.
However, the editor will want to read papers when revisions come in, so that may mean going through a paper several times during the course of the review process.
In addition to the reply from aeismail to which I agree you need to add several other aspects. First, let's emphasise that good indepth knowledge of the field is vital.
The first stage for an editor is to assess whether the paper is appropriate for the journal, that it follows instructions for authors and is of reasonable technical quality to go to review (figures in order, language ok etc.)
The second stage for an editor is as was already stated to identify and assign referees based on the content of the papeer and reviewers speciality.
The third stage is to assess the reviewers comments and provide the author(s) with an educated summary of the reviewers work and possibly help by providing guidelines as to how to handle the reviews, emphasising some comments and possibly de-emphasising others. It not uncommon that reviews differ widely and in such cases the editor must be able to mediate, alternatively assign additional reviewers. This means apply objectivity and evaluate reviews. It also means you need to understand (at a deeper level) the paper and the comments that go with it.
The fourth stage concerns the revised work. Once the revised version is back from the author you need to evaluate the authors response to the reviewers comments. The author may not agree with the reviewers comments and it is the editors job to judge the revisons and make appropriate decisions (for additional review or accept/reject).
It might be appropriate to point out here that the editor is not just an evaluator but also a mediator. Disagrements between authors and reviewers are common. Some reviewers may have good points but terible ways of conveying them. In such cases the editor must place him/herself above the infected views and convey the essential points being made to the author.
The fifth stage concerns final decisions. This can be a formality but to have an editor sign off on a paper for publication means it has gone through peer review/revisions in a satisfactory way and is sound. So it is an important final step.
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15654 | How to acknowledge funding after the acceptance of the manuscript
We got this accepted article. A preliminary PDF version of the article is available online. The final look shape of the article is still under processing by journal publisher. However, I forgot to mention my acknowledgement while others did acknowledge their respective funding.
I am wondering what should I do now to acknowledge my funding institute? Does it make any difference that I am not the corresponding author of the manuscript?
The first thing you can do is to ask the publisher/journal editor(s) (wherever the paper processing is with the journal in question) to make the addition. Since you are not the first author (assuming first = corresponding) you should probably go through that person. The likelihood of getting such changes done if the paper is published online is uncertain but worth asking about anyway.
Having your funding not acknowledged in the paper is not the end of the world so if changes cannot be made, well there are probably more papers coming later. It is of course always a god way to show the funding source where their money ended up. There might be funding sources that request such acknowledgements but there is no law. some authors never acknowledge anything. The fact that you are not first author is not terribly relevant. Any funding source adding to the total funding of the study is of importance to the results; the paper.
So in the end, I would not worry too much about it. It was an omission, a mistake; it happened, you make an effort to rectify and you will likely remember it in the future.
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34619 | What is systematic literature review?
I know what a literature review is and was wondering what makes such a review systematic? What extra steps do people usually go through when they do a systematic literature review? how is it different from regular literature review? The field is software engineering if it matters.
The quintessence of the systematic review is that it's, well, systematic. That is to say, you have a system by which you do the review: a detailed protocol that you work by, just like when you run experiments. The protocol sets out how you will define your search terms, where you will search, what your criteria are for inclusion are, what your criteria for exclusion are, and so on.
The idea is that, just as with an experiment's protocol, it would allow someone else to reproduce your work: in this case, your trawl through the literature. It gives you and your reviewers and readers a basis for assessing how comprehensive your review is. It may include a detailed protocol for quantitative meta-analysis or qualitative synthesis.
Systematic reviews can be hugely varied in form and scope: I've got 3 books that each provide part of the answer to this question. Check your library (possibly in the medical / epidemiological section) - they should have at least one of these.
Systematic Approaches to a Successful Literature Review - Andrew Booth et al - encyclopaedic
Doing a Systematic Review: A Student's Guide - Angela Boland et al
An Introduction to Systematic Reviews by David Gough et al
That's the answer I was going to write, only more extensive. One thing to note, though - just being "systematic" does not make a SLR good. It is perfectly possible to do a highly systematic but also terrible literature review.
Wikipedia:
A systematic review (also systematic literature review or structured literature review, SLR) is a literature review focused on a research question that tries to identify, appraise, select and synthesize all high quality research evidence relevant to that question.
One among many roughly equivalent definitions easily found on the web. Some place a higher emphasis on having precisely defined criteria for defining "high quality" and "relevant", so it might be worth doing a systematic review of these definitions and synthesizing a combined definition from them.
This question is a bit older, but I thought I would add a couple other suggestions for resources to hopefully help anyone else with a similar question.
Grant and Booth, 2009 (https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-1842.2009.00848.x) offers a typology of 14 different types of reviews, including systematic reviews, and compares and contrasts between the different types in detail in terms of their methods, strengths, weaknesses, and applications. Their basic description of a systematic review is: "Seeks to systematically search for, appraise and synthesis research evidence, often adhering to guidelines on the conduct of a review".
I have also included below two examples of manuals that describe systematized review guidelines in detail.
The Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions (https://training.cochrane.org/handbook/current) is one of the most widely recognized resources for planning a systematic review, particularly in the health sciences though it is also used by other fields (including I would imagine software engineering). Cochrane was also one of the earliest organizations to produce and publish systematic reviews. Their handbook provides a comprehensive description of their systematic review requirements and best practices, which they update regularly.
Similar to Cochrane, there is the Collaboration for Environmental Evidence which also publishes its own manual on systematic reviews that may be more applicable to other fields in the life sciences (https://environmentalevidence.org/information-for-authors/).
More recently, I find that Prof Justin Paul has published a few good articles (guidance) on systematic literature review (SLR) [See his 2019-2022 articles in Google Scholar].
Among those, this could be particularly helpful: Paul, J., & Barari, M. (2022). Meta‐analysis and traditional systematic literature reviews—What, why, when, where, and how?. Psychology & Marketing. https://doi.org/10.1002/mar.21657. According to this article (also see Table 1 for details),
SLR method is considered to be a scientific and highly informative
method for systematically collecting, reviewing, and synthesizing
research findings on a particular topic to determine what is known –
and what is not known — at domain.
Regarding extra steps in SLR - a current trend is to use software R for collecting literature for review quickly. A few videos are available online, and these 2022 articles could help: SLR on Cybersecurity, SLR on safety and security elements in omnichannel Retailing.
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14326 | Am I allowed to publish reviews submitted for courses in open-access journals?
Question is rather self explanatory.
I understand that the article was submitted within the context of a course within the university, but it is nonetheless my intellectual property. I also generally cannot seem to get a clear answer from the university's staff.
Generally, is it acceptable and legal to submit an article or review submitted within the context of a course to a journal for publication?
Does it really make any difference to your question whether the journal is open-access?
I cannot see anything in general that could prevent you from submitting a report written in a course to a journal. There are of course several issues you need to be aware of. First, did you do the entire work yourself from coming up with the idea through researching the topic and writing? You need to look if someone else's "intellectual property" is involved. Second, you do not state under what circumstances your report was written. Submitting a manuscript to a journal involves meeting certain standards so under what I would consider normal circumstances, course reports would not be in shape for publication. One obvious reason for this is that reviews typically involves reading and summarizing/synthesizing a very large number of papers, work that cannot fit into the short time span of a course. So, in general, I doubt the scenario you describe would work without significant extra work. I have no doubts the core of a useful paper can be achieved within a course format but from there to publication is a different story. So without additional details, it is difficult to assess the likely success but the principle stands, yes it is acceptable and legal as long as the work adheres to general publication ethics.
Thanks Peter, you raise some great points. I would in fact spend much more time on the paper to make it up to par for journal publication, but you've made me question whether the professor of the course would indeed be a contributing author.
Normally, the professor would not be an author, otherwise, they could not give you a grade for your individual effort--coursework normally assumes that the students who receive the grade did the work themselves. The professor might be thanked in the acknowledgements section, but should not normally be considered a coauthor.
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14504 | How can my students learn to value the rules of academia?
I teach a course in academic writing covering the writing aspects, the very basics of research skills, such as referencing works, plus related college skills. At this point in the term, quite a number of foreign students have begun to express frustration:
Some wish they can organize their papers in more “creative” ways.
Some want to share their feelings and personal experiences.
Some see the style guide rules as overly pedantic or finicky.
They don't like the many “restrictions” dictating how they should gather information and organize and present their ideas.
I compiled a short list explaining why such strict conventions are necessary:
Predictably-organized writing helps readers to access information quickly.
The various research procedures generally raises the quality of the work, so others can benefit from the ideas presented.
Most of these students, however, have no intention of ever becoming “academics”, and maybe they don't care so much benefiting readers. They just want to get a degree and get a good job.
Can I help them to see some personal benefit to learning all of these conventions?
why can't they be creative ?
They can indeed write in any way that they find comfortable. Then they should call the result a draft and rewrite it. "Good writing is good re-writing," if I'm remembering correctly the wise words of a textbook that I can unfortunately no longer identify.
...don't care so much benefiting readers. They just want to get a degree and get a good job. — "Oh, sorry, you want the plumbing department; they're down the hall."
I'd consider changing the title to say "rules of academic writing".
The points you list are key, and a good starting point. I am not sure you need to add to that list but rather expand on the points to set them in a wider perspective.
There are several misconceptions that needs discussing. There is the idea that academic (scientific) writing is complicated and uses difficult language. Well, it does not have to be, and really should not be. With the huge onslaught of information, we must all learn how to express ourselves concisely and clearly. This is an art that requires training, not only in science but also in writing. Regardless of which sort of work we have, assuming communication is part of it, we need to be able to get our points across. Hence it is key to impress on students the importance of learning to write well. So point at the goals: being able to present information in a way that it can be understood by the intended recipients. You then need to be able to take complicated issues and express them clearly and in language that can be understood. Understanding terminology and concepts is the basis for being able to explain them and making necessary simplifications. Badly written reports will not serve the author, the company (equivalent) the author works for, or the recipients who need the information. I therefore think it is important to make these wider perspectives clear to students.
Companies usually have very strict rules for how reports should be written and formatted. Getting used to following such instructions may seem like a limitation, but understanding the necessity is a good preparation for the work place. With commercial reports come legal aspects that puts much restriction on how to express oneself. Learning about such rules and restrictions is therefore a key to become a successful contributor in the future, inside and outside of academia.
The fact that most (if not all) employers look for people who are good at presenting information, written as well as in speech should be emphasized (often included in social skills). These skills require much training and a solid foundation to build on. Courses in scientific writing and presentation as well as term papers and other reports (including a final thesis) are all parts of this education.
So, in the end, I am totally convinced that skills such as these will make a difference when applying for jobs. We just need to point out the fact. Getting feedback from employers about the necessity for these skills to share with the students is very valuable. Some students have better basic skills than others but none are good at writing concisely and clearly without the training we can provide. It is also important to make students understand that in the longer term they will have to develop their own skills, not just take whatever is served and think it is enough. It is a life-long learning experience which requires solid a foundation. and that is what we can offer.
+1. I work in one of the larger software companies and work on specifications for software developers, user stories and so on. I shudder to think what would happen if we got "creative" with the way we presented the information. As you write, the point is to get the information across, and there are good reasons why a set of rules evolved. On the other hand, we should of course be as creative as possible in the content. It might be best to explain the difference to the students. "Save your creativity for what you say, don't spend it in how you say it!"
Some wish they can organize their papers in more “creative” ways.
Some want to share their feelings and personal experiences.
Some see the style guide rules as overly pedantic or finicky.
I'm not sure why there are "rules" about organizing papers, and what's wrong with more "creative" approaches. As for style guides, they are often overly pedantic and finicky, and in any case are mostly appropriate for an actual publication.
It's possible you're referring instead to the way to organize a paper (in terms of introductions, related work, methods, discussion, and so on). In which case you can explain the particular roles these components serve, while emphasizing that these components achieve a certain purpose and if that purpose can be achieved using other methods, there's nothing wrong with it.
As for sharing feelings and personal experiences, it's common for students with little experience of writing formally to confuse the "what" with the "how", because they're focused so intently on the "how". One way to help them is to identify places where they're spending too much space on process words, and ask them to describe the outcomes instead. In other words, their goal should be to describe WHAT was done, rather than WHO did it, in order to ensure that the process can be repeated by someone else.
I would encourage a peer-exchange assignment that is not marked. Each student writes a technical paper (or maybe a short technical paper), and then each student has to read every other person's paper and then "mark" them on a scale of criteria such as "clarity of presentation" and "I was able to decipher the main ideas of the paper" and "This paper was easy to read" and "I clearly understood the technical contributions of this paper".
After they finish that with others' papers, then they should go back and read their own paper, and then mark their own paper. (I would also recommend in parallel that you or other markers also mark the paper to "check" that the marks given to the particular paper are not outrageously out of line).
By comparing their own work with those of others, they will get exposure to a large number of different writing styles, get constructive feedback, and a large portion of the class marking will be done for you as well. With so many papers to read, many of them will start getting a feeling of what works, what doesn't, what they skip, what they absorb, and so forth.
I wish I could say that I thought of this all by myself, but many of the ideas were mentioned in a talk by Scott Klemmer about innovation and evaluating innovation in a massively open course situation.
Consider emphasizing the potential personal benefits that come with good communications skills:
Organizing information in an easily accessible manner makes others more likely to read your writing and follow your thoughts.
Presenting ideas concisely helps make your idea more accessible, and therefore make it more likely that the reader will actually understand your point.
Presenting methodology along with your idea demonstrates transparency, showing that you have nothing to hide, making you appear trustworthy.
Citing other people's work has two benefits: Firstly, it demonstrates your knowledge scope by showing that you're familiar with the literature, and secondly, it improves your standing with the people you cited, as it shows them you found their work useful.
All of these apply to academia, but apply equally to all other areas of life. I used to work in academia, and I know work in operations for a health care company doing analytics. I use all of the above when I write white papers, and I have seen numerous times how following these guidelines helps others understand, appreciate, and build upon your work.
By emphasizing these points you may be able to better connect with your students.
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12056 | Is it common practice to remove an author's name from a paper?
I work as an instructor at a university. I am not a graduate student there and my responsibilities end at teaching. Recently, a supervisor from another department asked me to prepare an article for their department to use, for some extra pay. The subject aligned well with my background and recent research.
When I finished the article, which involved additional research and several weeks of work, I put my name as author, as I would any other paper. After I finished, the supervisor requested that I completely remove my name, as he wished to submit it to the leader of his department, assembled together with some students' work.
Is that at all unusual that someone would request that I remove my name from a paper?
Repeat after me: "Hell no."
The question in the title is phrased in an opposite way as the question in the content. This makes any "yes/no" question potentially ambiguous.
It is clearly unethical, but also unusual. If I were ethically challenged and in that supervisor's position, I would just accept your paper and remove your name myself - leaving you none the wiser.
@emory That way they'd risk ending up with the original author filing a complaint, adding probably another felony to the charges they'd be facing afterwards. By trying to convince OP into "voluntarily" removing their name, they'd basically increase the chances OP would never whistle-blow.
I do not agree with this approach but I have known colleagues that feel that workers that are hired and paid to do specific work on a project (lab techs, etc...) should not get authorship but should get placed in the acknowledgments. Perhaps that is what is motivating this person.
@KennyPeanuts Good thing there's a specific question on that subject now: What are the minimum contributions required for co-authorship
To clarify: Is this paper is for internal use only, or will it be submitted for publication (in a scholarly journal, or elsewhere)? Most of the answers seem to have in mind a scholarly journal publication, in which case removing your name would be egregiously unethical, but for an internal paper it's slightly fuzzier.
Not to disagree necessarily with the negative answers here, but I would first ask the colleague, why do you need my name removed, in order to submit the paper? Are you wanting to take credit for it? After all, he did ask you, rather than just removing your name himself. I'm just saying it would be good to hear more about his thought process before assuming the worst motives.
" ... to use, for some extra pay" i think there are some issues regarding authorship if it is some kind of hired work, sounds that here is some kind of (verbal) contract. Work for hire can have effects on authorship: "It is an exception to the general rule that the person who actually creates a work is the legally recognized author of that work." see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Work_for_hire
I think your name needs to be on it, but maybe not as corresponding author. The corresponding author will have to field all the questions about it.
As a bit of an aside, it seems to be becoming more and more common for someone whose job title is "technician" to be an author - their contribution to the work is often a substantial part of making an experiment work. My point relevant here, is that not being part of the academic branch of a university does not cut you out of authorship (which is about work, not affiliation).
From what you describe this is serious misconduct.
This is a "slam-dunk" case, provided you have a paper trail.
If you have both done research for the paper as well as wrote the first draft, then your colleague is required to give you co-authorship on the paper. (In fact, there's a strong case that you should be the first author, not your colleague.)
So I would agree with Damien that you should "politely but firmly" make your case to your colleague. If he refuses, then speak to the "leader of the department" and present your evidence.
I would also make sure not to work with this colleague again in the future!
The paper trail is really important. If you have an email from that colleague, that's solid enough proof. If you worked on a university computer/network location that is being regularly backed up, you will have date stamps on your work, too. Without the paper trail, it may get shaky, and the department head may just side with the higher-than-you-ranked colleague -- simply because they are here to stay, and you, as a non-regular faculty, can be tossed out if you make too much noise.
An episode I personally witnessed:
A married grad student at a top university in a semi-experimental field told one of her two PhD advisers that she was pregnant 3 months before the dissertation defence (the baby was due 5 months after the defence). He replied "congratulations, I suppose" and sent her an e-mail (the same day) telling her that he was removing her from the author list in one of their joint papers. To say that she was shocked is an understatement. After much agonizing she replied to him and all the other paper authors, listing her contribution to the paper and expressing a surprize that this does not merit her being one of the authors. The advisor apologized and her authorship was reinstated.
In short: never surrender.
That was plain cruel .( similarly, a friend of mine learned that her work at a previous postdoc position was published by her former supervisor without any mention of her name. I'm starting to wonder whether there is some gender discrimination involved or whether these supervisors are dumbsh*ts in general
[facepalm] Good for her!
Just to round up the discussion, there are situations where you want to have your name removed -- when you are not satisfied with the quality of the work in the paper. I am a statistician, and I have heard of cases when a group of substantive researchers would ask a statistician for initial guidance, do the (wrong) analysis on their own, and stick the statistician's name into the list of authors to make their paper more credible. I have also heard of really weird situations when statisticians from pharma industry did not want their names on solid papers so as not to signal to their competitors that their firm is working on this new type of a drug. In either case, the initiative of having the name removed comes from the co-author themselves, not from the lead author.
Other than that, I have +1ed most answers here. As most others, from your description the situation appears to be that of plagiarism and a blatant violation of your authorship rights.
+1 That's a very good point, a colleague of mine did indeed request others to not use their name in a publication since they didn't exactly agree with the interpretation of the results... Though in this case OP sounds rather fond of their work, and probably should be
If someone wants to steal your research for whatever purpose, he is a thief. It is not acceptable in academic world to do such thing, but as far as I know, such things can happen quite often in comparison how unethical it is. You have to resist and you have to change or expel your supervisor as soon as possible. If he use your work without your name, you can / and you have to use it against him, (with help of 3rd party, who will "accidentally" find this) so such thing will not repeat in the future and you will have no strikes back. Academic world should be (and unfortunately it is not) free of parasites.
That last statement should not only hold for Academia... Anyway, I would avoid the "accidental" exposure but instead really expose. It is incontestably wrong behaviour by the supervisor and there should be no conspiracy-like behaviour on your side - such things always backfire and are the first step towards becoming just like that supervisor
L- @Tobias : you could be right, if we want to practise -Christian love your neighbor- style, but if you start to tolerate or not to fight the parasitism, you will finally become a part of such behaviour. (and "having a quiet word with the leader of the department" have lot of + here above) ... And you never know, if the leader of the department is not involved in this. Friendly 3rd party is just better. If you think that you can deal with parasites direct and straight way, I do not think so. You have to be more outsmarter than Afghan partisan to successfully deal with this.
Ah yes, the exposure does not necessarily have to be restricted to some superior of accused person, but rather directly at the universities chancellor, or even directly to the local media. No, I certainly did not intend to mean Christian love your neighbor-style, rather the opposite. What I meant to say was, don't let the exposure look like an accident but make sure they know you exposed their behaviour on purpose and will do it again
L- @ Tobias ... and then your scientific career was ended. Absolutely not. Direct way is not good to deal with a parasitism as they are already prepared in advance to strike back, in case something like this happen. Heroes dies young.
You consider exposing corruption a career limiting move? Well, if that is really what would happen I'd be more than happy to not make career in that field. I agree there may be more subtle ways to handle this - first of all a direct talk to said supervisor might clarify a lot - but ultimately you'd also harm your university more by supporting a cover-up of this instead of having it sorted out right away
Ok, this depends on the situation. If you expose it directly, you will get a strike back for sure. If you think you can bear it... no problem. I prefer to expose parasitism indirectly, but bigger in its consequences, what SHOULD end in terrible death of the poor parasite.
I hope you're not suggesting literal death ;-) But I agree, said parasite's scientific life should be put to a quick end, not necessarily painless.
from shared experience - parasites dies in pains... EVERYTIME, because they depend on their living from work of others and on expenses of the others and they worry the most of lost of influence. They better sell their soul to the devil, than give-up their influence. Therefore clever strategy is a key.
My answer assumes the worst case, namely that said supervisor indeed attempts to claim authorship for your work. As LarsH justly pointed out, you might first want to clarify this is not a severe misunderstanding by having a talk with said supervisor, i.e. why would he want you to do such a thing (and please don't go down the path of asking "ok, assuming I did, what's in it for me?"). There may be a sensible argument, but personally I doubt it, thus let's assume he basically wants to publish your work as his:
Not only is this unusual and unethical, it is against all scientific conduct and might even be a felony to press charges against. This would warrant said supervisor to face severe consequences like being fired or having their PhD/tenure disavowed. Do however not attempt something stupid like blackmailing them - instead, assuming you have sufficient prove of this, expose them immediately since this is intolerable misconduct. (If you don't have prove, treat carefully though, since this might backfire into you ending up being "that jerk jealous of the "real"* scientists")
* No offence meant, but unfortunately in the event of doubt rank all too often outranks common sense
I don't like it very much either, but I doubt very much it is a criminal violation in most jurisdictions. Otherwise politicians would have to start writing their own speeches or at least crediting their speechwriters.
@emory Well, would they truly publish said paper without attributing the author it would obviously be fraud, and independently of whether it's a legal crime it certainly is scientific misconduct which the Scientific Community will most likely not react pleased to. And depending on how they requested OP to remove their name from the author list, e.g. harassment, threats or even blackmailing, it could quite well be a criminal act in every sense. And let's better not get started about politicians :P Though I'd certainly appreciate politicians actually citing their "sources" for a change...
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34330 | What unforeseen dangers might exist when choosing an open access textbook for a new subject?
I must create a new module (first time to do from scratch). In the past, I've had either existing course descriptions, textbooks, etc. as a base on which to structure a module which is new for me. This time, I have nothing (blank canvas).
My thought is to use an open access textbook and some initial looking makes me believe I can find something either usable as-is or that will allow me to mix-and-match the chapters into something suitable.
I'm concerned about what, if any, dangers might not be obvious to me at this stage but might cause significant problems for the students, myself, or the department later (say, after the semester begins).
After reading this question, I still find myself wondering.
If anyone has designed a course using an open access textbook in the past, what are the key considerations which should be considered for first-timers?
Why do you expect other dangers than if you would use closed-access textbooks?
@Raphael I don't expect anything. I just don't want to be blindsided mid-semester.
It's important to check the license used by the author to make sure that it's compatible with your use of the open access textbook.
Issues to check include:
Does the license allows you to redistribute the book to your students (e.g. by putting it on your course web site) or whether students have to get it from the author's web site. I would not be willing to use any material that I couldn't distribute to my students, because the author might pull it from the web at any time.
Does the license allow you to modify the work (e.g. fix typos or more broadly edit the work)? How are you required to describe any modifications?
If there are any restrictions on "commercial use", does your course constitute commercial use? Some people have argued that for-profit higher educational institutions can't use Creative Commons NC (CC-NC) licensed materials in courses.
Many open access educational resources are licensed under the Creative Commons license with varying options (CC-BY, CC-NC, CC-ND, etc.) The Creative Commons web site has clear explanations of how those licenses work. Many other resources have been put up on the web with no specified license. If there's no license specified you should contact the author and ask for permission to use the material.
And, of course, read through the book to make sure there aren't typos, misstatements, misleading phrases, or anything else that you will need to warn the students about, or that might cause you to select another book. (He says, after having been technical proofreader on a book that he wouldn't subject any student to.)
Determining whether the open educational resource is of adequate quality is very important, but not something that I discussed in my answer.
FWIW, @keshlam's advice applies to any material you make students read. (Yes, also your own. Especially your own.)
@Brian, you said that some people have argued that some institutions shouldn't be able to use works licensed under CC-NC. Were those arguments compelling? Is there some class of schools that I might not be considering?
The general issue is that there's no easy dividing line between "commercial" and "non-commercial" use of materials. There are gradations between public universities, private non-profit universities, and private for-profit universities such as the University of Phoenix in the US. It has certainly been argued by some that the private for-profit schools like University of Phoenix should not be able to use CC-NC materials. Ultimately, that's something that would have to be decided by the courts. I am not a lawyer, but it's hard for me to draw a line.
Please remember that it is always possible to negotiate with the author. I think that the doubts that Brian explained are a thing, but asking the author is probably the best thing to do in those cases.
I think Brian's answer is perfect, but let me be a bit more clear: the answer is none.
As others have said better, one crucial quality for material course is quality: if you had an excellent "closed" textbook and a mediocre open access one, you should choose the better one, for the sake of your students.
But in this case I don't think you can actually choose, and this is for the better: you can start off with an open access textbook, and you probably can make it better.
"Openness" of things boils down to their license. They are often (as said) Creative Commons:
CC-BY-SA allows you to do whatever you want with the original material, and create your own derivative works without even asking, provided that you release your material with the same license. For example, Wikipedia articles have this license: everyone builds on the previous version of the page, the license persists, the article (often) gets better.
CC-BY-NC allows you to do everything without even asking, provided that you do not have a commercial purpose. Brian's response hints that this is maybe tricky, but I'll come to that.
CC-BY-ND is rare, but CC-BY-NC-ND is common: it is the strictest version of Creative Commons, and in practice you can use and share the material, but not have commercial purpose and create derivative work without asking.
This is important: you can't do it without asking.
Of course, you can directly ask the author, and I doubt very much you can't negotiate a way to use the material as you want. It is possible you'd have to pay, but this is the norm with closed textbooks.
Creative Commons are licensed used to share our creative works: the open access-open knowledge movement advocates for a more flexible copyright system in which people are allowed to share and build things together.
The only thing you should pay attention, thus, are the different licenses of the different materials involved: if you want to create a new textbook, for example, you should check them and ask/negotiate permission if needed.
Copyright-wise, things can't get worse than with closed-access content.
Hope this clears a little.
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36963 | Is there any evidence that students are more likely to watch a video over reading homework?
As background, many of my students fall into the "un-prepared" for university category. This has introduced many challenges. Some challenges are easily handled when a student is sincerely interested in learning (they want to know what to read and I guide them appropriately).
More challenging is that these students are not native-speakers of English yet they are studying in English. Again, those who work hard do well. Those who do not work hard, do poorly.
I am looking for a way to encourage ALL students to spend more time outside of class studying. To this end, I am considering composing some videos (a significant time commitment on my part) which will teach material that I do not cover in class.
This question discusses how to identify the reason students are not doing home work and this questions discusses how to make best use of videos as homework. However, I am asking something different.
I have done some surveying of students and many of them say that they prefer watching videos over reading. What I really want to know is whether anyone has seen or has researched the increased likelihood that a student will actually follow the homework because it is a video as opposed to in a textual format.
I do not want to get into the issues of punishment here. The students generally know that less homework = lower scores but they think they can still pass and that is all they care about. Sadly, I care more about their education than they do.
This is a very interesting question... I don't know the answer, but I do know that a major disadvantage of videos is that they generally have a much lower density of information than texts. That, however, says nothing about their efficacy in gaining compliance...
You could run a study where you make or find videos about topics that will be covered on a single test. Compare this with pervious test where video was not used - see if there is s difference :)
Part of this might depend on the length of the videos. Students might be more likely to watch 5- or 10-minute videos than 30- or 40-minute videos, though I'm unaware of a formal study supporting that theory. Also, some research suggests that says humor can be very effective in the online/blended environment. If you inject a little humor in your videos, they'll be more watchable.
@sevensevens Yes, I am thinking of exactly that....but it takes a lot of time to make these videos so I would like to see what has been done before making that kind of investment.
I don't understand the question. Isn't homework something you do? Are you asking whether students should make videos intead of writing?
@JeffE I am playing a bit loose with term "Homework" considering it any work done between class sessions. This includes (but is not limited to) reading/watching/gaining an understanding in some other way. Some of my students simply do not do the assigned reading, which severely limits in-class discussion. So, my question is whether they would be more likely to watch a video since they don't like to read.
@earthling Again, I'm confused, although perhaps this is a difference in fields. The obvious way to encouraged students to do the assigned reading is to ask them to do something that requires understanding (the material presented in) the assigned reading. If they can't demonstrate understanding, they shouldn't pass. If they can demonstrate understanding, why do you care if they actually read the material? And if you never ask them to demonstrate understanding, what incentive do they have to read?
@JeffE You make a very good point. However, there is one class that I teach where assessment is done by someone in another country (so, for that class I'm really a tutor). In that class, I cannot control whether they pass or not but I would still like to find the best way to encourage them to learn.
@JeffE To be clear, I want to facilitate in-class discussions but that requires students to prepare outside of class. There is a single assessment at the end of the semester and students tend to ignore any work until just before the assessment.
There is a single assessment at the end of the semester — So change that. Give them grades, even if they don't "count". Collect statistics. After a few semesters, start showing the strong (?) correlation between your informal grades and the real grades.
It's been a while since I was a student, but I think it's still worth saying this:
I find it easier (as in less effort) to just sit through a video than read a book.
But: If I actually want to learn something or I have a specific task to solve, I find the linear format of videos extremely constraining, and I find them frustratingly slow. Like most people, I read much faster than normal talking speed. I can also skim texts easily, and find the relevant part, or go back and check a formula again. This is not possible with videos. There's a reason for taking notes in class instead of just recording it: a recording is not going to be useful for preparing for the exam.
You mentioned that many of your students are not native speakers of English. This is a big reason to avoid videos in favour of written material. I am not a native speaker either, and even though for the past few years English was the language I used the most, I still prefer watching English-speaking films with English subtitles. When watching videos there will always, always be at least a few words I can't catch or I can only comprehend with a few seconds' delay. Listening is simply more work for my brain than reading, and makes it just a little bit harder to pay attention to the content.
My personal opinion on the matter (no more than an opinion!) is that some students are indeed more likely to watch videos than read texts. But that's only because it feels like less effort to them. In reality videos are going to be less efficient at communicating information. They will require significantly more time commitment from you and they will require more time commitment from motivated students as well, who would be able to learn faster from written material. But yes: I do think unmotivated students are more likely to watch a video than to read a text.
Personally I find it very frustrating when the only material available is a video because it just slows me down and forces me to take notes I wouldn't need to take if I already had written material ...
I should have mentioned that I work in physics which will influence my viewpoint. I really have no idea about management subjects.
Your answer fits very well with my students. Thanks!
I am currently involved in a research project that is associated with the study of the influence of LMS in a blended learning environment. I also use LMS to teach courses.
Every student has a different learning style. Visual learners will prefer video over text. But to engage the other students, you may think of activities that could be performed outside the class, if you are using an LMS. E.g. you could give them 2 minute quizzes they could solve from home, or create educational games.
As a student, I would like to throw in my two cents...
Videos are incredibly useful and I think that more professors would be wise to create/use them. When studying or working on a project, I often cruise right on over to YouTube and begin searching for videos on the particular topics that I need to know about. Specifically, I like to use lecture videos. If I have a mid-term coming up and my professor had videos available...my study time would be cut and my retention would be better. It is a very efficient use of time on our end.
Why are they so great? Because I can pause at any time I need some time to write something down and I can watch any part or the whole thing as many times as I want to until the information I want really sinks in.
To support this, all I need to do is point to Khan Academy. Nearly all of my classmates know what Khan Academy is and most of them actively use the site to help them with math. I've actually watched most of the Khan Academy videos for personal development completely unrelated to anything that I was studying in school. They're fun to watch and, yes, there is a lot of learning going on for me.
Concerning video vs. text, I have recently taken to learning the Java programming language. I bought the most recommended books and started to get going. I've come a long way and I am starting to get the language down. The booster for this, though, was the innumerable videos on YouTube explaining the Java language for beginners. The books are great, but I really got my best impact from the videos. My learning curve was far steeper from the videos than the books.
Videos...very effective teaching tools!!
Videos are incredibly useful and I think that more professors would be wise to create/use them. — This statement is like fingernails on a chalkboard for me: is it "wise" for a student to study the course material regardless of whether videos are used or not? What is your opinion on that?
In my current position I create mini-LMS (Learning Management Systems) solutions for our large company. Breaking these up by topics and groups much like SE does. My systems hold almost anything - videos, pdfs, spreadsheets, elearning, quizzes, games, online content (like SE).
I am also a stat head and track everything that goes on all the way down to the time a person takes to answer a question - and if they are in the same browser what sites they visited during that question.
Some things that may help you:
For long elearnings people generally skipped to the quiz at the end and kept taking quiz until they passed.
People don't watch long videos. Anything over 15 minutes have super high drop rates. Those under 7 minutes are generally watched.
People generally don't read through long documents unless they are told to. We get way more hits on web content then we get people opening up docs. This flipped about 5-6 years ago and is getting worse. To the point were we may do away with documents.
If you want people to really look at something there are three keys: fear (that they may get a bad score, not pass, look bad, whatever), entertainment (lack of professionalism and boring stuff), and interaction (have users do something every once in a while other than read/listen).
What learning on my systems do the best. Unequivocally it is blended web learning. An example page may contain a few paragraphs of explanation, a video, few more paragraphs, a video, a few more paragraphs, and a couple of questions. Don't make the questions "homework" questions. They should be easy to answer if the read the page and watched the videos. The 2-3 questions should take 30 seconds.
If you don't have a system that can accomplish this I am available for hire. Just kidding. Just get your content and video on a page and give them the quiz from somewhere else (a link maybe) or even on paper. Your goal should be to mix 4-7 minute videos with graphics and information. Keeping the videos shorter also makes it easier to change things up if something changes whether it be the info in the video or the curriculum.
Thanks for this. It is nice to hear from someone with the data.
I totaly agree, that videos should be short, 5 minutes is a maximum.
It is not possible to keep students involved in the learning process, if videos are longer.
I think that the best is to create a blended learning environment, refering to a text and including activities to reinforce learning. Videos should be part of it.
Moodle or Google Classroom could be used for this. Activities and videos could be then embedded into pages and show/hide when needed. Also, Quizlet is a very good tool to help learning.
An other advantage of using a such environment, is that the learning material is always available, even from student smartphones or tablets...
Hope this helps a bit :o) Phil
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25853 | Where to draw the line when giving feedback?
When teaching undergraduates, I find myself trying to balance making them stretch to produce good work and giving them guidance. I must admit in my own undergraduate and graduate studies I rarely if ever asked for feedback (plenty of missed opportunities for me). That might color my judgment on this question.
This question is somewhat related to this other one Drawing Lines when Giving Ideas to Undergraduate Students; however, this question is more focused on when to give feedback and when not to.
I generally do quite a few in-class activities (and am considering automated online no-penalty testing) and I consider those ample chances for students to gain feedback which does not affect their final grade (formative feedback). Most modules in my department are assessed by one written report. While I do have the ability to change how my modules are assessed the question still remains:
Does reviewing drafts and giving advice on how to improve their graded submission (prior to actual submission) maximize student learning?
I am interested in any research in this field as well as expert opinions.
Arguments for giving feedback before submission
Students may genuinely not understand what is expected of them (although I do feel I cover it quite well in dedicated review sessions)
Students may work harder when things are made crystal clear
Arguments against giving feedback before submission
Students may end up looking to the teacher for too much assistance and will, therefore, become more dependent where we want to foster independence
Students may be lazy and simply wait for the teacher to tell them exactly what to write seek excessive hand-holding when deciding what to write.
In student surveys asking for what students would most like to see more of, students primarily choose to have more feedback of their drafts prior to submission. This is unsurprising since (almost) everyone wants a better grade. However, I'm thinking that reviewing of drafts is actually hindering student learning.
Your questions asks "is it a good idea," which sounds like it could lead to lots of people giving their own opinions. Are you looking for research on this subject? Experiences from educators? Please clarify.
@ff524 Thanks for pointing that out. I have edited my question accordingly.
Students may be lazy and simply wait for the teacher to tell them exactly what to write — That's not what "feedback" means.
@JeffE Yes, it was a bit of an exaggeration of me but my point was that the students will seek excessive hand-holding. I've updated the question.
Hand-holding is also not what "feedback" means.
@JeffE I admit I might be under a wrong impression here. Could you please clarify for me (or point me somewhere) explaining what you believe is appropriate and inappropriate feedback? I've always considered showing students what they did wrong and guiding them through detailed examples (for me that is hand-holding) how to correct their mistakes. Perhaps my feedback simply needs to be less deep?
Pointing out errors (or better yet, asking leading questions that expose errors), guiding students through related examples that illustrate general techniques, guiding students through a detailed solution of the actual homework problem after they submit their own solutions, and saying "You need to figure out the details yourself." are all appropriate and useful feedback. Guiding them through a detailed solution of an assigned problem before the due date is hand-holding.
@JeffE Thank you for this. Are you saying that teachers should not let students know if they have made mistakes (in what they submit) before they submit their work for marking?
At least sometimes, yes, but it's not black and white; you have some freedom in how to point out errors. Asking "Did you check your answer when x=0?" gives away less than "Your answer is wrong when x=0", which gives gives away less than "You dropped a minus sign in step 4".
My personal experience (both as student and teacher) favors the clear-cut "I'll review one of your drafts" model. Other support notwithstanding, this gives control to the student: at which point do I want feedback on my whole work? What amount of effort do I put in before or after? How much time do I give myself to incorporate feedback? How much work won't be reviewed (because I do it after the review)? For the teacher, the amount of work is both predictable and manageable. The review should be detailed enough for the student to predict their grade roughly (say, A-B vs C-D vs fail).
A first point is to ask what is the purpose of the activity to be graded? Is it to test student's knowledge, or is it to provide a learning activity? If it is the former, then feedback before grading seems counter-productive. If it is the latter then the feedback is necessary to provide the sought effect.
I am experiencing this problem with student theses. In the system where I work, the thesis is considered an individual work and grading it should take into consideration qualities such as originality and independence and yet the student has a supervisor who should provide input. The task is caught in the middle between examination of a task and a learning experience; and each supervisor has their own take on where the limits are. So why is this such a mess?
The key lies in failing to define what is a learning experience and what is a test of knowledge or understanding. Hence it is necessary to try to define these points so that the division becomes clear to all concerned. The key lies in deciding the balance between the two. Feedback provided after grading is, in my opinion a lost cause since students have moved on to other activities and very few probably run through the comments. Better is then to, for example, build in the feedback into the grading. This can be done by setting a preliminary grade and stating that successfully working through (not just any work-through) comments to improve the task will provide additional points or step up to a higher grade. This may be incentive enough for most to do the extra work and for those who do not want to, well that will be their decision.
So a key ingredient will be to build in the feedback--improvement into the grading of the task. exactly how to do this will of course vary depending on the task at hand.
This is related to another issue I am dealing with (for which there are already other questions on this site): Should the teacher allow the student to increase their grade after submission (through re-submission)? From your answer, it seems you believe yes. However, I do see many students who will do the minimum of work on original submission simply waiting for greater detail during feedback to see how they should change their assignment. I really want them to work to submit their best on the first submission so I do not allow greater than the minimum passing grade on resubmit.
If it is the latter then the feedback is necessary to provide the sought effect. — I don't think it's so black and white. Every test of knowledge is also a learning experience. And often what we want students learn is how to solve problems without expert guidance.
Should the teacher allow the student to increase their grade after submission (through re-submission)? — The instructors I know who allow resubmission do so with a penalty. Most of them average the scores of both submissions. One will change the grade to 100% if the resubmission is absolutely perfect, which (among other things) means no arithmetic mistakes, no off-by-one errors, no sign errors, no spelling or grammar mistakes, no typos, and no missing commas.
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163706 | Failed at all meetings
I am a postdoc researcher in mathematics and finished my Ph.D. some month ago. I wrote three papers during my Ph.D., and I am the only author for two of them.
The day when I started my postdoc position, my mentor asked me "let's work", but I was not ready, so I made a lot of mistakes. My mentor works some area that is not close to me. We tried to work together, but I couldn't follow what they were working on it.
Monday, we had a meeting with her college about a project that I was working on. I gave a conjecture that I wanted to reach it, and then he gave a contradiction example for it and then left the meeting. I felt so bad.
Moreover, they don't treat me as same as when I came here. I feel they think I cheated them or I am weak or stupid because sometimes I feel they ignore me and they don't answer my emails as either. I asked them to write a recommendation letter for some job, but they didn't do it.
These problems made me think about whether I am a mathematician or a lucky guy that I wrote some papers. You can look at my previous questions and see that I had this problem in my Ph.D., but surprisingly I finished it.
I have had several meetings here, also some online meetings, that all were terrible. Now, I lost my self-confidence and am scared that I am losing my reputation due to the above problems and it will spread in the club soon or later that I am a stupid mathematician.
I wanted to quit academia for industry because of the above problems, but as you know, finding a job is very difficult now due to COVID-19, so I'm just looking for a postdoc position, which is very difficult.
To be honest, I don't have anyone to talk to about my problem (my Ph.D. supervisor doesn't listen to me) which is why I wrote here almost everything. What should I do to break all the failing and walk in the right direction?
Does this answer your question? How to effectively deal with Imposter Syndrome and feelings of inadequacy: "I've somehow convinced everyone that I'm actually good at this"
I moved the comments about imposter syndrome and answers in comments to chat.
First of all, OP, take a deep breath.
There are two well-used tropes on SE, one is 'get mental health support' and 'impostor syndrome'. Both have their place. And if you really feel it is a mental health issue, go for it.
However: I do not think your case is either. You have an objective (I do not say real, you will soon see why) reason to feel down. You have been just shoved to the side by an insensitive PI.
Of course your question is, were you just lucky in your PhD?
Yes, you may have been lucky that you had a good PhD topic. You may have been lucky that you just needed to scratch its surface and results would gush out. Yes. That's luck. That's researcher's luck, it's the luck of the one who can harvest it; the expert in the field. It may be luck or not, but it's still yours and deservedly so.
Others, say, equally talented to you, may have spent their whole PhD on some miserly results to be scraped together in some work paper, who knows? They were less lucky. Was it their fault? Not necessarily. They were good researchers, just picked the wrong topic.
Almost unavoidably, you will run into bad luck periods, but, on the long run, good research comes from honing your instinct on where good luck can be more regularly found to loiter around.
Let's move to the second one. Collaboration. Comes this guy spewing stuff at you and you are lost. You do not get them. Note: "them", not the "math". They confuse these two. They think you don't get the math, but that's not what happened - they simply didn't explain it properly.
Sometimes, you find people, where conversation flows naturally, as if you always had worked together. There is a natural intersection of ideas, even where you do not understand them, you fill it with insights and interpolations from your own experience, quite naturally. It is exhilarating to work in such conditions, and rare. But it happens. And it's the most fun science can be.
You got the opposite. You got some - perhaps famous - guy as mentor that you simply couldn't tango with. It's not your fault.
Or perhaps it is? Your PhD supervisor does not listen to you - well, perhaps your choice of mentors is what needs to be improved?
So, your mentor found a counterexample to your conjecture and left the room. What does he want to prove? That's simple to see one? That if you have not such superior vision into the field, you are not worth to discuss with? How did you get to this guy? Ask yourself this question.
Whether the counterexample may have been obvious, it may be not, I cannot judge. A famous chess master made once a complete beginner's blunder in the opening moves of a game. It happens. It's not nice, but it's not an excuse for a put-down.
If he is that dismissive of your work, cut your losses, and get a different mentor. Find colleagues, mentors etc. who you have a common language of mathematics, where you understand what they say when they say it (I do not say that you need to understand their math fully, only you understand what they communicate). Find a place where you intertwine into the scientific discussion. You do not have to be a Gauss, Galois or Grothendieck to be a good mathematician. Having luck is fair game if you put in your part of the effort (note: I say effort not talent - if you can do a PhD in math, that's a given).
TL;DR
You feel down for an objective reason, not for some mental health problem. You have been treated badly.
You are entitled to luck in the choice of your research topics. You were lucky in your PhD thesis. Expect also some bad luck in your career, but develop the scent for the good places.
Collaboration requires effort from both sides, not dropping packages and expecting someone to pick them up, which is what your mentor did. Perhaps that's the way to test you, but it's not a way to treat people. Get a different mentor.
As with luck, the right collaboration partner can make results come out easy. It will feel effortless and not because the partner does everything. Like luck, find where these people loiter around.
So, perhaps the one thing where you are really not yet good at is finding the right people to work with. Your supervisor, as well as your mentor are both not exactly the most ideal of colleagues. Maybe, however, you are just in a difficult location. Clearly that's something you should work on changing.
It's not your fault. You are entitled to researcher's luck. You are entitled to a proper explanation of fresh concepts, or else direction where to read them up before "wasting" the precious mentor's time. First and Foremost, you are entitled to be treated as a human.
Get out of there and either a mentor or position or even just visit to a group who are interested in your stuff and who you can communicate with.
Good luck. If it comes, it's yours.
Thank you very much for your answer. It seems you know my problem very well. Your answer makes me a bit better. I read your answer 3 times. Thanks again.
Postdoc hosts can sometimes be a bit insensitive to their new hires. I've seen it before - they tend to expect more of them than they do of their own grad students, and expect someone who's fully on board with their research agenda. What I tell my postdocs is that I don't expect any progress for at least 4 months from the day they start the job. This is the minimum it takes to read up on literature and be up to speed on how I work on problems.
Small comments can also have a really big impact, more than the advisor thinks. I would imagine that your host is not out to humiliate or demoralize you - what's the point of hiring you to begin with if that's the case? They probably made an offhand remark that rubbed you the wrong way. I remember that I suggested to my postdoc advisor that I start exploring a new topic X, and they just gave me this look like I was daft; I haven't touched that topic to this day.
Following the other answer given here, your postdoc host might not be aware of the issues you had during your PhD, so they're not being as sensitive as they can be.
What should you do:
Communicate with your postdoc host to set goals, expectations (so - study topic X, advise a grad student and publish one paper) and a work dynamic (weekly meetings? biweekly meetings?).
Don't be hard on yourself - you did successfully graduate, there's no reason to believe that you'll do badly in your postdoc.
If you feel that this is affecting you in a deeper way, talk to friends or loved ones, consult a professional on how to better handle your emotional state. There's absolutely no reason for you to suffer through things alone.
Good luck!
Thank you very much for your comment. 1) We had a regular meeting, but I couldn't follow what they are doing it and they told me since my postdoc is a year, I should do whatever I want because there is no time for learning. 2)I need to ask my university whether there is a mental health professional at our university.
Also from reading your question history here, it sounds as if you should talk to the mental health support on your campus as soon as you can. There may or may not be deficiencies in your ability as a mathematician that you also have been asking about, but just from reading what you share on academia SE you appear isolated, socially and otherwise, and troubled. I’m sure those around you want you to succeed (they just hired you!), but you could benefit from a professional trained to support people in your situation, helping you to put what you see and experience into perspective.
You're putting a lot of faith in "mental health care support" at OP's campus. I wonder if it is really that reliant. I mean, it's a good suggestion to try them, but...
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155546 | How can I politely tell a student that I already support him several times and that is enough?
I have a student who sends me emails twice a week showing me his updated dissertation. At first I supported him a lot. But he literally does what I say word by word and never goes beyond what I tell him in doing further research. I have been clear to him that his limits are the sky. But when he adds a small detail he sends me an email again asking me if that was okay or not.
I think he assumes that he will take a very high mark if I did not tell him exactly what he needs to do for his dissertation. I am a bit worried about how to reply to this student. As I am trying to be polite and nice and I do not want him to fail, but at the same time I need to be genuine.
Please give me advice on how to reply to such kind of students so that I do not offend them. I want to convey that I encourage them to do further research and it is okay to say something I disagree with as long as they support it with proofs and evidence.
What dissertation is this? PhD? Masters?
But when he adds a small detail he sends me an email again asking me if that was okay or not. - Do you mean this is twice a week? Or he sends emails 10 times/day in addition to these biweekly updates?
Is your impression that this is a problem of ability or caution? What if you gave him some more open-ended questions to work on, i.e. don't fill in as many of the details - so that if he did exactly what you told him to ("prove the Riemann hypothesis") it would make a great thesis?
@CaptainEmacs It is a Master student dissertation but also I get the same from Students who are doing a coursework question that is graded.
@Kimball twice a week
@BenBolker I think it is that he does not want to work further to push his boundaries he is reliant on what I say because I will mark his dissertation. So he wants to feel that he is safe in terms of getting high marks for minimal work.
You could limit the slots he can get feedback on. Is the student capable of carrying out your instructions? You may then want to gradually increase the scope of their task.
Does he know that he is judged on his work and not your work? You might want to make this clear. Another idea is to give him less precise instructions and maybe set boundaries for how often you'll look at his thesis. While I think it's reasonable to meet once a week to discuss progress, I'm not sure I'd read a thesis once a week.
Why is the student so insecure about his/her work? what is the root cause?
@Kimball I think this is the crux of it. In my undergrad, we had one lecturer who said "If you write down exactly what I've told you & repeat it back to me verbatim, you'll get 39%. You may have done at excellent job at it, but I will still fail you. School may have been about learning by rote and repeating it back, but university is about forming your own arguments, backed by evidence."
Is it actual helplessness (it sounds like it from the description)? Or fear of authority?
I strongly suggest to listen to @Kimball 's first sentence. I have been on the other end of this situation during my master's. I struggled hard, so I needed and received frequent help from my very patient advisor. In the end I was disappointed by my grade because "I did everything exactly as my advisor told me, so why is he not happy?" I wish he made clear that he expected me to do more than expand on his advice. (Yes, this should be obvious and yes, this is no answer to your question. This just emphasizes that expectations should be made clear.)
I'll assume you already have language that indicates your support. Don't give up on that.
But, ask him for two things. First, that he only asks for feedback once a week (or whatever you are comfortable with) and add a report on changes and why they were made.
Second, ask him to specify in the report things he is unsure about and to detail why he is unsure.
The goal is to get him to think more deeply about why he is doing things and to separate the simpler from the deeper things.
+1 Socratic method, aka the Tom Sawyer turnaround. Make them work for the help.
I think the key here is your insistence on “trying to be polite and nice” and telling the student “politely”. I can’t say for sure, but I’m guessing your desire to be polite is getting in the way of clear communication. I’ve seen this happen with people who are so afraid of upsetting others that a lot of the time when they want to communicate something it comes out all muddled because of the insistence on passing everything through a kind of “politeness encoder”. Usually the way this happens is the person who does this tends to think that the listener knows all about this encoding scheme and can decipher the message easily by applying the inverse “politeness decoder”. But this is simply not true, and the message is lost.
Be polite if you want, but first of all be clear. Have a frank talk with the student, explain the problem as you perceive it (with the politeness encoder dialed down to a minimum or turned off altogether), and brainstorm with the student some plan to get past this obstacle in his approach. Once the student understands what the problem is, he will be well-positioned to address it.
(+1) passing everything through a kind of “politeness encoder” --- This often happens when my wife wants me to do something, but it's phrased in such a manner that to me it comes across as "only do this if you really want to". I've mostly learned over the last 30 years which things I need to filter out the words "only" and "if you really want to". I'm also reminded of this book, which we saw at a bookstore and bought, and then read, shortly after it appeared.
@DaveLRenfro Reminds me of the short video "It's Not About the Nail" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4EDhdAHrOg
Could be a culture issue, too. German feedback may sound rude to an American and vague to a Russian.
@henning--reinstateMonica true. Reminds me of this discussion.
I want to convey that I encourage them to do further research and it
is okay to say something I disagree with as long as they support it
with proofs and evidence.
Then that is what you should say! Precisely that.
Dear X
I appreciate your desire to get things right but always relying on others may be counterproductive. I encourage you to do further research. It is okay to say something I disagree with as long as you support it with proofs and evidence.
I usually set weekly or so meeting to discuss progress of my students. They are free to contact me in between if something important/urgent comes up.
I'd handle a situation like the above with a short answer, if needed, or just "take another look, we'll talk about it next time".
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210379 | What should I do when a coauthor suggests I fluff up a manuscript?
I have worked on a project almost entirely on my own with some input from my main advisor.
Now I've drafted a manuscript, and I have received comments from my secondary advisor, who is also a coauthor, along the lines of: extend the abstract to include things similar to "why AI is important to humanity", move the derivation in the appendix to the main text to make it seem longer, cite his previous papers, etc.
I don't like the idea of adding unnecessary content to the paper, but I also don't want to tell him that directly. My main advisor wants me to revise based on the secondary advisor's comments before reviewing the paper. What should I do?
If you add the fluff that the secondary adviser wants, be sure to keep a copy of today's version, in case your primary adviser tells you to remove the fluff.
@DanielHatton It's related to electric vehicles.
@DanielHatton The paper is on a control algorithm intended for people already working on EV control. I started off the paper with "Machine learning is the traditional way of doing this, we are proposing another approach because it offers improvements xyz". The suggestion my coadvisor gave is along the lines of adding "We are shifting to EV and it is important that we do". Hope that makes a little more sense.
I commend you on not wanting to add fluff. Fluff detracts from the real content.
Others have noted that you should talk to your advisor, but I would first suggest talking to your secondary advisor and ask them to clarify their comments (especially if they were provided in text form). Explain your concern to them, and I suspect they will be able to defend their suggestions. I highly doubt that they see their comments as "fluff". For example, they want you to revise the intro in a way that you don't think is necessary - if you ask them about it you can get a better sense of why they want the intro revised, which means your revision will better address their concern
It's hard to answer this in the abstract. What you view as "fluff", others might view as "writing a good introduction" or "writing a more comprehensive literature review." The best advice is to talk to your advisor, who has already said you should revise based on what the secondary advisor says. If the secondary advisor has successfully published a lot of papers, I would say that's an argument in favor of taking their advice seriously. It seems likely to me that your advisors have useful tips for how to get a paper published.
I should add that my main supervisor hasn't seen the comments yet, he just wants to review the final version after everyone else has reviewed. I agree I may be biased here, I see lots of my coadvisor's work as incremental & "fluff" because of the way he approaches it, but you and everyone else is right that he probably knows more than me anyways. I will edit and try to get explicit feedback from my main advisor.
+1 for the main first few sentences, but I’d disagree with “If the secondary advisor has successfully published a lot of papers, I would say that's an argument in favor of taking their advice seriously.” Too many researchers thrive on hot air, buzzwords, and salami-slicing, publishing a lot of papers with relatively little serious content — the current academic ecosystem incentivises this, and is the worse for it. OP may be underestimating the genuine value of the suggestions, or may be quite right that this is fluff — and the co-author’s prolificness is compatible with both cases.
I cannot agree more. On my second publishable paper (law), I cut an entire section dealing with a review of other law view journal articles addressing similar topics because I decided it was unnecessary. The one reviewer comment was that I needed that very section. I was able to respond very fast since I could just add it back in from an earlier draft, but the point is that what I (then very inexperienced) thought was unnecessary padding they thought was essential. It got published after that was re-added.
SHORT ANSWER
Do add the "fluffy stuff", but mark it so that to clearly identify it for your primary advisor. One way to mark it would be to put it in italics, I describe below a more specific way to do so if you are using LaTeX.
LONGER ANSWER
If you use LaTeX, use the commands \markversion{LONG} or \includeversion{LONG} from the LaTeX package versions (which is distinct from version) to create the environment \begin{LONG}\end{LONG}, and put the "fluffy stuff" in such environments (or any other name than "LONG" that you might fancy).
If you need to adjust the length of your report, you can replace the command \markversion{LONG} by \excludeversion{LONG} in the header and see all such blocks disappear without any further effort.
Some personal notes:
I found useful to write quite "fluffy" articles, which I shorten at the time of the submission to a conference, using "LONG" and "VLONG" environments, so that to balance how much space and details I dedicate to each topic (especially in the background). This strategy might work for you too!
I (and the students I advised) found also useful to use a "TODO" environment for parts that I would like to expand later, in such a way that if I do not find the time or energy to do so, I can just use \excludeversion{TODO} to make all such indication disappear from the draft at the moment of sharing or submitting a draft.
I hope it helps!
The half-baked solution for this is "mark the added fluff in a visible way" when using a WYSIWYG editor like LibreOffice or MS Word that doesn't have a facility for the versioning you use in LaTeX.
Tell your advisor what you told us. Ask him to read the paper without the changes wished by your second advisor and with your concerns in mind. Point out that you are unsure and want explicit feedback regarding what you perceive as fluff. Ensure that if he agrees with the second advisor, you make the changes.
Hopefully your advisor understands that you are not reluctant to make the changes but are unsure, want a second opinion, and are willing to learn.
extend the abstract to include things similar to "why AI is important to humanity", move the derivation in the appendix to the main text to make it seem longer, cite his previous papers, etc.
These don't seem too bad. You would just be adding one sentence to the abstract, and I am sure you can write something more substantial than literally "AI is important to humanity". Moving the derivation does not add any fluff. Citing his previous papers only adds a handful of papers that might be unnecessary but might be helpful to the reader.
One potentially diplomatic approach is to make the changes that the co-author suggests, then tag your advisor for review on the places you don't like with something akin to "Not sure I like how I wrote this, thoughts advisor on how to improve?". This can make it seem like the advice itself was good but you doubt your ability to implement it.
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88871 | What should PhD students do if they submit a paper to two journals and a reviewer notices concurrent submission?
I am in a desperate situation. I made a mistake and committed academic misconduct.
I have submitted my article to two journals in parallel, let's say in j1 and j2. Once I received acceptance from journal j1 I wrote a withdraw email to j2.
However, after the article came online it was found by the reviewer of j2 that the withdrawal article was actually a parallel submission.
I am 3rd year PhD student and my professor was unaware of this act. How can I handle this situation?
Should I write an apology email to j2? If j2 accept the apology, will j1 keep the article or still it will be retracted?
What is the best way to come out of the situation?
*I am reviewer of both journals as well.
Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.
If you are a seasoned reviewer you should know the rules, so falling back on being an inexperienced graduate student probably won't hold water. So clearly this was less a 'mistake' and more of a 'gamble'. You should pull the article from both venues and state -unequivocally- that your advisor had no knowledge.
You didn't mention if your advisor was a co-author on the submission, but if he/she was, the infraction is even worse, because not only have you submitted without consent, you risked damaging their reputation with the journals as well.
The best path forward is to own your mistake wholly and apologize. On the positive side, it's not like you committed the mortal sin of fabricating data or plagiarizing - you violated a rule (and likely the terms and conditions of the journal). Probably not grounds for dismissal but you might be on a leash for a while.
Don't do it again! The rule is in place for several reasons, not the least of which is respecting reviewers' time and effort (reviewers' time is precious and usually pro-bono. We can't have every journal reviewing the same work).
The odd thing is that it was never a very good gamble. j1 and j2 have enough subject overlap to share reviewers and receive similar papers. The paper is in their overlap area. The probability that nobody involved in reviewing it for j2 would also read it in j1 must be close to zero.
I think your recommendation is far too severe; don't you think that the matter could be settled amicably without a retraction?
"You should pull the article from both venues and state -unequivocally- that your advisor had no knowledge." @Kumar I just want to jump in here to say that I don't think that this warrants withdrawal of an accepted paper. Just apologise to the j2 reviewer, and don't do it again. If he pursues it further you have a problem, but he may not You don't say exactly what the reviewer said/did. Ahd who did he communicate with regarding this?
@FaheemMitha I wouldn't go so far as to retract from both journals, but I do think both journals deserve an apology and the opportunity to decide for themselves if they are going to reject the paper. Only apologizing to j2 will get you in very hot water once j1 gets wind of it.
Gamble? Submiting to a journal is always a gamble. Breaking the rules just means disrespecting the disastrous and aged system of academic journals.
@innisfree Retraction might not be absolutely required, but telling both journals definitely is - you likely violated their submission rules. Most reputable journals will be very miffed at you for simultaneous submission and may even pull the paper post-acceptance because of it. You messed up your reputation, and if you don't want to damage it further, you need to be honestly contrite about it. This involves honestly apologizing to all parties about the error, and offering to pull the paper (i.e. removing any benefit from your deceit) is part of that.
@Džuris And the people working for them for free that you rely on to get published.
This is a faux pas, but retracting the article is unnecessary and wrong from a scientific standpoint. If the article were retracted it would suggest that something was wrong with the research, not that the author broke some arbitrary rules about not submitting your articles to competing journals. Yes we all understand why they are there, but the research literature shouldn't suffer as a consequence.
Can the published article really be pulled at this stage? It's gone online already, people have read it... you can't remove it from the community's mind. Not to mention the fact that the PDF has been cached in a dozen places.
I am not a PHD student. Why exactly is this bad?
@terdon Gow is it not disrespectful to the reviewers? If I have spent many hours reviewing a paper and then when I am about done notice that paper published in another journal, that was a complete waste of my time. And this is a very likely outcome of double submission.
Your best course is to write your professor, both journals, explain your reason sincerely, and let them handle the situation as they see fit.
Everyone make mistakes, and sometimes they are bad mistakes. In my opinion, trying to hide these mistakes or covering up would cost you more than the mistake itself in terms of academic reputation.
I would not advise writing at once to both the advisor and both journals. I'd go talk to my advisor - and my coauthors - first, immediately and face-to-face if possible; and this will definitely affect how I write the letter to the journal publishers.
The action can be altered, but main idea is to keep all the parties up-to-date.
TL;DR: Come clean with your advisor and coauthors first and hope that they help you.
Concurrent submission is a big no-no, because it means you are wasting the time of the reviewers and editors by creating twice as much work as is necessary and you are effectively queue-jumping by doubling your chances of acceptance, which is unfair to other authors. Unless you have a good excuse, people will be very unhappy about this.
You will need to talk to your advisor and coauthors before taking further action. They will find out sooner or later and it is best if they hear it from you first. You must explain what you did, why you did it, that it was a terrible mistake, and that you sincerely regret it. Hopefully they will decide to help you resolve the situation.
Your advisor and coauthors will need to help you apologize to the journals.
Everyone makes mistakes. The important thing is that you must rectify them as soon as possible. If you appropriately apologize, then hopefully it can be forgiven and you can move on having learned an important lesson.
Concurrent submission is nowhere near as serious as, say, falsifying data. I hope that you are able to learn a lesson from this and that your reputation can be recovered. Good luck!
+1 for letting your coauthors know first. As a coauthor, I'd want to know what happened and I'd want to proofread your apologies to the journals, because it'd be my reputation on the line as well.
I can't speak for how these journals will react, but i can say that as a conference program chair the course of action was to reject from both venues. My expectation would be for j2 to contact j1 and for j1 to rescind the acceptance.
Thanks for the answer. What if j2 somehow accept the apology, bearing in mind I served j2 as a reviewer and reviewed 10s of articles. Still j1 will cancel the acceptance of article?
I don't think serving as reviewer has any bearing.
As for the apology... that's up to them, and how seriously they treat the infraction will dictate what they do about it.
The question is: if you are that experienced as a reviewer - what was the reason for making the mistake? State that reason and apologise, perhaps they will give you the benefit of the doubt. However, I really do not hope your reason was "hedging", because that would be really not a good one to have.
If the answer was something other than hedging, I'd expect that to have come out in the question. My money is on hedging, and I agree, OP should have known better, and most submission systems explicitly ask this. If they did here, for either j1 or j2, it is inexcusable.
@FredDouglis: The article was already published; what would a rescension (sp?) mean, other than an official loss of credit? The file's floating on-line, too, and I bet the printed copies have gone out. Nobody's going to go rip the pages out of those...
I'm a bit confused about how Kumar posed the question and @einpoklum is making statements about how it is already published. Anyway, yeah, if it has already been formally published, it is much less likely that j1 will rescind it, but I really don't know all the details about how such ethical lapses are handled. If they wanted to, they could probably purge their online presence of the article, though printed copies would survive. But I imagine it's considered archival and immutable.
I think you have already got proper answers; however, the outcome of your apology depends on several factors.
1- if both journals belongs to same publisher I will expect a warning letter and maybe no further action will be taken.
2- If journals belongs to different publisher than you are in tricky situation. First you need to apologise to j2 and inform your apology to j1. If j2 rejects your apology I will expect strong action from j1; at least retraction of article and possible ban. However, if j2 shows flexibility and just issue a warning than there is a high possibility that j1 will endorse the warning issued by j2 and matter will solved.
My recommendation to is don't hide or don't try to play smart. Apologise and you should mention about your services to journal. Might be Editor will show little flexible behaviour based on your voulenteer work.
Finally, never repeat such mistake.
I actually have the opposite reaction. If they are the same publisher, I would think they are more likely to be bothered by the overlap, and more likely for the two EICs to communicate, meaning that it is IMHO more likely that j2 is peeved and gets j1 to rescind. If they are independent, j2 has no sway with j1.
If they viewed it all along as simultaneous bites with the intention to withdraw one, they wouldn't think copyright would ever come into it. Only a waste of time and breach of ethics. That being said, I have met Ph.D.s who have never been informed these rules apply. That's why it matters whether either submission system explicitly reminded the authors of this, as so many now do. If so, the apology rings hollow.
Downvoted; whether the journals have the same publisher or not has no bearing whatsoever on the issue. Parallel submission isn't frowned on because it creates legal issues for the pulbisher(s); it's an issue of professional ethics.
JeffE two different publishers adds difficulty to deal with two different set of rules. why its hard to understand :)
Like it was stated in the other answers, your co-authors should be aware of the current state of this situation and the fact of parallel submission itself.
In terms of informing journals j1 and j2, as I see it: you may write a brief message to j1 (editor?) just informing that the (accepted) article has been also submitted to j2 due to your neglect but it is withdrawn from there, and write an apology letter to j2 (it would be good if you specifically indicate that it happened due to your mistake, neglect, etc.). By writing to j2 (reviewer) you 'pass a ball' to j2. So, then it is up to j2 whether to accept your apologies, escalate it to the next level (e.g. by contacting j1 and asking them to withdraw your manuscript) or do something else.
You came here to ask an advice on how to handle this issue. But actually, you have no option.
Let your supervisor know, and he/she will tell you what you should do and how to handle it.
For me, your university has a bigger responsibility than you. Your university should educate you regarding the scientific community before it allows you to submit a paper in a scientific journal, and not by giving you just a booklet with some info of Do and Dont. However, I am not removing your responsibility. Your supervisor and both journals are the real victims of all this situation.
It might not help you much right now...
But a more tactical approach is to send two versions, differing by as much as you are comfortable in explaining the differences if this happens. Obvious obligatory differences:
different titles
different focus on results
explaining your method differently, example: many fields today are a mixture so researchers have literally each toe in a different field. Each field have their own journals and expect you to write things which are readable by their audience.
different comparisons to previous work done by others.
Voila and you have almost a whole new paper. Yes some extra work required, but not nearly as much and probably not nearly as stressful work as risking being pointed out as a cheater.
Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.
I tend to disagree with everyone here. One fellow noticed you submitted in parallel. So? That's not a problem yet.
Were you allowed to do that? Probably not. Should you have done it? Absoulutely.
Currently journals gamble with us. They take your article, hold it up for months and reject it in the end. Why shouldn't we do the same?
You can apply dor several jobs or schools at once just as schools and employers can consider a lot of options at once. The same should be true and acceptable for journals. The fact that it currently isn't is not your fault but the fault of journals displaying their power.
Couldn't disagree more. If you don't like the system - fine, don't use it. Or work to reform it. But abusing the system will make the situation worse, not better.
Additionally, it is terrible advice to give: people following it will be hurt badly. Don't confuse your dislike of the current rules with the proper way to handle them.
Once a paper is submitted, no action on the part of the author is required for the paper to be published. The reason why concurrent submissions are forbidden is to prevent double publishing, which is auto-plagiarizing.
"Were you allowed to do that? Probably not. Should you have done it? Absoulutely." Ah yes, the classic way to get respect and help your career in every field. If there are rules about something, generally there is a reason. Breaking those rules is an invitation for punishment. Regardless of if you agree with those rules, this is not good advice. It doesn't address the potential repercussions of choosing to ignore rules and regulations. If you want to publish in other peoples journals, it's best advised to follow their rules.
To some extent I do agree with you there are flaws in the current peer review system. One of my article went got rejected after 14 months and that after minor revision. But you should follow the established norms and strive for change. I will like to hear from you what alternate practical solution and system will you suggest and how can you implement.
This doesn't answer the question. The question was not "Was I allowed to do that?" or "Should I have done that?", but "What should I do now?". I assume that your implied answer is "You should take no immediate action, keep making multiple submissions, and ignore any negative consequences of doing this.", but it would be helpful if you could make that explicit.
@MBK the alternatives are already there. Some have even become eligible for the Millenium prize while ignoring the journals.
It sounds like you have never been on the reviewer/editor side of the publishing process. It's a lot of work and authors should respect that by not spamming journals with concurrent submissions.
"Currently journals gamble with us. They take your article, hold it up for months and reject it in the end. Why shouldn't we do the same?" There certainly are inefficiencies, but usually "hold it up for many months" means that someone is slogging through your paper and verifying every line of it for months, taking time away from teaching and research, pro bono. It's not like your paper stays in a cupboard for six months and then you magically get a decision.
I wonder if there is some sort of academic version of Godwin's law where inevitably someone will involve Perelman as an example.
@Džuris How is ignoring the journals and trying to use them while lying to them and breaking their rules the same thing?
@Dzuris - how motivated would you be to provide a thoughtful review if you thought 30 other people were simultaneously reviewing the paper, and the author has hedged his/her bets with enough journals that even if you recommended reject, the author will probably get it in elsewhere? It dilutes your contribution to the process.
I like your advice, in the real world, I hope that the authors have more rights.
As many problems as there are with the way academic publishing works, this isn't helping anything. The process takes as long as it does because reviewing papers takes time and there are a lot of them. If people submitted everything multiple times, that'd just slow the process down even more while making extra work for the unpaid volunteers (i.e. us).
I partially agree with the point you're making - but not with your concrete advice. You're bringing up an issue which merits at least serious discussion. The thing is, OP's situation is not a good context to hold that discussion.
@HEITZ: You're presenting an extreme. What about if some submissions you check had a note saying "I have submitted this paper on Foo Bars both to the Journal of Foo Research and to Bar Studies Quarterly". Would that really bother you?
@Roland I see the problem in the fact that reviewers aren't respected (paid appropriately) either.
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57054 | Students with physical disabilities - blindness, deafness, etc
Update: There isn't any disabilities office. Not US...
I'd like to expand on a comment I just made down there: I'm not trying to find a silver bullet. I just want a reasonable starting point.
It is a pretty straightforward question:
As a teacher, what can I do to make sure the course is accessible to people with physical disabilities?
I have limited experience with these issues; a student lost some of his eyesight midway through the course. It wasn't that big of an issue; the only change we made was to print the exams using a bigger font.
I'm thinking specifically blindness and deafness, but then again, my lack of experience in this matter might lead me to forget important stuff :)
Therefore I'm aiming my question to anyone with some experience at this, from both sides of the table. What changes did you make to the material? Classes? Exams, etc., etc., etc.?
Official guidelines are helpful too. I'll try to find the guidelines at my university and add it here, if relevant.
Rather than edit it, I'll append a more detailed version:
What are the best practices to prepare material when dealing with students with blindness or deafness?
I know the question is quite general. That is because I'm trying to be proactive. I'm aware that these issues should be dealt in a case-by-case manner, but I'm looking for general good practices/experience to reduce the work needed to perform these adaptations, on both sides.
A few examples following jakebeal's answer:
There are a few file formats that don't play nice with accessibility software (screen readers and protected PDF files).
What multimedia material would you prepare? A subtitled video can be useful to deaf students, for instance.
I do not think that this question is a good fit for this site in its present form. There is no correct answer (it is rather a poll) and even despite this, it is very broad (by being not about a specific disability). A suitable question for this site would be how to address specific problems with a specific disability or about general best practices of dealing with disabilities.
I agree in general with most what's been said here. But I think one of the most important things you can do is just let the students know you're available to help without calling attention to specific problems. I will usually say something on the first day like "If there's anything you need me to consider, if I speak too quickly or you can't read my handwriting, feel free to come up to me after class or shoot me an e-mail." And the few times students have taken me up on that I've reached out to whatever student services department is best qualified to handle the issue.
Good book on Universal Design http://www.cehd.umn.edu/passit/docs/pass-it-book.pdf
I had a deaf classmate in University who would follow lectures by lip reading. One of our professors had a large, bushy mustache and my friend had trouble understanding him. He therefore spoke to the professor and asked if he could try and enunciate more clearly to make it easier for him to understand. The next day, the professor had shaved off his mustache, earning the respect of all of us. I just mention this as an example of what people can do to help.
The part of the question about how you can amend your teaching to make it inclusive for disabilities does not seem to have been addressed so far.
Although you may not be in an institution that has a disability office, or in a territory that has anti-discrimination legislation, many readers of the question may be. Thus answers that suggest consulting someone centrally that can advise on institutional policy and practice is a sensible generic response.
The observation that complete blindness or deafness is so uncommon in normal university teaching that one should not specifically amend teaching practices to accommodate is a statistically valid observation.
However, teachers still need to know what to do. Further, vision impairment and hearing impairment are spectrum disorders and it will be certain that not all students in a class can hear everything that is said and see everything that is shown to them. I suspect many of us have been to presentations when we could not hear every word or see every image with sufficient clarity.
I advise my colleagues in similar situations, and this answer is based on the advice that I give.
Almost every institution has a VLE (Virtual Learning Environment) of some sort. Sometimes it is a simple primitive set of web pages and sometimes it is more capable. Before we had VLEs we had class handout sheets, notice boards and so forth. Whatever level of information technology you are equipped with, you should use it to improve and enhance the mechanisms of information distribution to the class.
Ensure, therefore, that critical information points are communicated in more than one medium. If you verbalise something important, ensure it is also written down somewhere, whether than is in a handout, on the VLE or in the textbook, it doesn't matter. If you show something, such as writing on the board, try and verbalise it also (it does not need to be verbatim); just enough that those who can't quite see know what you have done. Sometimes, with diagrams and illustrations shown on the screen this can be more difficult, but with practice you will find that it improves your teaching for everyone.
Machine readable copies of material on the VLE become accessible to students with impairment by the use of technology. I suggest to my colleagues that copies of the notes or slides are put up on the VLE just in advance of the class. Then some students can follow along by using magnification software on their tablet, laptop or smartphone rather than looking at the screen or board.
By being more inclusive in this way, you enable the material to those with other conditions also, such as dyslexia, Irlens syndrome and a wider variety of SpLDs (Specific Learning Differences). One then moves away from Disability being a problem and an issue to an appreciation of social model where we are all differently enabled.
References:
[1] Tompsett, B.C, 2007,
Experiences of Teaching Disabled Students of Computing at UK Universities
Outstandingly fantastic answer. I agree with every single thing you said, I like your general guidelines and you provided links. I'm accepting this answer (sorry Mediocrateez). But if you are reading this, please consider Mediocrateez's answer as well.
I would like to echo the other answers and enhance by focusing specifically on the breadth of ability challenges that may be faced by various students. There are many different types of physical challenges that students may face, and even for a given challenge the answers may be different. For example, did you know that most blind people can actually see, just so poorly that it cannot be effectively corrected, and that "blindness" actually covers a wide range of different conditions?
The key approach to any student with physical impairments that need accommodation is:
Do not assume that you should be handling it alone, or that you have the necessary knowledge to make an appropriate accommodation for that individual.
Ask the student. They are the world's foremost expert on their condition and needs. You'll generally do much better if you begin by just treating them like any other capable adult.
Get the university's experts involved, who will help you work out an appropriate plan tailored to an individual student.
I understand that each individual has specific needs (disabilities or not), but as a whole, is there common practices? For instance, there are versions of pdf (protected, etc) in which screen readers won't work. Should I use .html or .txt files for my material? If I record videos of the lecture, should I also add subtitles? These preparations can help tailor the content to specific needs as well..
@FábioDias Subtitles will help pretty much every student, if you have time to add them, since your diction and recording quality will be imperfect and some students may not be native speakers. As for the others: that's a rapidly moving target as technology changes on both sides, and you should consult the experts at your university for current best practices.
+1 for "ask the student". Any student with a disability pobably has had it for quite a while, has developed way to cope with it, and can tell you exactly what they need (either directly or through the university's disability office).
@fkraiem on the context of the question, "ask the student" doesn't really help. While you are preparing the material for the course, there is no student involved... with disabilities or otherwise...
@FábioDias It is impossible to predict what any given student will need, just be prepared to make adjustments as the need arises.
@fkraiem I'm not trying to predict something that will work for every and all students..... I'm trying to find a reasonable baseline. I'd like to prepare all my courses in english for instance, but I know that not all brazilian students understand english, so I can't do that. Or better, I can, but then I'll have to translate again...
@FábioDias The I recommend your read resources on "universal design," such those supplied by AHEAD, or this collection of accommodation resources suggested by the University of Washington DO-IT program.
+1 for "Get the university's experts involved" My college has a Disability Services Program. Each disabled student goes to a disability counselor, who then fills out an accommodations form, copies of which are given to the student's professors. OP, see if your college/uni offers a similar program. If so, you should instruct disabled students to utilize that program. In fact, you may wish to mention the existence of such a program in your syllabus and/or on the first day of class.
Please note that there is (at least a possibility) of legal contention in cases like the ones you are describing, so this is largely a matter of university policy, and not for individual instructors to decide. That being said, universities generally set up some office of disability services, which offer customized advice, on individual case-by-case basis. For example, here is this office for Boston University, and here for Harvard. Other universities also follow suite, as far as I know.
Thus, a general answer to this question is not possible, this is really something that these offices are going to answer for you, and that advice will be legally binding.
To be honest, legal contention was not in my original list of concerns. Rather, my line of though is more like: regardless of what you are supposed to do, what should you do?
As noted by The Dark Side universities typically have offices to arrange proper solutions for students with disabilities.
In the past, I had a visually impaired student (partially blind), and the university paid a student assistant to help him taking notes during the lessons.
For the exam, I printed the exam sheet with a much larger font and gave him a bit of extra time. He agreed that this was sufficient for him.
Exactly what we did to my student, but since the university did not have a specialized office for that, other students shared notes with him. We offered more time for the tests, he didn't need it and had the top grade of the class... Which concerns me, because he barely needed anyone anyway, he's very bright and competent. A student that needs more resources to learn with such disabilities would pose a more difficult challenge...
FWIW, the extra time thing happens "up the chain" at my (German) university; it's not a decision every teacher gets to (or has to) make.
First off, I'd recommend reading Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, and Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 and the regulations that implemented those statutes at 34 C.F.R. Part 104 and 28 C.F.R Part 35. That will give you information about the legal portion. Know that the US Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights (OCR) does enforce these regulations for higher education. Your local DSS department can help you with specifics.
TL;DR: check here for examples:
http://webaim.org/standards/508/checklist and here
https://wcetblog.wordpress.com/2015/09/29/universal-design/
Since there are no strict "Do this, then do this" rules to HOW you're to implement this, many Universities and Colleges have differing standards and implementations. However, most all of them follow a certain set of loose guidelines. I'm not sure if you're asking about all formats, handouts, web pages, videos, etc. There's a TON of information out there, but no centralized spot to find it all.
I've found lots of stuff by searching for things like Accessibility, accessible documents, and section 504.
If you want to send me a DM, I can send you some more specific information, and guidelines that we use.
I have accepted this answer because, despite the unrelated US legal part, the provided links have useful resources regarding document accessibility.
my apologies. I didn't see the "not US" part until just now.
My fault. I moved that part to the top now.
I think deafness and blindness are so rare that preparing beforehand is a waste of resources. Dealing with such cases when they occur should be sufficient, in particular because you are probably not able to completely accomodate them without external expert assistance.
What you can and arguable should consider are issues that occur more frequently, such as color-blindness. Statistics suggest that every sizable course has at least a handful of afflicted students, so you can be sure your effor pays off. Plus, color blindness is usually quite easy to work around by using suitable color palettes and/or using markings besides color. As a nice bonus, such scripts/slides also print better, so you incidentally help every student.
I'm sure there are more disadvantages that frequently appear; I'll not try to give a complete list. Browse some resources on physical, mental and social issues that have high incidence (meaning that they are likely to occur in every 100-student-classroom), that may impede learning in your course as it is, and that you can actually accomodate to some extent given your skills and resources.
Tl;dr: Accept that you won't be able to prepare for all eventualities. Pick your battles; spend your resources effectively.
It's amazing how many plotting tools pick green and red as the first two default colors.
At my university, there is an entire Services for Students with Disabilities office that handles these kinds of issues. Students with health issues that require accommodations are referred, usually by their teachers or doctors, to the office. At the office, they are screened for which types of accommodations will truly help them while being fair to other students given the circumstances. Then, the students can go to their professors with official forms indicating what kinds of accommodations they can receive.
This system allows professors to give very specific and reasonable accommodations. There's no risk that they'll make decisions that are too generous or restrictive, make the situation worse, are taken in by a student who is lying or refuse to believe a student who really has an issue, or fall for any of the other very serious risks associated with trying to decide what to do on their own.
I strongly suspect that your university has a similar department. You should do some research and see whether that's the case.
It doesn't. As stated in the question. Not United States. And considering that I specifically asked about general guidelines, explicitly saying that I'm aware of the 'case-by-case' approach, mostly irrelevant/repetition of other answer. Thanks for your opinion tho.
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17581 | Is there any reason to not make course details public?
While attending a course sometime back, I recall an instructor saying, "I need to warn (other instructor's name)...their course syllabus is available to anyone!"
I do not have access to an LMS for my classroom-based course, so I just post my course details to a regular Web hosting service. On the Web site, students, or anyone else, can easily locate:
the syllabus
exam study guide
homework instructions
I cannot think of any reason why this would be a problem, but recall the comment, so wonder if there might be some issue I have overlooked. Is there any reason why any of this information should not be open to the public?
Basically, I would answer no! There are, however, several issues that may prevent people from publishing material openly. One is if it contains copyrighted material, another is if the material contains hints that can help students gain an unfair advantage. In your list, the only possible issue could be with the third if those in any way could lead to an unfair advantage (not that I can think of how). That said, many publish homework questions, lecture materials etc on web sites that can be found by a search. I have benefited from finding such materials when developing my own courses and I am very grateful for that. Returning to your three points, I think they provide a good basis for students to decide what they can expect from the course and hopefully will attract the right students to it.
Let me put it this way, if I know of a published book that explains the topic of the course very nicely, do I have an advantage compared to my fellow classmates? One could think that. It is unfair? Not really, anyone could have done the same research as me and find the same book.
Some universities actually encourage professors to publish their class notes. It is a good way of getting prestige, as other professors can base their course plan on yours, or students may find the notes useful. In both cases, it is a very good publicity for the university, and very cheap.
Copyright issues are probably the only possible limitation, but they depend greatly on the subject: for modern English literature, you will need to comment on extracts of copyrighted books, and perhaps you want to avoid any legal fuzz regarding whether you are under fair use or not; but in mathematics there are hardly any copyrights in theorems.
Another reason not to have things public is if you are going to publish them as a book. But that is another ethics debate for another time.
As @PeterJansson explains putting material online has many advantages for the students. But I believe that there are two small conditions for this.
First, that the author keeps control of the material. By this I mean that is not just posted somewhere on the internet where the author cannot modify it. This is because usually the material created and typesetted by a single person has not gone through a publishing process and usually has many errors an typos that the author should be able to correct anytime. This is the reason why I believe any uploaded material should always explain the way to contact the author (at least an email address). We all have found note on the web plagued with error that the author either can't correct or doesn't even know they exist.
Second, that the existence of the material and the way to access the last version of it is explained to all the student attending the course. The problem is that we cannot control what happens whith the files once we upload them but at least we can tell students where to get the right version of them.
This is the way to avoid the only way to prevent the only form of unfair advantage I can think of which is some students having a more recent version of the notes or some students not knowing that the notes exist.
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32246 | Must one find references to fit knowledge already known from education or experience?
Recently I wrote a course paper on a subject connecting my major to my current major. In the background section, I listed quite a bit of essential information I think is information that is readily available, and which I can confirm through many years of life and work experience, but which my instructor knows nothing about. The instructor has accused me of not providing references for this information.
Do I need to fill my paper with citations to people who wrote books saying the same thing? How do I know where to draw the line between what gets a reference and what does not?
Here is the general principle for citations: anything that is not considered "elementary knowledge" to the community reading the paper must have a citation.
This means that different communities need citations for different things.
For example, when I write for a biology community, I often end up including citations to basic computer science textbooks, to give a grounding for things that are simple undergraduate information in my background, but that would be highly unintuitive to an experimental biologist. The reverse applies as well, for a biologist writing to a computer science audience.
Something that you know through experience definitely needs to be backed up with citation. One of the critical values of the scientific method is that it lets us separate statements supportable by facts from myths based on cognitive biases. We humans are very, very bad at learning from experience, in the sense that we draw many conclusions that are simply not true. Folklore is full of these types of experience-grounded myths, some of which turn out to be true (willow bark does help with pain: that's the basis for aspirin), and some of which turn out to be false (mercury turns out to be terrible as a medicine).
If you can find things backing up your experience in reliable literature, you can cite them. If not, perhaps you have a good subject for study, if you can figure out how to design an appropriate experiment...
The standard rule of thumb in this situation is not whether the information is readily available, but whether it is common knowledge. If the majority of people on the street (or beginners in your field) will know the information, then you probably don't need to cite a source for that information. However, if it is information specific to your subspecialty, you do need to cite a source, even when this is 'common knowledge' to you and others in your sub-specialty. The rest of the world--and in this case, your instructor--do not simply know this information, and thus you need to provide them a way to evaluate the validity of your claims.
Where this really gets tricky is when you are writing for a specialty audience. You do not need to provide a source for background information that your audience already knows and has known since beginning their studies. For example, I would not expect to need to provide a definition of, or citation for, third spacing to an audience of healthcare professionals, but if my audience may include other disciplines then I need to address this because third spacing can mean more than one thing.
"you need to provide them a way to evaluate the validity of your claims" - does this imply that claims without source are invalid by definition? That is to say that no "new" claims can be made by the author of the derivative paper, as they can not back them up. Wouldn't that constrain research greatly?
@aevitas A citation is one way to back up a claim. Others include experimental data, simulations, mathematical analysis, and the rest of the "meat" of scientific papers.
@aevitas - welcome to Academia, where referencing has become more important than validity, research or original thought.
@JonStory if you base a valid argument on false premises, the outcome is likely to be wrong. That is why you need to back up your claims, be it by experiment, citation, or others.
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32250 | Is it okay for the author field to contain names of research labs?
I find most articles through EBSCO and similar search tools, then export the BibTeX details to my own bibliography.bib file. Recently, I found some BibTeX files with a strange author field, containing not just the name of a person, but also of a research lab or a college. E.g.:
Author = {White, R. R. and West College Child Development Laboratory}
When compiled in APA format, it looks very odd:
White, R. R. and Laboratory, W. C. C. D.
Are there situations in which it is correct to place such lab or school details directly in the author field? If not, where do I need to relocate this information to?
I have seen labs signing papers in cases of very big collaborations. If that is how it is cited in the journal, you should adjust your bib file like so (thanks to Federico Poloni for the fix):
Author = "White, R. R. and {West College Child Development Laboratory}"
I think that the correct format should be Author = "White, R. R. and {West College Child Development Laboratory}", so that the first author gets formatted according to the bibtex style.
@FedericoPoloni You are correct, fixed.
What does the article itself look like if you pull it up from the journal itself? You should probably adjust your record of it to match whatever the article actually says. This could be a problem with the machine parsing of the original document, or the journal may have accepted the "authorship" of the lab as a convention in that field.
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4787 | Is it necessary to obtain permissions for copying figures from published articles in your proposal/dissertation?
I am currently writing a proposal for my research topic and I want to copy figures from published articles into my proposal document. To put it in perspective, almost all the copied figures are to go in the “Literature review” section of the document.
Is it necessary to send an email to each and every author requesting permissions to copy the figures, even though complete citations and references are included? I referred to the following link:
MITLibraries: Reuse of content in thesis.
From what it says, copying images in thesis (with correct citations) seems to be valid under US copyright law.
For figures from your own papers, it would depend on the copyright transfer agreement you (or the corresponding author) signed upon publication. However, all copyright agreements I know explicitly authorize reuse of content for academic theses.
As an example: the American Chemical Society, which does not leave the authors too many rights, includes this wording:
Authors may reuse all or part of the Submitted, Accepted or Published Work in a thesis or dissertation that the Author writes and is required to submit to satisfy the criteria of degree-granting institutions. Such reuse is permitted subject to the ACS’ “Ethical Guidelines to Publication of Chemical Research"
For figures from others’ papers, a thesis is not very different from any other publication (see the related question about blogging). Unless your institution has a specific agreement with publishers (as MIT seems to have), you have to either:
ask for permission; these days, it's all done online and once you have located the appropriate form for a publisher, you can make your requests and get all the answers the next day
rely on fair use in the US, or similar law in other countries; around me, most people actually do that, either knowingly or just out of ignorance :)
Copyright laws vary by country, so this answer may be UK specific.
To be safe rather than sorry, it probably is a good idea to copyright clear third party works, especially if your dissertation will eventually be uploaded to an online depository, which is becoming more common. Imperial College London, as an example, specify that proof of permission to include third party works needs to be included in the electronic copy of the thesis and this may be a policy at other universities too. In addition, the source needs to be carefully referenced in a note to the figure. Not doing this can cause unwanted delays in depositing the thesis in the archive.
In my case, I found it rapid and free to include single figures from published journal articles in the thesis. Just as F'x says, requesting permissions can be done in a day, although it's probably best not to leave it to the last minute. I was sent through to Copyright Clearance Center's Rightslink from the published journal articles each time I requested permission and the process was straightforward.
I created an account on copyright.com and using the same I was able to get permissions for more than half of the figures for which I needed to do so. This way is particularly useful for students in the United States as there's now one place where most of the requesting and granting can take place. The experience is like shopping from an online website (they literally have a shopping cart) and in general the process was more convenient than I had thought what it would be.
For a subset of the remaining papers, where the publisher was the copyright holder, I emailed the publisher and I was able to get a response in less than a couple of working days. This was true for a few papers from Europe and the UK. For the papers where the holder was the author, I emailed the author. For all figures for which I didn't get a reply or I got a reply which quoted a significant cost for reusing the figures, I simply removed the figures from my literature review.
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4915 | Where to define nomenclature in a proposal or dissertation?
I am writing my proposal and I am borrowing heavily from one of my publications. The published paper has a Nomenclature section at the very beginning (just after the abstract).
What is the appropriate place for a nomenclature in a proposal/thesis? Or is it more advisable to explain the terms near the place where they are used (considering that if Nomenclature is published on a distant page it would be too much of an effort on the reader's part to scroll down and up again)?
I prefer to group definitions of notation and symbols with the typical "List of ..." elements. You probably already have "List of figures" and "List of tables", so simple add something like "List of symbols" or "List of abbreviations" after the other lists.
I personally think the biggest consideration is how often the term or symbol is used. If it's used a lot, then a clear definition at the start is probably the best. The reader then knows where to look if they're unsure of the meaning rather than having to find the first place it's used, and it would be ridiculous to keep defining it every time you use it.
For things that are just used once, it may be more readable to define it at the point of use. The definition is only relevant for that little portion, so splitting the definition and use makes things, as you say, too much of an effort for the reader.
The question then is where to draw the line; at what point does a rarely used term become common enough to warrant being included in the nomenclature section? This is, I think, becomes a matter of preference. Personally, if a term were used in more than one section, I'd define it at the start. Though, if it really is only used twice, perhaps an in-place definition and a "recall that we define..." kind of sentence would read more smoothly.
But where should I add it? Before Introduction? In an Appendix?
Personally, I would put it at the front, but after the introduction. Then people can read it "in-line" or skip it as they prefer. As an appendix always requires page flipping. However, matters of style and field always intervene. I'm in CS, we tend to put it at the start, similar to larger mathematics documents. In the arts, a glossary as an appendix is often common, but in that case it's often expected that most of the definitions are already known to the reader (not special to that particular publication) and thus are only occasionally referenced.
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21684 | Examples of teams of teachers?
There was another question In universities, how to team up with your colleagues? which talked about building relationships but what I am really curious about is:
Are there any universities which actually have teams of teachers?
I am not referring to simply two teachers sharing the same module. I am also not referring to teachers being friendly with each other. I'm referring to teachers actually being developed into a formal team. In a team not everyone has the same skills and those differences make the team stronger, not weaker. In teams there is a genuine interdependence. In a team, there are common objectives which you know have been met or not.
There are many examples of increased effectiveness of teams (and certainly plenty of books and articles written about them) but since teaching is such a solitary activity (meaning you do not interact with your colleagues while teaching) perhaps it is natural to ignore the idea of actually building teams of teachers.
Edit: When studying team dynamics, we can see that "real" teams do include some risks but my point is not about the weaknesses (which are typically overcome by the strengths). Teams normally operate an a higher level of efficiency than non-team-groups-of-people working together. A key element of real teams is that objectives are team objectives and individual accomplishments are not highlighted. For example, if 3 teams are all competing to get to the top of the mountain and we give a reward to the first person to summit the mountain, then we are really focusing on individual efforts (so each member would naturally think of themselves before the group as a whole). However, if you simply reward the team which first plants its flag at the top, then individual accomplishments are minimized and one member of the team is more likely to sacrifice for the greater good of the team.
Indicators of real teams (as opposed to groups of people who work together but are not a team) include: Interdependence, shared accountability (each answers to the boss but also to every other member), common goals, and members having skills which compliment each other in order to affect the common goals.
Do we ever see these qualities in groups of teachers?
Isn't an academic department a formal team of teachers (and researchers)?
@PeteL.Clark There are many different definitions of teams but in the definition I went by included the members being interdependent. I cannot say how typical my department is but I do not feel any interdependence with the other teachers in my department-they could be replaced tomorrow and I do not think it would impact me in any significant way.
If one of them gets hit by a bus, their teaching duty will have to be taken by someone else. The lecturer/TA can be considered an interdependent team too. I don't think I fully understand what you ask, though.
Then you have the team of professor/TA, or several lecturers dividing a subject by area of expertise.
@Davidmh I have edited my question in hopes of making it clearer. I've also deleted my previous comments to keep the question clean.
Are you asking for examples of "team work gone right" among teachers? If so, this article on how two teachers merged science and math into one "super subject" comes to mind.
In the more advanced levels, I have had subjects taught by several lecturers. Each one was teaching the part of the subject closer to their area of research and expertise.
On a more general level, there was a department of Astronomy and Atmospheric physics (climate and weather). Astrophysics subjects were taught by astrophysicists, and climate subjects by atmospheric scientists (do they have a cool specific name?). Inside Astrophysics, stellar evolution was taught by a different subset of professors than extragalatic astronomy.
It is also common for the senior professors to lecture, and the grad students to do problem solving. This is usually explained because a clear explanation of the theory requires experience and care; whereas solving exercises is a less critical task, ideal to build teaching experience. (Bad people that hate professors may say that teaching theory requires less work, and once it is done they can repeat the same for years, but solving exercises requires more work)
Edit:
Another example is the curriculum. Each subject is built upon the subjects taught before, with more or less coordination among the lecturers. Differential equations requires the knowledge obtained in Calculus, and it will in turn be used for Quantum Mechanics. If the Calculus lecturer fails miserably (for example, not covering the necessary material), the students will struggle through the following ones.
I had the same experience with my Anatomy course, which was in my second undergrad year of study; each division of the body (ie. Abdomen, Head and Neck, Neuroanatomy) was taught by a registrar who had specialised in that division.
whereas solving exercises is a less critical task — [citation needed]!!!
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2864 | How to create HTML Slides with audio for online lectures?
This follows on from a recent question about embedding audio in PDF slides. I don't like the thought of users needing to use a particular PDF viewer in order to hear the audio and I don't like the thought of needing proprietary software just to create the presentations. Thus, another option would be to create HTML slides. There are a range of HTML slide production approaches (e.g., S5, DZSlides, Slidy, Slideous).
Update:
I was thinking about using pandoc to convert markdown into one of the slide formats. @Federico mentions the audio HTML tag. I assume that would be part of an overall solution. This presumably represents a basic answer, but I'd be keen to get some guidance about how this works on a practical level:
Are there any examples of implementing audio in HTML slides?
Are there any strategies for increasing the usability of consuming and activating the audio?
Are there any browser or operating system compatibility issues?
Thus, in a broad sense my question is
How can HTML slides be created in an effective and efficient way with embedded audio?
I've posted this question to the webapps chat room, maybe someone there will have some insight.
If I read correctly, in all those HTML slide systems you write the HTML file directly, it is not produced by some external tool. So I think you can simply put an audio tag in it. Or am I missing something?
+1 Thanks for that. I've update the question to try to highlight that my question concerns some of the broader workflow and usability issues related to creating such slides.
A different option would be creating a screencast. A screencasting program would record your slides as they play as well as recording voice (or other sounds) from the microphone. Jing is a free, though limited, screencast program. CamStudio is another free program. There programs you can purchase that include advanced features, including editing and post-production.
The benefit of this method is that your lecture is now a video file, which rarely requires any type of special software, and you can share them easily on youtube, vimeo, or social media.
I like the idea of a self-contained file. Hopefully any system would minimise the video file size given that the visual information on slides rarely changes. There would be pros and cons. Slide approaches allow you to create audio one slide at a time. Thus, if you make errors, you only need to redo audio for the slide. Slides also create a convenient navigational system for students/listeners.
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6175 | Advancement to Candidacy, PhD in Computer Science
As a PhD student in CS I will have advancement to candidacy soon.
I am looking for information which helps me on the advancement exam.
Particularly:
What does a committee expecting to hear from me?
What should I focus on during me presentation: should I tell them about work I have done or what I am planning to do?
If I need tell them what I am planning to do, then how to do that? I mean, research is vague, there is no clear guidance, and you don't know what will be in the end.
Any comments that help better understand what to expect and how to prepare are very welcome!
It's different for every institution, do you have an advisor? Usually your advisor would be helping you to plan what you're going to present.
The only goal of the candidacy/qualifying/preliminary exam is to convince the committee that you deserve to pass the candidacy/qualifying/preliminary exam. The passing criteria differ, sometimes radically, from one university to the next, from department to the next, from one research area to the next, and even from one committee member to the next. It's the academic equivalent of Calvinball, only you don't get to make up the rules. Do not question the mask.
The only way to determine how to prepare for the candidacy/qualifying/preliminary exam is to ask your committee members directly. Individually. In person. I strongly recommend scheduling a one-on-one meeting with each committee member at least a month in advance of the actual exam.
Same goes for the thesis defense.
"Ask committee members directly": That's not always possible—in my department, the exams used to be conducted by random panels of faculty members that weren't chosen until a few days before the exam—for exactly the reason of preventing students from "gaming" the system. Also, in some disciplines, including many engineering fields, the qualifying exam is usually completed before the thesis committee is selected!
the exams used to be conducted by random panels of faculty members — Well, then to be safe, I guess you have to talk to the entire faculty one by one. And yes, quals are usually held well before the student selects their their committee, but there's a separate qualifying exam committee (sometimes called a "panel", but yeah, it's a committee).
It's disturbing how many academic processes can be adequately described as a game of Calvinball.
Have a solid research proposal and present it well. There is no other way to convince your assessors.
In my case, I had to do a public presentation with the assessors sitting in the audience. It was not an easy exercise but I took on the challenge head-on (really, there was no other option). And I prepared, prepared and prepared.
I asked my supervisor what the likely questions would be and how can I make my proposal better. I attended presentations by other students and studied the vibes.
Just be aware that not everything always goes to plan. I had chosen a concept that was highly contested in the literature so had several question on how I would handle it. (One of my assessors was an expert in that area!)
Most importantly, show a willingness to learn. If you cannot answer a question, be honest about it. Say something like "Thats an interesting angle and I will certainly take your comments on board". And mean it. Be honest and polite.
Confirmation of candidature is to show you are ready to do advanced research. Your assessors would most likely overlook a few flaws in your proposal (no research is perfect) but may not
be that generous if they realise you are not ready. Believe me, they are amazingly quick at the latter.
+1 For I prepared, prepared and prepared. All you can do is to do your best.
Ask your advisor and the program coordinator. Usually, each institute has a guide for the candidacy exam. The guide lists some general requirements and the method of examining. The answers to your questions depends upon your department regulations and policies.
What does a committee expecting to hear from me?
They expect you to be expert in your field and answer their tough questions. Also, they expect you to agree with their opinions and not try to be too smart.
To say that they expect you to agree with their opinions is very bizarre. I'm looking for independent thought and the willingness to go out on a limb.
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7824 | Thesis peer review "service"
There are a lot of post about peer review of papers, but how about graduate/undergraduate thesis?
Is there somewhere on the vast internet, where one can submit his thesis for a peer review.
The reason I am asking this is because I am finishing my master's in engineering and so far my advisor has not seen my thesis even once. The only "review" I got was a friend who found out only grammatical and punctuation errors and I did the same for her. But the fact that we know nothing about each other's research stops us from performing a quality peer review.
I don't think a MSc thesis needs a true, full-blown peer review, but I might be mistaken. What you need is a good proofread. Maybe you can ask PostDocs (or even PhD students) from your department whether they could proofread your text from a scientific perspective? I always proofread the theses of my BSc and MSc students (I'm a PhD student) before I allow them to give them to ze big boss.
There is a full-blown, high-quality peer-review process for a thesis: it's called the thesis committee.
If you mean a service where you can get help improve your document before you submit it to your committee, that is something that one's advisor(s) tasks. Maybe you can actually get help from friends, colleagues, or in the most severe cases your advisor's friends, but there is not much.
The thing that may be closely related is that, in some systems (the French one at least), there is a person that is responsible for validating the PhD student's manuscript before it gets sent to the committee. Then, it's that person's responsibility (in theory) to do a basic check of your manuscript and your work, and decide if there is enough to gather a committee. I say “in theory”, because this person will probably get dozens of theses per year (at the very least) and can only perform the most basic checks. In practice, they most often do not check the manuscript content, but its form (does it follow the University's standards), as well as some simple indicators of your research (has the candidate published? how many times? did he attend conferences? that sort of stuff).
Your situation suggests that your relationship with your adviser has broken down. Fix it. I usually find going out for coffee and just talking, not necessarily about your thesis, always helps.
You can always get editorial assistance but you want expert assistance. This is where your adviser comes in. Make it easy for him or her. Submit perhaps a chapter at a time. Then meet and have a good honest discussion.
Other than the above, search for a newly minted PhD candidate in your department, perhaps a former student of your adviser, and ask him or her to review your work. Believe me, this does wonders because of the motivation that the newly minted PhD candidate brings to the review. By newly minted PhD, I mean a person who has already completed his study.
+1 for “make it easy for your advisor”. Sometimes student submit very low quality work, or lots of it with only short to time review, … which makes it genuinely hard to give them the help they want.
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47383 | Principal investigator requests transfer of GitHub repository with my code to his account
I am a senior postdoc and have recently published a bioinformatics algorithm in an academic journal. For that publication, I was listed as the first author of the manuscript, and my principal investigator (PI)/supervisor as the senior author. Both of us were listed as corresponding authors.
As a follow-up we decided to submit an application note pertaining to that algorithm. Once again, the same authorship (and corresponding authors) was maintained. Additionally, the algorithm had been developed into a webserver that was placed on the PI's lab website.
The PI asked me to put the algorithm on Github. Accordingly, I created a repository on my personal account and later added the PI as a collaborator. I am a Github novice user but my understanding is that this would be sufficient to push/pull the repository and generally make modifications to it.
However I was very surprised that my PI specifically requested a Transfer of Ownership of the repository from my account to his account. The other solution is to fork the repository onto his account, but the PI doesn't like this solution on the basis that it makes it harder for him/her to maintain a copy in their lab.
So the questions:
Is the request to transfer ownership a fair request? My rationale is that since I created the code, the repository should be on my personal account! And since the algorithm is broadcasted on the lab website and the PI is the senior author, then he/she has been properly acknowledged and their ownership of the algorithm is also properly represented!
How will transfer of ownership affect my future career prospects and search for Assistant Professor jobs, especially as my field (bioinformatics) is heavily dependent on coding and algorithm development?
What other GitHub alternatives are there (besides forking and transfer
of ownership), which would still allow me to keep ownership of the
repository and have any changes directly synchronised to a copy on the lab account?
Do you hold copyright, or does your lab?
Its being deposited as an open-source package under CRAN with a GPL-3 license. My guess is that the copyright would be of the authors, or perhaps in this case maybe the research institution in which the authors work. Its a good question but I don't know how to properly verify the copyright holders in this case.
If they wrote the software as part of their job for an institution, then the research institution holds the copyright, and the research institution should get a Github organisation to store their code under. Personal Github accounts are for what people do in their free time.
@RemcoGerlich that is a common situation, but depends on the institution.
The other solution is to fork the repository onto his account, but the PI doesn't like this solution on the basis that it makes it harder for him/her to maintain a copy in their lab. This makes exactly zero sense. I can't even begin to guess…
@RemcoGerlich That also depends on the country. In Germany, the authors always have copyright which is not transferable. Right to publish and profit is another thing, though.
Keep in mind that you can maintain your own fork under your own account even after a transfer. So potential employers will be able to find the project via your account, and see your contributions.
@Lohoris I take it to mean "It makes it harder for him/her to maintain the authorative copy in their lab.
@emory ok, but it's still wrong: just push to both repositories… and he doesn't have to do anything: it's the OP himself who can push to his own fork…
If you've gotten first authorship on the paper describing the algorithm and someone else has agreed offered to maintain it, you've got a great setup. On the other hand, if you wanted to take your code in one direction and your PI wants the code base to go in a different direction, you've now got a competitor, although that's how open source works.
The PI asked me to put the algorithm on Github. Accordingly, I created a repository on my personal account and later added the PI as a collaborator. I am a Github novice user but my understanding is that this would be sufficient to push/pull the repository and generally make modifications to it.
It is. The problem is that a personal account is, well, personal, and not overly suited for professional activities, such as research projects. To this end, GitHub uses the notion of "organizations", which can also own repositories. AFAIK there is very little practical difference between having a repo owned by a personal account and an organization, only that having it under your personal account gives the impression that this is a project of yours (as opposed to a project of your lab).
However I was very surprised that my PI specifically requested a Transfer of Ownership of the repository from my account to his account.
From your personal account to his would be a little weird. From your account to an organization with the name of your lab sounds like entirely fair game to me if for no other reason than to maintain the "corporate identity" of your lab.
The other solution is to fork the repository onto his account, but the PI doesn't like this solution on the basis that it makes it harder for him/her to maintain a copy in their lab.
Well, if you end up having to maintain both forks your PI is correct. Forking is easy, but keeping two forks up-to-date is unnecessarily cumbersome.
Is the request to Transfer Ownership a fair request? My rationale is that since I created the code, it the repository should be on my personal account!
... and since you likely created it on grant money of the lab, having it under the account of the lab is at least equally fair.
How will transfer of ownership affect my future career prospects and search for Assistant Professor jobs, especially as my field (bioinformatics) is heavily dependent on coding and algorithm development?
If bioinformatics isn't completely unlike any other computer science field, then very little people in a hiring committee will care about code in the first place, and nobody will care about whether the repo that contains the code is yours, or the one of your lab, or even the one of your PI where you committed a lot to.
What other Github alternatives are there (besides forking and transfer of ownership), which would still allow me to keep ownership of the repository and have any changes directly synced to a copy on the lab account?
You can set up a Git repo with two origins, and you always push each change to both origins. However, that seems somewhat cumbersome for rather questionable gains.
Regarding the last question, with post commit hooks you can do that automatically.
Thanks for the detailed feedback. Some small clarifications though:
Currently I am paid from an external postdoc grant, so the PI is not directly paying me from his/her account.
I did request that he/she create an organization account. My idea was that a fork could be added to that organization account. My concern is whether ownership transfer (even to the organization account) reduces my rights and opportunities when I search for a job. As you correctly pointed out, having it under my account (and giving a fork) gives the impression that I am the creator of the code.
Thanks!
@YoungAcademic, as an employee of a university, and developed code in that role, your rights are a matter of unversity policy, regardless of where the repository is. You are probably encumbered, and have little freedom to operate without involvement of your current university.
@YoungAcademic I would also suggest creating an organization. However, frankly, this is probably not the right fight to fight, as I cannot imagine the question having any particular relevance to later job searches. GitHub maintains who commited the code anyway, so who owns the repo is just a detail no matter what.
@xLeitix well, technically as author of a commit I can write anything, it's not like git checks if it's really you. I'd go the fork route.
@Lohoris: Indeed, git does not verify the identity. But why would a hypothetical different committer write your name on it just so that you can take all the credit?
@xLeitix: GitHub only reads the metadata in the repository, which can be altered, for instance, using reposurgeon. So it is technically possible for someone like the PI to rewrite all commits and make them look as if they were the author, once they gain control of the repo. I believe the only way to combat this sort of spoofing right now is adding PGP/GPG commit signatures.
@GeoffOxberry Let's not get carried away here.
@xLeitix: Let's also not be naive. Multiple people on this thread have assumed the integrity of the repo is inviolable, which is untrue. I believe the risk of misconduct here is low, but to act as if it doesn't exist ignores the fact that there are bad actors in academia, and fraud happens. Also, who writes the code is of material importance for non-academic job searches, and on grant applications, NSF and DOE (among others) are placing increasing emphasis on code artifacts, so it would behoove the OP to get credit for their code, if they can do so without alienating their PI.
From the perspective of a PI, I think the request to transfer ownership is fair. Your university (through a fellowship, or through a direct position) paid for the software's creation and assigning "ownership" to a github organization that corresponds to your lab seems like a reasonable approach to ensure that others in the lab will continue to be able to use and develop the software. As a PI who's in it for the long haul, one often worries what happens if the student or postdoc decides to quit the project or quit academia altogether (which is what most of them eventually do, statistically speaking) and what that will do to the continued usability of their codes; moving them into a central location that is controlled by the PI is one way to at least eliminate the possibility that the code might simply disappear at one point. That's not a judgment on the student or author, it's just being realistic and pragmatic.
As for the impact on your future employment: it makes no difference. First, git records who wrote the code, and it will continue to show you and not your adviser as the author of the code. Second, if you state in your CV/your website/your application documents that you wrote the code available at github.com/X/Y, everyone will simply believe this unless they have evidence to the contrary (in which case they can look up there who really wrote it -- and find that it really was you), so your word that you're the author typically counts for much more than where it is actually hosted. Third, in all likelihood you're still the one who knows the code best. If anyone wants to use it but doesn't have the technical skill to do so, they will still come back to you and ask whether you're interested in collaborating -- whether the repository is under your name or that of your former lab -- given that nobody in the lab likely knows as much about it as you do. In other words, you will still reap the benefits.
In summary, I think the request is fair. I also think that you're not losing anything by it.
I think this answer contains some good points in favor of transferring ownership of the repository from the OP's personal account to an organizational account. But as I understand it, the professor wants to transfer ownership to his personal account. I don't think you've justified how that would be fair.
That's semantics. Whether the account is called "Bangerth research group" or "Bangerth" makes very little difference in real life.
I don't agree. The name on the account is irrelevant, of course; the issue of who owns and controls it is very relevant. In fact it's the core issue of this whole Q&A. (One might, of course, argue that the whole question makes very little difference in real life.)
That's what I'm saying. The reality is that the PI would control both his and his research group's accounts from a practical perspective. Who has the legal rights to the code is an issue not affected by how you call the account.
His partner could easily delete the codebase from github and reupload it as it would appear to be only developed by him.
@easymoden00b: Exactly. Just rewrite the metadata.
Folks, the original question was whether the request to host the same repository in location A instead of location B was fair. The last two answers here now suggest that someone actually commit academic fraud by claiming some code was written by one person instead of another. That has nothing to do with the original question. It's clearly also not what the OP's principal investigator had in mind.
@WolfgangBangerth: The suggestion is merely that it is possible to commit academic fraud (specifically with an unsigned repo) once ownership of the repo is transferred. I think the probability of that actually happening is low, but nonzero, just like faking data in a paper has a low, but nonzero probability of happening. Since it is one potential consequence of transferring ownership (as opposed to forking), the OP should be aware of it, and it is relevant to the question. We can't deduce the intentions of the OP's PI from their question.
Firstly, if the code is GPLv3 this sounds like an non-issue. Anyone can legally fork the repository and work from there. If your PI wants his own copy he can just create it. If the repository gets transferred then anyone, including you, can create their own fork from that.
A fork will retain the commit history, showing you as the author. But the same is true for a transfer, the transferred repository will still show you've done the commits. So whether you fork or do nothing the net result will be roughly the same. It's just the first impression when someone finds the repository through Google. During interviews you can still show it's your work.
Practically, this is why GitHub organisations exist. I'd create an organisation for the lab and transfer the repository to that organisation. That way the location of the repository doesn't create an assumption about the person who wrote the code, but it is clear the code belongs to the organisation.
That organization could also contain any future projects of the lab.
One of the topics that has been hinted at in the other answers but not so directly expressed is the notion that your PI may have committed himself to providing such a GitHub repository as part of the application for the funds used to support the code's creation. Many grants now require data stewardship and code maintenance to be explicitly addressed as part of the application itself. Consequently, such a request from your PI may be an attempt to satisfy these requirements. (If I were him, personally I would have mentioned this at the time, but it's possible he may have thought such a notion was obvious.)
A very broad answer but: whether the PI's request is completely reasonable or not, it's a request that does you no conceivable harm. Whenever you work with other people (in the presence of a power/seniority differential or not) you have to make certain compromises and do things in a way which is not exactly what you would do if you were alone.
It sounds like you have a fruitful collaboration. I don't think this issue is worth jeopardizing it.
I say "very broad" because I fear I am missing some nuances of your situation. For instance you say you are a "senior postdoc" but I don't know what the "senior" means. I have never experienced any hierarchy within postdoctoral positions, and if anything, being long in the tooth is a bad thing for a postdoc: as the position is an inherent junior/temporary one, stretching it out too long creates the impression that you couldn't move on to a more permanent position. Nor do I know what the "senior author" is, given that you have separated it from both the first author and the corresponding authors. Such things do not exist in my field, so I wonder what it means in your case...
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60518 | Internship university asks to give up all intellectual property
I am a graduate student of university A, and I'm going to do an internship in a lab in university B.
I used an internship contract from my originating university A, which stipulates that university B can make a contract on a case-by-case basis to later exploit my work made during my internship. However, university B asks me to change this clause to transfer all intellectual property rights to university B exclusively, meaning that I won't be able to use it aftewards without approval from university B. Note that I am not paid by university B, nor having any other compensation for the whole duration of my internship there from university B, and I'm not hosted on-campus either, but I will get academic credits from university A.
Is this a common practice for lab internships? Can I do something about it? (I don't mind giving all the rights to exploit my work, but I would also like to be able to use it myself, particularly softwares I will develop).
/Final update: Thank you all for your great feedback. The issue was resolved quite simply by agreeing with my supervisor to put the developped softwares under an opensource licence. The contract thus won't have any impact whatsoever.
Repeat after me: NO.
@JeffE : No about what? Is this not common, or can I do nothing about it?
I think he meant that you should say "no" to such a contract. I don't see how university B has any right to your work - they aren't paying for you, nor do you receive any other compensation.
What exactly does university B provide then?
@Olorun They provide an opportunity to work in a lab that is on the state-of-the-art in the domain I seek to pursue my academic career. I think they're playing on their competitivity, but I'm not sure that's fair...
The world is full of unpleasant people who take every chance to exploit those around them as hard as they can. Offer a version which would give them the right to use your work however they wish but allows you to use your work as well. It's all they should need. You might still choose to sign but it lets you know that they're taking and will continue to take every opportunity to screw you.
@gabrous No, I will not sign over all of my intellectual property rights for an unpaid internship.
No, don't do it. Possibly the people don't realize what paperwork they push on junior people, but/and it might be time to bring it to their attention. Or, cross out the offending parts of the contract (!), initial them, and then sign. I've done this with some "copyright agreements", and, on some occasions, the people did not balk. Seemingly the relevant people didn't really care. That might be a point.
Is the contract saying that university B retains the intellectual property developed at that university, or is it saying even the work you do at University A should be transferred to them?
@user1938107: it's saying that the work I will do as part of my internship (implying at their university) will belong exclusively to them.
@gaborous In my Institute (in asia), this is a standard term, and there is no renegotiation of contracts, which would cost so much money in legal fees and opening holes of conduct rules. No one would accept an intern coming, taking up the time of the researchers being taught something, then given a place on the research team work together, and then have university A or the student start claiming IP and tech transfer. It just is not worth the trouble.
With that said, interns are all paid. The exception to a paid intern is when the intern receives academic credit for their work from the original university they come from.
@user1938107 yes I will receive academic credit at my original university indeed. But where I come from, this is still unusual to not be paid, unless it's a very short internship, but that's not my case. About claiming IP, I don't want to claim them exclusively, I just would like to continue to use and develop softwares I will develop from scratch.
@gaborous I think you should update your question. You are receiving compensation, it is credit from your university.
@user1938107 you're right, I have updated the question.
Can I do something about it?
There aren't any magical answers here, but aside from the obvious options of either signing the contract and accepting that this is a price you'll have to pay for a really good professional development opportunity, or refusing to sign the contract under any conditions and seeking an alternative internship at a more accommodating institution, I see a third option: negotiate.
There are many possible ways to go about this, but here's one: I assume you were accepted to the internship by a PI/researcher who thought that you had good qualifications and that his/her lab would benefit from your work and talent. This person could be your ally. What I would do is write them a polite email along the following lines:
Dear Professor Smith,
Thank you for offering me the internship at your fusion reactor lab. I am excited about this wonderful opportunity and am looking forward to starting in a couple of months, and have even begun doing some background reading on flux capacitor technology to make sure I can be as productive and helpful as possible from day one. I am writing however to express a concern about an issue that came up and that may prevent me from taking on the internship. I was informed by your Office of Research that your university is refusing to accept the standard internship contract my own university advised me to use (see the email I received from them, appended below) and are asking me to agree to a change in the standard intellectual property clause, which in its present form is designed to protect the interests of myself, yourself and both our respective universities, to an alternative version that transfers all IP rights to your institution. I am afraid I don't see this as an acceptable or balanced arrangement from either a moral or practical point of view. I am happy to assign any rights that would allow your lab to exploit and make use of any work I do while at your lab as in my proposed contract, but since among other activities I will be developing code that I may want to use in the future for my thesis research or other legitimate purposes, I do not think it is reasonable to accept the terms offered by your university.
For this reason, I am asking for your help in resolving this situation. If we cannot reach an agreement, sadly I may be forced to withdraw my acceptance of your internship.
Best wishes,
[your name]
The thing to remember is that while you are negotiating with a counterparty that's massively more powerful than you (which is why they feel they can get away with making such demands), you do have a bit of leverage: they want something from you. Whether you will succeed depends on the personalities of the people involved, how badly the PI wants you, how many other talented students are lining up to take your place, how unique are the skills that you have to offer, how rigid the university's bureaucratic machinery is, etc. If the PI is unwilling or unable to help, you will find yourself back where you started, so you'll still have the option of either accepting the terms you're offered, or giving up the internship.
This is good advice as an option, but its important to remember there might be nothing you can change, so you should be confident you will not take the internship before threatening. My institute has the same agreement, anyone who works there signs the contract for IP. If a student starts emailing about this and not wanting to sign, we go on to the next person.
@user1938107 I disagree. Note that my proposed email is careful not to take any irreversible positions (by using words like "may" and "might"), thus leaving the OP a ladder to climb off the tree if the negotiation gambit doesn't work out (in such a case he/she may lose a bit of face, but nothing to seriously worry about IMO, and in fact may gain some respect in the eyes of the PI by impressing them as being an assertive, thoughtful person).
if my lab had a contract, and someone emailed that they dont think the contract is moral nor practical, if the contract cannot change, there is no reason to bring this person to my lab, as i would not want to have them feel like they are under an immoral contract.
@user who says the contract can't change? Besides, this is not an all or nothing type of thing. I see the email as the starting point of a negotiation in which the parties try to reach an arrangement they can both live with. Maybe it will turn out that at least a word in the contract can be changed, making a minor concession of some sort? Also the contract may not be written by the lab but dictated by a clueless university bureaucracy, and the lab PI could actually agree with the OP's position and help support it. There are many possible outcomes. Why give up without even testing the waters?
What I am saying is, if the contract is decided by the PI, or even if it is not, but there is nothing the PI can do, which is very likely in legal situations...in this case, if the PI agrees with the person or not, your letter has made clear they feel it is immoral. For example, to enter my lab, the contract is standard, and cannot be changed. If someone told me they feel the contract is immoral, and I know it can not be changed, I move on to the next person. There is no reason to bring on someone who feels they are being put into an unjust situation, because to me, that would be immoral.
It is common for universities (at least in Europe) to have you sign-off the rights of your work when you are being paid by them. At least I had to do that as a PhD and a postdoc.
In your case, you will be working in a hi-end lab and they'll be training you, probably give you access to existing code and data, and not charge you for using their equipment. If there is already a large amount of code at the lab and you develop an extension to it (something that frequently happens in my lab) should you be allowed to use the entire platform later or not?
I would say that at this point of your academic career, you don't really have a lot of leverage, except refusing to sign and finding another lab. My advise is to sign the contract and go to the lab. Learn everything you can and do your best job. Once you leave the lab, ask the professor if you could keep using the code for your future projects, while citing his lab or some paper that you'll jointly publish. Most people will say yes.
If they refuse you to use your code, it doesn't stop you from using the ideas behind it as long as they have been published (article, thesis, etc.). In the past when dealing with unreasonable people, I rewrote a mathematical library that I developed to begin with, based only on the published papers. I even switched programming language and made many improvements the second time around. Of course, it was a wasted week...
If this is common practice, it should not be. It is exploitative.
If they will not negotiate down to something reasonable -- and they might; that contract has the air of being written by lawyers who did not explain it clearly to the lab -- do not take the internship. You can do better.
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14022 | Is it worth it to add substitute teacher work in a CV?
As a graduate student, i've had to substitute teach a number of times for a variety of classes. I'm wondering if it is really worth while to add this information into my CV. Obviously, it won't hold as much weight as teaching a full class. But if it is worth mentioning on the CV, what category should I add it to? Teaching? Volunteer Service? Something else?
I am going to disagree with Peter Jansson here.
If you mean you stepped in to cover a couple of classes here and there when the regular instructor was sick or out of town, I would say this by itself doesn't constitute a meaningful amount of teaching experience for professional purposes, and shouldn't be listed on a CV. It may have been valuable to you, but I think it would look kind of silly on a CV.
If you were assigned as a teaching assistant for the course, you probably have a line where you describe your responsibilities in that role (grading exams, holding office hours, etc), and you could add "occasional lectures" to that line.
If you filled in for an instructor for a longer period of time, then you could consider listing it ("taught 3 weeks of Calculus 4").
Definitely. Teaching experience is always worth adding to the cv because it reflects that you have gained experience in presentation techniques beyond the usual scientific presentations. The difference to research presentations lies in that the latter involves explaining matters and making material understandable at a more basic level. On its own, such experiences may not be enough so document your teaching experience such as levels of the courses, number of students and amount of teaching. you should also gather evaluations of your efforts. I could add links on teaching portfolios here but a simple search on "teaching portfolio" will give you quite a lot of examples and your own university might also have links worth loking at.
I'm not sure this really addresses the situation at hand. A grad student who fills in for an instructor for a couple of lectures is not going to have evaluations, etc, and I can't see turning this into a "portfolio".
There is always a first step on a journey. It is always good to keep track of all the teaching (or other activities that may be added to a CV) one has performed. Later in the career one can perhaps be more selective. To look into how to build a portfolio is never a bad idea.
+1. And don't just say you "substituted" for someone, use verbs to describe what you did: delivered a 45-min lecture on whatever to 25 graduate students, conducted a computer lab session on whatever topic, etc. Just "substitute" sounds too passive. And these experiences should be under the teaching section. As you get better experiences, you may consider revising these substitute gigs out.
I agree with Peter Jasson. It's worth mentioning in your CV unless you already have quite a bit teaching experience. You should put it under "Teaching".
You're a graduate student. Anything meaningful should be listed in the CV. Many years later, you'll find the substitute teaching looks funny when you're a professor. For now, list it unless you already have more than 2 pages long CV.
Here is my personal experience. I put my number of years teaching experience in my resume while in industry. A lot people were interested in that. It's was one of the most frequently asked questions in my industry job interviews I had. One time, I did ask the hiring manager why he was interested to know. He said it shows that I do know how to communicate.
In my case, I've already got 4 years of full time university level teaching experience prior to my current PhD pursuit. Although, a lot of the classes I taught were very low level classes like precalculus, calculus, etc. In contrast, my substitute teaching was for much more advanced (graduate level) courses. I just wonder if including this info on my CV would look, as you say, "funny" because of my previous experience.
@Paul Your case falls into unless you already have quite a bit teaching experience category. Four(4) years of university level teaching is quite a bit. My answer is intended for graduate students in general. Most of them don't have that much extensive experience. So, yes, it does look a little bit funny if the substitue teaching was short. It's up to you.
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15893 | What is the work load of a journal reviewing editor?
I was wandering what was the work load of a journal reviewing editor? More precisely, if someone would like to apply for such a position, how much time is required to do the job correctly?
I am of course aware that it might highly depend on the type of journal and/or field of research, but I would like to have some general feedback / experiences / advices.
Thanks to all!
You are correct in that the total time will first of all vary between journals and fields but also slightly over time. I am chief editor of an international journal in the environmental sciences. The time each reviewing editor spends on a paper with our journal can be broken down as follows:
Must scan the paper upon receiving it for assigning reviewers (probably takes an hour, maybe less)
Assign reviewers (does not take much time but can be drawn out over time when reviewers decline to review)
Read reviews carefully and provide authors with guidelines on what to focus on (probably takes a few hours)
Carefully check the revisions and decide on the faith of the paper (takes a couple of hours at least depending on extent of revisions)
If the paper goes to major revisions you need to go through steps 2-4 again
If the paper is accepted then spend maybe 15 minutes to half an hour formulating a suggestion for final decision (depends on what might need to be written)
This can be summed up for one paper as probably more than half a day. Then the question is how many papers you are requested to handle per month/year etc. You can then easily multiply by the number of papers to get a reasonable idea of the total time you will need to spend.
To add to this, you will need to act whenever a paper arrives, so you are expected to be more or less on call all year. Most journals have systems for indicating when editors are away but that only works for assigning new papers; if you have started the process you will have to see it through ... and keep chasing late reviews and delayed revisions.
So although I cannot give you an idea of workload, you have some tools to figure out what will be involved. Knowing the number of papers you are expected to handle is the most important statistic to figure out. Then depending on your field, you may have a sense of whether my estimates for scanning and reading materials are reasonable. I am sure they will vary depending on discipline.
That really sounds like a lot of work. Are the steps 1-6 you have described more difficult if you are unfamiliar with the area (which must happen some of the time)?
Yes, the time will vary depending on many factors such as familiarity but also experience. You learn to read quicker without loss of detail. You may still need time to pick up the science issues but can spot more mundane errors in referencing etc. much quicker.
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18356 | Impact Factor vs 5-year Impact Factor
In ISI Web of Knowledge Journal Citation Report, we can find any journal Impact Factor (IF) and 5-Years Impact Factor (IF5), which is, as far as I get it, the Impact Factor over the last 5 years (well, the name is quite self-descriptive...).
What interests me is the difference between both indexes. I was wondering how to analyse this difference. If IF > IF5, does it means the journal IF is globally increasing?
And which one is more accurate while evaluating a journal?
The impact factor is calculated over the two previous years (the 2013 number is based on referencing for 2011 and 2012). A high IF indicates that many papers are referenced very quickly (within 2 years of publication). This indicates high turnover rates for the journal. If the longer term value is lower, it could mean what you describe but can also mean that work published has very limited life span. In many fields where publications are slow to produce, in my case they may involve field and longer term experimental work, it is hard to gain many references very quickly and hence the longer term indicator becomes more important and higher. This is also true for small fields where the number of publications is too small for a regular IF to make sense. In field that I am familiar with the five year factor is higher than the ordinary IF bit it will likely vary depending mostly on the nature of the field; if publications have a long or short time span.
There is another factor called the Cited half-life (The median age of the articles that were cited in a year) which in my field often exceeds 10 years indicating the longevity of publications.
For further reading look at Journal Citation Reports
How to compare impact factor over time
If you want to see whether the impact factor of a journal is increasing, then you should look at how the same metric has changed over time. You could choose the 2 year or 5 year impact factor for various reasons. However, you need to focus on only one of these metrics at a time.
The scimagojr website has similar data that is publicly available based on slightly different sources to the ISI data, but it provides information on how indicators have changed from year to year. E.g., Cites per doc
Here's one example for a journal in my field: http://www.scimagojr.com/journalsearch.php?q=30073&tip=sid
What does a difference between 5 and 2 year impact factor mean
It's mostly caused by how citations to the journal are distributed over time. The citation half-life is a useful summary of this distribution. So, for example a citation half-life of 5 years means that half of all the citations that an article will obtain will be accrued 5 years after publication. The ratio of the 5 year to two year impact factor will be larger for journals with longer citation half-lives.
Importantly, fields vary dramatically in citation half-lives. Medicine, neuroscience, and nursing have short half lives, whereas psychology, mathematics, and the social sciences have longer half lives. So, using longer time windows for impact factor calculation will reduce differences between disciplines, although there are other metrics that can used if you wish to reduce discipline-specific bias.
Of course, it may also be that the underlying impact factor of the journal is increasing or decreasing over time, and this will also contribute (typically a small amount) to the nature of any difference between 5 and 2 year impact factor. Specifically, if the impact of the journal is increasing over time, the ratio of 5 to 2 year impact factor will be reduced.
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12825 | External advisor for graduate students?
Some graduate students (MSc and PhD) have a second advisor from outside the university (and even outside the country). In most cases I've seen, the second advisor is a collaborator of the primary supervisor.
Is there any institutional attitude towards having a second advisor from outside the university (and probably internationally)?
What are the terms of working with an external advisor? Does it need an HR contract, or institutional agreement? Who approves the qualifications of the external advisor to meet the university standards/regulations?
I believe this is an institution-dependent issue. Different departments and schools may have very different approaches as to what is formally allowed. In this day and age, however, collaborations, particularly between different departments or institutions, is generally looked on favorably. Whether it rises to an "official" arrangement or not, however, is clearly a different matter.
I don't believe that this is normally done via an employment contract; I think this is handled according to the regulations of the department—so the chair or graduate officer (or whoever normally approves student-advisor matches) would have to sign off on the arrangement. The responsibility for making sure all appropriate procedures are followed, however, lies with the advising team. (In general, this only matters with respect to the thesis committee and matters related to the thesis defense itself.)
The only other situation which might complicate matters is if both advisors are jointly funding the student; then the situation is certainly thornier. However, for such purposes, usually one advisor is the "hosting" advisor who has the primary responsibility for the student, which normally obviates the need for a complicated contract.
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15504 | Is there an open source tool for producing bibtex entries from paper PDFs?
In the desktop application for Mendeley, it's possible to import a PDF and have the bibliographic data automatically extracted (or perhaps looked up, I'm not sure). This feature is more or less reliable. However, Mendeley's code is closed source (they once promised to release the source, but then they were bought by Elsevier). I'm looking for an open source tool that takes one or more PDFs as input and returns a bibtex entry for each.
I've found the following, but couldn't get either of them to work:
cb2Bib
pdfmeat
At present, the fastest alternative I know is to copy/paste the title into Google Scholar, and click the link to bibtex. That's very nice, but I'm wondering if there is something more automated.
Have you tried Zotero? In its free version, it can handle a limited number of pdf's at at time but will extract the info from the pdf, provided it exists.
Be careful with bibtex metadata provided by Google Scholar. Though it is a great tool without a doubt, the bibtex entries may be incomplete and should at the very least be proofread prior to publication, assuming you are using those in a paper.
I got pdfmeat working just now on OS X. Had to modify path to FireFox cookies, and pip install what it complained it was missing. P.S. didn't know about that tool. Thanks for the link.
@PeterJansson Thanks; you should post that as an answer!
@mankoff I did the same and got pdfmeat to run, but for the paper I tried it just launched a totally nonsensical GScholar search and came up with nothing.
I think this is a duplicate of http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/42361/citation-manager
@StrongBad Thanks for the link; I agree! If they are willing to migrate that here, we can delete my question. Otherwise, perhaps it is worthwhile to have it appear on both sites.
@DavidKetcheson it seems like a big list type question to me so I am not sure it is a great fit here. I will check about migrating it here when I get a chance. It might be worth asking what to do in our meta.
@DavidKetcheson A quick Google search turned up at least 20 unique ways of extracting metadata from a PDF file. Not all are open source, but it seems like a number might be.
This question of mine on TeX.SE and specially this answer may also help you: website for easy creating biblatex code?.
@MarcClaesen, treat all BibTeX entries you get from elsewhere with suspicion. E.g. the BibTeX entries given by ACM for their publications are uniformly atrocious (wrong capitalization, useless fields, the works).
The question is now also raised at tex.stackexchange: http://tex.stackexchange.com/q/344081/9075
I use Zotero which in itself is a system for handling references, it comes as both a plugin to Firefox and as standalone. I use the standalone version to extract reference information from pdf and then export to, in my case, BibTeX .bib format. There are possibilities to export to other formats as well.
This doesn't answer your entire question, but may be useful (for example, you might have got the papers from a list of DOIs in the first place).
Assuming these are PDFs with CrossRef DOIs, if you can extract the DOI from the PDF, you can get citation directly from CrossRef's API. For the DOI 10.5555/12345678, the query:
http://api.crossref.org/works/10.5555/12345678/transform/application/x-bibtex
returns
@article{Carberry_2008,
doi = {10.5555/12345678},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.5555/12345678},
year = 2008,
month = {aug},
publisher = {{CrossRef}},
volume = {5},
number = {11},
pages = {1--3},
author = {Josiah Carberry},
title = {Toward a Unified Theory of High-Energy Metaphysics: Silly String Theory},
journal = {Journal of Psychoceramics}
}
You could write a very small script to scan a list of DOIs and download the citations.
The month entry should be integer.
cb2Bib is a tool to extract bibtex entries from PDF files.
The following will command extract bibtex entries from PDF file using cb2Bib command line
c2bconsole --doc2bib paper2.pdf references.bib --sloppy
NB: My answer does not differentiate between open and closed sourced projects and I have not used any of the seemingly big list of solutions.
This SO answer suggests that the 2010 London Dev8D meeting, whatever that is, ran a contest for meta data extraction and resulted in pdfssa4met. I cannot find any documentation on the meeting and anything else that came out of it. The JISC ConnectedWorks project produced a review document that considered Zotero, Mendeley, Google Scholar, CB2BIB, Metadata Extraction Tool, pdfssa4met, pdfmeat, GNU libextractor, FITS, Apache Tika, XPDF, PDFTOHTML, pdf2xml, CiteSeerX, and Paperpile. This list seems to leave out some other solutions, although it is possible that they rely on the same underlying technology. This answers to this TeX.SX question suggests BibDesk and JabRef do metadata extraction. Papers also seems to do metadata extraction. This blog reviews the metadata extraction performance of WizFolio.
There is also Mr. dLib, pdfextract and TeamBeam which seem to have scholarly papers associated with them and therefore seem to be misssed by the JISC review (or developed afterwards). I also found exiftool.
Disclaimer: This is a short version of an answer posted at tex.sx. This solution is not perfect, but might be a good start. I am one of the authors of JabRef and like open source development.
JabRef is an MIT-licensed open-source BibTeX and BibLaTeX bibliographic manager actively developed on GitHub. It offers the functionality to import bibliographic data from PDFs.
Create or open a .bib file.
Go to "Quality" -> "Find unlinked files".
The "Find unlinked files" dialog opens.
Choose a directory using the "Browse" button.
Click on "Scan directory".
In "Select files", the files not yet contained in the database are shown.
To create entries for all files, click on "Apply".
For each file, an import dialog is shown
The dialog shows the XMP metadata stored in the PDF in the area "XMP-metadata".
If this data fits your needs, select "Create entry based on XMP data".
Typically, the XMP-metadata is not good enough.
Choose "Create entry based on content".
Click on "OK" to start the import
A dialog asking for the link is opened
You can choose "Leave file in its current directory" to keep the file where it is. Typically, this is that what one wants.
In case you choose "Move file to file directory", you can also choose to rename the file to the generated BibTeX key.
Press OK to link the file to the BibTeX entry
This happens for each file. After that, the "Find unlinked files" dialog is shown. Just click on "Close" to close it.
You might want to look at pdf-extract:
https://github.com/CrossRef/pdfextract
It doesn't seem to be very actively maintained, but promises to do what you want.
Thanks for the suggestion. As far as I can tell, pdfextract is designed to extract references in a paper, so it wouldn't give you a bibtex entry for the paper that you run it on.
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12796 | Why are all authors credited equally with authorship regardless of level of contribution?
Normally, the credit of a scientific paper is equally distributed among authors. In the real world, it is almost impossible to write a paper with equal contributions of all authors. Usually, one author is the main one who is the idea maker or discoverer by subtle analysis of data.
In most cases, contributions of some authors are trivial, e.g., consultation on a specialized area, analysis of a part of data, etc. With this system, there are many famous professors who are co-authors for tens of hundreds of papers.
Why when judging the research records of a researchers, only the quantity and quality of papers are considered, and no one cares about how much s/he has contributed to those papers?
It's not perfect. Have you got a better idea?
@NateEldredge not a practical one, but I met a promotion committee who needed a statement for contribution to each paper, as major journals like Nature recently add to each paper. However, it is just a note at the end of papers with no real considerations within academia. I also witnessed that some committees significantly credit the first author as the main author.
This is not true where I teach. We are expected to quantify and describe our contribution if we are not the sole author of a paper.
@JoeHass describe to whom? When someone posts his resume on personal webpage or submits for a job application, everyone just look at the list of publications and do not bother with his actual contributions.
We are expected to describe our contributions to the committee that governs promotion, retention, and tenure. Since you mentioned "promotion committee" I thought that was obvious.
@JoeHass In the above comment, I quoted that I've also seen such attention in promotion committees. My question was for general credit in academia. They may consider this for promotion, but I have not seen this attention for job applications. They just need a research statement and record of publication, and no one asks for the applicant contribution to previous research projects.
If you get an interview, they will ask.
@JoeHass that would be a subjective question with biased speculative answer!
What makes you think that subjective questions are not asked in an academic interview, or that subjective factors are not considered in academic hiring?
@JoeHass I mean that one with trivial contributions to many papers has a better position in academia, as compared with someone with major role (but a few) in outstanding works.
Success in academia is not determined solely by your published papers. At some institutions your publication record is not even the most important determinant. Your original question made many, many unjustified assumptions.
@JoeHass Just a personal example of interviewers asking about ones contribution to a paper: I didn't just get asked "How much did you do?" I was asked to "Please describe my contribution in some detail". If I just said that I did everything, that would have been an obvious lie, as I couldn't talk about details of about half a project. My part I could describe perfectly and explain how it complemented the results of the other part (that's the only thing I knew). They won't ask this for every one of your papers, but could ask about any of them.
as I couldn't talk about details of about half a project — Well, don't do that then.
@JoeHass So you are expected to say something like: "My contribution to this project was 47.391 %"...
@NickS The review committee has a spreadsheet that you fill out for every co-authored paper, and they give you some rough bins to choose from describing your contributions to the ideas expressed in the paper as well as your contribution to the actual writing of the paper.
I agree that using simple publication or citation counts is prone to a range of problems. One important class of such biases relates to differential levels of involvement of an author.
In terms of some basic corrections for this, there are ways that individual papers are evaluated to assess relative contribution.
In some fields being first author (and to a lesser extent, subsequent positions) suggests a greater level of involvement in a given paper.
In a few cases, proportion of contribution is explicitly stated.
In some contexts, some form of proportional analysis is performed such that if you are one author among two, then the paper is weighted more than one author among ten (I've seen this in some university workload models).
However, generally, when evaluating the publication achievements of a researchers, a more holistic approach can be taken.
An overall program of research will be evaluated in order to assess a sustained contribution.
To some extent, over time researchers would be expected to play a range of roles from lead to secondary contributor. Therefore, often an overall sum of papers may balance out such varying levels of contributions. In particular, if you have a reasonable balance of first author papers and the number of authors per paper is similar to other researchers in your field, this may reinforce such a perspective.
My opinion is that, contrary to what you say about "one main contributor", in most cases, it is absolutely impossible to judge "the level of contribution" from any objective standpoint. Let's consider a (not hypothetical, just missing real names!) example.
A and B spent about a year thinking of a problem and devising a scheme for solution they could not make work.
A discussed the question with C.
C, who wasn't much interested in trying it yourself, passed it to his collaborator on a different project D.
D found an approach that gives fairly good result but not quite what was wanted and told it to C.
C passed it to A and B and during the two week visit of D arranged that A,C,D have a few discussions about it that resulted in some extra ideas but not a full solution yet.
Meanwhile B tried to combine what he knew himself and what he was told by C and obtained an even slightly better result than D (though still short of the exact statement wanted) but under more restrictive assumptions. He sent it to D.
D, upon reading B's draft, realized that the initial scheme of A and B could be made to work after all (what he was missing was in that note from B and what B was missing was a part of D's "general knowledge"), finished it off, and sent the solution to A,B,C, who have read and verified it.
Now, I suggest you try to tell the "level of contribution" of each person keeping in mind that
1) If not for C, D would most likely not hear of the problem at all and it is doubtful that he would come into direct contact with A,B.
2) It is possible that A and B would make their approach work eventually without D.
3) What was a "general knowledge" for D and allowed him to finish the problem off, would hardly come into the mind of A,B,C at all.
4) Without B's draft, D would, most likely, stop at the "partial result" he obtained first.
5) Both A and C participated in the discussion during D's visit and, while everybody remembers all the ideas that surfaced, nobody remembers (or cares much about) who said what.
6) A,B,C,D all argue that the rest 3 could surely do the problem without him, just in longer time, so the current idea of "author credit" C and D have is to publish the whole thing under the name AB CoD.
I have to disagree that all authors are credited equally. Since there are several ways in which authorships are counted, the position of your name will provide different signals. In my realm, first authors are simply assumed to have done the most, such papers count higher. Other authors are considered to have done less in falling order, unless stated otherwise. In some fields the last author is the "important" one. In some fields authorships come through contract, e.g. CERN consortia authorships (see link in the reply on coauthorships, the answer there may also be of help). Hence authorships are treated differently.
Ideally everyone should follow the Vancouver Protocol) in which it is clear that some contributions simply should not warrant authorship but rather a mention in the acknowledgement.
So in the end when judging the authorships of papers, each field applies their own "standard".
follow the Vancouver Protocol: "Editors may ask authors to describe what each contributed; this information may be published." After reading this, I lost quite a noticeable part of my belief in the assumption that those guys have clear idea of what they are talking about and are in touch with current realities and customary practices of collaboration.
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45905 | How do I deal with my family which doesn't respect science and math while I am doing a double science and math major?
How do I deal with two parents who don't see the utility of science and mathematics while pursuing an education in science and math (while depending on their income to fund my tuition?). They come from a blue-collar background and don't think learning arcane symbols has anything to do with innovation or make big bucks in today's world.
My parents wish for me to go off to the industry ASAP or do some freelance or make an app that get them rich quick. I want to pursuit further education beyond that of a bachelor degree.
In the summertime I am preparing for some course work for next semester, but they keep on telling me that I should sign up for some fitness class or make money. I appreciate their viewpoint, but I can't bring myself to balance between studying and concentrating on course work while doing things that are a waste of time.
What should I do?
Going to a finess class or finding a work is not a waste of time. There are people who can do them both along with studying for a PHD, so I am sure you can do them along in your undergraduate days, during summer. Also private tutoring may make you some money, while practising what you learnt in your university e.g. in Math. Many of us have done it during our undergradute studies and beyond (MSc or PHD).
Get a job. Get out from under your parent's money. Then do what you want. (But take a fitness class anyway.)
Second on the fitness class. I've found that the better my physical condition, the better my brain works.
You call tell them about big data science, which is relatively close to maths and pays very well. You can tell them about how the finance industry and other big corporations are keen on science/math PhD (they are, including physics and biology!) and how such positions can pay very well.
I voted to close this? I have no idea why. I have no idea why; I have voted to reopen.
If the goal of your parents for you really is that you become the next Steve Jobs, Sergey Brin, or Mark Zuckerberg, then letting you go to graduate studies and letting you hang with all the other smart people is certainly more useful than telling you to "start getting rich now". This is akin to wanting to raise an Olympian athlete, and, rather than making him train, shouting at him that he needs to run faster right now. Of course the assumption that any specific person will break through and get super-rich is unrealistic to the point of being ridiculous, but obviously it will be hard to convince your parents of that (at least short-term), so you may need to work with what you got.
While the idea of Nox is generally useful (find statistics and show them), it sounds like your parents may be the type for which statistics are too abstract and would probably not work very well. Rather, you can try convincing them with anecdotes of well-educated people who "made it" (became rich, to use the terminology of the question). Of those there are many - opposite to popular opinion, most startup founders etc. are not random people off the streets who were selling sandwiches before breaking through. Rather, most greatly successful ideas and companies have been developed by people with degrees from top universities in, yes, math and science. There is a reason why Silicon Valley is in the Bay Area, and it's likely not the weather.
Concrete examples include:
The company Google sprung out of a research project by Sergey Brin and Larry Page, two Stanford graduate students. Sergey is now the 18th-richest person in the world.
Facebook was not a research project, but (at least so the story goes) the original ideas have been developed by Mark Zuckerberg in a dormitory in Harvard in discussion with other students in breaks between computer science classes.
Bill Gates never finished, but even the founder and long-time CEO of Microsoft was in Harvard for some time. Incidentally, there he met Steve Ballmer, who became CEO of Microsoft after Gates - another case of a very wealthy and important person who happens to have great education.
There is one thing you should actually do: listen to them, even if just a bit.
Your parents are funding your education and are not entirely happy with what you do. They are also proposing to you to get a job during your breaks.
Try to do just that. To elaborate: I think there is a high chance that your parents will not be willing to help you later on (i.e. at M.Sc. level), thus you will need money.
Also, speaking from experience, the sports part is not to be underestimated. You do not have to be a pro-whatever, but going to the gym and keeping fit is certainly not going to hurt your brain.
Beyond this it is up to you to educate them. Look for statistics etc. which
show that having higher education is beneficial for a job and then make it understandable for your parents (basically it should be easy to imagine for them). The latter part is actually the hard part. It seems to me that your parents may have a warped understanding of how difficult it is to actually "get rich quick".
Do not think that trying to educate your parents will be a waste of your time. You might lose some study-time now, but if you are successful you stand to gain much more in the long run (i.e. tuition for masters) – do not underestimate this.
@JeffE that very much depends on the country you're in.
@JeffE I think you are biased. By (overstated) extension of your argument the only research to be pursued is one that pays for itself! In Germany for example it is generally expected to do an M.Sc. after B.Sc. and that requires living funds for 1 or 2 years (setting aside available student loans from the state).
Do we actually know that the parents are funding her education? Though she doesn't give her location, in the US it is (or was 30 years ago) possible to get a degree without any parental support.
@terdon I suspect the OP is American based to the phrase "blue collar"
@JeffE Masters level degrees in my field are, by and large, unfunded.
You guys are giving examples of where you must pay for your masters degree, but that doesn't mean what JeffE says is not true. He is suggesting that if you are in a situation where you have to pay for your graduate degree.... don't.
@JeffE I think the OP is female, so maybe edit your comment (his->her).
Why would OP's parents need to support their graduate degree? The only graduate degrees worth pursuing are the ones that provide funding. @Neo is correct: If you have to pay for your graduate degree, don't.
@JeffE in many countries--most, probably--there are no graduate degrees that offer funding. In other words, if you can't pay for your graduate degree, you're not getting one.
As long as your parents are in control of your tuition, you need to deal with the question of whether they approve of your choices. If you want to make an argument to them that getting a higher education is worth it then here is a really useful chart:
STEM education in particular is even more valuable than general higher education (a good summary may be found in this report), though the percent benefit is less for higher degrees, where non-STEM folks tend to make good money and have very low unemployment as well. Your STEM undergraduate degree, for example, is worth an expected 25% gain in salary vs. a non-STEM degree.
Now it's also possible that your parents aren't actually concerned about your ability to make money in the future, and so you won't be able to make an argument to them in this way. For example, what they might really be concerned about is their own current debt (e.g., if they are on the brink of bankruptcy or foreclosure and hiding from you) or about non-monetary issues (e.g., if they are religious fundamentalists or anti-government conspiracy theorists).
If something like this is the case, and they aren't receptive to a respectful presentation of your case for STEM and higher education, then you're going to need to think about going along them as part of obtaining your STEM education, i.e., a price you have to pay, not unlike putting up with annoying dorm-mates, in order to remain at college.
Once you finish your undergraduate and move on to a graduate program, any good graduate program will give you a sufficient stipend to live on, and you need not be dependent on your parents finances or approval any more in any way.
So some advice and a personal story. TL;DR: Take advice tactfully, and make your own decisions.
I feel a connection between your brief explanation and my own life story. I went off for business school and studied economics, only to get very depressed and decide to drop out to travel a bit. I eventually went back to school, graduated with a double bachelors in Spanish and sociology and am working on a masters degree right now. But let's focus in on the middle of the story.
My parents were very convinced that this 'travelling' would only be a setback, that I might die, and even if I didn't I would regret the wasted time for the rest of my life. I heard them and accepted their comments, but knowing that only I could know what was going on inside of me, I left anyway. I rediscovered what interested me, and in two years I was back in school.
How does this relate to you? Your parents are different people than you, but they are still people. This means they have opinions and views about everything, just like you do. They will freely offer all the advice you can put up with, but in the end it's you that has to make the decision for your life. Having them pay for your education can complicate things, and some of the other answers have some advice about that, but perhaps try talking to them. Explain to them that a) you do hear them, b) you have some of your own ideas, and c) you have a plan that will incorporate what you feel is the best of all the advice you have received, from them, from yourself, and from others.
Parents have opinions, and often, money. But your life is yours, and you have to make the decisions for you. Listen to your parents, and even ask them to go deeper into the whys of their advice. But in the end, make your own choices.
In this recent Numberphile video, James Simons (who, incidentally, build his billion-dollar fortune in large part by being really good at math) comments that in the United States, if you know enough math to teach it well at the high school level, you can probably get a job with Google, Microsoft, or some other big tech company. That is a pretty good career prospect, if you ask me. Depending on the type of science your other major is on, the same applies (for example, if you are studying Chemistry and get good grades, you can possibly get into a MSc program in Chemical Engineering, which will also open the door to a number of good careers in industry).
As xLeitix mentions, your parents have to understand that higher education is a long-term investment. You may not get rich straight away (very few people do, and they will be the first to admit that a lot depends on being in the right place at the right time), but you will be reaping tangible benefits for the rest of your life.
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110430 | GDPR and predatory/spam journals
As the new general data protection regulation approached, I got a ton of emails from services I'm using asking me to give my consent.
My question is, would the new law help me to get rid of the million emails I receive from journals that somehow got my contact information and want me to publish, become an editor, or speak at a conference?
To be clear, it is a theoretical question. I know that each day more and more of these journals appear and there is no way to get rid of them all. But I wonder if I could send them a standard text like "As you know the law.. please delete my contact information".
However, I'm suspect the new law doesn't apply to people that are outside the EU.
Yes, the law does only apply to EU citizens. The rest of your question is still interesting, though.
It matters to companies anywhere that are emailing people in the EU.
@Flyto It may apply, but enforcement would be difficult.
Thanks for your input guys. I always was under the impression that those journals may be in a gray area, but they need to hold up at least some "professionality". While it is hard to know the identity of the mysterious Nigerian Prince, some of those journals/conferences do exist. I thought it might be possible to scare them off.
It might help, if the people writing those emails are law-abiding.
However, since, a large proportion of such emails are trying to get money out of you by fraudulent means (publication fees or conference fees), they're probably not fussed about breaking another law as well.
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138009 | Is it reasonable to ask candidates to create a profile on Google Scholar?
I was in the evaluation committee for the adjunct lecturers this year, and it was a complete nightmare. There were over thirty candidates and many of them didn't have an account on Google Scholar, which made tracking their impact really hard, due to name collisions etc.
My question is would it be a reasonable requirement to force the candidates to create a Google Scholar account, so that we can easily track their publication/citation record and impact?
My hesitation is that it would require them to give away private information to a third-party company, and some people wouldn't like to be forced to do it, or even raise legal issues.
Well, I wouldn't do it. I would be happy to supply a list of publications, and expect you to use real tools such as Web of Science to check citations and whatnot. If you want to evaluate professionals, use professional tools.
@JonCuster: Unfortunately we don't have a subscription for that. We do have for scopus though.
Comments are not for extended discussion; the rest of this conversation has been moved to chat.
@Roland: I wouldn't like to add the specific country, let's just say it is in the EU.
As much as I like Google Scholar, requiring candidates to create a Google Scholar profile specifically seems inappropriate. You are effectively saying you won't hire people that don't use Google.
What you could do is make it an optional part of the application or you could ask candidates to submit something more vague like a "citation report" and suggest that a printout of their Google Scholar profile is sufficient for this.
I am completely fine with an optional box for a Google scholar account, but I would be very put off by a request for a "citation report." But this may be a field-dependent thing. (I am in pure math, along with I believe a disproportionately large number of users of this site.)
@Kimball I agree that not much weight should be placed on citations, but that seems to be the information OP is looking for.
@Kimball I think the solution for people like you, is to require a citation report, and say "or you can just give us your Google Scholar page if you don't feel like typing it!" Of course you still have the issue of normalizing the non-Scholar citation reports to Scholar and each other, but then if a candidate feels one option undersells them they are always free to just use the other option.
you could ask candidates to submit something more vague like a "citation report" — Such a request would only convince me that the search committee is too lazy to look up the data they want themselves.
Suggesting is one thing; requiring is inappropriate. Some people have a philosophical objection to supporting NSA’s biggest competitor. Right or wrong, this attitude is irrelevant to their academic qualifications. Same goes for less successful snoops or spammers like Facebook or Linked-In. Yes, I am obviously biased against these (censored) but again, that is irrelevant to my academic potential.
@WGroleau Publications are, by definition, public. So Google Scholar is just collating public information. To each their own, but I don't understand this attitude that Google Scholar is somehow a privacy concern. (I understand more the concern that citation counts are overemphasized.)
@JeffE Having all the information summarized in a Google Scholar report is convenient, even if it is, in theory, possible to collect it yourself. I wouldn't interpret it as laziness -- the search committee has limited time and many applications to review. Perhaps they shouldn't look at citation counts at all, but that's another discussion.
Have you considered ORCID (Open Researcher and Contributor IDentifier)?
I have the same concerns about intellectual property protection issues around Google unfortunately. GoogleScholar is also quite discipline specific (as others have said here) and is banned in some countries (China, etc). So to endorse a product that exposes a scholar to legal ramifications in their country plus the risk of commercialization of their data is highly problematic.
ORCID on the other hand is "an international, interdisciplinary, open, non-proprietary, and not-for-profit organization". ORCID aims to include every discipline and many publishers and their journals are now mandating ORCID sign-in for their journal logins. Most people do not know about ORCID so you can offer them information. Also, make sure they know to make their ORCID profile public.
Unfortunately, if your applicants refuse to use ORCID, your choice would be limited. I am not sure whether you have a friendly and supportive librarian can confirm their publication record and piece together their impact factor before progressing them through the selection process?
This answer is pretty good but I think you should use ORCID profiles, not ORCIDs. It is possible to have an ORCID but no public profile.
Hi Poidah, it was not intended to be a put down. My comment was intended to be helpful to the asker, not to you. My criticism of ORCID would be that their website is very slow to use. That's not a criticism of you for suggesting it.
ORCID does not track citations, so it only satisfies a subset of the requirements that Google Scholar fulfills (publication and citation tracking).
Poidah, I did not say anything about plurals. If you don't want to be critiqued (in a respectful tone) Stack Exchange is not for you.
Poidah You are making a very big deal about a very minor issue, especially since @AnonymousPhysicist used the word criticism at ORCID's website, not you.
Yeah @lighthousekeeper I think the OP was keen to have a way to easily confirm the legitimacy of someone's publication. Rather than having to go through each publication individually on a search engine. Imagine if each person has 5 to 30 and there are 5 to 15 applicants. It would easily take an afternoon or a couple of days to do a proper due diligence. But yes, citations are not collected on ORCID which is the other point that the OP was keen to measure and easily double check. ORCID does interact with some databases, so it may be easier to find the impact stats through their ORCID.
I do not think it is reasonable to ask candidates to create a profile on any third-party platform. Particularly on a google service, taking in account that some proportion of web users have concerns about this company (as well as other large corporate data processing companies), and do not want to get on their radar if possible.
Typically, it is sufficient to make it clear to the candidates what are the selection criteria for the post and let them find their preferred way of demonstrating that they meet those criteria. For example, if your criteria is number of citations, you can suggest Google Scholar as an acceptable evidence, along with WoS and others, ultimately allowing your candidates to choose the service they prefer. If you want to check impact, you need to explain what you mean by this (the definitions vary widely across different fields and countries). Note that impact typically is not measured by the academic citations, but rather by adoption of research in non-academic environment, such as industry, government policies, patents, etc.
In the UK, the impact is a key performance indicator in the Research Excellence Framework. It takes Universities a few months to prepare and evidence strong impact cases. I am sometimes puzzled when I see an entry-level faculty post requiring candidates to provide a fully justified impact statement. Maybe it is possible in some disciplines, but in my area (numerical mathematics) I find it difficult to trace, demonstrate and fully evidence the non-academic impact.
"I do not think it is reasonable to ask candidates to create a profile on any third-party platform." Most academic job applications are submitted using a third-party platform. Most require creating an account and entering your information.
@AnonymousPhysicist Most applications I submitted were through the university website, i.e. the platform is hosted by the university. University is the first/second party, not the third one. In the US, many guys use mathjobs.org, but this is not universal across the globe.
@AnonymousPhysicist: There's a huge difference in an isolated outsourced job application submission service and a platform that's tied into all sorts of other things.
It is common, and reasonable, for employers to require job candidates and employees coming up for review to provide the employer with any information it needs to evaluate the candidates/employees. So certainly you can ask them to prepare readable, well-formatted publication lists, citation information, and anything else that lets you evaluate their impact and productivity. I don’t see how the lecturers could reasonably complain if asked to provide such information in a format of your choice.
However, your concern about Google Scholar is justified. Requiring people to open Google accounts as a condition of employment is, at the very least, coercive and unprofessional, and will reflect badly on you. It seems not unlike asking employees to use Gmail email addresses for work because you are too cheap or lazy to figure out a better solution. Similarly, if the evaluation process was a “nightmare”, to me it suggests that the evaluation committee did not give sufficient forethought to asking the lecturers to provide the relevant information. The problem is not with the lecturers not using the tool you wish they used, but with your department not designing the evaluation process thoughtfully enough.
Assuming your university has a subscription, Scopus is pretty good at giving you relatively comprehensive and up to date author publication and citation profiles.
It's generally good at dealing with name conflicts.
A few scenarios where it might fail:
Academics who have changed names (e.g., by marriage).
Academics with particularly common names who have changed institutional affiliation. Of course, academics can notify Scopus of these changes and merge profile data, but it can't be counted on.
And as @Flyto, Scopus has fairly good journal coverage, but it may miss other important output (e.g., conference publications, some books and book chapters), which can be particularly important in some fields.
I guess it all depends on how much you want to rely on it versus using it as an additional source of information.
I thought it cost money for authors to use, but apparently I was wrong and author profiles lookup is free?
I just tried updating my profile, and wow this is worse than Google Scholar.
Field-dependant. For me, Scopus includes my journal articles but does not include a number of peer-reviewed conference papers, and hence does not give a fair impression of my output.
@AnonymousPhysicist I guess it depends on what you mean by update your profile. I don't believe that it's designed for adding publications. My understanding was that the main things you can do is (a) get publications in the database linked to your name if for some reason they didn't get automatically linked; (b) explain that two names in the system are both you; (c) remove publications from your profile that are not you. But yes, I agree. It's a bit clunky.
My question is would it be a reasonable requirement to force the candidates to create a Google Scholar account
You should recommend that candidates provide a Google Scholar Profile (not account). In practice, hiring committees are going to go look for a profile. You might as well let candidates know that is going to happen.
You cannot force job applicants to do anything. They can always just decide not to apply.
so that we can easily track their publication/citation record and impact?
Google Scholar is good for tracking publications. Beware that some people allow Google to add publications to their profile, and these are of often incorrectly added. Do not use it to judge impact, and beware that no citation counting system will be totally reliable.
You cannot force job applicants to do anything. They can always just decide not to apply. You can also spin that the other way: "You can force job applicants to do anything, as long as you accept that those that do not want to comply, will just walk away."
"You cannot force job applicants to do anything. They can always just decide not to apply." Well, duh, sorry. It's clear that "force applicants to do X" means "refuse to consider applicants who don't do X." I'm quite sure that nobody believes it means to actually physically compel applicants to do something.
Yes, it is completely within reason to ask candidates to have a profile somewhere. What it's not appropriate is to demand they use Google specifically.
Besides Scholar there are other alternatives like Scopus, ORCID (mentioned in other answers) or even creating profiles in sites like scholarly, researchgate, or academia.edu. You should leave it to them to choose whichever they like but perhaps suggest Google Scholar as that is what you'd be using to asses them. Don't force them to use an specific 3th party as that could even be illegal in some countries for considering such as 'coercion'.
A little story. During my MBA one teacher made us use facebook to create a group to drop the homework there and such, so I had to create a profile there for that since I had avoided getting one, and after that class I have only used it a couple times for subscriptions. Still, I know some of my data is there. had the professor given us option, we would have use Google environment for the class and it would have worked. So yeah, a professor did asked us directly to use a third party.
On another note, since you mention that it's for hiring, then yes, it is still appropriate to ask for profiles because many companies want to see social media profile before hiring.
"many companies want to see social media profile before hiring": too bad, they usually can't, at least not for the generalist kind of social media. And frankly, even where it is allowed, it's likely going to piss off many of the good applicants. But this is tangential to the question, since we are talking about ORCID and likes, which cannot really be considered personal profiles (I wouldn't even call them social media).
Many universities operate as companies in a broad sense and nothing stops them from searching your name in media (Thank you for that site, it's quite interesting even if it only applies to USA, I'll check if there are repositories on international rulings). As fort Orchid, it says in it's main page "...your ORCID record with your professional information and link to your other identifiers (such as Scopus or ResearcherID or LinkedIn)", so yeah, its a public profile linked to social media. I dont see it working alone as it wouldn't be such an useful tool [https://orcid.org/].
ORCID alone actually can be a useful tool if your name is common or has many spellings (and these cases cover lots of researchers). Not to mention that it is a step towards the semantic web, which is always a good thing :)
That is true, although in integration it works even better for the researcher as she/he can link all the profiles. The common name thing however is a big problem, more so because researches around the world are forced to cut their names to only the first name and the first family name to conform to anglosaxon simplicity, like when APA deems to add just 1 initial and first family name ¬¬ . But yeah, moving to better dta and metadata integration is a good thing. I completely agree on that.
To some extent this depends on the field and where in the process you are (although I have to find it funny that 30 applications is considered severe; in math there are positions which get literally 300 or 400 applications). Here are some relevant considerations:
Are you in a field which usually uses Google Scholar? Math for example doesn't almost at all(Edit: See comments by Dmitry here- I may be seriously wrong about how much it is used in math), but it seems to be common in some other fields. If one is one of the fields where it is common, that may make more sense.
Is this is a position where research is going to matter? If you are hiring someone as an adjunct as you suggest, this doesn't seem like a research focused position, so why should it matter?
What stage in one's selection process is one in? If for example one first selects out some of the candidates, and asks the remaining pool to do so, that looks a lot more reasonable. You can probably eliminate a fair number of candidates simply by not having strong CVs (and frankly it is likely if you are looking for a research position in a field that often uses Google Scholar that those people will often be the ones without Google Scholar profiles).
Legal issues are complicated, and we can't really give legal advice here, but there are some potential issues that can be highlighted. The most obvious one is accessibility: is Google Scholar easily accessible for people with disabilities? If it isn't, this would be a potential problem. Are you at a state school or a private school? If a state school there are a lot more rules about hiring generally that need to be followed, and asking for something like this after the job has already been advertised with instructions on what to do will be a problem in some states. Note that in some respects for some of these issues this may also be the sort of thing where it is better to ask for forgiveness than permission: if you ask a university legal counsel if you can do anything that seems remotely questionable, they'll frequently just say "no." If you are in Europe some of the legal issues may also be more severe as they may interact with European data privacy issues, and that's a serious enough issue right now that if one is concerned about it, getting competent legal counsel may make sense, but you may have someone even in IT who can walk you through any relevant issues at an informal level.
Now for my personal opinion: For what it is worth, if I were applying for a position and they asked me to make a Google Scholar profile, since we don't generally use them in math, I'd consider that to be a serious red flag about what the committee knew or how much the school was micromanaging hiring decisions. Unless it was a high profile school, at a highly desirable position, I'd almost certainly say no. And if I were to see it while applying for a position that was a primarily teaching position, my reaction would be extremely negative. I have seen positions that ask one to highlight which of one's research papers one is most proud of, and it might be a substantially more useful than trying to use some potentially gameable metric like this.
I am in Maths and I use Google Scholar.
@DmitrySavostyanov I'm not claiming that none of us use it, but that it isn't used much. Do you think that impression is incorrect?
All my close collaborators (in Maths) use Google Scholar, apart from maybe one or two very senior professors.
@DmitrySavostyanov Hmm, interesting. I'll include an edit then that I may be wrong. Could you explain what you are using it for? I'm not sure what I'd use it for that MathSciNet doesn't do better, with the exception of if one is in a highly applied field that it might help to be able to see citations from journals not indexed by MathSciNet.
I can't say I did a rigorous statistical testing, but when I last checked, GS was picking almost all my papers and almost all citations in a few weeks from the publication date, while WoS and MathSciNet took months and sometimes years to update the records.
Mathscinet is only for published papers (it updates quickly when it’s published) while google scholar includes arxiv preprints.
The problem with Google Scholar is not that it doesn't pick up publications; it's that it picks up too many of them (false positives / inflated citation counts).
Is it reasonable to ask candidates to create a profile on Google Scholar?
Absolutely not. Google is an atrocious entity involved in mass commercial and governmental surveillance, political censorship etc. You really must not require people to use Google's services, legitimizing these practices.
Now, to be practical - I'm not saying that you should demand the opposite. I mean, I use Google Scholar from time to time (though I wish I could avoid it completely). But you should definitely make an effort to stay away from the Google "octopus" of services and definitely not feed it more victims. I suggest you not even ask people to have a Google profile (Google Scholar or whatever other account).
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18664 | Submitting paper when leaving academia?
Is it a good idea to submit a paper when you are about to leave academia, say in the next year?
In my field (Mathematics), the review progress is typically very long (At the moment I'm waiting for the first review for almost a year). I do not want to receive a review while I'm in the middle of a new job (probably without access to other academic people, articles, books, etc.). On the other hand, I've done something which is worth to published somewhere.
Should I submit it? How can I improve the length of the review (e.g., by chosing the journal?)?
Edit: Some details: I'm about to finish my PhD and I have no co-authors for the latest paper who could handle big parts of revisions.
I think you answered your own question by saying you've got something worth publishing :)
I would say, yes.
If the results are worth publishing, then the world should know about them.
That said, even if the paper is accepted, it is likely that you'll need to make minor or major revisions. If you do not expect that you will have the time to do this, then ultimately the paper will be rejected (or simply just vanish). So you need to consider whether you will, in 1, 2 or 3 years (or whatever the journal turn around time is) be in a position, mentally and otherwise, to address the review comments.
The other option is to archive the paper on arxiv.org and hope that interested people find the work – for the good of science.
Another alternative is to ask a trusted colleague to be the corresponding author in your absence. (It used to be relatively common, especially in various Society publications, for results by X to be communicated by Y.)
If you think it's worth publishing, you should at least put it on ArXiv.
I'd also recommend submitting it to a journal. If the paper is well-written and correct, it shouldn't need a great deal of revision, so it should be possible to do that in your spare time. You could also mention when you submit the paper that you'll be leaving academia so you might need more time than usual to make revisions.
Another possibility is to bring your advisor on board as a co-author to deal with these things.
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1658 | How to communicate achievements on the StackExchange network in an academic CV or job interview?
I think contributions to StackExchange constitute a valuable thing for an academic to do. In many cases such contributions are directly related to the aims of an academic department: community engagement, building new knowledge, etc.
This is particularly clear for sites that directly align with a particular academic discipline (e.g., mathematics, statistics, psychology).
However, many people in academia have not heard of StackExchange. They often won't have heard about the reputation system. They may not be aware of the high quality content that often appears.
Thus, as an academic, how should you share your achievements on the StackExchange network in contexts where how your performance is evaluated has material consequences? (e.g., a CV, job interview, grant application context, promotion context)
This is not an answer, but apparently for computer programming jobs, participation in StackOverflow (the original SE) is viewed as a plus.
E.g. I included in my CV "a moderator of Theoretical Physics - Stack Exchange (Nov 2011 - May 2012)" under projects/activities, with a proper link.
I routinely mention my participation in cstheory as a moderator on grant applications (under Broader Impact). I also mention it as part of 'synergistic activities' in my NSF 2-page bio.
For departmental review, I'd view this as external service.
what if you are not a mod of any academic site?
The StackExchange point system is not a metric for anything other than "how much we trust you to use the site correctly". The idea exists to balance the needs of a public/open/crowdsourced/self-moderating Q&A system, with protection from internet trolls and defacement. The authors of SE even said themselves that "reputation was useless," and not a proxy for the value someone brings to the site.
For example, some people like Brian Tompsett rack up huge amounts of points by editing posts with minor spelling corrections. This is NOT to say Brian's work is meaningless though - it absolutely is not - but you can't just look at a score and directly convert it into value to the community since there are so many different ways to gain rep.
I am myself a pretty good example of this. Recently I made a question regarding my poor working conditions which gained the most number of views for a question on the site to date. Probably because many people felt sympathetic to my circumstances, it gained a large number of upvotes too. I am under no illusion however, that my question and thus my account has anything like the value to the community that my rep score indicates. The large number of upvotes however, gave me the psychological support i needed to tell my boss that my working conditions are unfair, despite what he claims, and now everything on my end is much much better - so ironically, it was the upvotes themselves that had value, not the question.
There are also numerous answers that contain "hard truths" that get heavily down-voted not because they are inaccurate, but because people just don't like what they are reading - despite it having considerable value. People who play devil's advocate get hit by this the hardest.
So you see there is only a weak correlation between between rep and value to the site - and that is by design. Anyone who would know what to do with your rep score if seen on a CV would likely know this too, so if you do go on to put your academia.SE details on your CV, make sure to highlight why you like helping people, whether you like to ask good/insightful questions or answer technical/demanding questions with research, etc etc. Don't make any reference to rep, because the person reading the review won't be impressed - particularly if their rep score is lower or much higher than yours ;)
You get no points for editing posts after 1k BTW.... I'm just a pedant
There are also numerous answers that contain "hard truths" that get heavily down-voted not because they are inaccurate, but because people just don't like what they are reading - I haven't noticed that so much on this site, have you? Maybe there are a few downvotes (which only effect rep a little anyway) but I think that good timely answers usually get many more up than down votes.
Yes I have experienced that, mostly on other people's answers but also occasionally my own. I guess your exposure to it all depends on the questions you read, and whether you look at a controversial answer and think its "bad" or "necessary". I think the last time it happened to me was 3 months ago: http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/64567/ where my lone attempt at answering the question was given -3, not because it's factually incorrect, but because lying to pull copyright is ethically indefensible (which I wrote in the answer). Anyway, this is getting a bit meta...
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13923 | How to automatically import APA references into reference manager?
Related to this question on cross-checking APA citations and references, I often have an existing list of APA formatted references. This might come from a document from a collaborator or it might just be a published article.
I often want to take this list of APA references (e.g., one reference per line) and import them into my bibliographic software in such a way that the reference manager is able to discern what aspects of the reference correspond to author, year, title, journal, issue, pages, etc.
I'm often working with Endnote to do this, but I imagine that once you get the data into any reference manager (e.g., Mendeley, Zotero, etc.), it would be relatively easy to export and import into a preferred reference manager.
I'd also be happy with a system that was pretty good but not perfect. In psychology at least, most references are journal articles, book chapters, and books. So a system that imported these and flagged the rest would still be useful.
Question
How can an existing list of APA references be automatically imported into a reference manager?
There is a list of tools that attempt to convert formatted bibliographies to bibliography software formats here. I haven't used any of them for a while so I can not recommend any of the tools in particular.
The reference management program Citavi does this quite successfully in the case of journal articles, but not so successfully in the case of books (I know this because I work for Swiss Academic Software, the developers of Citavi).
It will not specifically import APA lists, but any kind of formatted bibliography.
This is how to do it:
Add the PDF document containing the list of references as a reference to Citavi.
Show the PDF in the preview column.
Select the text with the references you want to import.
In the menu above the PDF click More > Search bibliography.
Windows only, unfortunately.
That is correct, but an operating system agnostic web version is being developped at the moment.
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17425 | Which summer internship to take?
I asked a similar question last year, but the stakes have changed slightly.
So, I have an offer from a top 5 program in Chemical engineering (my major). There are a couple of extremely accomplished professors in fluid mechanics here, which is what I want to study in grad school. However, I am not so interested in attending this school for graduate school because it does not send many people to academia post-graduation, despite being a top 5 program, mostly because it isn't a very big name school. Or at least I assume this is the reason.
The deadline to reply to this school is March 5th.
To complicate things, I am waiting on a reply from a much more prestigious university for a summer internship. While the school has a much better name, its ranking is slightly less (number 6 for chemical engineering). I think I have a very good chance of getting this internship (my PI went to grad school here and wrote a very strong letter, plus I have a good resume otherwise). However, I learned today that they will NOT be able to get a response back to me before March 5th.
I am much more interested in attending School 2 (slightly lower rank, better name), because they very frequently send people to academia, which is my long term goal.
School 1 (higher rank, worse name) was pretty firm in the March 5th date, so I don't think I can ask for an extension.
Financially, School 1 offered me a slightly better deal, I'd be netting about 2k more over 10 weeks. However, that isn't as important to me, since the experience is worth far more than the money.
I apologize for the long question, but any advice or guidance would be appreciated. Am I putting too much emphasis on the name and rank? I don't want to be greedy and put all of my eggs in School 2's basket, and be left with nothing if I end up not getting it after all.
Are both of these REUs at different universities, or is 1 primarily an industry based internship?
Both of these are at different universities in the US.
Two things: 1) An internship isn't going to lock you into a school. The goal is ultimately to do good work; this may net you an excellent recommendation letter regardless of school. 2) Just because school 1 is ranked lower, doesn't mean it'd be the worse choice. For grad school never underestimate the importance of a good relationship with a supervisor.
Since these are both REUs, I do not think attending school 1's summer program will affect your chances of attending grad school and continuing in academia. Most REUs are designed to give students an opportunity to see if they can conduct scientific research and / or enjoy it. Depending on the university and the discipline, they may be considered 'recruiting' camps for people to attend that university's grad school program in your discipline.
Since you have a fairly strong inclination to working in academia, you do not need the experience other than to confirm your suspicions and to make you a better candidate when you apply to graduate schools.
As for what I would suggest --- ask when you think the earliest day / time you would be able to get a response from School 2 on acceptance or rejection, and then from there, try to see if you can eke out some more time on School 1's deadline so that you don't end up shooting yourself in the foot.
You may also be able to talk with your current PI and see if he can hear anything through some back channels as to whether or not you have a decent chance.
At the end of the day, it's up to you. Consider all your options wisely.
Thanks for the reply. Unfortunately School 1's deadline is firm, and School 2 will not be getting me a decision before March 5th. I'm going to talk to my PI but I think I'll be headed to School 1 this summer, hopefully I can work with a professor who is in my desired field.
Good luck! Maybe this will broaden your research interests beyond what you currently want to do (something that is quintessential in academia).
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19144 | Finishing a PhD while working at a community college
I'm a PhD student that just finished my first year in graduate school. The University I am at will only fund me if I work as a TA.
There is a community college in the area which I have a long working relationship with. The full time instructors are paid more than I am. They also get 6 credit hours per semester of paid graduate tuition at the university.
I am considering going back to work at the college after I get my masters degree to have some more control over my life while continuing to work on my PhD.
My question is whether anyone on this site knows someone who has done this or has done this themselves? If so what were the worst and best aspects of the situation?
A major consideration you didn't mention is whether you can count on each possibility (TA / community college instructor) being available to you.
@MarkMeckes, for the purpose of this discussion they are both a pretty sure thing.
Teaching at a community college while in grad school is certainly an option and I know people who have done it.
My major concern would be workload. I'd expect a community college job to be drastically more work, greater responsibility and stress, and less likely to accommodate your coursework and research time. It can be very difficult in grad school to balance your time and energy among your responsibilities, and it's easy for the short-term demands of teaching to push the longer-term demands of research to the back burner, ultimately sabotaging your chances of finishing your degree. I certainly wouldn't suggest a full-time community college appointment; even part-time seems like it would be hard to manage. But it sounds like you've actually taught at this college before, and have also TA'ed, so you'll be in the best position to make that judgment.
At the university, you'll probably get to TA a variety of courses, including more advanced courses in your discipline. This can be a great learning experience for you, and fill in gaps in your education that you didn't know you had. It can also be an asset on the job market. At the community college, I presume you'd teach introductory or remedial courses exclusively; that's a learning experience too, but not in the same way.
At the university, you're more likely to find fellow students and faculty mentors with whom you can discuss aspects of teaching, and being a TA can be a great social / bonding / networking experience. If you stay in academia, you'll be able to get letters from well-known professors attesting to your teaching ability. At the community college, you'll probably be more on your own, and a letter from the department head there may not carry so much weight.
Overall, it might be better to plan on teaching community college during occasional summers (when TA'ing may not be available), or perhaps near the end of your PhD (and especially if your departmental funding runs out). It seems overly ambitious to plan to do it throughout.
I made the decision to go work at the college part time.
The balance between PhD research and teaching part time has been manageable under the following two conditions. 1) I am not teaching a new course which is unfamiliar to me. 2) I am not taking advanced graduate course. When one of these conditions is not met then the amount of outside work is simply too much to balance with research.
Regarding condition (1). Teaching new classes takes me roughly an hour or two per lecture to prepare. This ends up taking all the free time which was presumed available for research. If at all possible it is preferable to co-teach with a colleague who has taught the course before.
Regarding condition (2). As a physics student I dearly wanted to take Quantum Field Theory even though it wasn't strictly necessary for my research. I found that I had no time to finish the homework assignments. In one week I fell behind on grading exams (which were all free response) and I fell badly behind in the course.
There are some advantages to teaching courses of my own design. As the course instructor I decide what gets graded and how it gets graded. If I give my students exams which can be automatically graded by a computer with a few free response components then I can finish grading exams within 30 minutes to an hour. The danger is to get too ambitious and forget how much grading free response exams takes.
I have found that I have to take advantage of every free moment. When I am proctoring it is advantageous to have something on my laptop which needs to be done for my PhD. This generally should be something that needs supervision, but not my exclusive attention (for instance compiling an application or linking libraries). Also, if I am co-teaching with a colleague I should have something to do which is productive on my laptop.
In short the balance is manageable, but the teaching must be strictly controlled so that it does not overflow past your paid working hours. An inexperienced instructor can easily give themselves too much work to do for a single person within the allotted hours.
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38539 | How to cite a new journal in abbreviation form which is not found in existing abbreviation list?
Recently, I want to submitted a paper to IEEE, I encounter a problem when I want to cite a paper from a new journal, for example, Systems Science & Control Engineering . According to IEEE standard, all papers submitted should have the abbreviation form of journal name in reference, however, I can not find the abbreviation form for the journal I want to cite. How to solve this problem?
I tried this abbreviation database JabRef/reference-abbreviations and not found.
You could write the journal and ask them. They should know and it's in their interest to have a well-defined abbreviation.
@fileunderwater I had twittered their office twitter, hopefully, we will find answer soon. Besides, my best guess would be Syst. Sci. Control Eng. based on the abbreviation pattern appeared on JabRef/reference-abbreviations.
There is a list of journal abbreviations issued by ISI (now Clarivate) where official abbreviations are found. There are many places where the list is found but the best updated will likely be the one at Web of Science. Your journal is not listed here as far as I can see but abbreviations follow certain guidelines so it would not be difficult to "guess" what abbreviation should be suitable. My guess will be Syst. Sci. Contr. Eng. based on other existing abbreviations including the words that make up the title.
Note, however, that this is still not the formal abbreviation and I would add a note to the fact to the editor when submitting the manuscript so the journal can decide what to print based on what you have provided. It is possible that the copy-editing will catch this as well but declaring your actions will always help editors in their work and will be appreciated.
Thank you very much, hopefully, we can find the official one. Science I can't the official one, if it's okay to cite it in full name instead of abbreviation?
Besides, I found the abbreviation list in Web of Science(WOS) is not compatible with the abbreviation list in IEEE, for example the journal IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON AUTOMATIC CONTROL, in WOS it has IEEE T AUTOMAT CONTR, while IEEE gives IEEE Trans AUTOMAT CONTR
I found a pattern, if a journal is IEEE's, the control is the title should be abbreviated as contr, otherwise, control is not abbreviated. Hence, my best guess would be Syst. Sci. Control Eng. :)
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38435 | How to reply to reviewer's positive comment more naturally?
I want to reply to the reviewer's comment (see below) on my paper,
My concerns have been addressed satisfactorily and the paper is acceptable.
My own reply would be like:
Your recognition of our work is much appreciated.
or
Your encouraging comment is greatly appreciated.
However, it seems unnatural to read, How to give an more appropriate reply?
There are a few points that have to be considered here.
First, a reviewer will usually not see an authors response to their review except if the reviewer has accepted to review also the (major) revision and the manuscript is not accepted after the revisions. This means such a response has no audience and editors will not typically convey such messages between author and reviewer.
Second, All reviews and rebuttals pass an editor, with the explicit exception of an open review (visible online), which occurs in a few journals. So for the most part the response you provide should be directed to the editor. It is perfectly fine to tell the editor you really appreciate the reviewers comments but that will most likely not reach the reviewers as pointed out above.
Third, most authors provide an acknowledgement in their published papers and it is in most, or at least many, circles considered polite to thank reviewers in the acknowledgement. A common phrase could be that "the manuscript was improved by the [insightful] reviews by X and y [or: the anonymous reviewers]" or something along those lines. The square parentheses indicate places where alternatives are necessary depending on ones view of the reviews. There is no need to involve very complicated thanks here as has also been pointed out in other replies. Simple and straight forward is better.
As a final point, the quote you provide stating that "My concerns have been addressed satisfactorily and the paper is acceptable." is not what I would consider an overwhelmingly positive response and your thanks should be written with this in consideration. If someone says the manuscript is just ok but publishable, a response glorifying the review and the effect of the review will certainly seem odd from all perspectives. So make sure there is a match between the "verdict" and your "thanks". Keeping it simple and non-convoluted is always a good reciepe.
For this sort of reply, I personally like to keep it short and sweet:
Thank you!
What about this one: thank you for your kind recommendation.
@WangyanLi That works too: anything simple, really.
How about 'Thanks bro fistbump!'?
This. There's very little served in anything other than "Thank you."
First, "your recognition of our work", although not intended as such, sounds slightly egotistical. Second, "your encouraging comment" seems to read too much into what is being stated: simply that your paper has met the necessary standard. While that may be encouraging to you (it would be to me), encouragement is not the purpose of the statement.
If you wish to thank your reviewer, you shouldn't directly address your thanks to that specific comment itself, but rather address your appreciation directly to the whole of the effort and time that the reviewer provided to help you to improve your work. Here's one possible way of starting such a statement:
We wish to express our appreciation for your in-depth comments, suggestions, and corrections, which have greatly improved the manuscript.
Ideally you should be specific in stating how you believe that the reviewer's comments have improved the paper: e.g. added clarity; technical accuracy; correction of specific errors; language; suggested analyses or experiments; etc...
Giving such feedback tells a reviewer that their anonymous review is valued and that their time was well spent. Remember: the anonymous peer reviewer is doing this as a community service for which they receive no payment and little recognition, if any.
Thank you for your kind suggestion, I would like to use We wish to express our appreciation for your in-depth comments, suggestions, and corrections, which have greatly improved the manuscript as opening words in my response. It seems more official.
That is First of all, we wish to express our appreciation to the editor and the anonymous reviewers for your in-depth comments, suggestions, and corrections, which have greatly improved the manuscript.. My original words are First of all, the authors would like to express their sincere thanks to the Editor and the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions, which I found it's not as good as yours.
It may be advisable to avoid condensing your expressions of thanks to the editor and the reviewer into a single sentence.
It's an opening words, I would like to thank them again when I reply their detailed comments.
I would suggest the following response to the reviewers:
That's great to hear! Thank you for trusting us. Have an awesome day!
Sorry dude, but this doesn't answer the question. It deserves to be a comment at most, but I understand you don't have enough rep points to comment. So, I'm flagging this for the moderators to convert to a comment. :)
What does trust have to do with it?
@TheDarkSide: This is not even a comment. The intended ways for expressing thanks are upvotes and bounties.
This was not a "thank you" comment; it seems to be an actual answer to the question, as seen in context.
this answer looks more like an attempt of trolling, like I had not seen yet on any Stackexchange forums.
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17303 | How to write a paper about marketing for publishing in ISI Journals?
I have read many ISI papers, and now I want to publish my own paper, but the subject I want to write is about marketing and brand development, which lots of people are writing in this topic. Is it possible if I don't do any mathematical or analytic researches and just write my paper based on other papers and my own knowledge and by mentioning the sources and books that I wrote my paper?
My main question is, can I just write descriptive words and mention some issue in just words, and I don't do any math or numeral calculations?
And what ISI Journal do you suggest me to send it, which will easily accept it, and has a good Impact Factor, and doesn't cost me too much?
which will easily accept it, and has a good Impact Factor I think you are asking too much.
yes i ask too much, and you could answer short, which you have already done
I would really appreciate your kind attention to my questions, please give me a comprehensive reply
As far as I know, it's not easy to let good IF journals accept papers. That's why I said that.
aha, lol, i misunderstood. Ok just advise an easy journal with lower IF, like 1 to 2.
So your question is really: How can I publish in a highly-regarded journal without doing the hard work of research like everyone else has to do?
It seems like you're going about this completely backwards. First you do the work (you know: research), then you write about it, and then you publish it where it fits.
For those of us in other fields, what is ISI?
Writing for an IF journal should follow standard good practises. First you need to have a well defined question/hypothesis for the work. You need to provide a solid and up to date background for the work (Introduction providing an overview of all relevant literature, i.e. earlier work). You need to successfully show significant (new) results and conclusions. Then you need to write the paper well, which means no spelling and hopefully no grammatical errors, clear and concise language, good structure. Finally you should adhere to any instructions for authors regarding how the journal requests papers to adhere.
So this is actually not so difficult in theory. To what extent this will be easy for you depends on your experience. Based on your question, it sounds as if you are thinking more about a literature review with some own thinking on the topic, avoiding new data and data analysis. This does not sound like the easiest way to gain acceptance. Likewise, knowing your field also involves understanding what journals accept what sort of papers. You seem to be at an disadvantage also here. The best advice is therefore to try to connect to someone who knows the field better and ask for assistance in, for example discussing the problem, and possibly helping with the strategic decisions regarding format of the paper and where to send it. One has to know the details of your work to provide such advice and that is clearly beyond the scope of this site.
Finally, as already stated by scaaahu, "easy accept" is not a concept known to the majority of us when it comes to scientific publishing.
What is an "IF journal"?
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34314 | Is it advisable to have a master or PhD thesis topic in mind before entering graduate school?
This is a question that fascinates a lot of people prior to attending graduate school. The question whether one should already have chosen a thesis topic so that all efforts will be put on creating that thesis and more time can be used to explore that given topic.
Or a more basic question, is it feasible or even possible for someone to know exactly what their thesis topic would be before going into graduate school?
Interesting question! "Poll" questions are not considered a good fit for the Q&A nature of SE sites (see the [help/dont-ask]). I'm therefore going to [edit] your post to remove the poll (the part beginning "how many of you...") However, please go ahead and edit the edit if you can restate that part of the question in a way that meets the community guidelines.
Scoping out the topic of a thesis is most likely a process of negotiation and adjustment where the process starts with your selection of the adviser. Your adviser's area of interest and yours will overlap but up to a point. You will have to negotiate and adjust where the overlap is lacking. I'd be surprised if you, as an entering graduate student, are in a position to know exactly what you want to do and you meet an adviser who is willing to let you do what you want without suggesting anything based on their experience. My caveat to you is to be careful what you want, because you might get it.
Your question "is it feasible, or even possible?" My counter question is "is it desirable, and is it the best thing for you, and is it something you want once you are more fully informed?" Note that your ability to negotiate will be constrained by the adviser coming back at you with "I love what you want to look into but it's outside of the scope of the grant I received" Yeah, the Golden Rule "He who has the gold makes the rules" applies in research as in almost anything else.
Yes! It is advisable!
"Is it feasible or even possible?" Yes, it is, but it is seldom the case and is not really expected unless you just continue to work with the same adviser on a project that is already well under way. What you should really know is where you stand in terms of your education and what areas are close to your heart. The first will save you from over/under-confidence when choosing the curriculum (yes, this is a major problem) and the second will prevent you from ending up doing work you just hate doing. In all other respects, just have open mind and decent work habits and you'll be fine :-)
"I love what you want to look into but it's outside of the scope of the grant I received" — So what? That only means the student can't be paid from the grant to pursue their research agenda, not that they can't pursue it. It's the student's PhD, not the advisor's, and certanly not the grant agency's.
@JeffE It is the student's PhD, but they don't have an automatic right to funding, and a supervisor is at liberty to limit how many students they take on (within uni politics). I've not yet come across a case of a supervisor not accepting a student they consider good enough who also has their own funding.
It all heavily depends on the area. In pure math. "the scope of the grant I received" means just "whatever I like doing or discussing with you at this moment". In other areas this phrase may mean anything up to "Either you'll be crunching these data on this machine, or I'll be getting someone else" (though I have to admit that I haven't seen such an extreme with my own eyes, just heard of it). This distinction by area seems to be even more pronounced with postdocs.
There may be advisers, departments, universities, countries (academic cultures) or fields where you need to come up with your own idea. I would not think this is the norm, however. In many cases Phd positions are financed by project funding so that the project is largely defined. This does not mean that the entire PhD is staked out in advance but the direction is. When you start a PhD you need an adviser which would imply that the field and direction of research of that adviser will determine the direction of your research. In many academic systems you directly apply to a PhD project which is pre-defined. I could probably come up with more cases that point away from come up with your own thesis topic.
That said, however, it is not inconceivable that someone could enter a system with an own idea but since coming up with great ideas commonly involves having a deep understanding of a field, and that in itself being one of the goals of a PhD, it would be a very rare case.
So depending where you are or where you are heading in the academic world, you do not need to know the thesis topic in advance. You will be looking for topics that may interest you and once finding positions announced decide if they fit your interests. It is rare that you find exactly what you dream of so many go for positions that are "close enough". Another point here is that you would probably not select a topic only, you would also consider the academic milieu and if you think it would be good for you and your endeavour into research.
I think this depends a bit on the country, or rather, who specifically provides the funding. There is a very good point about the knowledge of the field; I have seen quite a bunch of PhD vacancies that do not adhere to it.
This is strongly dependent on the field and department. In some places the grant-driven approach is very unusual.
This is a very local issue, depending (as Peter Jansson says) on the country, university, field etc. For instance, at least in the arts and humanities, it is usual in the UK to apply to PhD programmes with a thesis proposal that explains pretty much what your thesis will be on. Of course, there's nothing to stop you changing what you work on once you're accepted into the programme, have discussed it with your supervisor etc.
As to whether or not it's advisable, again that depends on local conditions. If your PhD has coursework then you have plenty of time to think about good thesis topics while you do that. On the other hand, for a purely research-based PhD like those in the UK, it's good to know the topic going in because you're supposed to get on with research straight away.
I've seen mixed results with this approach, to be honest. I ended up sticking with exactly what I proposed, but I suspect that's less common: research often doesn't turn out how one expects, some topics seem like a good idea at the start but as one learns more one's focus shifts and what appeared to be an interesting and tractable question turns out to be tedious or impossible to make progress on. Many of my fellow PhD students changed topic partway through, although often this was more a change of emphasis than a complete change of topic—that's less common, and correspondingly more difficult since ars longa, vita brevis (in particular, PhD students in the UK are expected to complete within four years).
This will very greatly by the discipline. My PhD was in mathematics, and I do not know of any of my colleagues that entered grad school with an idea of the problem that they would solve for their dissertation. In fact, most entered with no more than a notion of the area of mathematics that interested them (algebra, analysis, topology, applied math, logic) and at least half ended up in a different area from their notion on entry.
In mathematics it seems not feasible to me to know the area upon entry. The frontiers of mathematics are just too far away ...
The answer is heavily dependent on the field, school, and department you will be applying to, and also the individual faculty you will be working with. As the other answers suggest, in some programs it is common for students to be immediately attached to an ongoing project, and the general boundaries of their possible dissertation projects will be set by that. In other programs that is almost unheard of, and each student must develop his or her own project.
That said, my impression is that you should have at least some idea (or ideas, plural!) of questions you would like to answer, even if you don't know exactly what the thesis topic per se will be. One big reason to have such ideas is that you aren't likely to be accepted into grad programs if you have no plans for what to write about. The difference between programs seems to be that some of them expect you to apply knowing that you will work on a particular project and write about that, some expect you to have a topic in mind and stick to it, and some expect you to have ideas but won't care if you change your mind during the program.
The individual variation in attitudes towards this question was, for me, beautifully summed up in a personal experience. When I was applying to PhD programs, I visited a certain school along with several other prospective students. As part of this process, each student had a short meeting with each faculty member. One professor, during our meeting, mentioned that she felt "students who come in with a dissertation topic already in mind sometimes miss the point" --- that is, that they should be open to exploring new things they hadn't thought of before. I then went across the hall to meet with another professor, whose first question was "Do you have any ideas for your dissertation topic?" And this was in the same department!
Just to touch a point that nobody else did, there is also the issue of timeliness.
Some fields of research advance pretty fast, and what was a great topic before starting graduate school, may be outdated or not relevant anymore when you are about to start your Ph.D.
For these fields it is usually better to define the topic close to the moment when you will actually start your research. I did my Ph.D. in Computer Sciences, and I have seen people Ph.D. topics get outdated while they were developing it!.
Any thoughts on how to better future-proof a topic?
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26552 | Review asks me to demonstrate "what is the new thing done"; what should I write?
The referee has asked to demonstrate ' what is the new thing done" so that the paper will be accepted. I feel, though the fundamental theory is same for the work, the experiment at various machine is carried out and result is being published. So what should i write to the journal for convincing the matter.
Are you sure that the referee is not asking you to demonstrate what is new in your work with respect to the existing literature?
According to the description, I would suggest that you can say your contribution is conducting several new experiments. This is seemingly just the new thing.
I have a really hard time parsing this question ("the experiment at various machine is carried out and result is being published.").
If you feel the need to ask this question of strangers on the internet, you should probably withdraw your paper.
First, it is important to clearly arrive at a conclusion that shows how the manuscript contributes to our unerstanding of the matter at hand. The referee apparently thinks your paper is lacking in this respect.
Second, in most journals it is not up to the referee to decide if a papepr is published or not, the editor(s) decide based upon recommendations from the referees (usually more than one). So is there a second referee? and if so what did that person say?
You should revise your manuscript and think about the conclusions. Make them clearer as suggested if you think you can. Such comments froma referee usually mean that the manuscript is not as clear as you may think and it is necessary to critically view your work and see if you can improve it. If you cannot, you should provide a note to the editor to meet the criticism of the referee which should entail why the improvements cannot be made. That would make a decision on the faith of the manuscript easier and more clear to the editor (which I suspect is involved).
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123364 | Professor requiring volunteer work
I am in a US graduate program and our professor has made a requirement that we have to participate in a program called VITA. It is a volunteer tax aid program for low-income individuals. As a volunteer you usually only review W2 and Social Security information. Not enough undergraduate students volunteered so they decided that the graduate students should be required to help. We (the graduate students) volunteered as undergraduate students and it does not benefit our learning.
Because of this requirement, I will now have to make up 8 hours a week AT my real job, which also does taxes, to not have my pay cut. I am a Staff Accountant.
How can I convince my professor to not require this volunteer work?
You need to discuss this with the Dean or other responsible at the institution.
Welcome to AC.SE. Please take a look at our [help]. Right now I am not sure what your question is and it seems more like a rant with some unneeded info (W2's and Social Security). Also the title seems to be missing something, but I am not sure what.
This VITA? https://www.irs.gov/individuals/free-tax-return-preparation-for-you-by-volunteers
Welcome to Academia, Darin. I rewrote the body to try to make your problem clearer. I don't know if you can see it until it's approved and if people vote to reopen the question.
So if I understand correctly, your question is this: you are being required to participate in a volunteer program to help people with their taxes. You feel that this does not benefit your learning, takes an excessive amount of time (8 hours per week), and is experience that you already get in your job (in fact your job is more advanced). You're looking for suggestions on how to get out of this requirement. Does that sum it up? You could edit your question to make it more clear.
Yes nate. and Yes Daniel that is that VITA.
Discuss with your professor or higher as to the facts that 1) you have already done this, 2) your work is above that level at your day job. I had a similar issue with a 4 week "workshop experience course" at Uni - (welding, turning etc but basic) and I wanted to go home and work contracting doing the same and more for money. Saw the professor in charge, provided proof and was given the credits, my fellow students were very jealous... :)
what would happen if you just refused?
To add to @guest’s question, can you clarify how it was communicated to you that you are “required” to participate? Were there any threats, explicit or implied, about what would happen if you refuse? And what is your relationship with this “our professor”? Are they your adviser, or teaching a class you’re in, etc? What sort of power do they hold over you?
If you are self funded through your regular job and need that income, then it is certainly burdensome. It seems that doing what everyone else in the program does doesn't give you any benefit at all. The university has made a commitment to help people, which is a good thing, but have no right to force that commitment on others.
But, perhaps there is an opportunity in this. The volunteers will need supervision and probably need tax advice themselves. You are probably in a good position to do either or both of these, and to do it effectively in less than eight hours per week. You could, for example, use email to field questions from volunteers as they arise, making the others more efficient and effective.
If this hasn't been resolved properly otherwise, you might suggest that as an option. Supervision might give you some experience that would be valuable later, depending on your regular job requirements.
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108944 | Can I conduct independent research and publish a paper on a H4 visa?
I am in the USA on H-4 visa (family member of a H-1B visa holder which is an employee visa), waiting for my Employment Authorization Document (EAD). Can I conduct independent research and publish a paper?
Welcome to Academia SE. Please mention which country you are talking about and explain what the abbreviations H4 and EAD mean. That would help you get meaningful answers.
If by independent research, you mean that you are not being paid by anyone and are doing it on your time, then in principle it should be allowed regardless of your visa type. Whatever "hobby" you do in your personal free time is your own prerogative.
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48823 | What does a successful NecTAR application look like
This is quite specific question, though, it specificness is largely related to the fact it can only be answered by someone with experience with computational research in Australia.
NeCTAR grants Cloud computing resources, in the form of VM's to Australian researchers.
To apply for resources there are several fields.
The allocation documentation is quite sparse on recommendations for what they are to contain.
The most significant of which is the "Research use case" which has the description:
Research use case [Form Box Here] Note: A short write up on how you intend to use your cloud instances will help us in our decision making.
It's not much to go on.
The box is quite small though it is expandable.
I'm not sure how much to write. It doesn't support rich text or any kind of markup. I am wondering if I should reference my statements (seems awkward without rich text).
Or if I should be describing other avenues of getting compute power attempted etc.
The documentation does note:
If there are any issues with your request, we will get in touch with you.
You may be asked to provide more detail about your research or to clarify your technical requirements.
So perhaps what I write the first time does not even matter,
since they will just ask for clarification until I have appropriate amounts of information?
I am really looking for an example of an application that someone has done successfully in the past. Just to get an idea of what it would be like.
My application was successful. I might actually check to see if there is any issue with me just uploading the whole thing as an answer.
I don't have any personal experience with NeCTAR; maybe someone who does will chime in.
But if it's anything like the US and EU analogues I have worked with (e.g. PlanetLab, GENI, OneLab), this information is used mainly
to collect information about how the system is being used (e.g. to report back to funding source), and
to filter requests that are clearly ineligible (e.g. "I want to host my personal website on your cloud"),
not because they reject some serious, eligible requests based on application details.
If that's the case here, too, you really don't need to worry too much about what you write. Something of the form
My research is on X. I will use the system in order to do Y.
should suffice. (If you happen to have a project website, adding a link to it is also nice.)
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123053 | proper grading fairness when certain questions dropped on exam
I had a 135 question final exam. The Professor decided 11 questions were problematic. For those 11 specific questions, he gave points to all students if they missed those questions. If a student got them correct no extra credit was given. Some students got more extra questions than others if they missed more of the 11. Is it unfair to not award the entire class same amount of wrong questions?
Frankly, I don't know what you're asking. Please clarify (1) Did you mean the professor added 11 more question to the make-up exam? (2) What do you mean by "Some students got more extra questions than others if they missed more of the 11"? Did those students take the exam the third time? Lastly, what do you mean by "same amount of wrong questions"? What are those wrong questions? Vote to close as "unclear what you're asking".
@mkennedy The original post says "Professor added back 11 specific questions to all students test if they missed them". The OP did not say those 11 questions were problematic. Did the OP actually come back and explain this? Or you just guessed it so? Also, what does it mean by "Some students got more extra questions than others if they missed more of the 11"? That does not sound like those 11 questions were problematic or wrong in the first place. Did the OP actually explain this?
He credited points on 11 questions if a student missed them. That implies to me that the prof thought something was wrong with them.
@scaaahu For your later query, I think that statement goes along with the OP's statement that students who did get them right were not given any extra points. OP is seeing them as "free points" to the students that missed them.
This is a common complaint. Anytime a professor relaxes a requirement, the students who achieved it are unhappy (turn in time for a paper, whatever).
As far as those questions, it is not clear if professor decided they were wrong, ambiguous or just too hard. In any case, what he did had the impact of removing them from any relative ranking (which is why the screams from those who got it right).
I wouldn't get outraged over it. Sometimes there is no perfect answer. (Consider also the possible damage from leaving the questions in if they were flawed in some way.) Just get over it, work hard, keep doing well.
The "get over it" advice is good for now. But after you receive your final marks, if your grade is within 1% from a grade cut off, it is worth contacting the professor saying something like "I'd just like to draw some attention to the way my grade was calculated. My answers on the 11 questions dropped from exam X showed a mastery of the material because __. It is clear I would have received grade Y if those questions were kept. While I know you dropped those questions would it be possible to discuss my grade in light of this unusual circumstance."
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1351 | What is an extended abstract?
Some conferences ask for an extended abstract. What are the differences among "abstracts," "extended abstracts," and "full papers?"
An abstract is a preliminary submission that summarizes the contribution of a paper. There are usually strict limits on the length of an abstract, either in terms of words or of total characters (rarely do they exceed 1000 words or 5000 characters; they are often substantially shorter than this.
An extended abstract and a full paper are nearly the same; the primary difference is that an extended abstract tends to be somewhat shorter than a full paper; I've seen extended abstracts from 2 pages up to 6 pages, while conference papers run from 4 up to about 12 or 15, depending on the space allotted.
One other important difference—outside of computer science, extended abstracts almost never go through a formal peer-review process before being published, while a conference paper will typically have at least one reviewer. (I think this is the case for almost all such papers, but there may be exceptions.)
According to Jukka they go similar peer review but you say extended abstract almost never go through formal peer review.
Computer science is different.
@JeffE: CS seems to be an exception in many ways. This is probably tied in some way to the fact that conference papers carry much more weight than journal publications in CS, but the reverse is true in almost every other scientific area I'm aware of. But I've edited the answer to take advantage of this.
@aeismail conference papers carry more weight than journals? So I shall consider submitting to conferences than journals.
In computer science conferences, the terms "full paper" and "extended abstract" are often used interchangeably.
For example, STOC calls it an "extended abstract" while SODA calls it a "full paper". In this case there is no difference that you can infer from the choice of the terminology: they are of the same length (approx. 10 pages + appendix) and they go through a similar peer review process.
I think the reason for the "extended abstract" terminology is historical. In the early days of CS conferences, it was thought that calling the conference papers "papers" might conflict with later journal publication, while calling them "extended abstracts" preserved the idea that they were merely summaries of longer journal papers to come. (This was especially true in more mathematical areas, since math has far fewer conferences that publish papers.) By now, the idea that conference papers can later be expanded to journal papers is well established and you can call them whatever you want.
Actually, there is a very important difference between STOC and SODA: STOC papers are limited to 10 pages, while SODA allows up to 20 pages. A typical STOC paper has to omit details to fit in the page limit; a typical SODA paper does not.
@JeffE: True, not a perfect example. Incidentally, ESA lets the authors pick whichever term they prefer: "Authors are invited to submit an extended abstract or full paper of at most 12 pages and an optional appendix".
Evidence to the contrary is e.g. William Pugh's guidelines for authors of extended abstracts http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~fischer/pldi96/pugh.html -- it appears to have been developed for the SIGPLAN 1991 conference, a computer science for programming language research. Apparently, the conference committee wanted to be able to cover a lot of submissions, hence went for extended abstracts instead of full papers.
Reading the other answers, it is definitely not the case that all disciplines understand the same when speaking about extended abstracts (while they can agree on abstracts and full papers).
In Economics, an extended abstract is something between an abstract and an introduction - being more close to the introduction. That is, it includes the What, the Why and a little bit of the the How, along with references and results. Results are, however, only preliminary, which is why there is only an extended abstract. There are usually no tables nor graphs in it. There are also no chapters.
I believe the Why is the most important part, as it distinguishes your work from the literature and shows what you are going to add.
Even a short (normal length) abstract should summarize real results. Preliminary results are what you find in a proposal.
I agree with the first sentence, but not with the same. In a proposal in Economics you don't even have preliminary results - you just propose that it's worth getting to them.
Just answer from the perspective of whether it will be included in the proceedings, some conferences will be included in the proceedings like regular research, but some won't, you need to confirm it by email.
Please clarify: do you mean "some conferences include the extended abstracts in the proceedings like regular research"?
My view is that in economics an extended abstract is a short version of the paper. Conferences that accept extended abstracts usually expect them to include results, methodology and a short discussion, to be able to gauge the plausibility of findings and appropriateness of the methodology.
In terms of lengths, I'd say 2-6 pages, while a full paper is anything from 15 to 100 pages. So, while very different in terms of length, the main contributions in the paper should be found in the extended abstract.
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70914 | Do workshop publications hold the same value as conference publications in CS?
I had missed deadline for a reputable conference (Computer Science). Now I see that a workshop is being organized with the conference which exactly aligns with my area of research. The workshop proceedings will be published with the conference proceedings. (It is the first workshop in this series)
Does a workshop publication holds same value as a conference publication for PhD work, future employment opportunities etc. ? (I am a PhD Candidate as of now)
Edit
My field is Computer Vision
The conference is ECCV
No, workshops are generally (at least in my area of CS) of much lower value than full conference proceedings. (Especially when held before a more major conference.) Even though workshop proceedings are published, they are not always considered archival, and usually are stepping stones to full publications later on. A workshop is a good place to get feedback on ideas that can then be upgraded to a "full" publication in the future.
But, I'd strongly advise you to attend the workshop in order to meet and interact with people in the area! You can get great feedback for taking a weak conference submission and making it a strong accept.
The answer of that question depends on the quality of your work, how it aligns with the workshop (very well it sounds like) and the conference alternative you are comparing it to.
Not all workshops and conferences are equal but generally conferences are much more important. Workshops are often informal and less academically significant. Ask someone in your field which would be more prestigious in your situation.
You are asking a hypothetical question without the specifics needed to provide you a quality answer.
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1746 | How active should professors be in writing papers with their students?
In recent months, I have found myself getting involved in varying degrees with the papers being written with members of my group. Some of the papers—by the more senior and experienced members of the group (primarily the postdoc) have needed little real effort on my part, except suggestions for improvements.
On the other hand, some of the more junior members of the group have been struggling significantly in writing papers that I believe can pass muster in getting into good peer-reviewed journals. My question is: how involved should I be in the writing process?
While I am ultimately equally responsible for the contents of the paper, it is not clear how strong a role I should play. Is it better for me to keep hounding the student through draft after draft until things are fixed to a satisfactory level, or do I need to step in at some point? Does the decision calculus change when an important deadline is on the horizon?
Could you clarify whether you are a coauthor on these papers in question (and, if appropriate, what kind of coauthor)? In my mind, this makes a difference.
I'm the "sponsoring" or "last" author on all of these papers.
Thanks for replying. This is really outside of my expertise -- in mathematics, we almost always list authors in alphabetical order, and it is far from unheard of for a faculty member to play a large role in a student's work but not put her name on the paper. For whatever it's worth, I feel a lot of ownership and responsibility for any document that I put my name on. For most (but not all) people I have cowritten papers with, I take a lead role in the writing because I am decently good at it, can do it relatively rapidly, and because good writing is important to me.
@PeteL.Clark: I am in engineering, which is decidedly different from mathematics in the way we operate. It is very rare for advisors not to be on papers written by their students, because of the funding issue (that is, the PI got a grant which was carried out by the student).
.AT.aeismail: Thanks again. I suspected things would be different in your field. (That's a large part of why I'm here, by the way: I'm interested to hear how things are in other corners of academia.) Maybe in your field it's well understood that you are in some sense "not really an author" of the type of student papers you describe. For me though, I feel like I am "really an author" of any piece of writing which I either write myself or has my name on it. This may not be the most pragmatic point of view, and I am not necessarily recommending it...
Personally, I would have greatly preferred more actual input on my writing from my PI. I primarily got "this needs work" with no further explanation and virtually no contribution of content.
Writing "good" papers is an integral part of being a good academic, and therefore it is, in my opinion, something that supervisors should teach their students.
This means you should be active in teaching them how to write, and less active in the actual writing itself.
Struggling is part of any learning process, provided they are struggling with writing, and not with your reviews. The best you can do is to provide the student with clear goals of how the paper should look, how it should be structured and what it should contain. Looking back at my own first papers, I usually started writing before knowing exactly what the bottom line, e.g. the take-home message, should be. Discussing a plan of the paper, both with regards to content and the writing process, with the student before letting him/her write it is probably a good idea.
When reviewing the manuscript, I think it's important to provide clear, consistent and constructive criticism. Specifically:
Clear: If you don't like a sentence, paragraph, figure or table (don't forget these latter two!), make sure you tell the student exactly what you don't like about it. This may require putting intuition aside and thinking through why you're not happy with it.
Consistent: Avoid editing ping-pong that lead to the same paragraph being re-written 20 times back and forth. It's probably a good idea to keep copies of previous iterations with your own comments. This also helps the students if you can tell them they've done a good job fixing things from the previous iteration.
Constructive: This is kind of obvious, but I can't be reminded of it often enough.
Deadlines are a bummer, but they're as much part of the academic process as the writing itself, so the best you can do is to teach your students to prepare for them adequately, i.e. plan ahead.
Addendum
As for authorship, in my opinion, teaching a student to write a paper in no way qualifies as co-authorship. It's part of your job as an academic. Co-authorship is something that arises out of having contributed significantly to the contents of the paper.
different disciplines have very different conventions for ownership - it's not uncommon for a PI of a lab to by default be on papers emanating from that lab. But as Pete points out, in math (and parts of theoryCS) it's quite different.
@Suresh: Quite right, I've amended the addendum to point out that it's my personal opinion.
"Is it better for me to keep hounding the student through draft after draft until things are fixed to a satisfactory level, or do I need to step in at some point?" — Better for you? Probably not. Better for the student? Absolutely!
It seems you already know the answer -- it depends on the paper (your level of interest), the co-authors (their ability to work alone) and your time. There are no rules. I saw both advisors that spend a lot of time in technical discussions and advisors that hardly spend time to read the paper. Both were good advisors INHO.
I would say the role of the advisor is like the role of the head-chef in a fancy restaurant: Quality Assurance. If the cooks make great food, all you need to do is to clean the crumbs off the plate before it goes out. If the cooks messed the food up, you need to return the plate back to them and tell them that the fish is still raw; the chicken is blend; and the correct way to do Flambé is by lighting up 95% alcohol rather than 5%-alc beer. Demonstrations are always appreciated.
That's a really nice analogy :)
One strategy for teaching students about the writing process is to get them involved in projects/papers being written by the professor or by more advanced researchers of the professor's group (post docs or 3rd or 4th year students in European system), and over time gradually increase the amount of responsibility that the student has. This works in groups where people are collaborating on the same thing. For a computer science example, you can imagine that people in the lab are developing the same software system.
Start by getting a first year PhD student working with a more advanced researcher. The research is not wholly done by the new student, but the student should be involved in all steps of the process. The new student can learn mostly by observation (watching the paper grow), contributing about 10% of the total effort.
Writing of the next paper could follow more or less the same pattern, except that the new student should take a more active role, say 25%.
For the third paper, give the new student the lead, and keep the more experienced researchers around helping and contributing, but make sure that they do not take over, and let the student work at his/her own pace. Whenever the student gets stuck, the more experience researcher could help move things forwards, to avoid the work stagnating. On this paper the student could do 60-70% of the work, and most of the writing.
Finally, let the student take the main responsibility on a paper and have the more experienced researchers contributing only comments and encouragement.
Doing things in this way requires a bit of bootstrapping, as you need to have multiple papers on the go, written by multiple people, but all around the same topic, but it could work with a single student-single professor set up.
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61469 | Switching field of study from computer science to GIS in the post graduate level
I have a B.Sc. in CS, but I want to further in the GIS (geographical information system) line. I am thinking I'd have to do some sort of post-graduate diploma in GIS, before I can go for a M.Sc., which is necessary to hit my mark, seemingly...
I need your guidance about this case.
Thank you very much
GIS = geographic information system? PGD = preimplementation genetic diagnosis?
yes, GIS=geographic information system and PGD=postgraduate diploma.
I can't comment with authority on your specific case, but some GIS masters courses may not assume much GIS-specific prior knowledge. You should probably have an interest in mapping, cartography or spatial data, and - since you are coming from a CS direction - in databases or spatial computing; but interest does not necessarily mean in-depth knowledge.
I think my advice would be "find a course that interests you, and discuss it with the person in charge of admissions".
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11738 | Pursuing a Masters, trying to figure out the potential effects of my undergraduate transcript on PhD admissions
Long story short, my transcript is quite the spectacle: I started off getting really good grades, but due to a lot of personal issues ended up graduating with a respectable, but lackluster GPA. Unfortunately, I have a downward trend. While my final GPA is slightly below 3.5, I have failed quite a few courses. I'm getting a MSE in computer science, coming from an applied math background. My undergraduate computer science GPA is really high, but my GPA in everything else is pretty low. I'm confident that I will do exceptionally well in the CS MSE, but I have a few questions:
Are undergraduate courses unrelated to one's discipline factored into the PhD admissions decision making process?
Despite doing poorly in some math classes in my undergrad, will taking graduate level math courses and doing well in them essentially negate the fact that I did poorly in some classes as an undergraduate (did well in most of them)?
For reference:
I'm currently conducting research and should have good to outstanding recommendations.
I understand that for PhD programs, a common order of applicant evaluation is:
Recommendations
Research
Transcript
and that I have valid reasons for my poor performance, nonetheless, I'm scared that they're going to look at my undergraduate transcript and just get scared off. Any insight or advice would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for the kind words. They definitely help, at least a little.
I'm not sure "boast" is the right word, exactly. "Confess"?
You're right to be concerned. Some places will be scared off—or more accurately, won't even see your application—because of your undergraduate record. But some won't. Some will see your strong record in computer science, in graduate classes, and in research, at the expense of other classes as a sign of passion/focus/geekery (which is a strong advantage in research) combined with immaturity (which most people grow out of).
PhD admission is a random process, a numbers game. You have a high-variance record, so to be reasonably confident of admission, you should apply to a wider spectrum of places than someone with a more consistent record with the same average.
I strongly recommend discussing your concerns directly with your letter writers. They have to make the case that the admissions committee should ignore the black marks in your record and focus on your considerable strengths—good performance in graduate classes, excellence in your chosen field, strong research ability, and so on. (You can't really make that case yourself.) Your references may also be willing to contact colleagues directly, to convince them to pull strings on your behalf.
Also: PUBLISH!
Best of luck!
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26783 | What are the flaws of working in a research center department led by young principal investigators?
In few months I will join a new research center department of an excellent university in Northern America. My field is computer science and bioinformatics.
This new department has mainly hired young principal investigators and scientists, all 35-40 years old.
I have visited the labs and clearly have seen the advantages of this new young environment: flow of new ideas, enthusiasm, friendly relationships, opening of mind.
But I am sure there are also some flaws of this situation.
So I am asking you all: what are the main flaws, defeats, disadvantages of being part of a department lead by young principal investigators?
Related: http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/20926/what-are-the-advantages-disadvantages-of-a-phd-advisor-who-is-experienced-vs-on/20935#20935
You may see raw behaviors/decisions by your colleagues in such young environment. Young researchers may not have older/senior professor's experiences in both professional and daily life-style. This may have bad effect on the researchers there. But exceptions always exist and not all the young environments have similar advantages/disadvantages.
The question is likely going to collect anecdotes, predisposing you to be more sensitive to probably unnecessarily small problems. Just keep a positive attitude, focus on enjoying the positives; the specific negatives will soon reveal themselves, if any. Also personality is not just dictated by age; you can put many 35-40 year-old PIs in a team and each of them can have a different outcome. This question is thus overly-broad.
I don't agree that this question is more broad than many others we have answered before. Voting to leave open.
Some of the disadvantages of young professors vs. more senior staff may be:
Less established in their field. One advantage of a very senior professor for a PhD student is that the senior professor often knows all or at least most of the important players in the area. Hence, he can put the student in contact with interesting collaborators, and open up doors for internships or postdocs. A younger professor may not yet have a network that broad.
Less experienced. This one is obvious, but more senior professors are typically more experienced. They have advised many students before, and make less "beginner's mistakes" (e.g., expecting too much from a student, and then getting angry because the student did not live up to those expectations).
Less laid-back. Non-tenured professors need their students to perform, as their own career is very tightly coupled with their students (mis-)fortunes. Many a high-potential assistant professor will not take an unsuccessful research project lightly. This can be an advantage or a disadvantage - an ambitious student and a non-tenured professor may push each other to achieve great results, but the same
professor and a more average student may lead to some friction and bad feelings.
Less money. Younger professors tend to have less research grants (yet). This has implications for you even if you personally have a stipend from another source, as it means there is less money for travel, less money to fund research students, etc.
Less pull in the faculty. This may be more relevant in some places than in others, but I have certainly seen faculties where working with an assistant professor had the disadvantage that your group was at a disadvantage whenever any sort of global resources were distributed. The senior professors were often able to acquire resources (they did not actually need) basically by appealing to their seniority.
Higher chance that your advisor moves. Non-tenured professors are much more likely to change university (voluntarily or due to not getting tenure) than ones that are already tenured. Especially take this into account if the tenure review of your professor is planned for the next years.
These things just came from the top of my head, I will edit the answer if I can think of anything else.
Sidenote: yes, these are all stark simplifications. No, none of those points has to be true for any given young professor.
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76066 | Circular References in Papers
Is it possible to submit two papers to the same conference which are citing each other?
Both papers were accepted and they are both very related, so I think to cite the papers in each other, when submitting the camera ready version. Is this allowed or is it not a good idea?
Whether the other paper is appearing in the same conference as your paper is utterly irrelevant. If you have a good reason to cite the other paper, then cite the other paper.
@JeffE I always thought reference graphs are directed and acyclic. Is this even possible in practice?
@ÉbeIsaac This is not only possible, but surprisingly common. Conferences in computer science announce the list of accepted papers well in advance of the deadline to submit the final proceedings paper, and authors regularly update their papers to cite other related papers in the same conference. At least once I've published papers at two different conferences, occurring within a month of each other, each of which refers to the "companion paper" in the other conference.
This is actually quite common in some fields, for both conference and journal submission, particularly when you have coordinated submission from a number of different participants in a complex project.
The way that I have handled this when I've done so is to have the citations initially as "submitted" and either bundle the other submissions as supplementary information for reviewers (when possible), or with a note saying "available on request" when the venue doesn't support supplementary information. Another option is to make use of pre-print services like arXiv, though that can violate double-blind review.
Once the papers are accepted, you just change the camera-ready to the final information and the circular reference enters the literature without issue. It gets more awkward if one paper is accepted and the other is not, but this can be resolved with the help of a pre-print service.
To avoid the possible awkwardness, sometimes the circular references can also be made "non-essential". If both papers are accepted, one will contain a sentence such as "A formal discussion of the underlying syntax can be found in another publication [...].", and the other one will contain a sentence such as "Another publication presents a more detailed description of a practical applied context for the syntax [...]." These references are helpful and therefore justified, but none of the two papers becomes incomprehensible if either of the papers is rejected and the references is removed.
@O.R.Mapper I suspect in OP's case, the citation would appear in a discussion of related work, not as necessary background information or supporting evidence for an argument, but rather to set OP's work in its proper context. In that setting, even if the cited work is not accepted, the circular reference doesn't make the paper incomprehensible. (Also: Why would I remove a reference to a paper just because it was rejected? I cite papers because I believe they're correct; rejection only implies that the PC did not find the paper sufficiently interesting.)
@JeffE: Maybe you wouldn't, but I'm from a non-arXiving field where "rejected" usually means "will remain inaccessible to the public" and is treated as "cannot yet be cited".
@O.R.Mapper But if the paper is inaccessible at submission time, can you even cite it in the submission?
@JeffE: Of course. As long as it is not strictly required for understanding the submitted paper, and rather a "further related information" kind of reference, the review can be done without having access to that paper. Instead of a year, the paper would be marked with "to appear", which - if the paper gets accepted and the official time of publication is known by the CR deadline of the citing paper - might get replaced with an actual year after the review.
@O.R.Mapper (1) I've always thought "to appear" is a statement that the paper will appear, which is only possible/honest if the paper has already been accepted, but just hasn't been published yet. (2) But why can't you cite an inaccessible paper (either rejected or under submission) in the camera-ready version, using exactly the same argument?
@JeffE: (1) You're right, thinking about it again, "under review" is probably more suitable than "to appear". (2) Well, what's the point of pointing out that another paper contains additional information for those interested, if that referenced paper cannot be accessed at all? I see the review phase as a bit of a special state - one of the special aspects is that reviewers might not be able to access some information that future readers will, for instance, because that information is still in the process of being published, or because that information is hidden due to double-blind review.
It's unusual in journals, but allowed - it's more common in special thematic issues which tend to be prepared at the same time and cover similar topics, perhaps even with authors in common across some papers. There may be a specific form of citation for, eg, "in this issue" rather than a volume number (I've seen this once or twice). This is not to say that every editor will like it, but there's no absolute rule against it.
I would assume that published conference papers, generally speaking, are in the same boat - unusual, but no fundamental principle why not, and individual venues may have specific policies.
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42615 | Doing a PhD in physics after doing bachelors and masters in mathematics
I have done my bachelors and currently doing masters in pure mathematics. I have done four physics courses during bachelors degree which also includes special relativity. What is the possibility that I may prosper in theoretical physics and earn a PhD in any branch of mathematical physics?
Also, I am going to take the GRE this year but I am little bit confused about choosing subject in subject GRE since scoring in maths is much easier than scoring in physics (if later its possible to change departments then of course I'll choose maths). Any suggestion regarding that is also welcome.
You should take up this issue with someone who you would like to be your supervisor
well...not much.....but i am little bit confused about choosing subject in subject gre since scoring in maths is much more easier than scoring in physics (if later its possible to change departments then of course i'll choose maths)......any suggestion regarding that is also welcome.
The first and second part are really two separate questions and should be asked separately (so future users can more easily search for them and so it is clear which answer to accept)
First of all, please remember that PhD is not about learning; learning about many different areas/fields/subjects. More specifically, it is not about increasing you knowledge in breadth, i.e., you know Mathematics, you can now learn about physics, then you can learn about computer science and so on.
PhD is about training in research.
Ask your self this question:
How can I contribute to this area (may be theoretical physics or any) in this particular topic by utilizing the knowledge I already have (say, acquired during bachelors and masters) in this specific field (say, in pure mathematics)?
Once you get the answer to this question (it should be in the form of a nice research proposal) you will definitely be able to do your PhD in that area, which you would select and do homework for.
2nd part:
It really depends upon the institute and the department you are targeting to: what actually is the requirement there? And remember, some might not need GRE subject at all.
So, please make a list of the institutes/departments based upon your interests/priorities and mention their requirements. Then you would be in a better position to decide which one should you go for. Maybe, only because it is unavoidable or simply you can perform better in that.
I would suggest you to have a profound focus upon the first part. Chances are that you might end up targeting a Mathematics department only, still being able to contribute in physics. Even, otherwise would give you a clear vision of what should you do and what you don't.
what about the second part?
@SK - Not every answer on the Stack Exchange will answer both parts of a two-part question. You may have to wait for someone who feels more qualified to talk about the second part.
My understanding of your question is that you want to pursue your PhD in an interdisciplinary field (including both math and physics fields).
It is not uncommon to do such a thing... However, doing PhD level research is different than taking bachelor level courses in that field. Taking those bachelor courses familiarizes you with the basics and fundamentals but that's the beginning of the way to the state of the art knowledge you'll be working with during your PhD.
However, if I'm wrong about my hypothesis and you're changing your field entirely then that's a different thing which requires careful consideration of your interests and circumstances.
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58645 | Can we quantify the difference made by or popularity of online learning?
How much of a change is online learning through open courseware (OCW), etc., actually making? Are there any peer reviewed studies regarding the same?
There are so many variables in this kind of study that such differences are extremely difficult to quantify reliably.
One way is to assess the performance by a single test of two groups of students, one in the regular classroom atmosphere and the other group using solely online tools. The topic may be chosen at random, with varying levels of difficulty. It would also provide information about effectiveness of using online tools in teaching difficult concepts. This study by Anna Ya Ni is in that direction.
One potential problem with this approach is the demographics of the student groups. If the "regular classroom" students are all full-time students, but the "solely online" students are mostly part-time working professionals, it will be hard to tell if any differences are due to the online/classroom delivery, or the full-time/part-time status.
It is unwise to compare the effectiveness of a particular learning method with two student groups with different demographics, say full time vs part time. The group by default should show common backgrounds in response to the term 'student' (although impossible to be an identical set). Also, have you read the study by Anna Ya Ni in the link?
Of course we agree on demographics - the more common, the better. I've not yet read the study (this is the first I've seen of it), but it looks like an interesting read and I plan to tackle it this week.
+Thejus, I skimmed through the study results and it was quite comprehensive. Plan to go through that in more detail later. However, my point is that while online learning is generally a convenient arrangement for the working professional, it might not be accepted as a proof of accomplishment at the workplace. I am not making judgements here but unless they are held at par with a professional degree, we would not see people take it seriously. If it is held at par, then we would see a noticeable difference in the way the world's workforce adapts to the power of self learning.
Consider the ratio of traditional credit hours per student to online credit hours per student: you could compare this ratio over time. (This doesn't say anything about the effectiveness of the trend towards online study.)
Can I propose that the percentage of people completing the course online vis a vis traditional university route should be held as a primary measure of a course's success? It can be universally applied to all the courses by multiplying a weighing factor for any course depending on its difficulty level e.g. a course on Linear Algebra might be easier to contemplate online than a course on Measure theory.
@user54870 - Ah, now for me to answer that would take careful thought and I would end up wanting to co-author the paper.
RE: Can I propose that the percentage of people completing the course online vis a vis traditional university route should be held as a primary measure of a course's success? Only if there is some kind of assessment involved that somehow guarantees successful completion is truly tied to mastering the course topics. Even then, that doesn't seem like a very good metric if you are trying to persuade the skeptic.
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23340 | Am I allowed to use a figure drawn by co-author in another paper?
I published paper 1 with a co-author A, who drew a very good illustrative figure in the introduction.
I want to submit paper 2 which addresses the same problem (but uses a completely different approach), so the introduction of the problem is pretty much the same. Do I need to ask A for permission to include the figure in paper 2?
My professor always asked for the journal's permission to reuse a figure, although he prepared the figure himself.
If it is going to be exactly the same picture, you should get journal's permission to republish the figure. If you are going to draw the figure yourself but essentially the same information as the previous one, you can just cite your previous journal.
@EnergyNumbers: I think my case is a little bit different since I'm the first author in the paper containing the fiugre.
the question is a little bit different, but the questions are very close, and the answer is still the same, thus it is, in Stack Exchange terms, a duplicate.
@EnergyNumbers: OK, as I already have an idea about how I should do, please feel free to delete the question.
You need to first check the copyright information (you have probably signed) from the journal/publisher where the figure is published. This will determine where the copyright for the typeset article lies. The figure is art and as such should be covered by an intellectual property, which then clearly belongs to your colleague. This issue seems to be overlooked by many copyright notices. As you probably know many publishers allow authors to post submitted (unedited) manuscripts to be posted on web-sites and repositories, but not the final typeset version. This is because the journal really does not own the intellectual thoughts in a paper but the right to publish and distribute the final version.
To me this becomes quite confused and it is not clear if all publishers have considered the true ownership of figures. It would be useful to survey the copyrights to see how these issues are dealt with and if, for example, country specific rules apply.
Anyway, to answer your question: tell your colleague of your intention. It is good etiquette regardless of whether or not it is necessary. When it comes to copyright of a journal: better safe than sorry; get permission. You of course need to reference your other publication and any permission that is needed. You should add your colleague's name to the acknowledgement as the originator of the figure; again etiquette.
I was at the "receiving end" of such a case once. One of my collaborators has used a figure I have drawn for another paper that I was not a co-author of without asking me first. I did not consider this intellectual dishonesty (the figure was neither particularly brilliant nor a lot of work), but I do admit that it stung a little bit to see my own work (however tiny this "work" was) being used without telling. If the collaborator had just dropped a brief email before, I would have certainly not minded.
Bottom line:
Do I need to ask A for permission to include the figure in paper 2?
Strictly speaking probably not, but you really should tell A.
Your question covers the academic honesty part, but legally there are no questions - every drawing is copyright protected from the moment of creation, and yes, you do need explicit permission in order to copy it.
When you published the original article the publisher may have required the copyright on the text and all figures to be transfer to them or for them to be granted exclusive rights. Presumably based on this question, you believe that the publisher does not have exclusive rights.
In the sciences figures are often not that valuable, but in the arts, figures can be very valuable. If someone takes a valuable photograph and grants you permission to publish that photo in a single article, then you clearly do not have the right to reproduce that photo in other articles. It is not uncommon for the artist who took the photo to be a coauthor on papers involving their photos. This doesn't change the "ownership" of the photo. The person who produces a photo/figure the figure is generally the copyright holder unless they sign the rights away.
You must ask the copyright holder for permission to use the figure again. The copyright holder is likely either the person who created the figure or the publisher of the original article.
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40920 | How to target possible authors? Ethics of increasing the visibility of open access journals
My colleague and I work at an Open Access journal, published by a regional scholarly association. The field is Communication and Media Studies. Recently we started to encounter problems with reaching out for authors. We use a small set of professional email lists, listservers and newsletters to disseminate our Call for Articles, which worked in the past 3 years; meaning we always had enough quality submissions from which we could build up a full and content-wise well-balanced issue.
Problem is that recently, we launched a digital marketing campaign after which we received only a handful of manuscripts with average to good publication potential compared to a swarm of plagiarized/incomprehensive/ below-standard/simply uninteresting manuscript mainly from third world countries, India and China (just for clarifications, we do not collect author fees or APCs and all content are free for our readers, so I thought it was clear for everyone that we are not in the pay-to-publish business). We desk reject the majority but enough will remain to completely drain out our reviewer pool for the next 6 months.
I'm asking the community to suggest a better way of reaching out for professional authors. Locally, we are in Eastern Europe and the journal is not ISI or SCOPUS-indexed, so it is not the best for bean-counting purposes; but we have quality content and peer review process. Are there any techniques that should help us convincing western universities to circulate our calls or publish it on their websites? Anyone in the same shoes as we are?
I don't really get your problem. You have too many paper submissions as-is, but you are looking for more? I don't think there is a feasible way to get word about your publication out to the wider public without at the same time also attracting really bad submissions. The trick, I guess, is to desk-reject harder. If you already know that all those bad submissions are not good enough, why even bother your reviewers?
My problem is that after screening out junk papers, we have too many submissions which 1. are in line with the wider profile of the journal 2. present (imho) methodologically sound science 3. does not report interesting/meaningful results or are on a topic which is only of very narrow interest.
@JDenes: I think most people would agree that it's totally reasonable to desk reject a paper for reason 3.
@JDenes Sure, but why do these papers clog up the review process? Just desk-reject them if you are convinced they are bad. And if you do that, don't you just end up with at least the same amount of reasonable papers that you had before your "digital marketing campaign"?
Shouldn't you clarify the purpose of your journal to let you desk reject with a good conscience on point 3?
@Samuel Russel: yes, this might be a solution. Till now, our approach was similar to PLoS in that matter, namely that we did not desk reject methodologically sound researches, whatever limited perceived impact they might be if published. In the past, no problem emerged from that. Some issues had filler papers, like 1 from every 10 articles or so. But now we risk to water down our future issues with filler papers if these manuscripts pass peer evaluation.
The key for most scientists is the impact factor. Trying and succeeding to become listed will attract more good manuscripts (MS). The flood of sub-par MS you are describing comes from the fact that you are free. Unless you want to impose a fee for submitting MS you will simply have to maintain a very stringent policy for submissions and hope that the wave ceases with time. In order to attain IF status, you will need to be stringent anyway. But as you probably realise being stringent and building a reputation is a fine balance.
For a budding journal, the most important aspect is to become known and for the right reasons. For starting a journal I would stress making sure you have some good names among the editors and that the idea of the journal is supported by the community. It is never to late to start this but best before your reputation solidifies as a less prominent journal because then the climb will be harder.
So, some suggestions: Thematic issues generally tends to attract citations because they provide the opportunity for someone interested to find other articles within the same field in the same issue. With electronic publishing it is also possible to assemble virtual thematic issues simply by linking to articles with similar aspects and labelling them with a theme, and of course announcing this on list servers etc.
Attracting established, respected and widely referenced authors to provide articles for the journal is also key. You can, for example, provide opportunities to author invited papers on key issues, review articles on key issues in your field etc.
Success will, however, not come overnight and the most important aspect is to gain the interest of your community. This can be a slow process but can be aided by linking up with societies or equivalent in your field. In my field the European Geophysical Union has generated several Open Access journals that quickly has gained IF status. These journals were firmly embedded in the community and emanated from a discussion about the need for journals with a specific target community. So you need to assess your community and see if you can liaise with activities or organisations that are established in your scientific community.
Regardless how you continue, you definitely need to maintain high standards so even if you need to reject the vast majority of submitted manuscripts, make sure you only publish good quality science and make that very clear in your "advertising". Without that basis, very little success can be expected.
The answer above is well-written and sums up some excellent tips on how to help you.
To add to this, many researchers are now pressured to publish in faculty recognised journals. When I started, I was given a list of journals and academic book publishers that would be considered high quality towards my overall publishing targets as developed by my faculty, and was told that I should aim to only publish in these journals.
There are a number of journals that cover my scope of research that are not included on this list which is highly frustrating. But as a new academic in an environment that's not just about how much you publish, but also where you publish, this means that I need to target these journals and publishing sparingly in non-recognised journals by my faculty.
This is something your journal will be coming up against (and actually, your journal's field would be something I'd publish in if it covers my particular scope of research). However, I can't, because unless it's on the list of journals I'm expected to pursue, I have to justify why I've published there and not somewhere else. Many researchers, already feeling pressured by these new systems in a highly competitive environment are going to forego journals like yours to publish in those recognised by their faculty.
So it's almost a bit of a paradox. You need quality authors to publish their work with your journal in order to strengthen your impact/prestige, but these same authors are pressured to only publish in high impact journals as recognised by their faculty. Give what Petter Jansson has suggested a go to try and raise your journal's impact.
I never heard of that "faculty recognized journals" list. Is this an R1 thing or fairly general just i was not aware of it? Thanks! I opened another question connected to this topic at http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/41268/how-much-reputational-value-is-added-to-a-journal-by-being-indexed-in-various-ab
@HunSoc I'm not sure. It's a common practice here in Australia I think at the group of 8 universities. Basically, a faculty recognised journal is just a list of quality journals/academic book presses the faculty/university has deemed appropriate for quality publication. Researchers are encouraged to publish in journals/academic book practices from this list, and a % of journal articles published must be from quality journals for your overall publication target expectations with your current Academic level (i.e. Level B lecturer might need to publish 2.5, with 1.5 being from quality journals).
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23654 | Are masters degrees treated equivalently in academia on both sides of the Atlantic?
This is just a general question regarding UK (and I suppose Western European) masters degrees vs. US masters degrees.
The reason for asking is that I have heard that US masters are considered at the same academic level as UK Bachelors with Honours degrees. This seems like pure hearsay but I'd like to understand if there is any thing concrete in this assertion.
And does equivalency tend to manifest itself in the same ways in commercial environments too?
The UK and US have fairly substantial differences in their underlying educational philosophies. In my field, in the US Masters degree programs are generally one or two years long and include both course work and research in equal proportions. In the UK, Masters degree programs are a year long and have little to no research requirements. As for the level that the taught components of the programs are taught at, they are pretty similar across the two countries using similar textbooks and covering similar amounts of material in terms of both breadth and depth. The US and UK institutions I worked for accepted students from both countries and while international students often have more difficulties than home students, it is not obvious to me that going UK-US or US-UK is easier.
As for the difference between a US and a UK Bachelors degree. Final year classes taught in both countries again use similar textbooks and cover similar amounts of material in terms of both breadth and depth. In my experience, there does not seem to be a substantial difference between students coming out of US and UK institutions in regards to their preparation for graduate school. That said, there are substantial differences in these students. The US system provides much more breadth of education (e.g., foreign language requirements and general education requirements) that are absent from UK universities. I have never heard an admissions committee member in the sciences argue that student X is is more likely to succeed than student Y because student X is competent in a foreign language.
I've seen (several) hundreds of students get UK bachelour with honours degrees in 3 years. A master degree in the UK takes another 1 year.
Normally in the US a bachelor degree takes 4+ years and a masters takes another 2 - for a total of 6.
How can 6 years of education in the US be considered equivalent to 3 in the UK? If anything, you could consider a UK master degree similar to a US bachelor degree.
Should that 3 in "How can 6 years of education in the US be considered equivalent to 3 in the UK?" be 4?
At my (Canadian) university, Bachelor students are forced to take 1 year of courses outside of their specialization. When I did my Bachelors in Europe, there was no such requirement. So in terms of subject-matter knowledge, a 3-year European Bachelors is equivalent to a 4-year North-American one.
@scaaahu The 6 = 3 was in reference to the op's saying "a US master degree = a UK bachelour with honours degree." Since a US master takes 6 years and a UK bachelour with honours takes 3 years, then the claim is really 6 = 3. I do not believe the op is saying a US master = a UK master (which would be 6=4).
@earthling this will probably lead to a discussion, which I would like to avoid in comments, but students in the UK tend to be better prepared than in the US when entering university. Further, the UK system does provide much breadth in terms of electives/subsids, so almost all UK classes are in the major. Finally, MSc degrees tend to not have a research component in the UK which speeds things up.
@StrongBad So are you saying a US master degree is similar to a UK bachelour degree? Regardless of quality of entrant (which may be better in the UK) does the education that comes with the 'typcial' UK bachelour (hons) degree match the education that comes with the 'typical' US master degree?
@earthling, see my answer. I find that the taught components of MSc degrees and the final year of a BSc degrees are nearly identical between the US and UK.
UK degrees tend to focus on the main degree subject from the beginning of the degree program and thus are more professionally oriented than the US liberal arts education, which requires each student to learn a broader curriculum.
Interesting comparison here:
http://colematson.com/2012/01/05/oxford-vs-us-an-undergrad-degree-comparison-chart-glossary/
As for "If anything, you could consider a UK master degree similar to a US bachelor degree." It tends to be the other way around due to the UK degree being a more narrow focus towards the subject area opposed to the US degree having a more broad overview.
So you believe that 3 years studying A, B, and C is "better" than 4 years studying A, B, C, and D (D here being the extra, broader subjects which are covered in the US system which are ignored in the UK system)? Or are you saying UK = A, B, and C where the US = A, B, D, and E where D and E are a bit off-topic and the US students really miss out on topic C?
The value of a US Masters degree is very dependent on the institution and its requirements.
A number of US institutions mass-market their MS (or equivalent) degrees as a quick way to make money. These degrees (often marketed as 1-year degrees) are basically just a coursework requirement and can be equivalent to a bachelor's degree with some advanced courses.
Other institutions require a serious thesis or project as part of a masters, often requiring publishable results in a significant academic venue. This is similar in style to the "old-school" Masters and is a significant step above a bachelor's degree because it requires self-motivated research and often takes two years to complete.
I am not sure you answered the question. The OP is asking "UK (and I suppose Western European) masters degrees vs. US masters degrees.". You only talk about US masters degree.
I don't know enough about UK masters degrees, so I'm presenting the material I do know.
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34211 | Is it better to request a recommendation letter in person after class or by email?
I am planning to apply for a PhD program and would like to request a letter of recommendation from a professor. However, I am quite hesitant about which way is better for me to make the initial request: asking the professor during the break of the class or just sending him an email?
I would suggest you ask the professor face to face at his office or somewhere suitable. If this is hardly probable, then consider contact him by phone. And email would be the last choice. I do not feel that asking the professor during a class break will be fine.
@Chou why not during the break? The most likely answer would be "Sure, let's discuss this at (insert convenient time for him)".
The most important thing is to be timely, so if asking in person means it's going to take you longer to get to it, then that might not be worth it.
My recommendation is definitely in person "after class". There are several reasons to do so. First, it is personal and you can iron out any details there and then. Second, the person you approach will have a face to go with any future e-mail conversations. Third, it is less likely a person will dismiss you in a direct approach than in an (impersonal) e-mail approach.
There are of course ways in which you can blow your hopes with a personal approach as well. Just be brief and to the point, try to be professional about it. If the person appears not to have time, ask if you can meet during an office hour or if an E-mail would be better. After all, you have just presented yourself and is now "a face".
There is of course nothing wrong with just sending an E-mail but I know from personal experience that I sometimes get mails from students who apparently have attended my classes but made no impression so I ask myself, who the ... is this? Not a great basis for a letter of recommendation. I personally also think that a personal approach shows more initiative and drive. All this is of course from the perspective that you actually can meet with the person without engaging in long distance travelling etc.
Assuming that the recommender agrees to write a letter, you should follow the conversation up with an email giving all of the specifics of where to send the letter and the due date.
You could try doing both - first talk to him after class, and if he expresses interest, send a packet of materials by email (your resume, things you'd like him to include, maybe your transcript if it's good). It's good for him to have these things electronically because then the materials are harder to lose and he has a written reminder of your request.
An e-mail from someone you can't even remember is easy to reject, there's almost no emotions involved. Plus if he says yes, you still have to meet to talk about the details and write them down, or risk misunderstandings via e-mail. It's better in person.
During a break or after class there may be other students waiting to ask questions, or the professor may be in a rush, or any other such disturbance, it doesn't feel serious to me and you risk getting only half an answer or him telling you to set up an appointment.
Just go find him during the official office/consultation hours (whatever they're called in your country), or if he said you have to take an appointment first, then take an appointment but go discuss it in person.
Don't agree with other answers! I'd 100% prefer students to ask me by email. It gives more time to think about how to phrase the request properly, motivate it, and give details; and it gives more time to the professor to think about his/her answer.
The other answers say it's more personal to ask face to face and the professor may forget who you are unless they see you, that's a strange argument. If your professor doesn't remember you by name, don't bother ask him/her for a letter.
Personally I'd also prefer students to just email me.
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32612 | If I use results from a source I don't have access to, should I include it in references?
Let's say, I am writing a paper. I am reading paper A that cites results in Paper/Book B. I do not have access to Paper/Book B.
In the list of references, do I include only A? A and B?
University libraries are pretty good at allowing you to borrow not only from their own collection but also from other univeristy libraries as well (at nominal cost). so I would start by asking at your local library about those possibilties.
What is so special about paper B that you consider citing it? If you cite every paper cited by a paper you cite, you probably end up citing millions of papers.
May I suggest
http://subjects.library.manchester.ac.uk/referencing/ as a source of detailed guidance for several referencing styles. Note however this is adapted for Manchester styling in some cases.
This might help: http://www.apastyle.org/learn/faqs/cite-another-source.aspx
"use results from a source I don't have access to" is paradoxical. You can't use something you don't have access to. If you only read A, cite only A.
@MaartenBuis In some countries, and in some positions (e.g. undergrad student), people have virtually zero legal access to (non-open-access) scientific literature. I was in this situation as an undergrad: the library only had print copies of a few very prominent journals. Now they're much better funded and have subscriptions to relevant publications.
@Wrzlprmft - reductio ad absurdum: if someone tried to follow a rule such as "cite all citations of all citations of all citations..." ad infinitum they'd need a nearly infinite amount of paper to print their nearly infinitely long paper upon. Not to mention the deforestation issues. Ecological catastrophe looms! Cite with restraint!!!! :-)
Be honest. You do not gain anything by pretending knowledge you have not, nor it helps the reader.
Write "According to A, in B it is shown that" or some variation on it. If you have made a good-faith effort to obtain a copy of B (that includes interlibrary loan), but had undue difficulty in doing so, you might want to mention it --- "We were unable to find a copy of B".
You should add both. I assume you, in your text, refer to B as referred to by A in some way. The point is that everyone should be able to trace your information and knowing B is a book and is referenced by A, from which article you took the information.
That said, I would like to add a warning against doing this, it should only be done as a last resort. The problem of using a reference in a reference is that you have not actually seen the original work and you are therefore trusting that A, in this case, have cited B correctly. Many cases exist where misconceptions have been propagated by trusting the judgement of others and not checking the original source.
+1 for the warning part. In the worst case, you could be accused of academic misconduct. Try very hard to put your hands on the original material. Librarians are wonderful at making such things happen. If you absolutely can't, consider writing, "According to Smith (1998) A.B. Charles (1980) reported that..."
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503 | How to choose the most worthwhile research papers to define my thesis?
I'm a first year PhD student. I'm just reading background papers trying to find a topic for my thesis: my subject is turning around tree different elements (XML (as a tool), complex data, and the cloud computing (as an environment)). So I find that is a large subject with many materials that treat this subject, whether each element individually, or two elements at most at a time, but not all three together.
My question is
How should I choose the most worthy materials so that I could find a good topic which uses these three elements together?
Any information, insights, or propositions are welcome. Thank you.
Find out what the most current problems in these fields are. This can be done by reading papers in the most recent proceedings of the conferences and journals dedicated to these topics.
Regarding these three topics:
XML is, as you say, a tool. XML in itself is not particularly novel and a lot of research involving XML is of the form "Something interesting and known in XML." I find such papers unexciting and reject them if they pass my way.
Cloud computing is a hot topic and there will be lots of people working on it. This means that it is easy to find papers and easy to find a venue for publications. On the other hand, there is a lot of competition.
Complex data is and will always be interesting. But what do you plan to do with it? Are you planning to use the cloud to process massive amounts of complex data? That is certainly a hot topic these days, with things like Google's Map-Reduce framework and other comparable things (Hadoop, Cassandra, ...). A lot of big companies have interest in such settings, so it might be challenging to find something new to do, but you will likely have people interested in the work you do.
In short, I think you only really need to consider the complex data and cloud computing combination. This will make your search a little easier. Then find the top conferences in the area and read the proceedings from the last few years.
In addition, it is crucial that you build on top of what other people have done, rather than starting from scratch. Ideally, start with something developed by people in your own lab (whether it be a system or a theory).
I can answer this from the perspective of someone who did it poorly in retrospect, but from a different field (engineering). You will want to make sure that any papers you begin with are:
Accepted findings in the field. I made the mistake of basing much of my thesis work on a paper which was used a one-off paradigm, and was not replicated by anyone other than myself. This resulted in my needing to spend much more time validating my results than I otherwise would have needed to, because there was no other validation in the literature.
Simplicity over novelty. You're a graduate student, at the beginning of your career. You'll have tons of time to do awesome things as your career progresses. Unless you're working for Dr. Awesome BigName Researcher whose lab is known for doing cutting-edge work on X, be conservative... choose the less exciting but more likely to work research over the more exciting but very complex and/or more likely to fail.
Note that this post is completely irrelevant to anyone whose advisor effectively tells them what their thesis project is, as your criterion will be (1) the papers your advisor hands you. You have my sympathies :)
Why would the outcome affect the study? After listening to a recent Planet Money podcast on "The Experiment Experiment" (sic), I'm curious why the probability of a success/fail should lead to any decisions. Shouldn't the process and discovery be the important thing, regardless of outcome?
I think the answer to your question depends on the aims you want to pursue with your thesis.
Start a career in academia. In this case I agree with eykanal. Use something that enables you to build a solid foundation.
Start a career in industry. Look at the particular industry/company you're interested in and decide what's going to be most important to them and hence most important in facilitating you getting a job there.
Neither of the above. If you don't really know what you want to do after you've finished your PhD, I'd say go for the thing that interests you most, even if the results you're basing your research on is novel and you're not sure if it's the right direction to go in. That's why it's called research after all :)
In any case you should make sure that you're comfortable doing the research. The best papers are no good for you if there's no scope for you to extend the work or you can't build on it for other reasons.
In your particular situtation I would probably focus on papers that bring the different subjects you've mentioned together, as this gives you the option of shifting the focus of your PhD slightly in one direction later.
Thank you Lars Kotthoff, your advises are very valuables, that's really what I wanted, I'll absolutely consider them.
One point not covered by the other answers is Review articles which summarize the state of a particular research field.
As the OP is at an early stage of the process, these are especially useful for gving an overview of the most important work, and are usually written by an authority on the topic. They can be invaluable in preparing a reading list, as the references are the ones that are considered central to the development of the field, and will often be articles that you'll be expected to know.
Even when looking for inter-disciplinary stuff it is usually useful to begin with review articles from all the sub-fields that touch upon the research topic. The Annual Reviews series of journals are a good generic place to start, though you should focus on the leading journals of your field. The number of citations that can be checked on google scholar are also useful in establishing the important research concerns of your field to know before you start working on something brilliant that nobody will care about. For instance, there might be excellent reasons why nobody has done work usng your chosen approach, so getting the most respected/ cited papers will help you identify useful research topics, and also the ones to avoid.
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4926 | Currently taking graduate course as an Undergraduate
I am currently taking graduate algebra as an undergraduate (junior) in University of Toronto Mathematics Specialist, and I just took a midterm today. Since I am an undergraduate, the grade matters. In order to get a good chance to go into graduate schools for Math in Canada and USA, do I need to get a A or A+ in graduate courses as an undergraduate? Or, is A– alright? (In my university, C and below are considered fail for graduate courses only) Or should I get at least an average grade on that course as an undergraduate competing with graduate students, instead of worrying about actual letter grade? (this is about absolute vs relative too)
Not sure what type of answer you're looking for. You should do the best you can, the same as with any class you take. Why would the fact that it's a graduate-level class make a difference in your work ethic?
I am working hard, but then I typically so called "ace" (but not really) in undergraduate math (getting A+), but graduate courses have many smart people in class, and I do not think I got way above average grade for midterm in grad courses (as I am competing with masters and PhDs). Since I am undergraduate, all grades are important, instead of just aiming for A-s (this is all that is required for masters and PhDs), I am not sure how much grade is ideal as an undergraduate to get out of graduate course (also this will help me decide whether to drop course or not (but I prefer not dropping it))
You'd be surprised how many undergrads outperform the grads in my classes.
If you are willing to share, can I ask which university/collge are you attending?
Suresh is a prof. So am I; my experience is similar to his.
In order to get a good chance to go into graduate schools for Math in Canada and USA, do I need to get a A or A+ in graduate courses as an undergraduate?
I don't think anyone cares too much about the distinction between A and A+, since the standards for what merits an A+ vary so much between universities or even individual professors.
Or, is A– alright?
This is a little more meaningful, but it's not likely to be the deciding factor. If you have a great application otherwise, nobody will care about an A- or two. If your application is not so compelling, getting straight A's won't help much. This could make a difference, but it's really a low-order effect.
Speaking as someone who regularly serves on admissions committees, I'd much rather see a B- in a graduate course than no graduate courses at all.
JeffE wow! I have never thought about it that way. Maybe I am overworrying because when I met my TA for the course, apparantly everybody did bad (similar mark I guess)... Thank you for the help though! It is very helpful for future
@JeffE: Hmm, I'm not sure. Not taking any grad classes is certainly a red flag, and I'd agree with you if you said B+, but B- is more questionable. The issue is that math grad students need a solid understanding of the core grad courses, and someone with a B- probably doesn't have that. The question then becomes whether they realize they need to learn this material better and have some likelihood of doing that. Someone mature and responsible enough can handle this, but what I don't want to see is someone saying "OK, I got my B-, so now I can move on and never think about topic X again."
(It's possible to do good work with that kind of attitude, but it's a very bad sign.)
someone with a B- probably doesn't have that — But at least they're willing to try, which is more than we can say for someone with no grad classes. Willingness to fail is crucial for good research, and it's much harder to learn than technical background. (Also, this all has to be calibrated by the relative strengths of the undergrad and grad programs at the applicant's school. There are many schools — Toronto is not one of them — where the grad classes are easier than the undergrad classes.)
Yeah, that's a good point about willingness to try. If someone enters with an unusually weak background, and they attend a school with a lot of challenging and interesting undergrad classes, then they might reasonably not get to grad classes within four years. However, a typical grad school applicant should have tried grad classes.
JeffE: Speaking of graduate admissions, is undergraduate at Toronto good enough for, say top 50 graduate schools in US for math?
Just a quick note that the need for graduate courses as an undergraduate varies a lot by field. In math and maybe CS, it's nearly a prerequisite. In engineering, however, because of the relative inflexibility of the program, I don't think taking graduate-level courses is necessarily anticipated or required. It definitely helps, but it doesn't raise red flags if you don't have that experience.
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5953 | How to request transcript copies from universities in the Netherlands?
In the US, one can request that the university from which one graduated to send copies of one's transcript to other universities (graduate admissions) or prospective employers. I would like to know what is the provision in the Netherlands, if one needs to send a copy of one's transcript to the university in the US.
The best thing to do is probably to contact the student administration of your university. They can make certified copies of your diploma (and presumably also grade transcripts, etc.). You can also contact the Dienst Uitvoering Onderwijs at http://www.duo.nl/, which are also authorised to make certified copies.
However, it may be that "ordinary" photocopies suffice, if you tell them that you can show the originals later if necessary. You would have to check with the admissions office though, I do not know about the situation in the US.
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14921 | How to improve my English from Academic papers?
I'm not a native speaker. However, I'm doing my PhD in an English country and I read Academic papers which are in English. How can I improve my English from those papers? Any ideas? Although sometimes those papers are not written by native English speakers and may still have problems.
If you also want to improve your spoken communication skills, take a look at Toastmasters (http://www.toastmasters.org/). There may even be a club in your school already.
One of the best ways to master the writing skill is to write a paper yourself, have you supervisor correct it, and then, thoroughly go through the review. If this process is repeated over 2-3 papers, you would have a strong hold in the style. But the key is to understand the corrections made to your draft.
@Barun: Better than your supervisor might be a fellow student (with good English) who you can bribe with a case of beer :) Correcting someone's writing is kind of a tedious task, and kind of a lot to ask of an advisor who's more interested in the research itself. (Besides, the advisor's English might not be so great, either!)
The old adage is: "the language of science is bad English" (and at least in computer science it is 100% true). That being said, I have known PhD students who have failed mainly because of their lacking English language skills – they had ideas, but they could not communicate them to anybody, and they could not write them down in a paper for the life of them. You need decent English to write any paper, and you need pretty good English to write papers at top venues.
You ask how to improve your language skills from reading papers. I would say, you can't do that effectively at all. Clearly, reading anything written in English will help you to some extent, but if you feel like you need to improve your English, taking one or more (good) courses in technical English will help you more than reading through a few dozen papers.
However, there is one language-related skill that reading papers for is really useful – if you are setting out to write the first or one of your first papers of your own, nothing beats analyzing existing papers (at the same conference, in the same journal) to find out how papers in these venues are usually structured. This gets you started much faster than drafting something only for your advisor to tear it apart.
Wish I could +2, over the said opinion point: you can't do that effectively at all
Perhaps it's worth adding that many universities offer English language courses geared towards PhD students, which focus on academic writing.
While I understand that there's a big difference between scientific and day-to-day language, I actually think you need both to succeed in academia.
While you do need to excel in research (e.g. publish papers, communicate ideas), only the "top level" will be done in pure scientific and formal language: writing papers and scientific presentations. A lot comes from communicating your ideas, either in formal and informal settings. The "level" of English varies from setting to setting: at some point, you would not want to host a prominent researcher in your country, and take him to lunch only to realize you do not know how to translate the menu.
That said, I think you need to improve your English overall, and the best way to do it is to expose yourself to the language as much as you find comfortable:
if you usually read (non-scientific literature), switch from your native language to English
when watching movies/TV shows, don't go for the dubbed versions: go for the original language, first with the subtitles in your language, then in English, and then no subtitles at all
try and find yourself in social situations where English is the main spoken language. Listen to people and talk to them. I saw a big change in a lot of people in just a few months from this.
take a course, possibly in technical English
specific terminology and style of writing will come in time, with immersion in your field, but it is okay to use a dictionary for rare terms
in addition to just using a dictionary (translations are not always stellar), use Thesaurus to find synonyms and antonyms. It is also useful when you know the correct word, but you feel your writing is too repetitive
have some kind of spell checker activated when you type (not only your papers, but also your posts, chats and e-mails), use it whenever it tells you that you misspelled the word, and try to remember your mistakes
start using an English-English dictionary, as often as you can when you come across an unknown word. For me, just typing "define:whatever" in Google works just fine.
In addition to other good observations... : the idiosyncrasies of English are not easily codified in "rules", so considerable familiarity with many good examples of standard use, to allow faithful mimicry, (in addition to more formal study and hearing-experience) is surely helpful.
That is, rather than "composing" in a vacuum (worst of all translating into English...), it is very convenient to be able to recall already-vetted phrases and wording-choices and simply re-use them.
This is especially true with regard to "articles" "a", "an", "the", or their absence, and related seemingly-innocent modifiers. Also, verb tenses.
Thus: imitation from good models.
Reading good papers from your field would improve to some extend your technical language specifically the style and structure in your field. I recommend you to read a few good books about writing science and manuscripts.
The exercise is to learn English by writing. Take a few paragraphs from Academic paper. Print the text and then write it by hand. Check if you have any errors? No errors? Then take another piece of paper and hide the side of printed text so that you can't see two letters at the end of each line. Write the whole text again. Check for errors? No errors? Move the sheet further and repeat. Have an error? Start from the beginning. Write the text looking at a printed one. Then add a sheet of paper on a side and write again and re-check for errors. No errors - move paper further. If you experience a mistake you need to start from very beginning! Eventually you should be able to write the text by looking at one letter of each line only and then the whole text by memory without any mistakes. Congrats! Do the same for second time next day. Once you complete second text, re-write first one too. Check for mistakes in both. Got a mistake? Start from text 1! Now you do that for 10 text and you will be shocked!
Another thing you need to do is to practice writing sentences. Take any phrase that has a new structure to you (e.g. from the academic paper) and write it down. Then write again. Repeat this 10 times. Then change one word using a thesaurus. And write 10 times again. Change the same word again and write re-phrased sentence 10 times. Repeat this task for each word. This practice will allow to learn the limited range of rules that are used in English sentences.
Surely you may check English grammar from time to time if you really want to know why something is like that, however don't spend too much time doing it. You will become bored and overloaded with information very soon.
Happy learning!
Participate in discussions strictly related to academic papers.
Don't read only - be active in your discussions and write as much as you can (you can make errors but you will self-eliminate them with more practice).
Please do not use this site for astroturfing; such practice is against site policy.
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9939 | How to hire editor to improve my paper
I'm thinking of hiring a contact/freelance editor to help me improve my paper, before I submit it. I'm looking for someone to perform proofreading and copy editing as well as broader, substantive editing services, to save me some time.
How should I find and select a suitable editor? Should I look specifically for a technical editor with knowledge in my general area, or will any editor be able to help? Does anyone have any recommendations for how to make this most effective?
Clarification: the term "editor" is potentially confusing, because it has multiple meanings. The meaning that's likely to jump to your mind is that of an Editor at a journal, but that's not what I'm referring to. Instead, I'm referring to professionals who help with editing manuscripts. Many folks are familiar with copy editing and copy editors; that is actually just one type of editing service, and other editors may offer other editing services (e.g., developmental/comprehensive editing). I'm trying to be a bit more general and not limit this question to just copy editing -- but if you're not familiar with the editing profession, you can think of my usage of the word "editor" as referring to a "copy editor" and you won't be too far off.
maybe get recommendations from other students who worked with the same editor ?
If you look at Related questions on the right hand side of this page, you may find some qusetions similar to yours.
Have you asked your peers/colleagues? usually they know someone who is good in that matter. If they do not know, then ask the student union or graduate student association (assuming you are a grad student).
How to find an editor
In the UK, there's the Society for Editing Professionals (SfEP) - get one of their members who meets the criteria for selecting an editor (below). This search for Advanced SfEP members in academic consultancy should give you a lead (disclosure: the editor I work with is on that list). If you're not in the UK, your country may have a similar organisation.
You could also try asking the journal publisher of your choice, as some now keep a list of recommended editors for pre-submission work.
Ask your peers for recommendations too.
If your employer has a department of Research Services or similar, they may be able to recommend someone.
How to select an editor
Here are some criteria for selecting an editor for pre-submission services, based on my own experiences of hiring technical editors over the last 7 years, and working with one as a publishing strategist too over the last year or two. These criteria are in no particular order - I recommend finding someone who meets all of them.
Someone with a good track record in technical editing / publishing. Everyone's got to learn some time, and so every new editor needs their first client. But you don't want to be that guinea pig, unless saving money or helping their career along is more important to you than getting the best result. Someone with a track record will already have thir editing-macros / tools and ready, and have streamlined their workflow.
A gamekeeper turned poacher. That is, someone who's been an editor on the post-submission side, working within journals. They'll know the rules and the etiquette from both sides. They may even have a helpful network at your target publisher.
Someone you can communicate clearly with: you'll only find this by actually doing it, at least via phone / skype / emails / tweets / whatever. Clear quick communication will save you money and give you a better result.
Someone who understands your speciality at least enough to get the gist of what's required. As a minimum, that means if you're in the humanities, you want someone from the humanities; if you're in sciences / tech / engineering / maths (STEM), you want someone with a STEM background.
Someone fluent in your writing medium. So if you write in LaTeX, you want someone fluent in that. Ditto for MS-Word, LibreOffice, whatever.
If you find might be using a good editor a lot, it's probably worth finding someone who you could develop a longer-term professional relationship with; in that case, pick someone who'd be able to help you develop your publishing strategy over time, too.
This is probably not going to be an answer you might like specifically but here's what we do.
I am a doctoral student and in our department, it is pretty common for students to iterate pre-submission and post review drafts with each other (especially before the deadlines of major conferences). It works pretty well. I have also seen tenured and un-tenured faculty doing this in our department.
Therefore, my bigger recommendation is, circulate drafts among your own departmental colleagues. Surely someone will give you sanity checks on your submission material?
Thanks, Shion, I'm certainly aware of that option, and I agree it is a good one. However, my test readers are a precious resource, and I don't want to expend their energy on fixing writing issues. I'm looking to make the quality of the writing in my papers be as good as possible before sharing it with my test readers, so that my test readers can focus on the substance/science and not get distracted by problematic writing.
Than again, getting your co-workers to read your papers is a great way to stimulate working together. In addition, I don't think it is wise to wait very long before letting other people read your work. You could end up in some errors in thought, which you no longer see yourself. Ofcourse you don't let your colleagues read a crap manuscript, but getting feedback in an earlier stage is really good imo.
+1 for the above comment. I have found this to be the best strategy when needing member checks from colleagues.
You may be able to use "any" editor to help with simple matters of grammatical constructions and general structure and clarity. However, if you require a lot of technical jargon in your paper, you may find it more advantageous to seek out someone who works in your specialty. Otherwise, they may want to change words that have specific meanings in your field.
If your university has a "writing office" or some other service that it offers to students and staff, I would begin by inquiring there. They may either have some professionals on staff who can help out, or provide you with recommendations for professionals in your area.
First, to avoid any confusion, an editor is typically a person associated with a journal or a publisher. The purpose of an editor is not to primarily to work on improving a paper but rather to judge if a paper is up to the standards of wherever it is supposed to be published. It seems in your question, you are looking for someone to help you with the writing process. This means you might go very wrong if you contact an editor for the tasks you describe. A copy editor and a proof reader is usually also part of a publishers chain and the purpose of such persons is to make sure everything adheres to the publishers standards before going into print; they are part of the end of the publishing chain, not the beginning. So, persons professionally working under titles like these are not likely of interest to you at a manuscript stage.
So typically, what you describe you need help with is part of what we all have to do to get published. We all should learn this process through our (primarily graduate) education but, in the end, there will always be room for further improvements for as long as we live. The first source for help should be your peers, or simply friends, in your research environment. They should have enough insight to check the science and general writing aspects. What may be more problematic if not an native English speaker, is language.
In the case of language there are numerous specialists that can be hired to check and correct your paper if that is also what you need. Many publishers have associated such specialists and it is probably necessary to find some service that specializes in scientific writing; remember that threre is much need for other types of translations, legal, fictional literature etc., so that many specialize and may not be suitable for science writing.
So, try your peers, you will probably have a hard time finding a person to hire to proide the services you require, with the exception of language corrections.
You write that "The purpose of an editor is not to primarily to work on improving a paper", but that's exactly what the job of a developmental editor is.
I think you are missing the point. Few researchers care about what happens on the technical publishing side with the paper after it gets accepted (except the annoying requests for a two-day turnaround with proofs). But improving English presentation, especially for non-native speakers, is a relatively cheap way to improve the chances to see their paper accepted. I have seen too many papers that seem to be technically correct, but gosh you just can't figure out what the authors did, as their presentation is simply incomprehensible. (Sometimes, this is true of native speakers, too!!!)
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15003 | Does anyone have rate the relative quality of scientific papers, rather than authors?
I've seen plenty of places where authors are rated on how much they publish and are cited. There are also metrics like the h-index and i10-index that try and assign a number to the relative quality of a given researcher (for better or worse). But, is there anything similar for individual articles?
It seems to me that people would want an easy way to see if a piece of research has been reproduced or not, peer reviewed for quality of methods and/or analysis, retracted, cited by other papers, the quality of the papers cited, etc. I would think that this would be an extremely useful tool to help people see if the paper they are reading, and potentially citing, is a quality paper or not. However, I've never seen or heard of anything that does this.
So, is there a service or metric out there that has something like an h-value on a per article basis rather than a per author basis?
Google Scholar and many other similar services can give you their counts of how many times an article has been cited, but there's no metric for how "good" it is.
Rating the quality of a paper is extremely difficult. Journal impact factors tell you little about the quality of individual papers. Citation counts are also misleading since papers that are wrong tend to get lots of citations. There is really no substitute for reading and making your own decisions.
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5824 | Value Vs. Uniqueness of Research
I am a PhD student and I am often faced with several ideas to explore. Two criteria often I consider in making a choice between approaches are based on the value proposition/ addition and the uniqueness of the approach. However, in the process of research (which I don't have any idea about and I am only in the exploratory phase of an idea) I have to make compromises in choosing between approaches which are not unique but add value and vice versa. I am faced with tradeoffs between the two until I find (or modify/improve) approaches that have both the qualities. My question is to the experienced researchers to share their strategies when they had to choose among approaches based on these two parameters. Which one among the two help in quicker publications or acceptance rate?
Two criteria often I consider in making a choice between approaches are based on the value proposition/ addition and the uniqueness of the approach.
Ideally, you don't choose. A "unique" approach that doesn't add value isn't worth much. Solving a problem using off-the-shelf techniques also isn't worth much. What you should aim for is a unique approach that adds value to the research landscape in your field.
But if you must choose, work toward your strengths. Do you carry a hammer and look for nails, or do you carry nails and look for hammers? If you're better at finding new tools to attack hard problems, then you're more likely to come up with unique approaches. If you're better at finding hard problems to successfully attack with a small suite of tools, then you're more likely to add value to those tools. I know lots of successful researchers in both camps.
Which one among the two help in quicker publications or
acceptance rate?
You are optimizing the wrong function. Your primary goal should be to produce the highest quality, highest impact research, not to maximize the number of lines in your CV. One good high-impact paper is worth far more than a pile of publications that nobody cares about.
thanks for your reply. Can you elaborate a bit about "high-impact" and how do you quantify it when someone, or especially a fledgling researcher, need to trade among different approaches.
@Shan You can quantify the value of a commercial product. You cannot quantify the value of a research. A research result may worth nothing today. But it may be proven invaluable ten years from now.
It probably depends on the field and the journal you're aiming at.
For small, low-impact journals, it could be sufficient that an idea is new. If your ambition is not very high, you can submit to such a journal. You might not need to show that the new idea is all that useful.
For more prestigious journals, new is not enough. You need to show that it's actually useful in practical situations or adds something significant. If you want to aim for good journals, then added value is important. However, it should not be a small added value; it should be a significant added value.
If it's not new and the added value is small, probably you'd need to improve the research until you have something more substantial.
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122856 | My supervisors take long time to respond to me
I am a PhD student. I need to finish my study in 6 months.
My story and problem:
I always send my work to my supervisors on time. For each work (objective), they take about one to two months to respond to me. Therefore, I need to send them a reminder after one month. After my reminder, they ask me to resend it again as they forget it and do not want to search for it. Then, they take about 2 weeks to respond.
After that, they asked me to do some more work, which I do and resend my work to them again. They agree that this version is good and ask me to do my next objective based on my study plan.
After finishing all my tasks and sending them my thesis, they asked me to go back through all my objectives and do further work. These objectives have been already proven many times in many different areas and are not related directly to my topic. I explained to them that I will be in trouble if I do not finish my study at the time that is specified by my sponsor. The university has put me under review as I did not finish on time already. Also, I have had to request two extensions from my sponsors.
In addition to their delay in responding, they sometimes travel overseas for about 6 months without regular contact. This happens every year.
What do I have to do now? Any help, please?
If the further work they want you to do has been proven before, ask if you can cite those papers instead. And don't wait a month. Contact them after a week or 2 weeks. In fact, see if you can schedule your viva now (in 5 or 5.5 months time, whatever makes sense) so they know you're serious about finishing on time.
@mkennedy thank you so much. I have already cited all the work and even explain to them that these works have been already proven. But they do not care and ask me to do so. If I send them an email after a week then they send me that they are busy and I must wait.
There isn't a lot you can do on your own. The supervisors have their habits. The best advice I can give is to try to find someone to speak to them on your behalf to get them to help you meet the deadlines. You want an advocate that will be respected by the supervisors. Deans are good for this sort of thing, actually.
But if you can meet face to face with people, either the supervisors or an advocate to help impress on them the urgency it would be better than trying to do things by email, which is asynchronous by design.
There is an email option to communicate you are serious about deadlines: "I intend to do X, Y, Z unless you tell me otherwise by (date)". It is heavy-handed, but if the deadline is justified it works on reasonable advisors (nothing will work on unreasonable ones).
I had a very similar situation as yours for a couple of years when I studied statistics as a master's degree. My supervisors used to send me emails back after 1 or 2 months and one of them liked to be away out of the country. I was so much struggling with the supervisors' issue, so I decided to change my supervisor at another faculty.
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124889 | How can I force a journal to withdraw a paper?
I submitted a research paper to a reputed journal (open access). Later, after getting the first reviews, most of the authors are refusing to pay the publication fees even though we all previously decided to contribute.
I sent a wave-off request to the journal by explaining the money problem. The journal denied the delay so at last I requested them to withdraw the paper. First they said that they were withdrawing it. Later they said that we mistakenly wrote withdraw instead of "move to production" (which is a clear lie).
I have mailed them so many times to withdraw but now they are replying in an impolite way. How can I convince the journal to withdraw the paper?
I don't understand. What do you mean by 'most of the authors they dragged their name for money'? Coauthors don't want to contribute to the cost of publication? And if you can't pay, how would this article go into production?
Researcher, I have a substantial edit that's in review. If it's approved, and I have misunderstood the problem, please revert or edit it.
Your question title says "in order to resubmit to a better journal" but the body of your question suggests "because coauthors don't want to pay the publication fees" - these are two quite different reasons. Can you please clarify?
What is a "wave-off request"? Have you already signed over your copyright? (If not, then why are you requesting to withdraw the paper, instead of just informing them that you are withdrawing the paper?)
The journal doesn't withdraw a paper; the author does. I think you mean "how can I prevent a journal from publishing my paper?".
This sounds like a strange situation, in which something isn't adding up. It seems to me that one of two things is going on here:
This isn't actually the reputable journal that you think it is. It might be a "look-alike" predatory journal, or a formerly-good journal that has been hijacked, but in either case they are trying to scam you.
Something is deeply confused within the editors, and they've decided to publish despite the fact you've told them that you will not be paying.
In the first case, you definitely don't want your paper there, and in the second case maybe you'll get a free publication for some strange reason. The problem is to distinguish between the two cases.
Accordingly, I would recommend proceeding by writing an email something like the following:
Dear Editors:
As you know know from our former correspondence, we are unexpectedly unable to pay the publication fee for this paper. We are confused as to your current plans for the paper, however, and request a clarification. Which of these two is your current plan for the paper?
The paper is withdrawn, and we will submit to a different venue.
You plan to waive the fee and publish the paper free of charge.
Please let us know promptly, so we can plan the next step with this paper. If you do not reply within one week, we will assume the paper is withdrawn.
If they are predatory, they'll probably try to either stall or else try to tell you they're going to publish it and you have to pay. Ignore such threats, even if they bluster about taking you to court. You are the author and nobody can force you to publish a scientific paper against your will: if they try, they will simply be exposing their own fraud.
If they're real, they'll probably answer one way or another --- or fail to, in which case you would be quite reasonable to assume the paper is de facto withdrawn and take it elsewhere.
Thank you very much for valuable suggestions.I have sent the paper already in another journal. But now i have seen that they have published it without our consent (two days back), however we have cleared them a month before that we want to withdraw and also got confirmation from their side. Sir, We are budding researchers not aware of such things and they are taking benefit of it. Now i am mentally upset, i dont know what to do. Now the situation has arrived that even if they wl be doing this free of charges still i don't want to publish or any kind of dealing with such journal.
@Researcher Have you been able to assess whether the journal is legitimate or predatory? In either case, if you did not transfer the copyright, you can send them a copyright takedown notice. If they do not comply, then you can set your university's legal department on them.
I've never tried this but if you inform them to withdraw the paper and that the fees won't be paid, that it will get their attention.
If you have given up copyright already, this might not be effective, and you may already have a contractual obligation to pay and will need to fight it out with your co-authors.
But if you still hold copyright, then they have no rights to publish the work. You can, then, also inform them that you won't sign over the rights.
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137370 | can my paper be excluded from the conference proceedings after attending and presenting?
I received a very weird email from an international conference committee, stating that their society (who organised the conference) reviewed the content of my paper and finally decided to exclude it from publication in the proceedings because my ideas did not reflect the society ideas and methods.
This is after they accepted the final edit of my conference paper, about 8 months after the end of a 10 day, very expensive conference. The book they are publishing is not a selection of papers, but the only proceedings which records the facts, topics that were discussed and people that were at the conference.
The paper topics were determined when the initial abstracts were submitted. There were no conditions specified at the time of registration, therefore, as for other general international conferences, registration, acceptance and oral presentation means being part of the proceedings, if not otherwise explicitly specified.
Can my paper and thus the record of my attendance and presentation be excluded from the conference proceedings? Can they discrimate against authors based on the society's views?
We don't know what promises were made by the conference organizers or anything about publication agreements that you may have entered into. As a practical matter, it's probably not worth your cost to get into a legal fight with the conference organizers.
Probably worth mentioning your field, and in particular whether it's one where conferences are the main outputs of record (and thus not being in the proceedings could have major career impact) versus one where conferences are relatively minor, and one could just get on with writing a journal article on the topic.
In computer science this would be considered an outlandish. While @BrianBorchers is right that it's rarely worth getting into a legal fight over it, it's easy enough to escalate to the conference chair or someone employed by the board of the organization sponsoring the conference. I would not hesitate to do so if I had this experience.
@StellaBiderman But in CS there also wouldn't be any revisions after the conference.
I made significant edits to your question to try to make the narrative easier to understand and remove some information that doesn't matter, The changes are currently under review and may be refused or further edited. If you disagree with them, you can revert or edit. Please feel free to do so.
Is this behavior new to this year, or is this how the conference has worked in the past? I.e. what do previous year's proceedings look like?
Well, is your paper so controversial that some people think they might get accused to be aiding a heretic?
@Karl If it was that controversial, why would they have accepted it in the first place?
There could be ethical issues that emerged only in a second phase, after your poster or oral presentation or, if any, during reviewing the potential proceedings. Given their answer, that points to ethical and not technical problems, it shouldn't be your case, but in general conferences in which presenting does not mean publishing as for the papers must pass review, DO exist and in my field is the norm.
@nick012000 Because it was not clear from the abstract? But still, if it was so controversial they should have known that at least directly after the talk, not only after final editing. Have concerns come up earlier in the process? Have you asked them what parts of the publication are problematic and why exactly?
@nick012000 I have no idea, but the given question triggers another one in my mind, which is cui bono?
I find your arguments very compelling and persuasive (except the one about “generating money losses”, which I think is not really the point, and isn’t something I’d advise you to focus on, although it’s understandable that having incurred great expense to attend the conference would add to your sense of outrage). If the conference website, correspondence with the organizers, and other official conference materials led you, and would lead a reasonable person, to believe that your paper will be published in the conference proceedings, then it seems pretty clear-cut that the organizers are guilty of a serious misrepresentation, and, under normal, circumstances, their behavior would be completely unacceptable.
The only explanation I can think of that would make for a legitimate reason to exclude your paper from the proceedings would be if they discovered that your paper is outright fraudulent or involved some serious unethical behavior on your part. Just saying your paper “does not reflect the society ideas and methods” isn’t nearly enough of a justification to make such a drastic move sound acceptable. (But I assume there are additional details that would shed more light on what’s going on here, although they may not change my conclusion.)
As for what you can do, it’s hard to say without more background details about your field, the people involved, what they find wrong with your paper, your professional status, etc. But certainly I think it would be quite reasonable on your part to raise a fuss and complain about this seemingly unfair treatment, and ask for the decision to be changed. Some people you might want to involve could be your department chair, other colleagues you are on friendly terms with, your advisor (if you have one), people you know who attended the conference, the chair of the organizing committee, and the publisher in charge of the proceedings volume. I think it’s quite possible that once this decision is scrutinized by enough reasonable people with some sway, you will see justice done.
Good luck! Hope you get this sorted out.
Isn't there any legal option for cases like these? Like suing the conference committee?
@gigabytes you can sue anyone at any time. If you want to propose that as a remedy to OP’s problem, feel free to do so.
I don’t have any experience to propose any solution of any sort. Rather, I was asking your opinion about this kind of solutions.
@gigabytes I’ve never been involved in any lawsuits, so I can’t offer any advice on this topic. I do think there’s a reasonable chance OP could get the problem resolved without having to resort to such measures.
Rules to be incuded in publications have to be objective and clear for all authors and they don't have to give rise to any discrimination. There was no explicit requirement about the conference papers, also there was no mention that only selected papers (with some kind of selecion criteria) would have been included in proceedings. Therefore based on general professional conduct of any conference the organisers behaviour is unacceptable.
Here are the words: 'Since the ........ Society began working years ago on the publication of a lexicon or encyclopedia on the terms in ancient hydraulic engineering, the publication of your article would be counterproductive for our project. Therefore we regret to inform you that we are not able to publish your contribution. But we will gladly invite you to participate in our project when we resume work on it.' They can comment on my definitions in their own paper, including my study in the published literature. I have all the rights to propose my own definition with freedom of expression.
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142291 | How to proceed when a required math class is preventing me from graduation?
I started working on an AS degree in 2014. I took the required math class and failed it twice. I then passed all my other classes, but was told I would have to take the math AGAIN.
So the entire summer I studied, but I was told I could not take only one class for financial aid reasons. I was given a waiver to take the class alone, but after registering, I was then told I needed to re-apply as a new student. I debated this with many of the folks in financial aid and tried to explain I had a waiver to take the class. I had no choice so I reapplied.
I was then told my degree audit went from 95 percent done to 80 percent and that I had to retake classes I have already taken and passed. Fast forward, the school ignores me now. And now they have applied the Satisfactory Academia Progress (SAP) Rule to my account.
I’ve already talked to the entire financial aid department, every mathematics professor at the college, and the ones who run the entire school. I absolutely don’t know what to do anymore.
I have added paragraph breaks which I hope will improve readability. Please explain/define "SAP RULE".
Could you transfer to a bachelor's degree college without completing the degree from the community college, but carrying across credits for work done?
Thank you for that. Well in my degree audit, it says that I have been to the school too long. What happened was the school was making me take courses that I didn’t even need to take for my degree, but they told me they had to be taken. I wasted at least two semesters taking these classes and they don’t even apply now. Of course taking the math added to that. Even though I was given the waiver, financial aide didn’t even care. I provided the proof of the waiver and they still said I had to reapply.
That is what I wanna know. If I could take the credits I do have and transfer them to complete my degree. I will tell you this school makes it hard to get away from them. I asked about any clep exams or any tests that would allow me to get the credit and get the degree and they flat out said absolutely NOT.
I applied some further clean up to your question; feel free to edit if I botched anything. This question will be a little hard to answer without knowing your school's policies and the specifics (e.g., I can't figure out why you would need to re-apply for admission), but some aspects of it are universal (e.g., cutting through incompetent bureaucrats)
"I was then told I needed to re-apply as a new student." "the school was making me take courses that I didn’t even need to take for my degree". What reason did they give for this? Did your course change its curriculum?
That is what I wanna know. If I could take the credits I do have and transfer them to complete my degree.
Most schools have an in residence requirement: you have to take a certain number of credits at that school to get a degree there. This prevents people from earning a degree at one school and then transferring the credits to hundreds of other schools to get hundreds of degrees.
To choose one example at random, Santa Barbara City College requires 15 credits in residence.
This means two things for you:
Transferring your credits to another school for an AS degree probably won't work; you'd have to do several classes there to meet their "in residence requirement." (Though as Patricia points out, you could possibly skip the AS altogether and transfer your credits directly to a BS program.)
This may explain why your degree audit changed after you were "readmitted" at your current school. Being re-admitted reset the clock on your in-residence requirement.
Assuming your goal is to get the AS, your situation could be one of two things.
Scenario #1 is that the rules were incorrectly applied to you. For example (and this is my guess) the advice to re-enroll as a new student was just bad advice. And now that you have done so, your situation is so complicated that the "front line" people don't know what to do (and don't care to find out). So, they're just hoping that you give up and go away.
If this is the case, the solution is to bypass the front-line people and go to someone higher up who has the knowledge and authority to fix this for you. This may be a dean. At some schools, it's hard for AS students to get a meeting with a dean. In the worst case, you could have to hire a lawyer to force them to pay attention to you.
Scenario #2 is that the rules were correctly applied. For example, some schools require you to graduate within 5 years. If your school has a time limit and you went over, then the policies were applied correctly and you don't have a leg to stand on. In this case, you would have to repeat the classes.
Of course, it's impossible for me to say which scenario you are in, not knowing your school's policies or your full situation. But it's something you should be able to find out by going through your school's policies carefully.
In addition to continuing to work with your current school, I suggest contacting transfer counselors at potential bachelor's degree schools in your area.
Even if you cannot complete the degree you are currently working on, it may, depending on regulations, be possible for you to enter a bachelor's degree program carrying a significant number of your current credits.
This needs to be worked out locally. Perhaps there is an office at the college that will intercede on your behalf - Student Support Office, or similar.
There may be laws that support your case, but then, you would likely need a lawyer.
But perhaps an appeal to someone higher up in the administration will help.
For what it's worth, it seems that you are being misused and that a number of rules are coming together to disadvantage you. Good luck.
I went to the higher ups to get the waiver to take the class alone. It was hell, but they gave it, only to have financial aide disregard it. Once I reapplied it set me back. They made me think all I had to do was reapply and take the class and be done. It added more classes that I have taken and then they threw the SAP RULE to stop the aide.
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197968 | How can I start writing a research paper?
I'm a PhD student and I want to start writing my research paper on chemistry modeling. I don't know how to organize my ideas or how to highlight my results.
I'm looking for a strategy to follow, and even though I've been reading a lot of papers about my topic, I still don't get the starting point.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMRAD have a look here, it might help. The IMRAD structure is widely used for scientific publications.
Related: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/122157/advice-on-writing-a-research-paper-in-a-less-time/122170#122170
A Ph.D. student often has an advisor to ask about such questions.
Start by writing a bullet point sentence for each paragraph summarizing in plain language what you want to say in it.
If certain things in your paper took you significant time to understand, and you were not able to find anywhere a clear explanation of those, add this explanation to your paper. If it's too long, add it to appendix. That's helpful for readers and also leads to more citations.
Read, a lot, and think about the structure of papers and arguments you are reading. Write, a lot, rewrite, think, rewrite. Understand the topic you want to write about deeply and thoroughly, but be open to revelation/new ideas/corrections while writing, thinking, or getting feedback. The importance of feedback from others on your writing cannot be overstated. Don't expect your first paper to be excellent. See it as a training and learning experience. Be patient as it takes a while to develope writing ability. And, yes, as mentioned, writing is a way to further develop your thoughts.
Congratulations on getting a publishable result!
When you're starting to write a paper, especially if you don't have a lot of experience with manuscript preparation, anything you can do to get past the blank page and start getting text down can help.
You've been reading a lot of related papers. Do you have any target journals picked out for this publication yet? Have you been reading papers from those journals? If you look at a few examples from your target journals, you can get a sense of the basic structure and organization they use. Put those section headings into your document. They will likely be Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion, but this can vary. Each section answers specific questions.
The first section to fill out is the Methods. What did you do? How could someone else replicate what you did?
Then fill out Results. What did you find out? What was significant, and what was not?
Now you are ready to write the introduction: What context would the reader need to understand why you picked this research question? Why was your research question important, what differentiates your strategy from other people's, and what was your contribution?
You can now write the Discussion, calling back to the context you established for your research question in the Introduction. Make specific references to your results and discuss what they mean in a more "big picture" way.
Finally, you are ready to write the abstract. This should summarize the whole paper, telling the reader in one or two sentences each why the research is important, what you did, what you found, and what it means. Basically, use one or two sentences to summarize each section of your paper in order.
That's it!
One last piece of advice: Don't be afraid to get feedback early and often, even if it is from your fellow PhD students rather than from your PI. The less developed your paper is when you solicit feedback, the easier it is to change course.
Beginning writers think of a paper as something that exists in their mind, and that the job of the writer is to 'download' it to paper via hands. This is not how it works. Writing is an iterative process, in which ideas are formed as you write them, and the writer moves from one draft to another, until it's good enough to send to the journal. So don't worry about perfection. Just keep doing drafts, and the paper will come to life, eventually.
Another thing that I think beginners miss is that the difficult part is usually just getting started, so I always advice my students to train themselves to start writing. This is achieved by putting a timer and promising yourself to work for say, 15 minutes. That time is usually short enough that you can avoid procrastination, but long enough to put something in writing. You then stop at 15 minutes, no matter if the writing is going well. You then force yourself to take a break and restart. Let's say you budgeted 2 hours of writing, that's 8 different times you have to force yourself to start. After a few days, your brain will be trained in the skill of starting to write.
I'm assuming that your paper will have the following sections, more or less in that order (the state of the art can be at the beginning or end of papers depending on fields, and sometimes fused with the intro):
Introduction what cool work you did in your paper and why it's important
State of the Art what other people did that are similar/related, what you are basing your paper on
Methodology the steps you took to achieve your results and why you chose them - sometimes also includes what you expected
Results a straight description the actual results and if they matched your hypotheses
Discussion now that you discussed the results, how do you interpret them more in depth? what do they tell you about your initial hypothesis? what follow-up questions did they raise?
Exploration (optional) if they raised questions and you did more experiments, quick summary (method + results + mini discussion)
Conclusion summary of the cool work you did + some perspectives.
If this is your first paper, it will probably be the easiest to start by the methodology and results description. Goal is to describe what you did, some of why, and your results, which you should know at this point. Then, I would suggest writing jointly the state of the art and the discussion, to make sure you are not overlooking things. Questions raised by your results might have answers in the literature, and doing a back and forth between discussion and existing papers will help you build a stronger argument.
You should finish by the introduction and conclusion: as they are summaries of your overall paper and how it fits in the rest of the science, as well as a way for you to sell your ideas, it will be easier (especially as a PhD student) to do them once you already actually have a paper.
Then you can do an overall re-reading to make everything simpler to read.
Good luck and have fun!
I really liked to work with this structure, where each section was one different latex file.
Much easier to work ... and to rework for the second paper (or the first paper, resubmitted somewhere else :D ).
I had the "rambling" section, which was equal to your "exploration". A lot of things put there, all related but all useless for the current paper...
Your starting point is reading tonnes of papers about your topic and in the type of journals you're targeting. You're already to good start.
A research paper conveys a key message to target audience and highlights the key contribution to the body of knowledge. It is not as broad as a Thesis.
Hence, in drafting a research paper, one needs to figure out and be clear in their mind ... what's the message I'm putting out there, what's significant about the work done, what's the purpose.
In your instance as you've narrated, you've got ideas already. Storyboard them and write them down.
Your results, itemise them and write them down. Also, write how you went about getting the results you've gotten. Slowly, the research paper is taking shape. With more ingredients, the paper is 'cooked', ready your 'dishing'.
There're different structures for research papers across different fields. For chemistry modelling, you should broadly fall under the IMRaD model.
I'll talk a bit more on this, before then take a look for instance at this GEOS-Chem chemistry model v10 by Keller and Evans (2019).
They have a structure introducing their work, the method used, deep dive into the work, followed by discussion and then conclusion.
1) Introduction;
2) Methods;
3) Long-term simulation using the random;
forest model;
4) Discussion;
5) Conclusions.
[Extract from IMRaD Wikipedia]
Introduction – Why was the study undertaken? What was the research question, the tested hypothesis or the purpose of the research?
Methods – When, where, and how was the study done? What materials were used or who was included in the study groups (patients, etc.)?
Results – What answer was found to the research question; what did the study find? Was the tested hypothesis true?
Discussion – What might the answer imply and why does it matter? How does it fit in with what other researchers have found? What are the perspectives for future research?
Please note that some have literature review (related works) as part of Introduction or better still just after introduction and before methods.
The literature review is rapid or purposeful. It's different from systematic review. However, some chemistry modelling papers are actually chemistry modelling reviews in which case they might be systematic review (aligning with PRISMA) or narrative review or even rapid following the PRISMA-ScR.
Also, take note that in some fields, methodology covers not just the methods, but the philosophical underpinning, research approach and strategy, methods and data collection tools. See the research onion in Saunders et al. (2023), now in the 9th edition.
Saunders, M., Lewis, P., & Thornhill, A. (2023). Research Methods for Business Students. (9th ed.) Pearson
Other answers give good advice on how to do this in general, I want to give some tips on how to do the practical thing. This is something I used to write all my papers.
In my opinion, separating the task of thinking from the task of doing is essential in overcoming mental blocks. If I'm trying to think about the overall story of the paper or proper language while I write down the content, I get stuck.
I employ a two-step process: First, I write everything down that I can think of. Anything related to the paper, what I did, why this is good, why it is better than other papers, what the application is etc. Crucial for this step is to not think about whether those claims made are correct or even make sense. After this, I usually have a draft of a paper that comes close to the required pages but the content is probably 50% nonsense, the language is bad, the pictures look bad...
So then you go to step two: Improving the content.
Now that there are some ideas on paper, it becomes much easier to get the actual paper that you want to write. Since judging content is simpler than creating content, I can now dissect everything I wrote. I find a lot of nonsense during this process, but some ideas stick and turn out to be good ones. It is also easier to judge the overall story from this, which helps to improve the structure. You do this a few times, filter out the bad stuff and keep the good stuff.
Two additional points: First, I like to get a bit tipsy to do the first part, but that is just me. Whatever helps you to produce a large amount of 'nonsense'. Second, an important skill is to not be afraid of reading your own text. This is something I struggled in the beginning of my PhD. Try to get over this, it is crucial for becoming good and fast.
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147598 | How should I interpret a suggestion to "synthesize" two sections of a paper?
I have submitted a manuscript to a journal. After some months, the submission is in the revised statute.
One of the referees suggested the following to me.
Sections 2 and 3 should be synthetized
What should I do over Sections 2 and 3?
My field is math.
Congratulations on submission... Google says it means to combine...
@PraphullaKoushik You are welcome.
In general, people say “thank you” when the other person says “congratulations”.. :) never mind...
@PraphullaKoushik Ok I got it! Thank you.
Synthesize in this context means to merge the sections into a coherent whole. So the reviewer is probably suggesting that these two sections would make more sense structurally (from their perspective) if they were combined.
Beyond this, it is not possible for us to understand the exact purpose of the reviewer's suggestion, as we do not have access to the article you wrote, nor the rest of the review(s). In general, suggestions or comments in any review are best understood in context -- what is this reviewer's understanding of the paper? What is their likely background? What did they think of the paper overall; which sections did they like and dislike? Based on the answers to these questions you may get a better idea of why they are suggesting merging the sections, and how you might go about doing it effectively (or alternatively, how to respond to the reviewer if you disagree).
Thanks for your complete and nice answer.
In addition to the meaning of this word in English, this may have been a mis-translation (a false friend from the referee's native language).
If the referee were Italian, for instance, they might have meant that you should reduce the length of these two sections.
Although, I have accepted the first answer, I really like to interpret the word ` synthetized' to reduce the length. Thanks for your useful link.
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206630 | How can I attract good postdocs?
I work as a research group leader at a top-100 university in Europe and supply of good PhD students is good, both from within the university and from other places in Europe. However, attracting good postdocs is much harder, even for the more senior professors with an even better international reputation than I have.
My impression is that the good postdocs are really picky with the places that they want to go to. It's the Ivy league places in the States, Cambridge, Oxford, ETH or EPFL. They don't seem to even consider any other options. I have tried to talk to good finishing PhD students in groups that I know, but they don't seem to see my university (or my group at least) as a good career choice.
How can I change this and attract good postdocs?
There is a lot of heterogeneity in Europe regarding postdoctoral working conditions. I don't know if this is the case where you are, but in some countries, like Portugal, postdocs don't have all the rights of standard employment. For me, this is a deal breaker, independent of institutional prestige and quality of research.
Pay well, provide stability?
I'm curious to know which field of research you are in. In my field of research there's always an over supply of good postdocs and an under supply of postdoc positions.
@AnderBiguri Neither of those things are probably in the gift of the OP, but more likely decided at a university level.
@IanSudbery well, one hopes that permanent academics can try to exert the little influence (or at least, voice) they have in the university. Plus its not entirely true, in the UK as a postdoc your salary can range for more than 20K£ of difference. I can tell you that hiring for the higher pay and longer projects will attract people. You can write grants with that in mind, for example.
@AnderBiguri Universities are not run by academics. There are probably location and disciplinary differences. But e.g. all PDs are grade 7 at my Uni, which is £37k-£45k. And HR want a very good reason if you want recruit someone beyond 7.1 (£37k) even if you can convince UKRI to fund higher (I've seen requests for 7.5 rejected by funders, although I have successfully gotten 7.8 funded once before). As for length - most grant calls have a soft 3 year limit. There are a small number of schemes allowing 5 years, but acceptance rates are 5% rather than the usual 20% for 3 year calls.
@IanSudbery this is my 7th year as a RA in the UK, I am well aware of how the system works. I insist that if you as an academic have no power, then there is no power and the answer is "screw all of this, let universities fall down", which I think is the least desirable solution. You have little voice, but you do have the most voice of all people involved.
Which subject you are talking about?
@AnderBiguri Increasing many of us are in the "burn it all down" camp. Those of us that arn't see the solution in national level reform, probably brought about by a prolonged fight against the basis of the system. But that doesn't help individual labs or postdocs in the immediate future.
Year on year, I have a good proportion of students in my cohort that clearly can't understand even basic English, and the only words they know how to say in class are "attendance code" (sometimes they also add "please", but that's rare). Every year we get students with the completely wrong background, our cohorts keep struggling with maths, and we keep getting told to just "remove the maths from the lectures" (aka lower our standards). And this is completely out of my control, as an academic. We try using our Voice on the admissions office, but alas, they don't listen. We have no power.
I don't think that there is an easy solution to your problem. If there were, and it were easy to put into practice, all the other less-famous labs would also put it into practice and the easy solution would no longer work. It's an old problem in economics.
That said, however, I think two parts of a solution (and by no means all of the solution) are the following (I ignore things like grant money, the fact that you are in Europe, etc. because you either can't change them or will already be well aware of them) :
Be a good person to work with. Treat your colleagues well, treat your students and post-docs well, share your ideas.
Increase your sales taskforce. You've probably never thought about the problem that way, but if you are the sole sales-person for your lab, then you are behind the eight-ball. You will find it very difficult to compete with the publicity that other, better known places, command. There is nothing shameful about asking people whom you know and who like you to advertise your good points (that's what post-docs do when they as you for a referral!). So, if there are postdoc who have worked with you or who are currently working with you, and with whom you enjoy a good collegiate relationship, mention to them that you are looking to the future. Tell them you'd be very grateful if they would mention your lab to any third person (potential post-doc?) whom they think worth telling.
To see how important, ultimately, it is to work with people who are friendly, supportive, challenging, collegiate, and all-round "nice", you need only look at the number of questions on this forum (see this example, and this) that are phrased along the lines of "HELP! I'm working in a famous lab with lots of money and a famous PI ... but the PI hates me and I hate them"!
slightly related to "sales force": What are some innovative techniques that new professors use to populate their new laboratories with students and postdocs? (besides advertising)
This is tough. The job market for assistant professorships is so tight that talented postdocs will try for the highest profile jobs that they can find in order to be competitive when they enter that job market.
So, if you want the best postdocs, you'll need to convince them that your environment and publication record is high profile enough to attract them. When you can say "I've hired 10 postdocs, and 9 of 10 of them moved on to stellar academic careers", you'll no longer have a problem.
That said, when you hire a postdoc, you're intrinsically saying that you'll be hiring a person with academic job aspirations. Every postdoc you hire will be looking toward that next job.
Presuming that you're looking for people to do the work your lab needs done, and not necessarily looking to train the next generation of faculty. an alternative approach would be to hire people that you need to do your work as normal employees, not aspirants to academe. Look for staff scientists and the like.
I'll add that the postdoc market is a networking thing, not necessarily a "I'll post the add and the applicants will pour in" thing.
"9 of 10 of them moved on to stellar academic careers" That's not going to happen.
Offer a position with a salary, rather than a stipend.
The position should also offer (paid!) teaching opportunities, for those who want to improve their CVs.
Why is a salary better? It may have tax implications.
@Buffy this will vary regionally, but in Europe, having a stipend instead of a salary forcibly removes you from all social benefits (health care, social security, pension contributions) and all the standard employee rights (legal protections for hiring/firing, collective salary agreements, holidays, sick & care leave, mediation). For some people, the smaller employee perks (subsidised childcare, mental health care, cheaper meals) might also add up in a big way. This might not matter in some countries, but in those set up around social benefits, it's a bad sign.
I'm guessing that outside of Europe, this distinction probably doesn't matter as much because the system is set up very differently.
@Buffy Yes, salary is taxed, which means it counts toward pension. Also, In Sweden you get 80% of your salary during parental leave. A stipend counts as 0, so this makes a big difference. Post-doc time is a common time when one starts a family, so this distinction is rather important.
Stipends have been taxed in the US since the Reagan years
Stipends for postdocs are not common in Europe, getting a salary and a work contract is much much more common.
@Dr.Snoopy My Swedish department has a yearly stipend for hiring postdocs. But it is indeed unusual; it is awarded via a foundation (big donation to the department by a private donor).
@coffee_into_plots In the US this distinction is not as stark as it apparently is in Europe, but it is still there. For example, stipend recipients do not receive unemployment insurance, do not have taxes withheld from their checks (their checks are not "pay", they are "stipends"), have to jump through hoops to get loans because they don't actually work for anyone (i.e., legally they're not employed and hence have no employer), etc. I did it for 3 years and it wasn't horrible, but it was a bit of a pain. That said, not all postdocs are viewed as stipend recipients...some are employees.
@PerAlexandersson Correct, stipends are taxed but only employers can withhold tax.
Since stipend recipients are not employed they are also not payed, making them responsible for withholding their tax and making their payment to the IRS. This is one of the many pains of being a stipend recipient as opposed to being an employee.
@Buffy In the US stipends are also taxed. The main difference of being a stipend recipient is you lose a lot of (maybe all) of the legal protections of an employee/employer relationship. Please see my previous comments for such examples.
@tnknepp, the question seems to be about the situation in Europe, not the US.
If the position comes for a salary of 100% of regular employment time, the teaching does not have to be paid extra. In fact, it would be quite strange and might require extra time spent on the teaching.
In what European country does having a stipend instead of a salary forcibly remove you from health care? This sounds highly unusual to me.
@RichardHardy (For Sweden) It does not remove you from health care. But unemployment benefits and maternity leave support, is based on your last few years salary. Since scholarship is no salary, this means your benefits will be on the minimum level, not 80% of a normal salary.
Right. I have more examples like this, so I was wondering if there is even a single country in Europe where having a stipend instead of a salary forcibly removes you from health care. I forgot to address my comment to the right person, though; it is @coffee_into_plots
@RichardHardy here's a link that explains the situation e.g. in Germany for PhD students on stipends. https://thesius.de/blog/articles/krankenversicherung-promotion-stipendium/ Basically, you'll need to find a workaround since health insurance is mandatory, which is expensive- you pay your own employer contributions, or private insurance. This is forcing you out of the job -> health insurance part of the system.
@RichardHardy Having paid into the system and showing that the country is your centre of life (so that you likely pay into the system again), e.g. by being a paid employee for a minimum amount of time, is a requirement for being eligible for socialized health care in Austria.
Sounds great, but nothing we have a choice of. Postdocs are salaried in the UK, PhD students are on stipends. No choice in the matter. Also, whether you can offer any (paid or unpaid) teaching opportunities to your postoc is often out of your hands. I was begging (even for unpaid) teaching opportunities, and in the end we couldn't get the approvals so my (then) supervisor just let me try out while sitting in on the lecture. Now (same department), the situation (read, the head of school) has changed, so now we can usually offer those kinds of opportunities to interested postdocs.
To get good postdocs, I think you first have to get a lot of applicants.
To get a lot of applicants, offer a lot of money and a lot of freedom. Offer a lot of career support for obtaining a permanent position.
If you have to offer less of one of these you may need to offer more of another.
And, those top schools you name generally offer a lot of the last item, which is likely the reason you ask this question.
Of course, this might not be possible or desirable in your context.
FWIW, I've seen the above suggestions work in practice.
It's hard to be competitive on pay. NASA's postdoctoral program currently has a base stipend of $70K/year (plus locality adjustment, insurance), plus $12K in relocation expenses, plus a $10K/year travel allowance. I've seen DOE postdocs making over $110K/year. That's tough to beat. Do you have a gauge for what postdocs in academia make?
@tnknepp, no, sorry. And it varies a lot by place and by field.
@tnknepp... postdocs in academia? not enough. At least in the US, postdocs in academia make so little that they qualify for government housing here in the US....
I think you are seeing the effects of the pyramid structure of academics. There are more PhD students than postdocs and more more postdocs than professors in academics overall. This means that not everyone who does a PhD at a top university will get a postdoc there and not everyone who does a postdoc will get a professorship there.
This means that at a university like yours that is good but not the very top, you will still have a good proportion of professors who did PhDs and postdocs at the very top universities before coming to your university. In other words, if you do try to rank people by their academic achievement you should expect that the average level of your professors is higher than the average level of your postdocs. Of course, trying to linearly sort everyone by their academic achievement is a gross oversimplification and as the other answers explain, networking, being a welcoming research group and offering attractive positions will help attract good postdocs.
A few things come to mind in addition to several of the important points raised
The Postdoc should provide an attractive compensation for those high aspirations that the University and project has (and they should have to a reasonable extent).
The Postdoc should be able to reasonably support the candidate's livelihood and personal needs. For instance to bring his family and return his family. Its not worth it if a Postdoc saves 6 months to bring his family under a one year contract and needs to save another six months to return them back.
Postdoc should reasonably give the candidate some room to express and explore his Academic philosophies e.g. the kind of top journals he might like to publish, the kinds of networks he would like to build.
The Postdoc should socially make the candidate look like someone working on a decent job in a foreign land. This has to do with pay and the job conditions should cushion some national policies and benefits that puts locals at a higher social pedestal
The institution, supervisor and lab should look attractive, adding value.
The postdoc experience should be able to add value in the sense that the candidate can even negotiate for greater opportunities in that country and the rest of the world afterwards.
The postdoc opportunity should give some reasonable time before expecting those high quality results and papers. Strong research footprint requires some time.
@Trunk, I get your point. There is a huge spectrum of what different countries and institutions offer, as well as the cost of living and benefits in those places, especially for foreigners. For #5, keeping other things relatively constant, this point is a reality that many live by. Prestige has its place, and many of those top institutions have higher expectations and ways of managing things, as that is what fuels their reputation. Similarly, a top professor in an area usually has a higher "taste of quality".
This is partly a marketing problem, as in marketing a service or goods. You can describe this is in several different ways, one is like this:
What is your intended target group, ie what people do you think should know about and have a positive impression of your program?
How do you reach the intended target group? Do they even know that you exist? What marketing do you do towards your intended target group?
How does the intended target group perceive your offering? Do they find it attractive or are there things missing in the initial offering?
What does current postdocs think and say about beeing part of the program? Is anything really good: make it public, is anything really bad: change it!
What does your alumni think about the program? Do you keep contact with them and use them in your marketing?
What does your grant donors / other cooperation partners think about your program? Do you use them and their contacts to reach out for new postdocs?
Another part of the problem is "sales". Sales is very much about filling the pipe-line of "customers" and handling them well. So how do your organization identify potential customers (suspects), contact them and make them interested (prospects) and get them to actually apply for postdocs. Reaching out to suspects could be done through various methods, one guess would be to scan published papers in the relevant area and contact the authors telling about your offering. What happens if someone contacts you -- how do you respond and is it timely?
Pay your postdoc a livable salary. None wants a miserable life.
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| Stack Exchange | 2025-03-21T12:55:49.708770 | 2024-02-11T09:49:02 | {
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13819 | Can a referee request a paper referenced in the reviewed paper?
If you review a paper which relies on results some other paper and you do not have access to that paper, is it acceptable to contact the editor and ask whether the author can provide a copy of the referenced paper? Are requests like this reasonably common?
Or should the referee simply take the word of authors that their conclusions based on the referenced paper are correct, even without seeing that paper?
Yes, if the paper is crucial to the work, I don't think there is anything wrong with asking the editor to provide it to you. I think the editor would probably check for it himself first (in order to save time), and if not possible would relay your query to the authors. As an extreme measure, if the editor was unwilling to do this, I would simply consider writing back saying you are unable to fully review the paper because access to this crucial reference was not provided.
So, in short: do not let your lack of subscriptions get in the way of doing of thorough review.
Now, there are some other ways around this. First, maybe you can find that paper in the usual ways: through interlibrary loan or on the “grey market” (ask a friend who's got more comprehensive subscriptions that yours). Second, maybe the editor offers reviewers some service that can be of help already (for example, Elsevier journals offer a 30-day free access to the Scopus database to their reviewers).
There are two aspects of the question: Should you try to find the necessary information (papers) to do a good review? And should you contact the author of the paper you review to ask for other sources written by that author?
It is clear that you should attempt to gather all information you deem necessary to perform your task as reviewer. Since journals typically only accept published materials to be used for sources (with the possible exception of unpublished data or personal communications) you should be able to find such information given some time and work. That said, I doubt that many would keep a review on hold just because they have not been able to find a specific source unless that source is absolute key for a critical (in the negative sense) aspect of the paper. It is, however, possible to inform the editor that you have not been able to check up on this particular aspect since you are unable to obtain a copy of the paper within a reasonable time. Although it is always possible to purchase papers from publishers, I do not think we consider such actions within the expectations placed on a reviewer.
Now, the second aspect about contacting the author for more information should be handled with care. As an editor, I would first of all want to be aware of such communications. Peer review is based on an objective evaluation for materials and although a simple request is not likely to change much it simply removes part of the desired distance between author and reviewer. One solution to this, which I would prefer is for the reviewer to contact the editor and ask for the material (from the editor or from the author through the editor). It has not happened to me that i have received such a request but I would not consider it other than a positive. I would also add that if a reviewer is lacking some key piece of information (as stated in the previous paragraph) I would greatly appreciate knowing about this weakness in the review. Given such information, I could, as and editor, add key comments of requests to the author to improve the paper in some respect.
As a side-point, I would like to add that some papers that totally rely on other previously published on, for example methods and error discussions, should include enough of a summary to make the paper stand on its own in its entirety. It is thus possible to request a major revision with the explicit wish to see additions to the paper to remove the necessity to have to read other papers for key aspects. I fully realize the delicate balance in such requests since no-one is striving for excessively long publications.
| Stack Exchange | 2025-03-21T12:55:49.710203 | 2013-11-03T07:38:41 | {
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