Introducing yourself to potential thesis advisor you didn't attend any class with

Go for it! This is perfectly normal, not at all weird or presumptuous!
I would put together a short, well-written email where you briefly introduce yourself, indicate your interest in his research, and propose a brief meeting to discuss whatever it is you want. Something like this would probably work:

Dear Dr. Eisenhardt,
I am Ignus Ignatius, a sophomore in the Computer Science Department here at Mutant University. I am looking forward to taking your Advanced Bioinformatics course next fall; I really enjoyed the bioinformatics module in Dr. Xavier's survey class this semester).
I am currently looking for a research internship and noticed that you have several active projects listed on your lab webpage, including the development of algorithms for processing NMR spectra.
Are you or your collaborators looking for interns? If so, I would love to talk for a few minutes if/how I might fit in your group (CV attached). I'm free Friday at 2:30 during your regular office hours and have a pretty flexible schedule on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.
Thank you,
--Ignus Ignatius

I would not ask for reference recommendations unless you actually plan to read them. Similarly, I'd try show that you did as much "homework" as possible by referring to specific things that this professor is doing. Some people spam out literally hundreds of generic "hire me" emails: this never goes well for them and you do not want yours to be mistaken for one of these.
You can rarely go wrong with a polite, personalized email. At the very worst, the prof will write back to say that they are not taking students right now, or never reply at all. Nevertheless, if this makes you very nervous, you can also ask a professor that you do know to introduce you to your "target." This also isn't that weird, though you do need to be careful if they work on very similar things--you probably want to avoid suggesting that the professor you already know is somehow worse.


How to cope with YouTube and use it as an aid for effective teaching

I've just embraced YouTube as part of my teaching. I've not used it to replace lectures or any classes but created my own separate YouTube content that serves a different purpose.

I am a copious consumer of YouTube, so I am perhaps familiar with some of the content there. I find that the viewers want to watch someone solve a problem or do something interesting or difficult but not be "taught" in the traditional sense.

I found that students need was to ask how to solve a problem when I was not around to show them how I might solve that problem. Although we had small group sessions when we could discuss problem solving, these were not really frequent enough for many students. Deferred gratification is a difficult thing for some students who prefer not to wait until the next support session.

To solve this dilemma I created some new unique problems that emulate the class work and create similar challenges without being useful for plagiarism. I then solved these problems as if I was a student and made the same set of blunders, many genuine on my part. I then verbalised how I would solve such an issue, create a working solution, and prepare it for classwork submission.

The idea was, that they could use these as a substitute for me being at their side and talking through a problem solution.

In the main, this has worked out. The episodes are not perfect, and could be improved; but it is path that teacher and class can walk together, and one has to start somewhere. Some students, foolishly just copied the work from the YouTube screen and handed it in as a class solution, when it was even a different problem; but they were the minority. Some students complained that  I did not solve their specific problem in the video, when there was clearly an analogue of a solution therein; but in the majority it was helpful. It was also a clear marketing ploy, in that some just picked the class "because it has YouTube" content!

What I did was additional and optional content. No student was required to use it, and all the information it contained was present elsewhere in written class material. It was just another form of delivery to complement existing media which helped some students.

Give it a try!


How does one go about finding an obscure journal and paper?

It's not a journal, it's a volume of proceedings from a conference (which you can derive from the format "Proc. X Conf.").
It looks like these are proceedings from a conference held in Bucharest, Romania, in 2017. It may have been a local conference; online sources are very limited in English and slightly less limited in Romanian.
As Buffy suggested in the comments, your best bet is to ask your local academic librarian.


A team member of a coursework software development project didn't contribute in any way. Can I remove his name from the project?

Can I remove someone's name from an academic software development project that didn't contribute a single line of code?

Just to focus on the title itself; lines of code contributed is not an accurate summary of contribution. This is a variation on the workman's fallacy of "management is useless because they don't directly make the product".

For example, someone can contribute by working together with the others, and due to working with everyone in different steps, they end up not writing the code and have only contributed to the design of the application. Or testing. Or analysis.
As a second example, maybe their initial code ended up being refactored due to a midway design change, thus technically not having their contribution added to the final product while still having contributed.

I'm aware that this is not the case here, but I want to advise you to refrain from using "not contributing a single line of code" as the main justification. When I read the title, before clicking the link, it implied that you were blindly measuring value by measuring LOC which would put you at fault for using a faulty metric.

However, as this person didn't do anything at all, let's address the real situation.

Whether or not removing the name is warranted depends on whether you are being graded collectively or not. If you all share the same grade, then this person should be prevented from mooching/piggybacking off of your results.

If the grading is done individually, and the professor is already aware (and has evidence) of this person's lack of contribution, then removing the name is unnecessary. It would only be a matter of principle/pride.
While I can certainly understand your desire to not give credit to someone who did not contribute; keep in mind that doing so may come across as petty and may even suggest to outside observers that this person was being ostracized by their team mates, which can end up as a mitigating circumstance in that person's favor.

In either case, I suggest you ask the professor on the right course of action. Since they are already aware of the issue (and presumably have not refuted your claim, since you didn't mention them doing so), having the professor agree to remove this person's name from the project safeguards you from possible negative inferences about having done so.


Can it hurt to put my GRE score on my resume?

Generally speaking it's okay to add whatever to your CV as long as it does not distract the reader from more important points/experiences.

For a GRE score, I highly doubt it would hurt to put it in, even if it is not required. Not to mention that some may perceive this as a plus.


Another PhD student is going to present my research

In my experience, it is very common for one person to present someone else's conference talk.  I know this happens because at about 5% of talks speaker announces they are doing it at the beginning of the talk.  The reason for this occurring is not usually given.  I would guess the most common reason is that the original speaker changed jobs or graduated, and is no longer able to attend.  I suspect that some speakers wish to give more talks (usually there is a limit of one or two per speaker), so they ask their students who are not able to attend to submit talks for them, and then change the speaker at the last minute.

Personally, I have given talks for colleagues twice.  The first time, the colleague was having a baby (it's mysterious why he didn't know this until a month before the conference) and I gave his talk.  In the second case, the colleague quit science altogether well before the conference.  We asked the conference to remove his abstract and put a new one, with a new author list, in its place.  I made the talk from scratch, with limited content about his work.

I think your professor's proposal is reasonable, but that it would also be reasonable to refuse or to specify how you would like to be credited.  But in my field, conference talks have near zero prestige.  Computer scientists see things differently.


Someone asks me to cite their paper. Should I cite?

I can think of a number of reasons to cite a source:

to acknowledge the work of others that you are building on (avoiding plagiarism)
to give credit to the author of a particular phrase that you quote (avoiding plagiarism)
to point readers to relevant previous literature
to signal that your work is at the cutting edge of the field, and
to situate your contribution in the context of related research
to provide evidence for a claim

"Being asked" is not among them.
Unless you retrospectively find that one of the reasons above applies (esp. 3-5), politely decline to cite the paper in question. In particular, you should refuse to add a citation as a favor.

Addendum: I just saw your update to the question, stating that your supervisor asks you to cite the apparently irrelevant paper. This complicates the issue. I would ask them to explain why and where to add the citation. Perhaps they want you to slightly revise your paper, incorporating information from the new source, which would justify the citation. If not, it depends on your relationship whether you are in a position to push back.


I would wait until you know the outcome first. It is possible (and not that usual from what I hear) to defer an offer of admission, which means you may be able to take up an offered position in the following academic year.

Since you do not know that you have been admitted yet, I would wait until you get a response. If you are rejected, there is no harm in re-applying next year. If you are offered a place, a request for deferral will not be looked upon badly.


When is it appropriate to contact the editor before submission to avoid rejection without review?

Thanks for clarifying.  Don't worry about the effect this would have on your future chances with this paper and this journal.  If this pre-submission step fails, that is an indication that the classic approach would also fail.  Either they feel it's worth sending out for review or they don't.

But send the whole thing, not just the abstract.  They need to be able to see the tables and figures.

When you send the full long version to the editor, here's a way to word the question: ask whether the work is appropriate for the journal.

If you get an encouraging response, then you can start slashing, do a formal submission, and hope for the best!

(Source: I have to give the credit to my spouse for this answer, who has about 250 publications.  Edit: in case this helps -- in the field of experimental physics.)


Why do some journal proofs insert dozens of typesetting mistakes?

Because they are incompetent.

That's about it, really. But don't lump all publishers/journals as one - the typesetters for one journal might not be the same as that for another journal, even one published by the same publisher, and of course there are good and bad employees everywhere.


How much does it matter if my Masters is in Stats or Math (in Stats track)

Well, do you want to end up applying for a job that is looking for a "Degree in Statistics (or related field)," or a job that is looking for a "Degree in Mathematics (or related field)?"

Employers don't usually ask for transcripts and don't look at your list of courses, they just look at your resume/CV, which will just have the title of your degree and perhaps your GPA (or some other summary grade if not in the US). If you look like you don't quite have the right qualifications on paper, you'll need to explain how a "mathematics" degree qualifies you for a job in statistics, or vice versa.


Is it appropriate to assign Mechanical Turk-type tasks as extra credit?

As I see it, the grade in the class is supposed to measure a student's mastery of the material. Letting students improve their grade via unrelated menial work is not consistent with this standard and seems dangerously close to letting the students wash your car for extra credit.


How do I publish the work of my elderly father, a "fringe" scientist?

There are precedents for this.
J.S. Bach assumed that his music would be forgotten after he died. It would have been it if weren't for the efforts of Mendelsohn, Schuman and others. Nowadays Bach is considered by many to be the greatest composer whoever lived. His work is to be heard ubiquitously.

For about 50 years after Bach’s death, his music was neglected. This
was only natural; in the days of Haydn and Mozart, no one could be
expected to take much interest in a composer who had been considered
old-fashioned even in his lifetime.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Johann-Sebastian-Bach/Reputation-and-influence

With regard to publication by children of a parent's work, there is the case of Pierre Fermat.
Fermat was a great mathematician by any measure. However his widespread recognition by the general public was the result of his so-called Last Theorem. This came to light purely as a result of his son reproducing a note from Pierre's handwritten note in a margin.

Written in 1637, it wasn’t actually his last theorem, but nobody knew
about it until his son found it five years after Fermat died. Years
later, after all of Fermat’s other theorems had surrendered to
mathematical proof, this remarkable theorem resisted all assaults.
https://www.famousscientists.org/pierre-de-fermat/

Self-publishing is always an option even if it ends up being simply a treasured family keepsake.
Without knowing the details (Did he visit and excavate the pyramids? Did he decipher hieroglyphics that no-one else could?) it is difficult for us to answer.
I think you need to consult an expert in the field. Alternatively you need to get a publishing agent in the field of interest. They will negotiate the traps and tricks of the publishing industry for you (at a fee of course).


I have always used/seen for MLA in Spanish, and instruct my students to use Obras citadas.  In truth, Bibliografía is vastly more common in native-Spanish, non-MLA works, but the same could be said of English Bibliography.

Since MLA keeps the references to strictly the works that were, well, cited (as opposed to read during research or useful for further reading), thus making a difference between a bibliography and a list of works cited, it has always seemed logical to me to make the same distinction in Spanish.

And just to give you a specific reference, grabbing a random journal I have here —Hispania, which generally uses MLA— references for articles are found in a section entitled Works Cited (English) or Obras citadas (Spanish/Portuguese).


Is it rude not to take a course with your adviser?

Expanding my comments from earlier...

Most importantly, talk to your advisor. Either you should be able to convince him/her that the other course will benefit you more or he/she should be able to convince you that his/her course will benefit you more.

I disagree with RoboKaren's answer. Working with your advisor is far more important than taking a class with him/her for a letter of rec. You may have other opportunities to take a course with him/her anyway.


Is it necessary to have a background in philosophy in order to get a position in logic in philosophy departments?

The correct, if not very useful, answer to the title question is no, not absolutely necessary. But philosophy departments aren't likely to advertise very often for mathematicians or computer scientists grounded in computability (an important topic in epistemology).

Like any other modern academic field, philosophy has specialization, and some departments are very specialized. So, with certain skills, but not a broad knowledge of the foundations of philosophy you would find a few positions open, but I suspect they would be rare.

Being specialized is both a blessing and a curse. The curse comes because you might not be suitable to teach the courses that need teaching, but the blessing is that you know how to go deep into some important topics.

If you have a degree already in math, philosophy might present an option if the right position came along. But it would probably be a mistake to try to build a career on the assumption that it would be easy to do so.

Also, of course, if you just love it, there is no real reason why a mathematician or linguist can't enter into collaborative relationships with philosophers on topics of common interest. Such relationships can be highly productive.


How can physicists help in theoretical biology, besides math and fresh perspectives?

One important contribution of physics to many areas is that physics is the origin of much of our understanding of complex systems phenomena, including emergence, chaotic systems, network effects, and phase transitions. Many areas of biology are still trapped in a hyper-reductionist framework (e.g., is FOXP2 the gene for speech) rather than realizing that such questions are poorly framed. Many biologists are embracing systems thinking, but the tools of physics are still not very widely dispersed overall, and collaboration that brings together such expertise with biological expertise (non-biologists are often frightfully naive about many realities of biology) can be of great value.

There are many other possibilities too, but this is a very important category that I think may be a good start...


Is it a good idea to ask my Master's supervisor to help me finding a PhD in other universities?

Yes, it would be a very good idea to ask your supervisor. They know the field much better than you do. They likely have contacts in many places and also know which universities would be a good match for your interests. Many places will want a recommendation from your supervisor anyways, so it would be good to have them on board.

I would not phrase the request as "Please help me find a PhD position" but more casually, for example: "I am interested in doing a PhD, do you happen to know of any openings?".


Whether common or not, it is acceptable to ask. Ask the main professor, who may pass on the request to a co-author.

I'd suggest that you only give a small amount of detail in the initial request but offer to say more if you like. But don't flood the professor in the initial request. Mention that you have a draft, but don't send it. And you can certainly mention that you are interested in applying to the university.

What happens next depends on the nature of the reply. Perhaps they will want to help you, but other outcomes are possible.


Would this be considered a case of plagiarism?

For coursework, some professors have a stricter definition of plagiarism than is strictly necessary. But, from what you say, you have cited the original and if it is clear enough that your citation implies that the source of the ideas is elsewhere, then it isn't technically plagiarism.
Note that whether you quote or paraphrase is irrelevant, assuming you quote properly (quote marks or a set aside of some sort). Plagiarism is about the idea itself, rather than the specific words.
Automatic plagiarism checkers do a poor job, actually, giving both false positives and false negatives. But if you cite (what the checker said overlapped) properly, it isn't plagiarism.
Another issue, frequently forgotten, is that for some sorts of things, especially in, say, math, there is effectively only one way to say something and some things are also common knowledge. So, for these things, neither plagiarism nor copyright actually apply. This probably doesn't apply in this specific case, but keep it in mind, generally.


Does undergrad score matter very much when applying for a second Masters?

Your question is difficult to answer confidently because you don't provide information about the program you're interested in or your prior studies. What did you study in the past? What do you want to study?

Did you do well in your undergraduate classes relating to your prospective masters area? Is your most recent masters in an area closely related to that of your second masters? Did you perform well in your first masters program?

To make things easier, you should perhaps call the admissions office of the program/department you're interested in joining. Be straightforward about your situation and they'll likely be helpful in guiding you.


Should we allow reuse a image in a publication as long as it is properly cited and noted?

Sometimes it is easier for the reader to understand a image if it is reused

Not really. You can go back and forth when reading a text. I see no advantage reproducing an image within the same document.

What is the original reason for forbidding this?

It is not strictly forbidden. I would call it common sense. The fact that you do not see images reproduced in the same document is because most people are convinced it is totally not necessary.


Can giving back to my alma mater have a positive impact on application?

Graduate admissions is based mainly on the question: Does this candidate's preparation suggest that he/she will be able and likely to succeed in our program?  It is not awarded as a token of gratitude for service to the institution.

This project of yours could have a positive impact on a graduate application, to the extent the project itself is evidence of your readiness for graduate work (programming skills, initiative, etc).  But from this point of view, it's not really relevant that you created it for your alma mater, or that your alma mater uses it, just that you created it at all.

(The fact that your alma mater actually uses it could have a small effect on your application at that same institution, if some of the people on the admissions committee are personally familiar with the product.  They would have a better understanding of what the project says about you as a potential student.  Of course this could cut both ways, depending on whether they think the product is good or bad.)

I would guess that this sort of thing would be a relatively minor factor in considering an application, and would not probably not save an application that was otherwise weak.  But of course it will depend on your particular institution, their criteria, and the overall strength of their applicant pool.  You could get a better sense by having a talk with one of the professors in your department who is involved in graduate admissions.


What should I do if I don't know the answer to a question posed by a student?

I agree that honesty is the best policy, and it's too bad if you're in a situation in which you feel worried about admitting you don't know the answer.  You shouldn't try to bluff, by pretending you know but don't have time to explain or by giving an intentionally vague answer.  However, there are ways of handling it more smoothly than just saying "I don't know" and leaving it at that.  Depending on the circumstances, you can say "That's a really interesting question.  I haven't thought about it, so I'll have to look into it, but let's talk about it in office hours."  (Or you can promise to return to the topic in the next class meeting if it's really relevant to the course and everyone in the class will want to know the answer.)  Or "These issues can be complicated.  I don't know the details off the top of my head, but the place I'd look them up is Reference Work X.  I'd be happy to show you where to find it after class."  Or "That's a good question, but it's somewhat beyond the scope of this class.  I'd be happy to investigate it with you outside of class."

The key is to respect the student's desire to learn.  If you avoid the question or give an answer you know is inadequate, then you're being deliberately unhelpful.  If you just give up and admit defeat, then at least you're being honest, but the student still isn't finding out what he/she wanted to know.  If you respond by pointing the student on the road to an answer, even if you can't supply it off the top of your head, then you've done everything that can be expected of you.


How to work in a group where the group members need to be taught everything?

You don't really have many options. As I see them:

You can talk to the instructor, explain the situation, and ask to move to another group
You can talk to the instructor, explain the situation, and ask to do the project individually
You can actually sit down and teach them

As far as which you should do, there are too many variable for us to answer here. However, it seems the best would be start with (1). If that fails, try (2). If that also fails, do (3) and try to find the pleasure in teaching others.


What to change between Conference and Journal Paper?

There is no good reason to simply copy large portions of an existing publication to make a new. By rewriting everything, you have the opportunity to rephrase your thoughts and most likely produce a better paper, at least from a writing point of view. Some journals definietly look at plagiarism and in this case self-plagiarism and the only way to avoid it is to rewrite. I think the benefits of rewriting clearly outweighs the possible time-saving by just copy-pasting.

Just to provide an example. I have written tens of papers about the same natural physical object that I have studied. In each paper, I have to provide a descritpion of the locality and characteristics and not once have this been copied. It is in fact interesting to see how many dofferent ways the same (dull) information can be conveyed.

As for a percentage of new material, I really would advice against relying on a numbr. It is possible this is a silent understanding in some fields but in general, only new insights and conclusion should warrant a new publication. Another year of data or something similar to that is in itself not enough. The paper might be published but such publication strategies are not looked upon favourably in the long term.

So, I strongly recomend rewriting each paper and not rely on copy-pasting. I am convinced you will develop as an author and also generate better papers by doing so. consider each paper a separate new entity.


Matriculating as master's student just for credits, with the intention of dropping after a year

You know you are planning to drop out, but no one else needs to know.  People's plans change all the time.  For example, a person might start a master's, then realize he actually wants to work toward a PhD.  He might start at one institution or in one program and realize he actually wants to be somewhere else.  If he has done good work before the change, and if he is not someone who habitually starts things but abandons them before finishing... I don't see a red admissions flag here.

I don't see an ethical problem either, because when you start a master's program, you are part of a flock.  The program doesn't suffer if you leave after 2 semesters, and an advisor hasn't invested a lot of time and thought into how to best guide you.

Caveat: I have never sat on an admissions committee.


What are characteristics of a "good" thesis topic?

I completely agree with ff524's criteria, but here are some further considerations:

A good thesis topic should not be all or nothing.  Instead, it should accommodate a range of levels of ambition.  There should be fallback options that would be enough to graduate even if things go poorly, moderately ambitious outcomes that you could reasonably aim for, and very ambitious outcomes that would be fantastic if they could be achieved.
It should offer scope for creativity and choice by the student.  You can only impress hiring committees so much if it looks like your advisor was the mastermind behind your thesis.  Instead, it has to be clear that over time you took ownership of the project and played a major role in determining its direction (even if your advisor made the initial suggestion and provided feedback and guidance).
Your thesis topic should connect with other topics you'd like to explore in the future.  If you spend your entire early career revisiting and elaborating on your thesis topic, it won't set you up for success as a researcher.  Instead, you need to branch out, and your choice of thesis topic can really help with this.  Choose a topic that is central and well-connected to adjacent areas, rather than one that is isolated.  That way you can build on your previous experience as you branch out.
Your thesis advisor needs to care about the topic.  Sometimes people are willing to supervise theses on topics they don't particularly care about.  They do this in an attempt to be helpful, but it can end up working against you when you graduate and discover that your advisor's lack of caring translates into a lack of support on the job market.
For a multi-year project like a thesis, it's generally best to pick a topic that seems to be becoming more popular and influential over time, rather than less so.  This sounds obvious, but it's surprisingly subtle to figure out.  Beginners are sometimes a little behind the times and can get excited by topics that were hot a few years ago but have since been thoroughly investigated and are already in decline.
It should be something you like doing, not just something you would like to have done.


How can I search for currently trending, new scientific articles?

You can see the arxiv repository site that is very interesting. This site Arxiv has an electronic archive and distribution server for research articles in Physics, mathematics, computer science, nonlinear sciences, quantitative biology and statistics. The interesting point is that you can access to the recent papers in these fields as soon as possible even before long story of publication process!
Also, you can subscribe to automatic email alerts from the subjects you'd like to see recent submitted papers in them.


Do professors recommend their students on LinkedIn?

I have, in the past, recommended students on LinkedIn, when requested by them. This applies, in particular, to PhD students shortly before or after their defense, who were looking for a position outside academia and in the private sector. In chemical engineering, the situation of that academics tend not to use LinkedIn for looking up/assessing prospective hires, while it is widely used outside academia (and I believe this is true of other fields).

For this reason, I maintain a small presence on LinkedIn myself, because:

This is one of the ways I can help (by networking and recommendations) my former students find a job, which is part of a PhD adviser’s responsibilities.
I might want a job outside academia at some point in my career, too!

Regarding FERPA compliance, I am not US-based so I have little knowledge about it. This webpage on “FERPA Compliance [for] Recommendation Letter Writers” implies that compliance mostly puts constraints on the content of the letter (which should not include “education records”).


My advisor asked me to co-author a paper, but I have no interest in an academic career

Congratulations! In my opinion, it is perfectly polite to write back and say that you are interested, but can't afford to make a significant time commitment to the project. Ideally, the professor will be happy to do the work himself, and your role would largely be to look over the finished product, sign off on it, and make suggestions or comments.
It's fine to invite the professor to write this paper without you as a coauthor. That said, since you did much of the work already, the professor might prefer that you be listed as an author.
If you are thinking of possibly applying to graduate school in the future, it would probably be a good thing to have a publication under your belt.


How does a dropout influence one's later scientific career?

Especially if you are applying for funding, the admissions committee is taking a risk when they decide to admit each student.  If a student comes and does not succeed, the department may have incurred expenses for the time the person was there, and they don't have another successful graduate they can show for it.   Is the reason you dropped out before something that still affects your likelihood to drop out again?  That'll be a question on the committee's mind as they're reading.

Having been expelled before would be a bigger issue, because it means you were a major problem for the previous place and most universities don't want to have people who they think would be likely to cause big problems like that for them.  An applicant with this background would definitely be expected to explain what's changed.

Some departments expect a certain percentage of students to be "weeded out" or not make it through; find out what the norm is where you're applying.  Also find out what the culture is in terms of encouraging people to branch out and try new things, but then be able to recognize when something's not working out and stop going down a path that doesn't lead to fruitful goals (once that's recognizable).  These are important parts of research, and I think most faculty understand that.

In your applications, clearly explain what happened, and how you made the most of it.  Is the experience you gained an asset that can help you now?  Also (this applies more broadly) explain why you want to now go back into academia and into the program you're applying for and why you think you'll be able to make the most of that opportunity, if admitted.

If you just assume your history makes you ineligible and don't apply, you won't be admitted.
If you do apply and explain things clearly, you have a chance, higher than zero.


Arxiv paper with lots of revisions and changes made to subject matter; shouldn't Arxiv clean this up?

It does indeed look confusing and irregular. Oh, and it only gets worse once you start looking into how interrelated it is with different versions of some of his other arXiv postings... In an ideal world, perhaps arXiv should clean this up somehow. However, the moderation team is relatively small, works on a voluntary basis, and has to handle a lot of submissions every day. One really can't expect them to sort out messes like this one, nor do I think it'd be good for them to have an extensive editorial function. Assuming the initial submission meets the criteria, the onus is on the author(s) to communicate clearly - not on arXiv.

It's also worth noting that only the first five versions are included in the daily listings, so individual authors making lots of revisions don't necessarily impact the community too much. Given all this, I think it makes sense for arXiv to focus on rapidly processing new submissions instead of worrying about excessive changes to a (presumably) small number of postings.

Finally, I'll note that in cases like this it's a very good thing that arXiv stores all versions. You can cite a specific version and leave it at that.


Avoid plagiarism when copying (paraphrasing) paragraphs for the background section of Masters Thesis

If you are paraphrasing everything then a single citation is enough, but provide a hint, at least, about where that section ends.

If you want to use direct quotes make it obvious that you are quoting using some textual hints (quote marks are only one way). It might be necessary to note that your quotes of definitions, etc, come from the original work.

It isn't hard to make sure that everything is correctly cited. What is hard is not making it look messy. If you can use foot/end notes then you can make citations less obvious, hiding the details in those notes.


How to assist your home university in evaluating whether classes taken when studying abroad should allow transfer of credit?

Submit the course (or module-) descriptions for the examination department/office.
The target university needs a basis for their decisions to make.

A description of the course containing information about the topic (a syllabus), learning goals and skills taught, the workload and the examination conditions, will help to decide whether a course fits into your major or not and if it can be granted with transfer credits and so on.


Include School Technical Project in CV for Grad Application

If a project is related to your field of study, and if the supervisor(s) of the project is writing a letter of recommendation for you, by all means include it. If you simply did the project, but nobody else mentions it (in a supporting letter, for example), you might still include it, depending on how significant you feel the project was.


In which situations can I claim that additional data is needed for an existing research paper?

A paper rarely addresses all problems and it is normal for other papers to follow.

However, a paper that lacks motivation needn't demand a subsequent paper. That said, you might be able to identify new applications for the paper, which could merit a new paper.

If you're finding it tricky to justify [a new paper], then perhaps no new paper is needed.


Research paper about an enhancement to algorithm

The question I would ask is: "Are there people working in this area who would learn something interesting and useful from what you've done?"  If the answer is yes then your paper makes a contribution and so is potentially publishable. At that point you could consider some secondary questions, e.g.:

Length of the paper: this should be commensurate with the extent of the contribution (i.e., how much someone would learn) -- a small contribution merits a short paper.
Venue of publication: some place (conference, journal, forum) typically accessed by the people who would learn the most from your paper.  For example, a theory journal would not be the right place for systems-oriented paper about the guts of a compiler.


After admission, should I thank a recommender who I suspect wrote a bad letter?

Yes, you should thank and inform your letter writer, and no, you shouldn't worry about some bizarre and unrealistic "re-evaluation" of your admission.

Comments: It is very unlikely that your writer wrote a negative letter. In general, one only agrees to write a letter if one has something constructive or positive to say. Having read lots of letters, I'll note that even judgmental and perfectionist people put their criticisms in context, comparing to their general assessments of other students or researchers. (I.e. this person isn't perfect, but he/she is better than most others for the following reasons). These letters, in fact, are often the most compelling.

As a further comment, you're being very uncharitable in assuming bad intentions of someone who agreed to write a letter for you!

And a final comment: no university is going to care to "re-evaluate" their admission of you, even in the stunningly unlikely event that someone asks them to, except in cases of actual fraud, criminal issues, etc. Everyone involved has better things to be doing with their time.


Should I do a Master's degree if I am already employed in the field?

First, research if your company has incentive programs for higher education. Many top companies offer partial/full tuition reimbursement to qualifying employees to pursue a masters. If this is the case, use the program to take 1 or two classes a semester. Frankly, a person with a bachelors can usually attain the same titles and salaries as a masters. The biggest difference in salaries/titles/responsibilities are between masters and PhDs. The main difference is that a PhD can be a PI on research grants/studies.
I went back to University when I was 30. Sometimes the market calls for a change in careers. But as I stated before, you may not have to "return". If your company is flexible, you could attain a masters on the side within 3-4 years by doing classes in the evening/weekend/online.


What should a student look for in an undergraduate thesis supervisor?

I would recommend you to take to things into consideration:
First, find a topic that you are interested in and motivated to work on. And then, try to find profs in your department that work on topics similar to what you plan to work on.
Second, try to figure out how you would like to work (and this is very important).
If you feel confident working more independently, the supervisor won't play a significant role there. If you feel that you need closer guidance, try to find a supervisor that is willing to do that.
Now, it is important to note that you will likely have to compromise some of your needs. It is possible that there won't be many professors willing to supervise you on a topic you want rather than what they want and will recommend you to join his projects/topics. On the other hand, you may find someone willing to supervise you on the topic you choose but won't provide you with close support.
Back in my undergrad thesis, I had a topic I really wanted to work with and only had one prof on the field to supervise me. I had very minimal supervision.
Was it the way I wished? No. I could've gone farther if we had worked closely and if I had had someone to discuss with or to push me.
Was it worthwhile? Definitely! This has brought me independence, which prepared me for many of the challenges I had throughout my masters and Ph.D.


How to preserve a rare version of a book respecting the copyright as well?

Discuss with the librarian - they may know what is available - ie it could be scanned while the book is refurbished and recovered.

And, take the opportunity to explain to the librarian why it is worth saving - you know why as a specialist in the subject...


How does one manage to "time stamp" their physics paper without submitting it to a preprint server like arXiv?

My main advice is that this is not something you need to do.
You could use an alternate repository.  Many universities have one.  Some have embargoes.
The old way to do it was to mail the paper to yourself in a sealed, postmarked envelope.  I suppose you could have it notarized as well.


How to remove gender bias from an academic job search?

Bias exists at many points of the hiring process. You suggested blinding the search committee to applicant gender but, as you point out, this is extremely difficult to do perfectly and completely broken by even small failures. For obvious reasons, blinding will also not be particularly relevant after you start interviewing candidates. I like the other suggestions to provide training to sensitize the committee to issues of gender bias.

Beyond that — and if your university policies allow it — you might also decide now (i.e., before the search) to interview at least one male and at least one female candidate. This way, you will give the best male and female candidates a full chance to convince you that they are right for your department. This ensures that at the top person of each gender makes it through the earlier stages of the process where gender bias may very well play its biggest role. At the interview stage, blinding would not have worked anyway.

This kind of policy is unusual but not unheard of. The most famous example I know if is the Rooney Rule in the US National Football League which requires that all teams interview minority candidates for head coaching and senior football operation jobs. Although this is sometimes cited as an example of affirmative action, it does not mandate any preference or quota to candidates within the pool of those being interviewed. If you're doing it right, it does mean that the very best candidates from under-represented groups will always have an opportunity to show their stuff at the final round.

If you found out that  best person from the under-represented groups is really not as good as the best person from the over-represented group, at least you'll know that you gave the best member from each group a full hearing.

Update: I will point out that this answer basically assumes that all of your candidates will present as either male or female. As a result, is it very limited in the case of non-gender conforming candidates. These candidates may also be subject to even greater discrimination and this approach will not solve (and could even aggravate) those problems.


Some suggestions for improving participation:

Recruit two to three faculty members to serve on a panel to judge presentations. The top three (or four or five) presentations receive prizes. Include this on the flyer.
Every participant gets a certificate of participation.
Announce a recognized name as a keynote speaker, if possible. Not a big deal, if it's not possible.

Then, mail the flyer to the graduate program directors (of the relevant departments) at the nearby universities and ask them to encourage their students to participate in the symposium. Also contact the graduate student organizations at these universities.


Most of the research I did during college took place in my classes. How can I leverage this when applying to grad school?

Research experience in classes should show up in recommendation letters from the corresponding faculty (and in your personal statement, but the former is much more impactful). If you've done high-quality and nontrivial research in your classes, then you should make sure to pick recommenders that can talk about and vouch for it.

In fact, research experience at dedicated RA positions shows up in pretty much the exact same way. Just listing an RA position on a resume does very little; the real value is getting a good recommendation letter from someone who knows you well and is familiar with your work.


Change of email address in peer-review system

It depends on how much time the editor is spending on the journal. When an invitation email bounces, the editor will receive an email. It's good practice then to cancel the invitation, because otherwise one could easily mislead oneself that the reviewer might still accept. If the bounce email includes a redirect, then it's a simple matter of changing the reviewer's email and inviting again. But doing this for reviewer after reviewer (an editor can conceivably have a couple of papers a day to handle, each of which needs 5+ invitations) gets tedious quickly. The editor might get tired, in which case a sufficiently motivated publisher can still pick up the ball ... but no guarantees. In your case the redirect will only work for a year, which might not suffice since the editor might be inviting based on your papers published over a year ago.
The easiest way to update your email is to log on to the system yourself and update your information. If you can't do this, emailing the publisher (the journal's full-time staff) is the next-best way.


apply for a Master's, already holding a PhD in a similar field

MS programs can be money-makers for the university, and already having a PhD in any other field would not likely be a problem for you in getting accepted to a program. On the other hand, were you hoping to apply to a similar PhD program, that would be prohibited by many top schools.


Is it possible to restart a PhD due to issues with supervisor (and should I do it)?

Adding a student's perspective to Pete's answer:

My advisor told me at the being of my master thesis, that soon I would know more about my particular area of research than him. At the time I didn't believe a word he said, but at our third meeting I was already explaining stuff to him and by the fifth I started to feel irritated that I had to explain stuff to him which I didn't have to explain to his PhD student whom I collaborated with.

But then I realised that I worked on this topic all day every day, my collaborator worked on a related topic and discussed my research with me several times a week but my advisor only got to spend time on this topic every other week when we met with him, because he had plenty of other students to advise in the meantime and also had his own research, teaching and some administration to do.

So from the sixth meeting on it became a habit for me to open the meeting with a quick catch up on my topic and my progress before diving into the details. And from that meeting on I always got great advice from him.

I think you need to think about whether you have given your advisor a fair chance to help you when you were stuck and whether he has been able to help in that regard, because that's his job and knowing all the details about your current topic is your job.


As an experimentalist, will it be possible to be a good theoretical researcher through self study?

Actually, pioneers in a field have no other option but to learn from self study. So, yes, it is possible and there are others before you.
In fact, for non-pioneers it is easier than in the past since there are now resources that didn't exist in the past. You have named some of them. You no longer have to depend on yourself and obscure papers that are probably misleading.
I assume that many of us here changed fields after their doctorate as I did.
But, a circle of collaborators or other contacts can be a big help in this so that you get some guidance. This is fairly easy if you hold an academic position at a place with, in your case, theoreticians.


What do I need to do as a potential mature student in the UK?

I went to the UK to start my undergraduate when I was 27.  I was also not able to access the normal 'go-to-class' higher education courses.  My path wasn't computer science, but I think the general rules and requirements are roughly the same for each course.

In a mature student, UK universities are typically looking for enthusiasm, evidence that they are interested in the subject they are applying for, and that they are capable of doing university work.  Ideally what they want to see is that you have done some systematic course of study, typically in the last three years.  You have this (A-Levels and the diploma).  They also value experience - which you are getting by being in work in the area you want to pursue a degree in.

Your A-Level results aren't bad at all, but as you note fall short of what they usually want.   With your work experience and additional formal certification, it is possible that the universities will look more favourably on your application.  Remember that even if you were to go into university straight from A-Level, grade requirements aren't hard and fast rules.  Which leads me to the next bit that is important - the personal statement.  This is the point at which you can say that you are more than capable of doing the course.  Don't dwell on your A-Level results, they can already see them.  Instead you sell yourself.  Really- this can make an application very attractive!  It's not all about grades - especially when you are a mature student.

If you did want to pursue another formal course, have you looked at the Open University options?  I did one of their courses (one 10 credit course) as I had been nearly 10 years out of education, and quite frankly my A-Level results were not...great.  It needed a lot of commitment to study and work full time, but overall it was a good experience, and I felt the course was delivered well.  If you can find something there that is relevant, I can highly recommend them.


As you're feeling, this is a greyish area.  To me, it depends on the paper itself.  If the paper really focuses on using this software to do something, this would nudge me toward offering authorship -- and I would ask the developer to fully participate in manuscript prep.  The credibility/knowlege of the developer may well make your paper better, and might be of help depending on how it is received by the referees.

If the use of the software amounts to a sentence in the methods section, I would acknowledge.


Why do some Thomson indexed Journals not have impact factors?

First things first, Thomson Reuters no longer manages impact factors; they sold the business to Clarivate Analytics.
Clarivate Analytics is not an index; they are a business. They manage multiple databases, such as ESCI (Emerging Sources Citation Index) and SCIE (Science Citation Index Expanded).
To have an "official" impact factor, you need to be indexed by the SCI (Science Citation Index). If you are indexed by SCI then you are in some sense "indexed" by Clarivate Analytics, but the converse is not true. The journals you mentioned are not indexed by the SCI, therefore they don't have impact factors.
Does this mean they are low quality? Not necessarily, e.g. it's possible for a new journal to not have an impact factor simply because it takes time to be indexed by the SCI. But it's certainly not a good sign.


How often can the reviewers correctly guess the identity of the authors when the review is double-blind?

Conferences in programming languages are moving toward double-blind reviewing, and since the idea is debated, people are collecting some evidence, including actual peer-reviewed papers.

In particular, even when reviewers believe they guessed the authors, it turns out they are sometimes/often incorrect, as profmartinez’s answer suggests. In the citations you’ll find actual numbers; I won’t attempt a literature review myself.

Links

A short FAQ
This points to this literature review (done as an editorial in SIGMOD, a database venue):
This in turn cites Fisher et al. (1994), published in the Journal of the American Medical Association — hence, a peer-reviewed publication where reviewers understand statistics well:
There are also reports from program chairs evaluating statistically double-blind reviewing, by (for instance) surveying PC members for correctness of their guesses.


Can I Plan to Write a Scholarly Book in LuaTeX or ConTeXt

It's possible that you could find a small or specialized publisher that is happy with an unusual format, but I don't think most academic publishers would be able to work with LuaTeX or ConTeXt.  It just won't be part of their standard workflow.

It's very unlikely that they will let you control the file and make all the changes yourself.  Instead, publishers almost always edit the file themselves, since that's more efficient and gives them more control.  If you care about doing all the edits yourself, you should mention it early and expect to be turned down by most publishers for this reason alone.

In practice, I don't think the editor will even think about the format issue if you don't bring it up.  They'll assume you are using LaTeX, and they'll be surprised to learn otherwise when it's time to submit your manuscript for copyediting and formatting.  At that point, they aren't likely to reject it for format reasons, but they'll probably do things that make you unhappy.  They might try to convert it to LaTeX themselves, or even retype everything from scratch.  Any fine details of formatting will have to be reconstructed, and the chances of getting everything exactly the way it was are slim.  If you have strong opinions about formatting, you should try hard to avoid this outcome.  (It's better to convert it to LaTeX yourself than to have them do it.)


What to do when completing a full-time masters by research, and a part-time job interferes with grades and progress?

It is most certainly possible to get a research degree while working part-time --- or even full-time.  I know a number of people who have done it.  As you are finding, it is quite rigorous, however.  In many cases, it may be better to take the coursework part time, so that you have enough space to really absorb the material, rather than just trying to hit passing marks.


how to present a talk on work in preparation

If the work corresponds to a paper submitted to a conference, I put in the slides "submitted to conference X". Otherwise, you can put "ongoing work with Author B". If you present the work in part of a seminar, you can put "Seminar of the department X".

But mainly, you don't have to put anything, especially if the slides are not put on the web or distributed. The only important point I would say, is to indicate if your work has been done with other people, in which case, you can write "Joint work with B".


Re: Terminated from D. Health Science program E.B.D.. Possible to apply to different program?

Wow.

Okay, it's too soon to give up on this institution.  Go higher up.  If you don't want to subject your husband to the risk of more frustration right now, go on your own initially.

Your story didn't leave clear for my what the internal dynamics of the committee were....  Any hope there?

Thinking about @mkennedy's great suggestion, I realized that a paragraph I wrote in another thread would be useful here too.

Lay out the contradictions in a calm tone of voice, letting the situation do the heavy lifting -- avoid expressive language, bitterness, tears, etc., if possible. Say you would like some advice. If no advice is offered in that appointment, give your email address and phone number, and ask if you can check in in a couple of days. If possible, bring some of your paper trail with you, to leave with the administrator. (You don't have to go over them in detail together during the meeting.)


Is consent required to record audio of a conference talk in the US?

I don't know the relevant laws, which may vary between U.S. states, but I wouldn't focus on the legal question.  Regardless of whether you have the legal right to make a recording, you should not do so without the speaker's permission.  If someone asked me, I would probably give permission, but making a recording without asking feels creepy and inappropriate.  If you go around doing this in academia, it's likely to be viewed as unprofessional, and some speakers will become angry.

Even if you ask, people may wonder why you want a recording.  (Are you stalking the speaker?  Are you going to scrutinize the recording to try to find misstatements?  Are you working on competing research and trying to document exactly what was said in your competitor's talk?)  If you have a compelling reason to make a recording, it's worth explaining why.  For example, perhaps it could help accommodate certain disabilities.  Otherwise, you can certainly ask, but it may come across as a weird request.


Here's the thing: I like my students. (I'm talking here about the ones in the major that I teach: the ones I see in my intimate upper-division seminars.) I've watched them learn and grow, struggle and overcome, and generally develop into capable if young professionals.

And they are about to leave the nest. They are going to take their transcripts out into the wider world and compete with other students from other institutions.

But I teach at a small and unheralded place. How are employer going to judge these friends of mine? Unless the employer knows something about my department (most don't but we have a couple of local firm who come to us looking for our best) they're going to have to rely on grades and other "objective" measures to select the ones to be interviewed.

I'm pretty confident that my students can wow them once they get a foot in the door, but they have to get into that office. If the students from that school down the road have systematically higher grades then my people might be at a disadvantage. That's a problem for me, because I want to take care of my people.

So it's a kind of tragedy of the commons: it's in most people's best interests if grades are a honest measure of something, but it's in everyone's personal interests to cheat just a little, and it is very much in everyone's personal interests not to be the only one not cheating.

Note that I say "might be at a disadvantage" because hiring managers may develop a feel for the difference between a 3.5 at my school and one from that place down the road. If they hire enough people in my field. But most of them don't. That's why we have such success locally: these firms see our people as interns and they get a chance to become familiar with the quality of students we produce and with the faculty.

There are other limits, too. If you send some total nincompoop out the door with a strong GPA and a glowing letter of recommendation the employer who hires them is likely to develop a negative opinion of your institution. That puts a very really pressure on the cheating to hold it down to a small degree. At least if your reputation isn't so secure that you don't fear the damage done by a few bozos.


How to communicate with research advisor politely?

While your post contains quite a few questions, the best answer for the question "How Do I Communicate With An Advisor Politely?" is very closely related to communicating with a boss in any professional situation. Do your best to be polite, yet firm. Email is a good way to contact him if you can not meet him in person, and a reasonable amount of time to wait for a response is anywhere between 24 hours and 3 days. Any longer than this can prove troublesome for a student (you). If he/she does not answer emails within 3 days, I believe you are well within your rights as a student to POLITELY yet firmly ask the question again or visit his/her office. In short, do your best to manage this relationship as you would manage any other professional relationship, while also making sure your needs are met in a timely manner.


Am I obliged to answer student queries that can readily be answered by reading the syllabus?

Whether or not you're obliged is debatable, but here is what you can do to reduce the time that's consumed by answering redundant emails:

Have your students write all questions into an online forum that's accessible for every participant of your course.* Post your answers there as well.

You can "pin" answers that are of a general nature. Your first pinned message should be a FAQ, entitled "Frequently asked questions. Read first before posting" and with the first line reading something like:

  Before posting a question, please make sure that it has not already
  been answered. In particular, check the pinned messages first. Chances
  are, your question has been answered and you can save yourself and me some work.

If you get a duplicate question, just refer the student to the relevant message. This should work as a gentle nudge that deters other students form asking redundant questions in the future (remember that the answer can be read by the whole course).

* and only them.


How much vacation time is typical during a PhD in the United States?

I'm not aware of explicit policies regarding vacation time during a Ph.D in the US. This is likely because in the US, the Ph.D is viewed as educational, and not as a job.

As a student, and now as a professor, vacation time was always an informal discussion between advisor and student. This is of course ripe for abuse. A job in the US usually grants 15 days of vacation (not counting weekends) per year, but in my experience that's MUCH less than what you might effectively get as a Ph.D student (in computer science) but might be comparable to what you get as a Ph.D student in the physical sciences.

Unfortunately, I don't have personal experience with physical science programs, but via my wife and other friends I've seen that physical science programs are fairly rough on vacation. This is partly because you need to be around to tend to long-running experiments ("the flies died!") and partly because of the nature of lab work and the much more intense style of lab-based science.

My recommendation would be, once you have some options, to ask students in the programs you're applying to, working with advisors you're interested in targeting.


What's the consensus on sharing raw data?

I'll share some thoughts with you as someone who has made all of his research software publicly available for the past 20 years.

My experience is that the risk of others "scooping" you by taking your data (or code, in my case) and doing analyses with them that lead to important studies is relatively small. The likelihood that they ask you to participate in such studies -- given that you know the data, how it was collected, and how it was curated -- is, on the other hand, relatively high and may lead to you writing papers you never dreamed of. So there are substantial positive upsides that, in my case, have always made it worth my while putting my work out there.


Are book reviews peer-reviewed? Are news articles peer-reviewed?

Book reviews, opinion pieces, and news articles are generally not peer reviewed.  That's not to say there's no review at all: editors read and approve these contributions, and they may request changes before publication if they feel it is necessary.  It's even possible that an editor would ask for an opinion from a third party.  However, peer review (by an external expert) is not a standard practice for these sorts of articles.

  Books are not peer reviewed in general.

Books can be an intermediate case.  Acquisitions editors often solicit external reviews of book proposals or manuscripts, to decide which ones to accept and how they should be revised.  However, you are right that the level of review is generally not as comprehensive or detailed as it is for journal articles.


Is it appropriate to ask a former professor to order a book for me through an inter-library loan?

I don't see an issue with this. In fact, you can probably do it yourself. Many libraries will offer library privileges to people for research. I live in a small town with a nice library. My local librarian has, on occasion, gotten such resources for me through contacts with a university library.

Libraries generally are there to help. They need some assurance that you will treat such privileges properly, of course, but you might just go ask to see what is available to you.

But, the professor might be willing to do it and will certainly serve as the trusted intermediary that might be needed.


Some co-authors unresponsive when I asked for consent for submission to biorXiv

2 weeks is a fair amount of time, so yes, remind them. You could also write something like "If I don't hear from you by [time] I'll assume you consent to submission", or "I'll submit this by [time], if you have any objections please let me know before then".

That said if you have a PI, you might as well ask them what to do. There's no reason not to, especially for contentious decisions that might lead to bad feelings.


Which is easier-publication in an online free of charge journal or the standart pay-per-view one?

You seem to be conflating two things, namely whether a journal is online and whether it is open access.  I'll focus on the open access part of the question, since whether there's a print edition is basically irrelevant nowadays.

  So what will be better, to go through the "standard" (pay-per-view paper journals) or the online free of charge ones?

"Better" is not well defined, but in this case the situation is simple enough that the question can be answered: neither one is better, outside of a couple of specific factors.

Open access journals have one advantage, that anyone can easily read the official published paper, and one possible disadvantage, that there might be publication charges.  Other than that, there is no significant difference between open access and traditional journals, at least among respectable journals.  There are tremendous differences between specific journals (in prestige, rigor of the review process, speed of publication, etc.), but these things simply can't be predicted on the basis of whether the journal is open access.

I said "among respectable journals" in the previous paragraph for a reason.  There are tons of obscure, predatory open access journals that will publish anything for a fee.  (They often claim to perform peer review, but it's clear from the garbage they publish that the review process is meaningless.  This problem is restricted to open access journals, because you can't make money selling subscriptions to a journal nobody wants to read.)  You should absolutely avoid predatory journals, since they will actively hurt your paper's reputation.

  If impact factor isn't the key which is better(and faster)-going through the big publishing houses who have a "well-oiled machine" and can handle my request with routine and speed or risking in the online-only community?

You are oversimplifying things by supposing that big publishers have a well-oiled machine.  Some do and some don't, and the same holds for small publishers.  Furthermore, some open access journals are published by big publishers, and some subscription journals are published by small publishers.

  My topic is something quite radical I have been working on it for years now and I have diverted a lot of what is "standard" for this community so I am pretty much a lonely wolf and expect enormous troubles going through the peer-review(radical ideas). So what will be easy for me-the paper or the online journals?

If the difficulty is with peer review, then you can't expect an easy time with any journal worth publishing in (i.e., a non-predatory journal).


Is there a consensus on how long you should know a person before you ask him/ her to write you a recommendation letter for graduate school?

What I personally have done is that if I get an A+/A/A- with his course I would reach out to him for a recommendation letter. This might not be the case for several Professors (it is a case by case basis), but in general this works. I also would ask for recommendations for Professor's that I have done research projects with.


Can I list an educational paper in my publications?

It is very simple: everything that is published is a publication. However, some authors choose to only list peer-reviewed publications. In both cases your educational paper qualifies.

Of course you are free to list certain types of publications in separate sections on your CV if you think it is better. How that is viewed depends on the person reading the CV. For what it's worth: in my opinion any list of publications has papers that are better than others even if it is all original research. There is no reason to list it separately.


Advantages of delaying/accelerating PhD application

The academic year does start around September in the USA and I think most European countries.  At least in Europe, this doesn't necessarily mean that you would have to start your PhD in September.  For example, I did my PhD in the UK and started in June.

Note that your 'competitors' won't have finished their degree yet either when they are applying.  They will be slightly further along, having already started their final year, but not significantly so, I think.

Is cramming the rest of your undergraduate degree into one semester less at all a realistic option?

I do think you are likely to get stronger letters of recommendation once you are in your final year, because you will have been doing more advanced work and will probably have closer contacts with faculty.

I don't think that having some time between your honours year and your PhD is necessarily a bad idea.  My husband started his PhD only two weeks after finishing his MSc, and he really could have done with more of a break.  I had almost a year between my MSc and PhD, but I spent six months of that doing research.

One of my friends from Australia managed to get part-time teaching work at his undergraduate university until he went to the UK for his PhD.  Or if money isn't too much of an issue, you could take the opportunity to go travelling.

EDIT:  I'd just like to add, along the lines of Dave Clarke's comment, that you should bear in mind that your honours year will likely be a lot more challenging than previous years, and so 'accelerating' this year might turn out to be a bad idea.  I certainly worked harder in my fourth year of university (honours in New Zealand, so quite a similar system to Australia) than I have in any year since.


What is an FTE and what are its variations?

An FTE stands for Full-Time Equivalent and is the unit of calculation for counting faculty positions or student enrollment at a university.

For faculty positions

A 1.0 FTE position is nominally a full-time position for one faculty member. If a department has 4 FTE, then you can expect that it has four full-time faculty at minimum (see adjunct FTEs below).

Split FTEs

Someone may have a split FTE such that for example, half of their FTE belongs to one department and half belongs to another -- e.g., Prof. Alice could be 0.5 Math and 0.5 Computer Science.

The ratio can vary so that Prof. Bob could be 0.25 Physics and 0.75 Geology.

Some spousal hires are structured so that Profs. Alice and Bob are both 0.5 in the same department (or even separate units).

Zero FTEs

Some universities have "zero FTE" positions. This is often used to indicate affiliate faculty. For example, Prof. Alice could be 0.5 FTE in Math, 0.5 FTE in CompSci, but also have a 0.0 FTE slot in Physics.

Adjunct FTE

Adjuncts are occasionally included in FTE but the exact calculation of an adjunct to a regular FTE varies considerably by university.

Other Variations

Bifurcated FTE Ranks: Some universities have separate "senior faculty (tenured)" FTE and "junior faculty (untenured)" FTE calculations, so that a 4 unit program may have 2 senior FTE and 2 junior FTE.

More than 1.0 FTE: Some universities also allow for someone to have more than 1.0 FTE. Since 1.0 FTE is calculated on a 9 month term (in the United States), one could conceivably have up to a 1.33 FTE by working through the summer. The NSF and others often restrict summer salary to .25 so the max under those grants is 1.25 FTE.

For student enrollment

Student enrollment can also be measured in FTE. "FTE enrollment" is computed as the sum of credits carried by all enrolled students, divided by the number of credits in a full-time load at that institution, school, or department.

For example, at the University of Colorado, a full-time undergraduate load is 30 credits a year, and a full-time graduate load is 24 credits per year, therefore

  Student Full-Time Equivalent Enrollment (SFTE) = total undergraduate student credit hours in a fiscal year divided by 30 plus total graduate student credit hours in a fiscal year divided by 24

This measure may be used for budgeting, resource allocation between departments or within a department, facilities planning, faculty hiring, and other similar considerations.


Do I have to wear academic regalia to a student's graduation?

It sounds as if you are going to be seated in the audience as guest (e.g., sitting with the family or as if you were friend or family), so just wear 'regular' clothes. It still is a very nice thing to do and to show support.

If you are seated with the faculty (in those universities which have the faculty march in with the students), then those faculty who are part of the ceremony would wear regalia. If you are sitting with the faculty, you probably wouldn't be asking your question, as it is usually arranged in advance to do so (both to make sure there are enough faculty showing up, and to help with renting the regalia for those faculty who do not have their own. And - depending on the size of the university, there will need to be a lot of instructions of where to park, where to mass up and what time to show up in order to march in.).

If the student is asking you to 'hood' him/her (for PhD in many US universities, the advisor can come up to put the PhD hood on the candidate) then talk to the department to find out how to get included in the 'faculty' who are formally seated in the ceremony.


[All of the following written from the perspective of mathematics, sciences, or geosciences where departments generally are not sitting on piles of corporate donations and industry funds.]

If you are talking about seminar talks at other universities, then the answer is that "no, there is no procedure for asking". As a general rule, giving seminar or colloquium talks at other places is part of your job duties and not a side business. It is generally expected by your department that you do it. If you do it only because someone pays you money for it, then it becomes a side business. If you consistently think that giving seminar talks is high-stress, then you need to either reconsider whether you're in the right line of business, or just not accept any invitations.

Now, some universities or departments will voluntarily give you a honorarium. If they offer that, you can accept it with gratitude. But most departments will not offer one, and asking for one is sure to make for a very awkward situation; it is also sure to make you look bad in the community.

All of this is of course separate from reimbursement of actual travel costs. You can expect that these are paid for, i.e., that you do not make a loss by giving a talk.


How can I ask a professor I've had as an undergrad for a recommendation

That's certainly fine if you just need a letter resubmitted, but often the best letters are tailored to particular opportunities - i.e., a letter talking about how well-suited user130306 is for Arbitrary Masters Program is going to look funny when you are reading that letter as a committee member for Abroad Research Program.

I would suggest acknowledging in your email that the recommender may need to write a new letter (though the previous one may be suitable as a draft) and ask if they are willing to do so. Implying that they can just resubmit a previous letter might be perceived as (weakly) rude or not understanding what recommendation letters entail.

Also I presume your second letter will come from someone at your current institution? It's certainly okay to use a previous recommender when you have not spent much time at your new institution, but ideally letters come from people who can best describe the current you.


Academic policy does not let me earn credits from certain past courses. How can I challenge it?

Edit: this answer was written based on the original policy quote.
The policy is clear, if the undergraduate course was taken to satisfy pre-requisite requirements then it can be counted.
As you clearly state that it was not needed to satisfy a pre-requisite requirement, and you state clearly that it was an elective then it will not be counted.
So, it looks like you will need to complete some credits to cover that lack.


Preprint Best Practices in Computer Science

The best practices I've seen in sciences, including computer science, involve

making the pre-print available upon/slightly before submission of the manuscript to the journal/conference,
publish the pre-print on the repository where the manuscript fits in thematically, i.e. where you find most pre-prints you read/cite (like arXiv oder Zenodo), or use your institutional repository, and
update the pre-print with the post-print (the version after peer-review but without the journal/conference layout) if allowed by the journal/conference, so that you have one or two versions available.

You can check whether you're allowed to update you pre-print with the post-print in Sherpa/RoMEO, on the journal/conference webside or in the copyright transfer agreement you have to sign upon acceptance. There is also statet what other conditions apply, e.g. whether a link to the published version is necessary or you have to use a specific licence and so on.


Is it possible to be an intellectual/do research without the internet?

You aren't taking proper advantage of your local libraries. Most have access to interlibrary loan through which you can obtain just about any book that exists. Talk to your librarian about your needs.

Academic libraries are best for this, of course, as the librarians are trained in the needs of academics. But even my local town library can get just about anything I require. At the town library you may need to know the actual titles you want to read. At an academic library, a research librarian can actually guide you fairly deeply into topics of interest. Perhaps not to the research edge of the known universe, but part way there, at least.

But if you have internet access, then I've found that wikipedia is a pretty good source for academic subjects, though not for popular culture, perhaps. In particular, most academic articles will have a references/bibliography section at the bottom that can point you to books and articles that might be worth exploring.

Be a bit cautious, though, even with wikipedia. I've occasionally found weird statements about mathematics there. But if it seems weird, it may actually be trolls at work. Normally, however, such things get cleaned up quickly (hours).


How to make thesis-writing feel less tedious?

tl;dr: Divide and conquer. –  aeismail♦

The Balloon Analogy
I used to hate writing with a passion. Trying to squeeze a 5 page paper out of me was like trying to juice a rock.
Eventually, though, I figured out the root cause for my procrastination.
The biggest sense of daunting I found when writing a paper is that you start with nothing, and have to end up with a significant something.
So, let's look at what you have set up. You create a new Word/TeX document, and it's there. Page 1 of 1. A blank page with that blinking cursor.
Pretty intimidating and most likely the reason why we push it off till tomorrow until it's due next week and then we've wasted forever. This is basically like us trying to inflate a big weather balloon. You do a little work, and it doesn't seem inflated at all.
I eventually got over this intimidation by reducing the size of the problem to its individual parts. Imagine trying to fill up a dozen individual party balloons with the same amount of air as the weather balloon. Each bit of inflating goes a long way, and a fully inflated mylar balloon is much easier to achieve.
Transforming one Big Balloon into a Bunch of Smaller Balloons
A strategy that we all learned in K-12 is outlining, which actually helps more now than it did then. Now, it doesn't have to be a formal outline. However, the idea behind the outline is that it can transform into a full-sized paper much more easily than a blank slate, for little actual effort in.
Stub out each individual section of your paper. If you have a glossary, add that. If you have a bunch of subsections, create them, and add the titles. Don't be afraid to dedicate an entire page to a chapter with no content, if you feel that eventually you will need it.
For basically 12 or so lines of typing, you've turned a single blank sheet into perhaps 8 or so pages with a rudimentary summary of what you're going to talk about. Filling out a single page or two is much less daunting than that previous 20-page paper we were fretting about before. This dividing and conquering of pages has turned 1 very large paper into 8 relatively easy to populate short papers.
Inflating the Balloons
After that, pick a section, any section, that you want to write. It doesn't have to be the introduction if you're drawing a blank. That's perfectly normal. I rewrote my introduction all the way to the end of my paper because the rest of the paper was evolving to include additional topics. Some sections needed more meat or could be expanded, others could be shortened or removed.
Now, type away at the keyboard on the section you've assigned to yourself until you fill it up or have run out of ideas. Wanted to write Chapter 5: Potatoes in Artwork? Go for it! Chapters 1 to 4 can wait until you're sufficiently inspired to do them, or have enough information from Chapter 5 to help give substance to the other chapters.
When you're done with the small subsection you're working on, you should evaluate whether you feel you can do more. Sometimes, after doing a relatively easy section, I enjoy tackling a somewhat harder piece and getting that out of the way. Other times, I'll need a break, and take one.
Basically, my strategy is that one shouldn't plan to, or even reasonably expect to, write the paper front to back.
Breaking the paper into parts, giving them sufficient weight so that you can see the progress as you go, and slowly but steadily inflate and become a full paper.

Author's Note: Yeah, for some reason now I write really long posts even when I don't mean to.


Should a Kickstarter funding be in an academic CV?

Since we're talking about the humanities, let me answer with a Simpsons quote:

Ned Flanders: I don't understand. Is God punishing me?
Reverend Lovejoy: Short answer, "yes" with an "if"; long answer, "no," with a "but"

I believe that academic CVs should be tailored to the requirements of the situation. If you're applying for a faculty position in the Department of Film and Media Studies, a Kickstarter campaign in which you raised money for an independent movie is appropriate. Otherwise, adding this information is about as useful as saying that you like pina coladas and getting caught in the rain.

PS. If you were Zack Danger Brown, I'd hire you right away if I was head of Social Psychology or Cultural Studies.
PPS. Thank god, I'm not head of an academic department.


Avoiding offense when asking about taking a course without watching lectures

I doubt many people would take offence at only the suggestion. More so if you have a reasonable reason, such as sitting somewhere else in the campus.

And if the professor gets offended by that, you wouldn't be able to take the course anyway, so the damage control is in place (and honestly, you have learned of a professor you probably don't want anything to do with).

On a side note: the value of lectures vs slides and books alone depends more on the lecturer and available books than on the material itself. For example, if you look at any of my slides (regardless of the topic) without me talking, is going to be cryptic and uninformative, because I don't design them to stand on their own. On the other hand, if you have listened to my talk, they can be a good memory refresher of what I said.


Sending a *digitally signed* email to prospective employer/supervisor

I cannot imagine anyone being too put off by the digital signature, although I would probably go with a detached signature.

I think if you are going to digitally sign your emails, you may want to make sure you understand what you are doing. This would definitely be the type of thing I might bring up as a "safe" small talk topic during a campus visit. Often the small talk conversations can influence a decision in a tight job search since the search committee is not only looking for someone who can teach the required classes and do great research, but also someone they want to work with.


Is it tacky to note awards on a conference poster?

If the goal is to have an engaging poster, do you want to engage those who are also researching your topic/field or engage anyone who would be interested in a paper that received accolades, regardless of the topic? The latter does not necessarily result in more exchange in ideas that could further the state of knowledge on your topic, which is what poster presentations are designed to do.

My advice is to design a poster that is engaging through its use of design and content, rather than adding blurbs about its praise. You will engage the right audience, giving you opportunity to talk about the paper with people who might actually read it and use it for their work. A boring poster won't engage a wide audience, even if you include information about it's accolades.


How relevant is a candidate's BA institution when applying to graduate schools in the US?

The general answer is

  Very relevant, but considered in the context of the rest of the application.

It seems hard to say more in the absence of a more focused question.  Before you do that, you might try to search the site: I can't say that all possible versions of this kind of question have already been asked and answered here....but certainly many of them have.


what to do when the acceptance deadline has passed with no notification from the reviewers?

Contact the editor and ask about the status of your paper.

  Does it mean my paper has already got rejected?

No, that's not what "Required Reviews Completed" means...as you probably know.  Maybe your paper has been or will be rejected and maybe it won't: there is no point in guessing.

  what should I do in this case?

Do what one normally does when one's paper is rejected: take the feedback into account and decide whether to resubmit elsewhere and whether to revise your paper.


"Thank you, I appreciate your suggestions" can mean anything from a true and deep appreciation to "I am politely throwing your work in the trash."

As such, I would strongly advise against including it in a CV, as it will essentially be meaningless padding.


I made a huge technical mistake in an arXiv paper... How bad is it?

Mistakes are "bad" in academia if you fail to disclose them once you know about them (which constitutes unethical behavior), or if they affect something that counts towards a formal credential (like a degree; which is unlikely for an arXiv submission).

So, the way forward is:

Inform your co-authors (if there were any).
Upload an updated version of your paper to arXiv, in which you place a big notice at the top stating that there is a major technical error and the contents of the paper should not be considered accurate.
Then withdraw the submission from arXiv with an appropriate notice as to the nature of the error.

Then, if you think you can correct the error and rescue the rest of the paper, get to work on that.

Academics make mistakes all the time. Acknowledge your error, disclose it, and move on.


How competitive will my profile be for Grad School

I think your question should be reconsidered:
1. What specific area of history do you want to study?
2. What do you want to do with your grad degree?
Based on those two questions you could then consider what program is a best fit and be somewhat less concerned with whether it is a top 25 vs. top 50 vs. top 100 program.

Hope this helps a bit.


How much work experience should be included in Statement of Purpose for Master program?

Well It really doesn't matter much whether your research subjects are related to what you have done internships in!

To make it more clear. Internships depicts that you are inclined and willing to work along with your regular curriculum. I would suggest you to relate your  internship with research subjects. As we all know that all subjects in Computer Science are inter- related so try to find out any open source concept that you can relate to or willing to work for it. This much is enough. No doubt Research is most important aspect for admissions but you should know to combine it with your life. Give small Instances (backed with Proofs) where you can prove your point. Speaking about Number of years to show for experience is all depends on your profile, show max possible and make sure that you have salary slips.


How should a graduate student email a professor from another country in order to get feedback on their work?

Most professors, particularly well-known ones, get tons of such requests. And silently drop them into their recycle bin. They are busy people, with too much on their plates already, to go reviewing stuff that doesn't do them any good (reviewing a paper for a conference/journal, or a thesis, is part of their work, and not to be avoided; this is just work for nothing).

Get somebody in your environment to check over your work, they will tell you if it is any good, help you polish it and present it to where it will be looked at.


Could it be beneficial for me to not disclose my gender/ethnicity in an REU application?

I am an undergraduate in the US applying to REUs in mathematics. [...] I am a white male from a suburban area. Clearly this is not going to boost my application

The personal consequences for you of being labeled on your application as a white male are not something that anyone can predict with any certainty. Even assuming that the data are visible to the people evaluating your application (which is probably not the case), the putative effect would depend on things like the individual attitudes of people evaluating your application. These attitudes would be variable and we have no way of measuring them.

Keep in mind that any pile of applications in mathematics in the US is going to contain vast numbers of white males, so even if there were some very strong bias against you, or some extremely aggressive affirmative action program, the result can't possibly be to exclude all white males.

Since the actual consequences of your disclosing your information or not disclosing it are unknowable and probably negligible on an individual level, your guess about those consequences is not a good criterion on which to base your choice.

You might instead want to base this on your political opinions. Reasonable people can be for or against the idea of having the US federal government classify people into racial categories. An example of a reason for: a horrific national history of slavery and oppression, which we could try to undo to some extent. An example of a reason against: race is a nonsensical and artificial construct, and there is no logical way to apply it to people of mixed race.

If your personal utopia is one that lies on one side or the other of this issue, be the change that you want to make.


Do school-wide holidays count against personal vacation time?

This is not meant to be an official opinion, since obviously the rules depend on the local labor laws.

We should distinguish school holidays—days on which classes are cancelled—from official holidays, on which the university offices are closed.
A graduate student not working on a school holiday would be counted as taking leave; however, when the university is closed, that is not normally expected to be a working day for anyone, and thus students would not use a vacation day in such a case.
Advisors should not have policies in place that expect students to be regularly working six days a week, particularly since that would mean that they are potentially in violation of a whole bunch of labor rules.

Given that information, my personal opinion is that research cannot be done according to a timecard. There will be days when you go into the office and figuratively spin your wheels all day, and there are days where you are firing on all cylinders and getting tons done. In my own group, so long as someone:

is prompt in answering requests,
attends group functions,
lets me know if he or she will be out of the office for extended periods, and
is getting his or her work done,

then I will let that person work in whatever manner is most conducive to getting the job done. That's more important to me than knowing they clocked in 8 hours per workday.


Does it make sense to get a PhD if I have a Candidate of Sciences degree from a post-soviet country

Does it make sense to go after a PhD...

To whom?

For someone who has published a couple of papers in Science or Nature as the first author during their aspirantura period, the answer is no — they should apply directly for a permanent post or a prestigious named Fellowship, and develop their research.
For someone who has published several papers in top international journals, and at least one without their supervisor, the answer is probably no again — they should go for a postdoc or research fellow route.
For someone who did not publish much (or did not publish in international journals), who may struggle with English a bit, and/or not quite on top of the methods and hot topics in their research area, the answer may be yes. Having a PhD from a well-known university definitely improves the position on a competitive academic job market. More importantly, it can provide you with a set of soft skills (networking, presentations, etc) which many post-Soviet institutions are not very strong at sometimes.


How can I increase my chances of being accepted to a top 20 MS CS program?

Realistically, do I have any chance of getting admitted in a top 10 or 20 program.

With a publication in an international conference?  Definitely!

Of course, I'm assuming that you mean a good publication in an internationally recognized conference (not just a conference with papers from more than one country), ideally indexed in DBLP and available over the web.  I'm also assuming that you will have strong recommendation letters describing your contributions to the paper, in specific, personal, and credible detail, as evidence of your research potential.  Ideally, your letters will make direct comparisons with other IIT graduates who have succeeded in strong graduate programs.

I'm also assuming that you have a compelling statement describing your research experience and interests, written in flawless English, and that those interests are a good fit for the faculty at your target departments.  Be sure to describe your ongoing open-source projects.  (The contest stuff?  Meh.)  As Daniel suggests, focus on the work you want to do, not the ranking of the department.

And of course, I do mean you have a chance, not that you have a sure thing.  Graduate admissions is a random process; you have some influence on the distribution, but someone else rolls the dice.  Machine learning is a particularly competitive area, so if you want to continue in that direction, you should apply broadly.  In particular, you should not limit yourself only to programs that appear at the top of some list in some stupid magazine.  Rather, aim yourself at departments whose faculty and students have similar research interests to your own.

(I regularly serve on the CS grad admissions committee at UIUC.)


Professor falsely accusing me of cheating in a class he does not teach, two months after end of the class. What precautions should I take?

@JeffE recommends in a comment:

  Discuss your situation with the department chair and your previous instructor, and keep careful documentation of everything.