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thread-34215
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34215
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How to handle possibly subtly flirtatious emails from students?
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2014-12-13T14:31:27.643
|
# Question
Title: How to handle possibly subtly flirtatious emails from students?
I got a series of emails from a student. At first, I thought she was being over-polite. But now things are making me very uncomfortable. For instance, at every email she thanks me for giving her good grades; it gave her motivation, encouragement etc. (this makes me very uncomfortable since it might imply I'm giving her preferential treatment) and I am the best TA she has ever seen. Her emails bear a tone which can be interpreted as either overly polite or very subtly flirtatious e.g. using emoticons, signing emails with only "Yours", "have a good night", "lovely day".
I am willing to give the student the benefit of doubt. English may not be her first language, so she may not know some phrases in emails are only appropriate with your closed ones. I want to tell her that she should avoid these phrases in formal emails not so directly. How can I convey this to the student?
# Answer
> 77 votes
You should keep your replies short, polite and professional. Do not respond to what you see as flirtatious. Try also to interpret what you see as flirtatious in a different light, as you say, it could be due to language issues. It would be bad if you started to respond in a manner that assumed something that was not intended.
In the end it is very important to not fuel any behaviour that you think is "suspect" but at the same time you cannot avoid responding altogether. Acknowledge praise briefly but do not return praise since that could appear as favouring a student before others. Turn the focus of a response quickly from any polite exchange to focus on the course material. You may also take opportunities to point out that information given is also given to others to at least subtly impress the fact that there is no "special treatment".
In short, act as if nothing special is going on, be brief to the point and professional in your response. Do not try to be anything other than yourself or treat any student differently from others. Keep records of your mail or other exchanges.
# Answer
> 35 votes
I would try to *ignore it* as long as that is practicable. As in Peter Jansson's answer, just reply professionally, as if you didn't notice the tone of the email.
Unless the emails become overtly flirtatious, or unless the student begins to say inappropriate things in person or in other settings, you may be able to just avoid responding to the tone you perceive in the emails. Each class ends in a few months, after all.
If you feel you cannot ignore it, I would show the emails to another faculty member you trust, and ask for their opinion. Don't tell them what to look for - just ask them to read the emails and tell you if they see anything unusual. This is a good test, in general, to see whether you might be misinterpreting an email.
If the other faculty member agrees the emails have crossed the line from friendly to flirtatious, I would first try a *non-confrontational* way of resolving the situation. Two easy options include:
* Make an announcement to the entire class about how to write a professional email. Of course, the announcement may be intended for a particular student, but it is less confrontational to announce it to everyone at once. Don't focus just on the flirtation issue, but make sure to emphasize that the student/professor professional relationship should be respected.
* Send an email to the entire class about professional communications, similar to the announcement above. Again, the goal is for the one student to get the message without realizing the email is really intended for him or her.
Only if that sort of non-confrontational technique does not work would I move on to any sort of direct intervention.
# Answer
> 19 votes
This is an extremely common problem for some teachers.
It may be difficult for her to control. Some cultures have extremely high regard for teachers. This puts you in a natural position as a target of infatuation.
If it can be interpreted in multiple ways, try to ignore it.
If it continues to get stronger, then explain that what she is doing is inappropriate considering your relationship (I'm referring here to the power dynamic between teacher and student).
If you are really uncomfortable and you cannot let it slide, then explain to her that she should not use certain phrases because it implies something that will never be there.
If you're too gentle with it may encourage her to try even harder. So, be clear (not mean, but clear).
One last, very important, thing is to make sure that you are not accidentally doing something which, in her culture, indicates some (romantic) openness on your part. In some cultures smiling at a stranger is just a nice way of saying hi. In other cultures that same exact smile is saying, "Hey, I would be very interested in dating you."
People see what they want to see, so look at yourself and see what you do that might be indicating to her that she has a shot. Then change.
# Answer
> 7 votes
A general way of responding to behavior that might appear flirtatious or unprofessional is to politely inform the student that while you appreciate her efforts to be polite, other people might possibly misconstrue her language or actions as meaning something she didn't intend. Don't imply that *you* perceived her actions as being flirtatious or in any way dishonorable, but rather that--whether or not she is aware of it--some people are very sensitive to such things.
Such an approach will effectively request that she avoid acting flirtatiously toward you, but at the same time avoid any aspersions on her actions to date. A statement that a person's actions could be misconstrued is not an accusation of impropriety, since it could be true even of some actions which were 100% proper. Someone who welcomed a person's flirtations and expected to continue doing so would be unlikely to make such a statement, but a person who thought continued flirtations might become annoying might make such a statement even if they hadn't yet. Consequently, the act of making such a statement is not a claim that one has been offended.
Ignoring a person's attempts at flirting may sometimes be effective, but some people may escalate their efforts until they get some sort of response. Since there's often no good way to respond to acknowledged attempts at flirting, it may be better to respond to an attempt at flirting which is subtle enough that one can claim to believe it wasn't deliberate, than to wait until increasingly-overt attempts can no longer be denied. The sooner flirtation can be discouraged, the easier it will be for everyone involved to save face.
# Answer
> 2 votes
It is a delicate matter as it can't really be pinned down as flirtatious but it does not seem very professional either. For example, even if I get quite familiar with some collaborators or colleagues, I do not add emoticons or texts that I normally use when talking to my family.
I would keep the answers as professional as possible, keep the tone quite "dry", and keep a very good track of all mails that go back and forth (just in case any problems later arise).
I would also approach as soon as possible, as part of the lecture course, the way that communication between teacher and students should take place - as @Oswald Veblen wrote above, or new routines in communication... you can eventually come with some reason for it. If the mails from the student continue in the same tone after bringing it up to the class, I would approach the subject directly with the student, at school, in an open space (if her intention is to flirt, you can never know how she will react when you will bring up the subject - better to have things as transparent and as clear as possible).
I would not start to change myself and be on a 24/7 stakeout, analyzing each and every move and grimace I make. I would make sure though that I behave in the same way with everyone.
A last thing, if it helps, maybe not :). Last time I was in a similar situation, only that it went to a not so subtle communication, I approached the person and told him that - probably I have misinterpreted the whole situation but I'd rather make a fool of myself than leaving things unclear. I told him I appreciated our collaboration but I was not interested in taking things further than just professionally.
Hope it was all just a misunderstanding! All the best!
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Tags: etiquette, email, teaching-assistant
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thread-25667
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/25667
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Can an online degree through an accredited institution affect admissions into masters programs abroad?
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2014-07-10T22:04:50.383
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# Question
Title: Can an online degree through an accredited institution affect admissions into masters programs abroad?
I'm currently attending an accredited university which provides an online BSc CIS program. Is an online degree considered lowly in compared to a traditional education, and can it affect admissions into masters programs offered abroad?
# Answer
> 1 votes
If you are seeking a BS degree from a United States accredited university through an online program, and wish to enter a Masters program with another U.S. accredited university, it should not be an issue on its own merits.
However, research universities may take a second look at your application if the online-achieved BS degree is not from another research institution. To ensure your acceptance to such a Masters program, you will want to achieve a higher grade point average than expected. It would also help if you publish any articles during you progress towards the BS.
Other non-research institutions in this scenario should not have an issue accepting you with your online-achieved BS degree, so long as you clearly demonstrate in your application you meet all their requirements for admission.
Now, even with that said, non-research universities may even accept you even if you have defficiency in required undergrad coursework. In this case, a little real-world job experience as little as 1 year can help assure them you can do the work.
In all cases, don't underestimate the application letter you submit. I would make sure it communicates you have a goal in your education and career after the Masters. And it should demonstrate you are capable to meet their requirements, and to succeed in their program. That is ultimately what they are looking for.
# Answer
> 1 votes
Firstly, let me clarify that i am a full-time B.IT (Hons) Majoring in Information Systems Engineering degree holder, currently trying for an admission for part-time MSc/MIT.
It definitely does make a difference when the degree is earned online. From the point of view of the faculty, especially if you're applying for a full-time course, is that you did not have face-to-face interaction within the learning process. Although, some online courses do include some physical classes in campus and video conferences via the web. At the end of the day, an online degree would not have included the same experiences a student has in campus running here and there to print and submit assignments etc.
But, on the other hand, it really does depend on the universities you are applying for and whether they would accept your BSc that as part of their requirements.
To me personally though, being from technical IT background, I know some people who are working hard to earn their degrees online and it definitely isn't easy juggling between studying and working as all of them work full-time. I think some universities would definitely take full credit from your BSc and allow you to enter to a related Masters program
Good luck in completing your program!
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Tags: masters, computer-science, graduate-admissions, abroad, online-degree
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thread-34314
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34314
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Is it advisable to have a master or PhD thesis topic in mind before entering graduate school?
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2014-12-15T09:48:06.313
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# Question
Title: Is it advisable to have a master or PhD thesis topic in mind before entering graduate school?
This is a question that fascinates a lot of people prior to attending graduate school. The question whether one should already have chosen a thesis topic so that all efforts will be put on creating that thesis and more time can be used to explore that given topic.
Or a more basic question, is it feasible or even possible for someone to know exactly what their thesis topic would be before going into graduate school?
# Answer
There may be advisers, departments, universities, countries (academic cultures) or fields where you need to come up with your own idea. I would not think this is the norm, however. In many cases Phd positions are financed by project funding so that the project is largely defined. This does not mean that the entire PhD is staked out in advance but the direction is. When you start a PhD you need an adviser which would imply that the field and direction of research of that adviser will determine the direction of your research. In many academic systems you directly apply to a PhD project which is pre-defined. I could probably come up with more cases that point away from come up with your own thesis topic.
That said, however, it is not inconceivable that someone could enter a system with an own idea but since coming up with great ideas commonly involves having a deep understanding of a field, and that in itself being one of the goals of a PhD, it would be a very rare case.
So depending where you are or where you are heading in the academic world, you do not need to know the thesis topic in advance. You will be looking for topics that may interest you and once finding positions announced decide if they fit your interests. It is rare that you find exactly what you dream of so many go for positions that are "close enough". Another point here is that you would probably not select a topic only, you would also consider the academic milieu and if you think it would be good for you and your endeavour into research.
> 16 votes
# Answer
This is a very local issue, depending (as Peter Jansson says) on the country, university, field etc. For instance, at least in the arts and humanities, it is usual in the UK to apply to PhD programmes with a thesis proposal that explains pretty much what your thesis will be on. Of course, there's nothing to stop you changing what you work on once you're accepted into the programme, have discussed it with your supervisor etc.
As to whether or not it's advisable, again that depends on local conditions. If your PhD has coursework then you have plenty of time to think about good thesis topics while you do that. On the other hand, for a purely research-based PhD like those in the UK, it's good to know the topic going in because you're supposed to get on with research straight away.
I've seen mixed results with this approach, to be honest. I ended up sticking with exactly what I proposed, but I suspect that's less common: research often doesn't turn out how one expects, some topics seem like a good idea at the start but as one learns more one's focus shifts and what appeared to be an interesting and tractable question turns out to be tedious or impossible to make progress on. Many of my fellow PhD students changed topic partway through, although often this was more a change of emphasis than a complete change of topic—that's less common, and correspondingly more difficult since ars longa, vita brevis (in particular, PhD students in the UK are expected to complete within four years).
> 9 votes
# Answer
This will very greatly by the discipline. My PhD was in mathematics, and I do not know of any of my colleagues that entered grad school with an idea of the problem that they would solve for their dissertation. In fact, most entered with no more than a notion of the area of mathematics that interested them (algebra, analysis, topology, applied math, logic) and at least half ended up in a different area from their notion on entry.
In mathematics it seems not feasible to me to know the area upon entry. The frontiers of mathematics are just too far away ...
> 8 votes
# Answer
The answer is heavily dependent on the field, school, and department you will be applying to, and also the individual faculty you will be working with. As the other answers suggest, in some programs it is common for students to be immediately attached to an ongoing project, and the general boundaries of their possible dissertation projects will be set by that. In other programs that is almost unheard of, and each student must develop his or her own project.
That said, my impression is that you should have at least some idea (or ideas, plural!) of questions you would like to answer, even if you don't know exactly what the thesis topic per se will be. One big reason to have such ideas is that you aren't likely to be accepted into grad programs if you have no plans for what to write about. The difference between programs seems to be that some of them expect you to apply knowing that you will work on a particular project and write about that, some expect you to have a topic in mind and stick to it, and some expect you to have ideas but won't care if you change your mind during the program.
The individual variation in attitudes towards this question was, for me, beautifully summed up in a personal experience. When I was applying to PhD programs, I visited a certain school along with several other prospective students. As part of this process, each student had a short meeting with each faculty member. One professor, during our meeting, mentioned that she felt "students who come in with a dissertation topic already in mind sometimes miss the point" --- that is, that they should be open to exploring new things they hadn't thought of before. I then went across the hall to meet with another professor, whose first question was "Do you have any ideas for your dissertation topic?" And this was in the same department!
> 5 votes
# Answer
Just to touch a point that nobody else did, there is also the issue of *timeliness*.
Some fields of research advance pretty fast, and what was a great topic before starting graduate school, may be outdated or not relevant anymore when you are about to start your Ph.D.
For these fields it is usually better to define the topic close to the moment when you will actually start your research. I did my Ph.D. in Computer Sciences, and I have seen people Ph.D. topics get outdated while they were developing it!.
> 1 votes
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Tags: graduate-admissions, research-process, graduate-school, thesis, research-topic
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thread-34349
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34349
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Suggestions for working effectively with international students from a non-western culture
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2014-12-16T05:41:00.080
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# Question
Title: Suggestions for working effectively with international students from a non-western culture
I am a Masters graduate student studying finance at a large public university located in a major city. Recently, I accepted a job as a teaching assistant. A significant number of students are from non-western cultures, with East Asia being especially heavily represented(China, S.Korea, etc). In leading discussion,I have found communication to be a problem and I strongly sense it has cultural roots.
Encouraging participation through questions does not seem to help and the students seem to be painfully shy. I attempt discussion that builds upon the text, but the students seem to have trouble expressing themselves and finding their voice. I use mainly open ended questions with some close ended questions for clarification. At the very first session, I explained my expectations:
1. Respect is crucial. While attacks on ideas are encouraged, personal attacks are inappropriate.
2. Creativity of thought is encouraged
3. That I am open to feedback about the students opinions.
4. Acknowledge wish to speak by raising hand
I feel its important for students to have their own ideas and to actively engage in these smaller discussion sections as it applies the concepts taught in lecture. In addition, I want feedback regarding what I can do better and students' opinions are valuable.
Some relevant background
1. English proficiency: Understandable but mediocre with accent
2. Most present in the USA less than 1 year
3. No family present in the US.
Coming from a western culture (USA), aside from leveraging the professor, what else can I do to improve the efficacy of these discussion groups?
# Answer
*I have found communication to be a problem and I strongly sense it has cultural roots.*
I think this is the first point to start with: Try to find out if your sense is right here and try to identify what kind of cultural difference may be the cause. In fact I am not sure if cultural differences are really the only (or most important) problem, but you may well be correct. However, there are very different cultures also in east Asia and also in the same country.
One thing that I have heard of is that in some Asian cultures it is impolite to ask questions to a professor (because it somehow shows that she did not explain things well). It may well be considered impolite to try answer questions for which the answer has not been well prepared in advance. (If this would be the case, you could, in principle, think about preparing questions in advance and hand them out a week early.)
If discussing of unprepared ideas is really important for the class, I am not sure what you could do. You may consider collecting different styles for the class such as
* participants present prepared thoughts on homework questions in written form as a hand-out or orally (or both),
* prepare handouts for some topics and distribute them in class, then let the participants work on them alone (or in groups), let them prepare statements and collect the statements,
* have open discussion (prepared or non-prepared).
In any case, communicate the different modes clearly to the students, i.e. explain what they have to do, what you expect them to deliver and what (besides the actual content) they should learn in class. In this way you may get the message across, that "discussing" (and comparable skills) is really something that you expect the students to learn.
> 6 votes
# Answer
You don't really explain how you try to get these discussions started. Do you ask open-ended questions (such as, "Does anyone have any questions?") or pointed questions (such as, "Who can explain why X did not work in this case?").
You also don't explain your protocol for letting students answer questions. Do they just chime in? Raise their hands first? Do you call on them individually?
Also, what mechanisms do you use to prevent a few extroverted and knowledgeable students from dominating the conversation?
Lastly, how do you encourage classwide participation? What expectations have you set?
The problems you discuss (students who are introverted, intimidated, embarrassed, or hesitant to talk), are not unique to any one culture, although certain cultural backgrounds or language barriers can exacerbate those problems.
Here are a few tricks that might help:
* Call on certain students individually. Try to get all your more taciturn students speaking more often, and your more vocal students giving others a chance to talk. (If a few students have already answered a couple questions, tell them that they are "done for awhile," and they need to give their classmates a chance to answer some questions now.)
* Let the students work in pairs for five minutes or so, and then call on those teams to share their thoughts. This may help students feel more confident as they realize they are not the only ones in the room who may be a little unsure about something. Also, even if a quieter student says very little in class, under this arrangement, they are still articulating their thoughts to a peer. (In your specific case, you might considered pairing up an international student with a native English speaker.)
* Use polling tools (a.k.a. "clickers"), if they are available at your institute. These will get everyone into a mindset of participating. You can also use your poll results to steer the conversation in a certain direction (for example, "Someone who answered (b) – please tell us why you thought that was the best answer.")
> 2 votes
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Tags: teaching-assistant, international-students, communication
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thread-34361
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34361
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Should I use hypophora in my SOP?
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2014-12-16T11:47:25.270
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# Question
Title: Should I use hypophora in my SOP?
Hypophora is the question similar to question tag:
> I want to shift the discipline from physics to biology. **Why?** Because, ...
**Should I ask this kind of question in my SOP?**
> ### Function of Hypophora
>
> The major purpose of using hypophora is to create curiosity among the readers, while a well-timed silence produces heightened effects and creates interest. It helps to capture the attention of the audience. However, hypophora can also be employed to introduce new discussions or topics of importance about which the readers might not have information. Also, it can be used as a directional device to change the topic. It can raise that type of questions which readers might already have on their minds and would like to get answers to. In addition, it is frequently used in political speeches as well as literary works.
I don't think it will make any harm, but I'm not sure. Why? Because this comment makes me have to rethink of any, erm, nonstandard things.
# Answer
I can't speak for all disciplines but in biomedical science this is generally considered an inefficient way of writing because the same sentence can be simplified to
> My reason(s) of shifting to biology from physics is(are)...
It's also considered tacky but I probably have to attribute that to overuse and misuse. I will only use hypophora if the statement is highly unusual or seemingly illogical. This is a bad use because the statement is not dramatic:
> To make tea I first need to bring the water to boiling. Why? Because...
Contrasting to:
> To make tea I first need to bring the water to boiling with a silver spoon in the kettle. Why? Because...
is probably synchronizing better with the readers' mental rhythm: "Huh? Why the heck would you put a silver spoon in it?" Then the following "Why?" would serve a better role: to resonate with the readers.
Surely enough in my own field nothing is dramatic enough for me to deploy this expression. Is "shifting from physics to biology" unusual enough to raise eyebrows? I am not sure without too much context. My gut sense is perhaps not because I'd categorize them both under the school of science and they do go together quite well. I'd think "shifting to biology after spending 10 years studying physics" or "shifting to biology from classical string performance study" may probably deserve a "Why?" Although, this is purely opinion.
The part after the "Because..." deserves attention as well. Make sure it's followed by a very compelling reason, or your "Why?" may be tainted with a taste of self-doubting or still-on-a-soul-searching instead of persuasion.
In any case, expressions like such are unlikely very harmful if used sparingly. They also serve to inject some liveliness into the statement. I'd consider using no more than once in a statement acceptable.
> 12 votes
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Tags: statement-of-purpose, writing-style
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thread-34064
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34064
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How can I politely explain to my students that the texts in my course are all in English and it is their duty to read it nonetheless?
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2014-12-11T12:15:11.500
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# Question
Title: How can I politely explain to my students that the texts in my course are all in English and it is their duty to read it nonetheless?
Eventually I grew tired of having to explain over and over why *all* my class material is in English. It's a mandatory course in Art History. I want to put some warning in my syllabus to minimize any arguments. The problem is how to do it politely, yet clearly.
The reasons are clear: there is no material in their native language for the courses I teach; obviously I cannot and will not translate the material; and it is their duty to read in English. I guess I cannot tell them straight that if they do not read English well they will not even understand classes well and will get low grades. I don't want to sound rude.
Is there a way to explain the situation, or is it better not to include such a written statement in a syllabus and keep things as they are?
# Answer
> 46 votes
I agree that it makes sense to set expectations as early as possible.
I'd just put
> Note that all XXX for this course are in English.
in the syllabus. You should of course be *specific* as to what XXX is:
* Class slides
* Required reading
* Supplemental reading
* Lectures (you could have slides in English but speak the local language during the actual lecture)
* Quizzes
* Exams
If quizzes/exams are in English, you should also note whether students would be expected to *answer* in English.
Whether or not you also want to include the reasons for this is really up to how much space you have in the syllabus and whether there isn't anything more important to put there. I'd say that a warning might be a better use for the space:
> If your English is not up to reading/understanding/writing technical documents, this course likely is not a good fit for you.
# Answer
> 24 votes
In many fields, you cannot be considered educated as an effective practitioner unless you know a particular language, because communications in that field are done in that language.
For example, once it was the case that one could not be a chemist without reading German, because all of the most critical work in chemistry was published in German. Currently, it is extremely difficult to be a computer programmer without reading English: although interfaces and user documentation is often translated, the actual code and APIs for most programs is written in English. Likewise, around the world all air traffic controllers are required to be proficient in English, as that is the agreed-upon fall-back language for air traffic control.
If the course you are teaching is in such a field, then explaining this fact can help students understand why it is important for them to read texts in English. They may not be happy with this fact (and there may be good reasons to be unhappy about it), but understanding how language plays into their ability to put the material to use may be useful for getting them to accept its importance.
# Answer
> 23 votes
Could you clarify where you are teaching and at what level?
A young undergraduate student might consider it "unfair" if he or she fails your course because of insufficient English skills. A more mature student will understand that you're offering preparation for real life.
A professor of mine once told us halfway through the class that "the remainder would be held in the international language of science, broken American English." He expected us to get the technical terms right and the rest of our sentences understandable. Proper pronounciation was optional.
Back to your question, tell your students that you expect reading comprehension of technical literature. They don't have to speak English, and they don't have to write beautiful sentences.
# Answer
> 13 votes
If the course is mandatory I think, in fairness to the students, you should go one of two routes:
* Make the English reading requirement formal and written. It should be included in the prospectus for any program that requires your course. There should be a suitable English course that can be taken before your course, and that course, or equivalent skill, should be a stated prerequisite.
* Make it possible to get the top grade in your course without reading any English. That would mean including in the course notes material that an English-reading student could get from text books. The text books would be at the most optional extras for students who want to go beyond your course, not required material. Given the additional information that the subject is Art History, you could still require the text books for their illustrations, but write notes that tell the students what they are looking at.
Whether English-reading is required for the program seems to be a policy decision that should be made by the faculty as a whole.
=======================================================================
There is a third, intermediate, option. Campaign to make the course an option rather than mandatory. In that case, the English requirement would only need to be documented in materials the students use to make their optional course selections. It does not need to be part of the requirements for the program as a whole.
# Answer
> 5 votes
I think you can simply mention the main references and course materials at the beginning of the class.
On the other hand, I believe, it is the job of an instructor, to present the material in the official language of his/her institution is such a way that without additional materials, the students can well follow the course and to be able to successfully pass the exams.
André Weil once said
```
The student's note-book should be his principal text-book.
```
In Mathematics (and I believe in many other domains) there are still some domains in which one cannot really be an expert without knowing French and German. But just because the materials of my domain is not in the official language of my institution (for example they are in French or German), doesn't mean I can force the students to learn them. It is my job to teach them and present them in the official language of my institution.
# Answer
> 4 votes
I think you certainly need to make crystal clear at the very beginning of the class that a reading knowledge of English is required. If possible, it should be clear even earlier than that - perhaps mentioned in the course description that students read when deciding to register for the class. That way, students who do not have the necessary skills can sign up for some other class instead. By the time the class starts, it may be more difficult for them to do so.
Another option may be to require an appropriate English class as a prerequisite (which can be waived for students who already have sufficient fluency).
If this is a mandatory course, then you need to have a discussion with your department as to whether your use of English materials is reasonable. They have an interest in running a program which students can actually pass. If your colleagues decide that this is not reasonable, then either you will have to change the way you teach it, or someone else will have to teach it instead of you.
# Answer
> 2 votes
Try something similar to the following:
> This course, and all required reading, will be presented in English. If you need assistance understanding any course materials, please see your counselor or \[other university resources for ESL students\].
This makes it clear that everything will be presented in a specific language, and indicates that the class and teacher are not the appropriate people to work with students lacking English proficiency.
# Answer
> 2 votes
Depending on the country/culture in which you teach, it might simply not be possible. It's easy to assume the “everybody speaks English” or that “students will need it anyway” to make your life easier but often it's not true.
Without starting a debate on language planning, it's not obvious to me why it should be impossible to learn art history and enter a career in teaching, become a museum curator or whatever it is your students could do after taking your course, certainly if they speak another major European language.
Personally, I speak several languages and would certainly recommend learning English to anybody who asks but I also know people doing decent work without knowing it, even in supposedly internationalized and English-dominated fields like computer science. It's useful and common to be sure but outside of academic research it's not vital and I don't think it would be fair for me to deny people an education and career (or, from another perspective, to limit the talent pool in the country) on that basis alone.
If you teach in a country where English is not a general requirement in higher education or there is an expectation that lecturers provide their own teaching material, then it is in fact your job to enable learning in the local language and there might be no way to prevent students from perceiving your not doing so as unfair, rude and lazy.
# Answer
> 1 votes
You are asking how to explain things politely. I don't think it's that complicated. Simply state:
"All required reading for this course will be in English."
There's nothing rude about that in terms of voice.
However, you don't give us enough background information to understand the context. If this college doesn't teach all courses in English, and doesn't require proficiency in English, or anything similar, then no matter what your voice, students are going to see this as a rather rude obstruction in their curriculum. This would be a failing of the particular school you are teaching in. They need to make it clear to students that there may be classes requiring all reading in English prior to them committing to the program.
# Answer
> 0 votes
I can't judge your colleagues just from your observations, but maybe I agree with you. Nonetheless, students are suffering (though not terribly) from this.
Since you wrote that you can't really discuss this with the faculty, I think the possible solutions are:
* List the requirement anyway, if your colleagues won't bother you for that. Some students will be annoyed *and* in their right to be annoyed (at the situation, if not necessarily at you).
* To improve things for students, if you can, get faculty to make your course optional, and possibly to accept at least an optional English course for credit in the degree.
That still implies discussion with colleagues, but it doesn't require them to do extra work (say, learn English), so they might be more willing to accept. Moreover, it's the easiest solution which is actually fair to students. That might reduce your studentship to people who care and accept the requirement. For you, that might be good (you'd get more motivated students) or not (if too few students pick your course and colleagues get nervous about it).
* I don't know really enough to say this, but if it's reasonable for you, you might want to change to another department where you can work with your colleagues rather than against them. From your tone, it sounds like it would avoid you quite some annoyance *and* make both departments better for students. I've seen or suffered, as a students, enough departments where communication between professors was visibly dysfunctional. Of course, I don't think anybody can demand such an extreme solution from you.
# Answer
> 0 votes
I second o.m.'s remark about the language of science being broken English -- and I would stress the **advantage** of this fact to the students (at least in the first lesson). Science isn't something that is done only in and for one country, e.g., German Science, or US Science, etc.
Sure, there are national organizations and differences in universities between countries, but the findings themselves are usually applicable and discussed internationally (with all intercultural differences, at least most of the work in psychology is widely applicable, probably all of the 'hard sciences', and I'm guessing that even if local art history is discussed, theories are probably internationally applicable).
So, being able to (at least) understand English allows a student to listen into that discussion.
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Tags: teaching, language, reading, syllabus
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thread-34370
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34370
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Is it inappropriate to explain why I really want to live where the university is located in my job talk?
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2014-12-16T15:43:26.713
|
# Question
Title: Is it inappropriate to explain why I really want to live where the university is located in my job talk?
I am preparing to give a job talk for an on-campus interview for a tenure-track assistant professor position. The university is located in city X. I really want a job in city X because I have many relatives living in city X, and my parents also live a few hours by plane from city X, and I feel that city X is a good place for my wife and I to raise our kids.
I would like to spend one slide and a minute near the end of my job talk in order to explain why I really want to live in city X. Would this strengthen my case, or would this be seen by the faculty as "too much information?"
# Answer
> 62 votes
Just to put what's already in the comments into an answer:
* **Yes**, you should convey the information you've told us to the hiring faculty. If you've gotten a campus interview for a faculty position, they are already extremely interested and satisfied with your on-paper qualifications. Final decisions are often strongly motivated by who they think will take the offer and who they think will stick around, happily and productively, in the job. You list several things that would earn you lots of points on that score, and since the hiring faculty cannot and should not ask too many questions about your personal life, the way to make that information known is to tell them so explicitly.
However,
* **No**, you should not put that information in as a slide. Your talk should be about your professional work. Throwing in "I'd like it here! Hire me!!" while people are listening to your work is jarring and shows (I think) just a soupçon of poor judgment. I assume that your on-campus interview is structured so that anyone who is involved in hiring you has multiple opportunities to talk to you outside of the context of your job talk. If so, then I wouldn't even bring it up at all in your talk, except possibly as an ice-breaker at the beginning or a parting shot at the very end.
# Answer
> 9 votes
I would not put it in a slide, but I would feel free to briefly mention it at the beginning or end of your talk. Immediately after you're introduced is a perfect time to say something like "Thank you \[name of introducer\], I'm looking forward to my day \[or I've had a wonderful day\] and I'm really excited to be in \[city\], because this is my favorite place in the world and I have so many family and friends here." You make your point quickly and efficiently without being effusive, it's a nice compliment to the people who are listening, and I think most people would find it a charming and elegant way of segueing into your talk.
# Answer
> 2 votes
Your talk is likely to be to a wider audience than the selection committee (who may not come in some universities) and might be even wider than your immediate disciplinary group.
You want to convey appreciation for the opportunity to address them. At the beginning, thank them for the opportunity and put up a slide or two on the main strengths of the university and town. This can feel like an exercise in bald-faced flattery but it is the equivalent of "good morning, how are you". You are simply acknowledging the audience and you will feel the appreciation mirrored back to you quite palpably.
Don't include personal reasons here unless they are likely to be shared by your audience. Once I a slide - about the third in my opening pack before I started speaking - and simply said "flat". I was coming from a city that was very hilly. The point is that these points must be shared.
And then to your talk --- and very good luck. Just remember that everyone likes to be liked. Let your liking shine through!
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Tags: job-search, tenure-track, presentation, interview
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thread-34374
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34374
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Tips on how to format a manuscript in marine biology and physiology
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2014-12-16T17:24:02.997
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# Question
Title: Tips on how to format a manuscript in marine biology and physiology
I'm working on my first publication on work I did as an undergrad. My adviser from undergrad will be helping me edit and go through multiple drafts, but because I'm now at a different university for grad school I haven't spoken to him about this first draft.
I've looked at the publisher's website, but they were vague and provided only general comments about how to format the manuscript. I don't want to send my draft to my old adviser and have him think I'm an idiot because my formatting is different from the norm. (Perhaps relevant: this publication has to do with marine biology and physiology.)
1. What font is appropriate? Times New Roman 12?
2. Double spaced?
3. Do figures go at the end? Should I space my figures the way I want them spaced in the publication?
4. Do I include line numbers?
Side question: What is an appropriate length (in number of words/pages/whatever) for this type of publication? I know it depends on the journal, but it's hard to translate pages in a journal to typewritten pages. I'm submitting to a journal with an average impact factor.
# Answer
The general formatting advice from @CapeCode is sound. Generic font (certainly not anything odd) and 1.5-2 line spacing is fine for the text. Tables and figures should go at then end. Many journals ask for figure files not to be included in the manuscript file at all, follow such advise. If figures are separate all figure captions go at the end of the manuscript file.
Regarding line numbers it is not a major issue unless the journal specifies something special. Some manuscript systems provide only PDF-files of the manuscript. Some reviewers then prefer to have the line numbers to locate their comments. If the journal provides the Word files then as @Cape Code states these can be more of an issue. So try to see if you can figure out what the journal sends out but in the end I do nto think it is a major issue.
In addition, I strongly want to push following any instructions for authors to the point. Make sure your use the proper reference formats and follow other journal formatting details. If no explicit instructions for authors exist then look at recent articles to see what styles the journal uses. A manuscript that follows the journal style looks more serious than a manuscript that does not.
As for length, I would say that 6000-8000 words incl. references is a reasonable size for a regular research paper in your disciplines, shorter is possible but longer should be treated as a warning. If you really want to know just count the words on a page and guestimate the total for the article, you will not be far off.
> 6 votes
# Answer
At this stage, *content is what you should focus on*. In most biology journals, formatting is done by the publisher. Thus formatting at this stage *only serves the purpose of making your draft easy to read and comment on*, so to answer your questions:
> What font is appropriate? Times New Roman 12?
If your adviser usually reads on a screen, consider using a sans serif typeface (Calibri, Arial, etc.), if read on paper TNR is fine.
> Double spaced?
Only useful for people who print it out and need space to scribble.
> Do figures go at the end? Should I space my figures the way I want them spaced in the publication?
For the convenience of your adviser, you should include them where you think they are relevant. It's usually editorial management software that place them at the end (which makes reading draft cumbersome). Consider using a smaller font size for captions to help differentiate them from the body.
> Do I include line numbers?
Can be helpful if you do not use interactive commenting tool (like the one of MS Word) it never hurts to have them IMO, make sure they are continuous, and *include page numbers* by all means.
Note: this only applies to internal circulation, you might need to re-format for submission following the journal's guidelines.
> 5 votes
# Answer
Most of these would depend on which journal/conference you are submitting to. For instance, IEEE and Springer each have their own style.
> -3 votes
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Tags: publications, journals, writing, formatting
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thread-34379
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34379
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Use 1st or 3rd person for university webpage description?
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2014-12-16T18:17:41.403
|
# Question
Title: Use 1st or 3rd person for university webpage description?
I am in the process of updating my teaching and research descriptions the main website of my university. It seems many of the best descriptions are written in the 3rd person, but as far as I am aware, they were all written by the individual being described. Presumably those willing to talk about themselves in the 3rd person also put in the effort to have a good web presence. It seems disingenuous to write about myself in the 3rd person. My university has no guidance or policy on this issue (it must be an oversight given how much they love to manage everything). Is there a preferred style for official descriptions on the web? The webpage is dynamically from a CMS system so it is possible that some pages (either now or in the future) would present the content in a way that it is not obviously linked to an individual.
# Answer
I think that it depends on whether the web site is written from a personal or an institutional perspective.
* **Personal perspective:** On my own web page, I use first person because I have formatted it as a web page about me personally and about my personal work.
* **Institutional perspective:** A close colleague of mine has formatted their page as "Name Laboratory", and it includes description of both themselves and of all of the students and postdocs in their group. Their web page is written in the third person, including their self-description, because it is from outside perspective of the group as a collective, rather than their own perspective.
Just as in most questions of writing and tense, either can be correct, and I think the question is really about which you feel most comfortable doing.
> 3 votes
# Answer
I've seen both 3rd and 1st being used. Though I mostly see 1st person used. I'd opt for 1st person to properly propel your voice.
Many of the 3rd person ones that I have seen are non-personal and feel awkward as I can't get a sense of the voice of the author.
> 1 votes
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Tags: writing-style, website
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thread-21562
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/21562
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How lenient are conferences in accepting and reviewing lately submitted poster presentation abstracts?
|
2014-05-28T04:30:17.577
|
# Question
Title: How lenient are conferences in accepting and reviewing lately submitted poster presentation abstracts?
There is a conference that my advisor suggested that I attend and present at, but unfortunately as this was just suggested today, I missed the abstract submission deadline by about a week.
I know this is my fault, but I am just wondering how lenient conferences are wrt late registration. I emailed the organizer politely explaining the situation and asking if it would still be possible to register. If anyone is curious, this is for the SIAM annual meeting in Chicago.
I've never attended any sort of conference at this level before (but do have some experience with poster presentations), so I'm wondering should I even expect a reply, let alone a positive one? I think this would be a really great opportunity for me to present my research to people in the field, and I will most likely attend the conference even if I'm not able to present at the poster session.
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**Edit and update:** The organizing committee has agreed to give consideration to my abstract, and said they'd let me know by the end of next week re: acceptance/rejection.
# Answer
> 9 votes
Some conferences usually/always extend. Others don't. I suggest writing to the organisers and asking - the worst that can happen is that they say no, and they might say yes, even if an extension hasn't been formally announced!
# Answer
> 5 votes
Some conferences (I don't know if it applies for the one you have in mind as well) give the opportunity for the submission of so-called "late breaking posters" even after the official submission deadline until shortly before the conference date.
By this one can present very recent results that did not get ready before the deadline. As a drawback it should be noted that the contribution will normally not be listed in the conference proceedings as they will already go into preparation/production soon after the deadline. Also the reviewers might have a special eye on the originality and the currency of the contribution, so submitting some rather well hung stuff just to get a poster presentation and a reason to attend the conference might not work.
# Answer
> 1 votes
Most would not let you submit your abstract. However - I would guess that it depends on the size of the conference, the amount of submissions, and the committee members themselves.
It doesn't hurt to ask!
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Tags: conference, peer-review, abstract, poster, deadlines
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thread-34402
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34402
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What are the key components of being an effective supervisor of undergraduate researchers?
|
2014-12-17T01:19:40.913
|
# Question
Title: What are the key components of being an effective supervisor of undergraduate researchers?
Quite a few tenure-track job ads I've come across recently have mentioned supervising research of undergraduate students as one of the position responsibilities specifically. I have had plenty of opportunities to supervise graduate student research activities, but have no experience supervising undergraduate research.
Personally, I never took advantage of opportunities to do research as an undergraduate (as an engineering undergraduate student, I was more focused on doing internships). So, unfortunately, I don't have any personal experience on "the receiving end," so to speak, to draw upon for what makes a good (or bad) approach to undergraduate research supervision.
My question:
> What are the key components of being an effective supervisor of undergraduate researchers?
If the field of study matters, this is in engineering (in particular, electrical engineering, and some of the job ads I've seen combine research supervision of both the electrical engineering and computer science undergraduates).
Somewhat related:
What are the main differences between undergraduate, master's, and doctoral theses?
# Answer
> 24 votes
I have had some pretty good success advising undergrads by:
* Making sure that the problem is extremely well-defined. That is, don't throw them into the water and see if they swim. Think a lot about what the expected outcome will be, and what the foreseeable steps, challenges and problems will be. Yes, this is a lot of work and means that you could (almost) "do the work yourself" in the same time, but for undergrads you can typically not yet expect that you can just drop them a research question and see them run with it.
* Have regular meetings. Make sure that there is progress, and if there isn't, make sure that you know what the blocking issues are. Don't expect them to necessarily come to you first with any issues. In my experience, undergrads often are a bit shy about asking for help, and sometimes get stuck on (for you) relatively easy problems unnecessarily.
* Make sure that you *would be able to do the project yourself given enough time*. I know that this is somewhat controversial, but for grad students, I am perfectly happy to accept projects where I myself wouldn't know how to do every part myself. That is, I expect a grad student to be able to solve her/his own problems. For undergrads, I do not do this. I want to be able to help undergrads in a meaningful way if they get stuck, technically.
* Conversely, make sure that the work is not just random grunt work. In my experience, the best way to make sure that the undergrad research project is *not* interesting for the student is by letting them do something that everybody else either considers unimportant or terribly tedious to do. Undergrads are not yet experienced, but they are still colleagues and *not* some sort of scientific minions.
* Somewhat related: make sure that you are excited about the project, or at the very least be able to convincingly pretend that you are. Again, having the feeling that nobody cares about their project is a surefire way to make for a terrible research experience.
* Integrate the undergrads into the lab. When there are talks, the undergrads are invited (i.e., expected to come). When the grad students are expected to regularly speak in the internal seminar, the undergrads need to do this as well. If there is a regular lab beer night, the undergrads are invited as well. If the lab usually goes to lunch together, the undergrads are asked to come along. You get the idea.
* If at all possible, give them a fixed work place in the lab, and require them to be there at least some percent of the time.
To summarize, the best undergrad projects in my lab always worked on a well-defined project, which was still an integral part of the research agenda for the lab that others were enthusiastic about. On concrete example from my research: some members of my lab are currently working on benchmarking compute cloud providers. That typically means hacking up some automation scripts, deploying benchmarks, gathering some data, and analysing the results. This is rather tedious and error-prone work. Hence, I got a computer science bachelor student to build a web-based platform, which students could use to define, schedule and execute benchmarks using a relatively simple DSL (domain-specific language). The platform the student built technically wasn't terribly complex, but the solution worked well, tackled a common community problem, and most importantly saved multiple grad students a ton of time. We also published the tool as open source software and wrote a small paper about it, allowing to student to go to a conference to another continent. During the conference, a number of professors asked the student for details on his tool, and expressed interest to also use it for their research.
# Answer
> 14 votes
When I was in high school, my (favorite) supervisor
* **Gave me a written problem statement** at the beginning of the project. In retrospect I really appreciate that he put it in writing, because it's easy to forget what was said in a verbal conversation.
* **Explained most of the relevant background to me**, instead of telling me to do a literature review. I really appreciated this because I wouldn't have understood most of the papers if he'd asked me to read them myself.
* **Kept his door open** so I could bug him whenever I had data or a question. (We didn't have weekly meetings, but I talked with him almost every day.)
* **Supervised me directly** instead of handing me off to a grad student.
* Had me give talks at **group meeting**.
* **Was actively interested in my future career**, and even helped me submit my project to a science fair.
* In general, he **told me what to do, but never how to do it**. He would tell me what problems to solve, and what directions were worth exploring, but he wouldn't help me code or tell me how to solve problems.
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Tags: advisor, research-undergraduate, supervision
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thread-34396
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34396
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Thoughts on Student with Bad Grades in Easy Courses and Better Grades in hard courses
|
2014-12-16T23:15:55.237
|
# Question
Title: Thoughts on Student with Bad Grades in Easy Courses and Better Grades in hard courses
I have a fairly weird transcript. I took two harder upper-year courses at the second-year of my undergraduate degree. I spent a lot of time working on these courses because I was fascinated by the course material and got A+'s in both of them. I did poorly in one lower-year undergraduate course and got a B+.
How will this reflect on the student for graduate admissions?
# Answer
> 7 votes
The comments are a bit surprising to me. I had several Bs and 2 Cs on my transcript (overall GPA 3.57, though my major GPA was more like 3.8), and I got into a very good engineering graduate school (US top 10) for my PhD. Maybe my admissions process was special in some way.
Some things to think about:
* At many schools (see comment), nobody can tell from your transcript what the class average was for the course you got a B+ in (or any other course)
* Nobody can tell that you got a B+ because you were bored
If you want to bolster your chances, stop slacking in the "easy" courses. Find some undergraduate research opportunities. If you did so well in your graduate courses, those professors might be worth approaching.
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Tags: graduate-admissions, grades
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thread-34394
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34394
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What is the best way to find an external examiner for an MSc (e-government)
|
2014-12-16T22:23:08.800
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# Question
Title: What is the best way to find an external examiner for an MSc (e-government)
I am an advisor trying to find an external examiner for my student for an MSc (area: e-government).
Currently the thesis is at the proposal stage (which also needs to be assessed by an external examiner). I'm a relatively young supervisor and therefore found it a bit difficult to find a suitable candidate. The person would have to have a Ph.D. and be proficient in English. There is also some money involved (but the details can be only disclosed to those who are really interested).
My approach so far has been to check papers on e-government and try to contact the authors. But maybe there is a dedicated forum where I could approach potential researchers in an easier way?
# Answer
> 1 votes
Although I haven't needed to recruit external examiners, I have served as one and have watched colleagues recruit them. Typically, the advisor is working with students in an area related to the their own work, and thus can reach out into their normal professional network to others who work in a related area. Thus, I doubt that a forum for making these types of connections exists---usually, you already have a bunch of colleagues who would be good candidates and who you already have some sort of relationship with.
It sounds like for your case, however, the student is doing something that pushes into a new area where you don't yet have a network. Other people in your institution, however, probably do. I would thus recommend starting by finding out who works in the area at your institution and approaching them: since you are both at the same institution, you are more likely to get a collegial response rather than a "who are you?" failure to respond. Your same-institution colleague, then, can make introductions to good candidates for external reviewers.
If there's nobody working in the area at your institution, though, you'll need to fall back to what you are already doing. I would recommend, however, that the best people to contact are not the luminaries in the field but others in a similar position to yourself: relatively young, and thus more likely to find it valuable for their CV to be an external reviewer.
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Tags: thesis, masters, supervision
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thread-34335
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34335
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Is independent research a good long term goal for a bachelor's degree holder with experience and interest?
|
2014-12-15T18:15:18.013
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# Question
Title: Is independent research a good long term goal for a bachelor's degree holder with experience and interest?
Bear with me while I put some biographical information here.
I'm a bachelor of engineering graduate from India with approximately a decade of work experience in design, engineering and project management. I've got a real fascination for the following subjects:
1. Optimization methods
2. Chaotic and dynamical systems
3. Data analysis and statistics (a field in which I work - as a quality management professional)
I have presented a couple of papers in international conferences in the first subject - based on work I did by teaching myself optimization methods. Learnt the ropes on researching papers/work, contacting researchers, running my own studies, writing concise papers, over many attempts in unpublished papers. I have only read books and papers on the remaining two subjects (#2 and #3) for over seven years but haven't really contributed anything significant or original.
Since I never was in the right financial state to pursue a masters or a PhD, I never earned one. I turned down an MS admit at Duke in 2010 for financial reasons too (didn't manage to secure funding). I considered and visited Indian universities including the IITs but find the entry barrier high for any univs worth going to, because I have a 7.0/10.0 GPA on my Bachelor's degree. Moreover, I hate going back and asking for recommendations from professors that I share no common interest with or who had no bearing or influence on my technical interests whatsoever. My mentors have all been in the industry, and all MS/PhD applications seem to want only academic recommendations, which I thought was stupid.
Having read a number of reports and accounts from researchers on the troubles PhD scholars face and the standard of life, I'm inclined to think that I wouldn't be happy giving up my job and my lifestyle (and compromising my wife's lifestyle) for a decade of research which may or may not lead to a PhD. I love the subjects but I'm looking for a way to learn and discover things in them without subjecting myself to the financial commitment that comes with a huge loan.
Is a life of independent research (something that is exciting for me personally) a viable way to move forward, or should I consider getting a formal research postgraduate degree? I'm eager to hear thoughts, advice, comments. Thanks for taking time out to read this.
# Answer
It seems you have two options to weigh against each other:
1. Do research independently, viewing it more as a hobby than as your profession, or
2. become a professional researcher, which would require getting the appropriate formal education.
If you want to make research the most important aspect of your life, then option 2 would be the way to go. However, from your current biography, it seems that this may require more effort and changes to your life than you may be willing to invest. Getting a PhD is a definite requirement along this path.
If you go for option 1, it will still be possible to make research an important aspect of your life. It will be more difficult though to maintain sufficient investment of time in view of work and family commitments to keep things running.
Personally, I think that being a hobby researcher can be viable and satisfying in research fields where you don't need expensive equipment. While the examples I know mostly do something like locally focussed historical research or botanical/zoological research in their environment, it seems that mathematical or theoretical engineering topics will also be feasible for this. If you want to go that way, the internet certainly provides much more advice on being a hobby researcher than I can hope to give here. A link to start with may be this question on cstheory.stackexchange.com.
> 4 votes
# Answer
Honestly, independently researching on your own time could be a lot tougher than working in a research group.
Here's a tip: if you are **serious** about researching, go to graduate school. A lot of people do independent readings as a hobby as well. Find which category you fit into.
> 2 votes
# Answer
I agree with phil above.
Research is fascinating but also very hard if done on one's own. There're so many results/problems out there. Without the guidance of a field expert you might just be spending time repeating someone else's research without knowing it.
> 1 votes
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Tags: phd, independent-researcher
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thread-34423
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34423
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Is it sensible to do two PhD's simultaneously?
|
2014-12-17T10:04:40.010
|
# Question
Title: Is it sensible to do two PhD's simultaneously?
I have finished my master's degree in Physics (Radiation and Health Physics Option) with distinction, but I want a PhD in Medical Physics. My university does not offer that pathway and other universities are insisting I do a M.Phil. for a year before they will consider me for PhD candidacy I really do not have the energy and time to concentrate on the M.Phil. right now and I fear I might not make the desired grade.
I have an offer to do a Ph.D. in my area of specialization (Radiation and Health) and I need to make a decision on this. I am thinking of accepting both offers and in case I don't get the desired grade to move over to PhD in medical physics, so I can still have my PhD in Radiation and Health Physics and not lose both ways.
# Answer
It sounds like you have offers from two different universities in two slightly different fields. If so, you will need to check with both universities to see if you can be simultaneously enrolled. My guess is that neither university will be happy about that, and especially the one that is providing a studentship. Even if it is allowed, you have to ask yourself what the advantage is.
A PhD is more about the research than the nominal department (or even university) that grants the degree. A PhD is all about gaining the skills needed to do independent research. Sometimes (maybe) a good way (or potentially the only way) of gaining those skills is to do two PhDs. More often a PhD with multiple supervisors will give you the necessary opportunities.
It sounds like for you that you want to start the first PhD and then switch to the second Phd if you do well enough in the MPhil year. While this provides some security, if the first PhD program is such a bad fit (either in terms of reputation or area of study) that you want that type of security, then the program is probably not a good fit for you.
> 4 votes
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Tags: phd
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thread-34421
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34421
|
How should I split my code and data between an open repository and the article's supplementary files?
|
2014-12-17T09:59:42.610
|
# Question
Title: How should I split my code and data between an open repository and the article's supplementary files?
I am working on a paper that involves some data and a piece of code to analyse the data.
I want the results of the analysis to be reproducible and the code to be open. This concept of "reproducible research" is essentially non-existent in my field, and potential journals have no guidelines regarding code. Also, I have no requirements as to how to publish my data and code by an institution or a funding agency.
The question is, how should I split the data and code between an open repository and and the article's supplementary files? What I currently have in mind is this:
* The `R` code itself (*i.e.* the functions) will be posted in an online repository, such as figshare or github.
* The data and its analysis will be posted, possibly using `knitr`, as a supplementary to the article.
What are the pros and cons of this approach? Is there something I should modify?
# Answer
A good way to think about the distinction is this:
* Code and/or data in a supplementary is static, providing a snapshot that was guaranteed to work in a particular time and place. Archival presentation is assured, but it cannot be maintained and thus is likely to eventually become obsolete.
* Code and/or data in an open repository is maintainable, and thus can be a "live" project that is updated and continues to be executable. For the same reason, however, it is also subject to possible destruction through a variety of means, including corrupting updates, deletion, and death of the repository. It will likely be fine for at least a few years, but multi-decade preservation is much more questionable.
However, as @Davidmh points out in the comments, there is generally no reason that you can't put everything in both places. Contrary to popular belief, there is nothing that prevents code from being distributed under more than one license. This is particularly true if you first post it in the open repository, then place a snapshot ("fork") of that repository in the supplementary information. Giving the journal control of a fork does not affect the original repository.
In many cases, however, the open license and the journal's copyright will not even interact with one another. Many journals will not claim any copyright over the code or data *as code or data*. Instead, the journal will claim only the right to distribute the bundle *as a supplementary publication*, which does not restrict the use of the information in that supplementary as data or code.
Bottom line: first put it in an open repository, then give the journal a snapshot as supplementary. In the extremely unlikely case that the journal won't take it, the open repository is still a fine place for it to stay.
> 11 votes
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Tags: data, code, open-science, reproducible-research, supporting-information
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thread-31952
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/31952
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Is it ok to call the professor in this situation?
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2014-11-19T15:20:40.053
|
# Question
Title: Is it ok to call the professor in this situation?
I had a telephone conversation with a proposed Ph.D. supervisor last Monday and he agreed that he will double-check my research proposal before I submit it. Then I emailed him the proposal. However, I haven't heard from him for a week, so I sent a reminder email to him this Monday. And yet still no feedback from him so far. I know that professors are busy and slow responders, but Christmas is coming and I do not want to miss the deadline. I wonder whether it is ok for me to call him at the same time as last time if I do not get his response before next Monday? Or are there any other solutions in this situation?
# Answer
First, ask yourself whether you are sending the right email.
One of my professor mentors had a very useful heuristic for ensuring effective communication with busy people. For any busy person, email typically gets triaged into three bins:
1. Email that can be safely ignored.
2. Email that can be responded to with trivial effort, thereby clearing it from their "todo list."
3. Email that requires non-trivial effort to respond, and must be put off for later... and later may be a long time, because now it's competing with their other "large" duties.
If you want a response from a busy person, write a short email that includes precisely one question, and make sure that question is easy to respond to. For example, in your case, if you send email saying:
> Here is my research proposal, as discussed. Can you please send me feedback?
then that might get no response until the professor has the feedback ready, and preparing your feedback may get pushed off and pushed off again. The professor might also misremember the deadline and have a lesser sense of urgency. If instead you write:
> Here is my research proposal, as discussed. Please recall that I must submit before the deadline of XXX, and I would like time to revise if necessary. When can I expect your feedback?
In this you've posed an easy question, which should get a response, and also gotten them to commit to a specific date. If you don't get a response in a day or two from an "easy" email like this, then you need to wonder whether this person is actually somebody you want to work with.
What, however, if you send the right email, get them to commit to a date, and then they fail to either respond or tell you they need more time? At that point, I would recommend against either emailing or calling on the phone. Instead, go find the professor in person. I have found that with busy people who fail on their commitments, that finding them in person is the best way to get yourself back in their queue. Again, however, you should ask yourself whether you really want your whole Ph.D. to be this way, because it is likely to be a pattern...
> 11 votes
# Answer
If you are danger of missing a deadline, yes call her/him. @jakebeal's answer is great for email, but sometimes people just don't check their email.
If you are worried about seeming too "pushy" or aggressive, just be really polite and give a sense that you are trying to get things done and moving, rather than blaming her/him for the delay.
> 2 votes
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Tags: phd, etiquette, application
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thread-34438
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34438
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Can I take the biochemistry GRE test if I am a biology graduate?
|
2014-12-17T19:43:14.817
|
# Question
Title: Can I take the biochemistry GRE test if I am a biology graduate?
I currently hold a bachelor of science in botany but plan to do a master's in genetics. I was wondering if I can take the GRE subject test for biochemistry, molecular biology, and genetics, or am I eligible for biology graduate record test only?
# Answer
> 7 votes
There are no requirements on who can take a GRE subject test. So long as you pay the test fee, they're happy to take your money, even if you've never taken a course in the subject in your life. You're a French major who wants to take the mathematics GRE? *Bien sur !*
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Tags: gre
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thread-34442
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34442
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Is it acceptable to change affiliation to new employer when submitting an updated manuscript when old employer provided limited research support?
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2014-12-17T21:16:34.163
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# Question
Title: Is it acceptable to change affiliation to new employer when submitting an updated manuscript when old employer provided limited research support?
**Background:** I have published a paper with no co-authors in a CS workshop a few months ago. I have put as my affiliation the place in which I was lecturing at that time, say university X. The work was made by myself, with no use of resources from my previous place of work. I applied for some financial help to cover the expenses that I suffered (registration for the workshop, tickets and accommodation), but they agreed only to give at most the 10% of the expenses roughly. This amount has not yet been paid.
I now work at a new university that is research oriented; and there is the opportunity to submit the research paper that I was doing to a journal, after some modifications. So I was wondering:
**Is it acceptable to change my affiliation from my old university to the new university when submitting an updated manuscript?**
This is mainly because the former one did not bring any kind of support for this research activity.
# Answer
> 9 votes
I would recommend to use both. If the journal differentiates "address" and "current address", then:
* "address" is X (where you did the research)
* "current address" is Y (that's where people can reach you now, right?)
If the journal doesn't distinguish them, I would put Y first (you seem to consider Y more important). If the journal doesn't allow two affiliations, them the journal is strange; just try to put both affiliations in the one field and see what happens.
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Tags: publications, affiliation
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thread-34441
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34441
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What kind of citation is needed for a whole paragraph?
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2014-12-17T21:08:54.863
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# Question
Title: What kind of citation is needed for a whole paragraph?
I'm writing a paper on The Beatles and in this paragraph I'm talking about the formation of the group. I got the info from their biographical book. So it's just a summarized version of a chapter. I have no idea how to state that this info is from a book?
# Answer
> 1 votes
Summarizing a chapter in a paragraph and citing it at the end, I think, is not a good idea.
It is better to write
> Simpson mentions the formation of the group in Chapter 5 of History of The Beatles \[12\].
And then write your paragraph in italic.
Actually, if you can, put citations at the end of each 2-3 sentences. The following example is more proper when writing an academic manuscript.
> The Famous English Rock Band Beatles was formed in 1957 \[34\]. First, John Lennon, the founder of the band, named the band as The Blackjacks. Then, with Paul McCartney joining the band, the name was changed to The Quarrymen \[21\].
# Answer
> 2 votes
You are paraphrasing the material, not quoting it. (You summarized it.) Put the citation at the end of the paragraph and add the source to your bibliography.
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Tags: citations
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thread-34275
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34275
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Why are [some] professors ambiguous about material that is actually tested on exams?
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2014-12-14T16:16:08.357
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# Question
Title: Why are [some] professors ambiguous about material that is actually tested on exams?
I've noticed a majority of professors that I have had will tell students something along the lines of, the exam covers Chapters 1, 2, 3, or the exam covers topics X, Y, Z. Sometimes this is ends up being so broad that it is unlikely that students will even see all the material that is fair game on the exam. It also likely ends up with some material being more prominent than other material which means playing the guessing game.
Why are professors hesitant to tell students more precisely what they expect them to know?
I do realize that not all (perhaps even most?) professors have not written the exam at the point of informing students what is covered. However, given that undergraduate course material is fairly static, would not the professor be expecting the students to have the same knowledge as the previous students?
# Answer
There are at least four worries, in my experience:
* The students may be trying not to study any more than they absolutely have to study. So if the professor says something isn't on the exam, they won't study it.
* If the professor says what is on the exam, but doesn't explicitly mention something, and then that thing comes up (even as a minor part of another problem), the students may complain that "you said that wasn't on the test!". This can happen even if the professor really made a good faith effort to say what was on the test, and the students simply misunderstood.
* The professor may not have written the exam yet, and so she doesn't know the exact topics that will be included.
* Someone else may write the exam, if there are many sections of the course taking the same exam. In that case, the professor may not be permitted to say what is on the exam. When I was a postdoc, they didn't even show us the common calculus exam until just before it was administered.
There are various strategies to cope with these worries. A common one, as described in the question, is to just say that the exam can include everything from the class, which is not very informative but is otherwise harmless.
There are other strategies, as well, such as making an exam review packet that includes more than the exam possibly could, and then selecting exam problems based on the review packet. But these don't help with the issue of common exams written by someone else.
By the way, if turnaround is fair play: we professors often ask the dual question: why do students so often ask what will be on the exam, when they have just had a class on the same material that will be on the exam? As you can imagine, we may feel that we have already told the students what we want them to know, by designing the course to include it!
> 76 votes
# Answer
Due to time constraints, most exams directly ask about only a small fraction of the course material. If a professor explicitly tells students exactly what parts of the material are going to be directly tested on the exam, many students would only bother to learn that material.
Therefore, professors often include anything they want students to learn/study in the exam coverage.
(There are obviously tradeoffs involved: include too much and students won't be able to study the really important things at a sufficient level of depth, include too little and the students won't get enough breadth.)
> 42 votes
# Answer
There are several aspects to this:
First of all: I don't know what questions I will use in the exam before I actually have written it - which may very well not have happened before the actual day of the exam. I have a pool of over 300 questions, categorised by the expected length of the answer (no multiple choice over here in Switzerland - you must word your own answers). The duration of the exam (normally 4x60 mins) determines the number of questions from each category. But the actual questions are chosen randomly, I even wrote a programme to do this part for me, to make sure that it is fair (I have my "favourites", the programme doesn't).
Secondly, I want the students to have a close look at large parts of the most important materials of the field. I don't expect them to know everything and all questions are worded in a way, that you can answer with the knowledge from one area or that of another; e.g. a question on the relevance of Hegel or Nietzsche can be answered from a historical point of view (what lead there and where did it lead afterwards?) or from a philosophical point of view (what did they say and why is that important?). So if you're weak in historical knowledge but strong in philosophical, you can put the stress on the latter and still get full scores - and vice versa, of course.
This way the exams are fair: Everybody knows the area, they can learn what is most interesting to them and still everybody can get good grades, given they really put effort into the preparations.
For oral exams the answer is pretty similar: The examiner and the co-examiner prepare a pool of questions at a meeting normally not much more before the exam than maybe a week. So also here: We simply don't know what questions will be in the exam, we just know which areas we want to cover. Also here we will adjust the questions to the strongest areas of the examinee. They have 5 to 10 minutes at the beginning to show us what they know: They choose a topic and get started. After that we ask questions with stress on that area. You quickly know which students have prepared well and which didn't.
Basically: If we see the effort, the grade will be good.
> 13 votes
# Answer
In addition to the other answers my personal motivation is based upon the fact that any exam is only a sample. To be valid as an assessment of how much the student knows about the subject this can only work if it is a truly random sample. If students know, or can predict due to a bias on topic selection, what topics are actually going to be assessed there is no random sample, and therefore the exam is no longer valid as random sample.
As such I do not give hints on what is covered in the exam. I do make clear which topics will not be covered, or what the structure of the exam will be. I will even help with tips such as including answer plans (such as mindmaps), examples and diagrams.
> 11 votes
# Answer
The question raises a few points that I would like to address separately.
> I've noticed a majority of professors that I have had will tell students something along the lines of, the exam covers Chapters 1, 2, 3, or the exam covers topics X, Y, Z. Sometimes this is ends up being so broad that it is unlikely that students will even see all the material that is fair game on the exam.
In your "sometimes" scenario, it sounds like you are saying that the exam covers a chapter or topic that has not been addressed *at all* in the lectures or in the homework. If so, this sounds like a serious problem that is different than the concern described in the question title.
> It also likely ends up with some material being more prominent than other material which means playing the guessing game.
Indeed, not all material from the term can be represented on the exam (because the exam period is so much shorter than the term!) So some material will end up being more prominent than other material (which may even be absent.) I don't agree that this means "playing the guessing game". I think it would usually work better to study everything a little bit than to guess a random subset and study that to the exclusion of everything else.
> Why are professors hesitant to tell students more precisely what they expect them to know?
There are two senses of "expect \[students\] to know" here. In one sense, we expect students to know everything we taught; otherwise we wouldn't have wasted our time and theirs teaching it. In a more limited sense, for the exam we expect you to know the answers to the exam questions. Obviously we're not going to tell those.
> However, given that undergraduate course material is fairly static, would not the professor be expecting the students to have the same knowledge as the previous students?
In the first sense, yes: for this term's exam, we expect the students to know everything we covered this term, and for last term's exam, we expected the students to know everything we covered last term. So if what we covered is the same, what we expect the students to know is also the same (but this isn't a very useful observation.) In the second sense, no: we ask different question on this term's exam than on last term's exam; otherwise if some students get hold of the last exam, it defeats the purpose of the exam.
**Executive summary**: We expect you to know everything we taught you—duh :-)
> 1 votes
# Answer
I think your premise is wrong. I've never had a professor not disclose the scope of knowledge and/or skill that I'm expected to know at the end of the course.
I've always been told to expect the exam to cover a subset of that material, sometimes with more explicit relative weighting between areas.
> 0 votes
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Tags: teaching, exams
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thread-34450
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34450
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If you want to do a PhD in mathematics, how important is it to start immediately after finishing undergraduate studies?
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2014-12-17T23:47:48.230
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# Question
Title: If you want to do a PhD in mathematics, how important is it to start immediately after finishing undergraduate studies?
I'm about to finish my undergraduates studies; I majored in mathematics and minored in physics, and I always intended on going to grad school to pursue a PhD in mathematics, but I've been having doubts recently. I did well in all my courses (3.92 GPA), but I'm trying to seriously consider if my background is strong enough now and if I'd truly have the motivation to stick it out. I've also been thinking even if I decided to give it a shot, it might be nice to take some time off for rest and to improve on some of my weaker areas. But I've been told by a few people that **if you want to do a PhD in mathematics, you have to go pretty much right after undergrad**, mainly because recent letters of recommendation are so important, and professors forget you after a time. So **I wanted to know if this is true**, and also thought I'd ask for advice if anyone has been in a similar situation.
# Answer
The other answers don't really address the issue of recommendations, so let me, at least briefly. I've been on our math PhD admission committee several times and we get many applications from people who've gotten their undergrad some time ago.
First, yes there is some truth to it being easier to get in right after your undergrad degree. The letters of recommendation are important. If your professors know you quite well, and the department is relatively small, they should still be able to write you decent letters after a year or two hiatus, but if it gets to 5-10 years, they may not, and with that kind of time lapse, their letters won't count for as much anyway.
My advice would be to consider what else you want to do. Is there something else you really want to do for awhile (peace corps, travel, interesting job opportunity)? If so, it won't kill your chances for grad school, but you may have to apply to more backup schools. If you're out for longer, it might be best to do a masters first before getting into a PhD program.
If you don't have any definite ideas, why don't you try applying to a few masters programs (Vladhagan's suggestion of trying a masters first is a good idea to give you a sense of what you want to do and give yourself a better background) and a few PhD programs that seem interesting to you? At the same time, maybe go to a career fair and send out a few job applications in the spring? The PhD programs that accept you (at least if you're in the US) at least should give you an opportunity to visit, so even if you're undecided about a PhD in the spring, visiting these schools (and similarly any job interview impressions) may help you make a decision.
> 8 votes
# Answer
> But I've been told by a few people that if you want to do a PhD in mathematics, you have to go pretty much right after undergrad, mainly because recent letters of recommendation are so important, and professors forget you after a time.
You do not have to start a PhD program "pretty much right after undergrad". It is most common to do so, but there is a substantial minority of students who are older and/or spent several years out of school. In (American, at least) academia, your age counts for nothing; the ticking clock in the sky keeps track of the number of years since your PhD. I know several people who spent years off from undergrad in the sense of leaving school but clearly kept up with their mathematical reading and learning -- while in the Israeli army, culinary school, creative writing programs... -- and started grad school with skills at least at good as those around them and a maturity that most 22 year-olds lack. I've looked through hundreds verging on thousands of job applicants' CVs, and I am struck by how often the stronger candidates were in their 30's rather than their 20's when they got their PhD.
Of course the biggest risk in taking time off between undergrad and grad is that you will get distracted by the rest of the world and not come back for graduate study. But that's only a risk in the context of your original plan: if you found something else that you like better than being a graduate student, good for you. It is also relatively common that after a fairly small time away -- one or two years -- people realize that they really do prefer an academic career. (For some reason this seems to be most common among high school teachers. Isn't that a bit sad?) If you're not totally committed to a PhD program, taking time off and seeing whether your desire waxes or wanes is a pretty smart idea.
Of all things in your decision, I don't think that going straight to a PhD program because you're worried that your professors will forget about you is a good strategy. Professors don't forget about students that quickly, but after a few years, they may. To combat this, I would say: if you are not sure whether you want to do a PhD right away, why not **apply right away** to PhD programs? Certainly knowing where you can get in and seeing the programs that admitted you are all factors in your decision. If you apply right away, professors will write letters for you, and if you go away even for a long time, those letters should still be equally usable afterwards: your past undergraduate performance is not a function of time.
> 16 votes
# Answer
At least in my area of the world (Western US) and among the professors from the institution where I did grad work, almost everyone did a master's degree first. There are exceptions to this of course. How I see it is if you are a genius, go on to the PhD directly. Otherwise, a MS can give you some good background without drinking from a fire hose. This is how I improved my weaker areas. I was weak in analysis before grad school. I was able to take 4 analysis classes (graduate level!) for my MS and it was a significant boost.
When I applied to PhD programs, I got my letters from professors I had taken graduate classes from (and my thesis advisor). This allowed them to comment not just on how well they *thought* I would do in grad school, but how well I *actually* had done. This also allowed for them to comment on my research. I think it made me a stronger PhD candidate.
I will back up that you will need to be (somewhat) confident that you can become very strong in a specific niche. But that is why you go to grad school; its purpose is to make you strong in your field. And your strengths may change. I entered grad school as a group theorist and left as a probabilist.
> 4 votes
# Answer
I doubled in math and physics at MIT, and went on to get a PhD. in physics. Although I had a successful career, first as a supergravity theorist and then as a computational physicist, I have always wished I had gone into math, which was my stronger love and better talent.
You don't have to be uniformly strong in all areas to do wel in a math PhD program. (Although many nice ideas stem from creative ideas in unrelated parts of math.) You do have to be pretty sure you can become insanely strong in one area, and you do need to be confident that you will love what you are doing.
> 3 votes
# Answer
Entering a PhD program is a major commitment that you should not enter into if you're not completely ready. Your question shows that you're very unsure about what you want to do. Thus I would not recommend entering a PhD program at this point in time.
It is certainly possible to work for a while and then go back to graduate school.
My own personal experience is that when I got my BS degree (in Computer Science), many friends urged me to go on to graduate school immediately. Instead, I went to work as a software developer for the next three years. It became clear that I would need at least an MS degree in order to advance within the company that employed me so I went back to graduate school for an MS in applied mathematics. During my first semester as a full time graduate student I became very interested in a new area (interior point methods for LP), and applied to switch into the PhD program so that I could really immerse myself in that topic. I wouldn't recommend this approach to everyone, but at the same time, I'm quite certain that it helped me to have worked for a while before going back to graduate school.
> 2 votes
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Tags: phd, mathematics
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thread-34460
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34460
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How long should I wait for an IEEE conference proceeding?
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2014-12-18T09:32:52.817
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# Question
Title: How long should I wait for an IEEE conference proceeding?
I have an accepted paper in TrustCom 2014. The conference was held several months ago. However I could not find any information regarding the proceedings. They do not answer email. Is it normal? In general, how long after a conference are proceedings published?
# Answer
For IEEE conferences (such as this one), there is a relatively standard procedure:
* You should have gotten your own copy of the proceedings at the conference itself: typically with IEEE conferences these days this will be on a USB drive. By the standard IEEE copyright policy, you can feel free to post your preprint on your website.
* The full proceedings typically appears in IEEE Xplore a few months later, but there is a lot of noise and randomness in this timing. IEEE is very good at maintaining communication and schedule before the conference to ensure the proceedings are ready for distribution at the conference, but are much more lax in following through after the conference has completed.
> 3 votes
# Answer
For IEEE Conferences, the length of time depends on a few factors.
1) When are the final proceedings sent from the conference organizers to the IEEE indexing
2) How long it takes for IEEE to look through the submitted work
3) How long it takes for the conference organizers to respond to any IEEE issues or questions about the proceedings
You can get a relative idea of the length of time and status of your proceedings from this excel file provided by IEEE: https://www.ieee.org/documents/2005\_present\_list\_of\_titles.xls
As you can see, the length of time before someone submits their proceedings changes, and some have taken over 1 year, as in, the next year conference has happened before the previous one has been submitted. The reason for this is that each year most conferences have a different set of chairs and organizers, so it largely depends on them.
> 3 votes
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Tags: publications, conference, ieee
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thread-34466
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34466
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Should I rewrite completely an extended paper?
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2014-12-18T11:52:32.847
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# Question
Title: Should I rewrite completely an extended paper?
If I submitted a paper on a conference, and now a special journal about that conference has asked for submit extended versions of our previous work; I was wondering if I should rewrite completely the first accepted version of my paper. I mean, I already have the additional material, but can I not add it into the original paper? also should I change the title in this situation?
I have seen articles of some authors that the extended version is almost identical to the previous one, only with the extension of some parts. That thing is not a case of self-plagiarism?
# Answer
> 7 votes
A rewrite is a matter of how you an expand your manuscript. i am sure you can start by using the existing text and add whatever is needed. Once that has been accomplished, or during that process, you will get a sense of whether the new material requires some or complete reorganisation of the original manuscript. so there is no clear answer, yes or no, it will clearly depend on the original manuscript and the material you add.
To start by completely rewriting everything does not sound like an efficient method unless you feel such an approach will free your mind from constraints imposed by the old manuscript. As a rule, I would say use the old manuscript as a basis since complete rewriting would probably take much more time. I am sure certain parts of the manuscript could easily be modified while particularly the results and the discussions sections is where most of the work will be.
Regarding the self-plagiarism, it has become evident from posts on Academia.sx that this is seen differently in different disciplines. You need to check with colleagues in the discipline about this issue but the fact that there is a request for the product you aim to produce indicates that no such issues exist.
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Tags: journals, writing, conference, self-plagiarism, extended-paper
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thread-29001
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/29001
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Is there a non-scientific related activity for students in a conference?
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2014-09-25T16:36:27.027
|
# Question
Title: Is there a non-scientific related activity for students in a conference?
The research group that I am associated with organizes a conference that will take place next month.
One of the students asked if there is something that he can volunteer and help in the organization of the conference. He has not any scientific work to present, but rather offers some logistic and technical help.
Can you think of any "volunteering position" and tasks that can be given to a young student? Is this of any benefit to him, or is that just a timeloss?
# Answer
> 2 votes
Lifted shamelessly from this answer, here are volunteer tasks that the student can do during the conference:
* Check attendees in at the registration desk
* Take minutes in meetings (if there are any)
* Mic shuttler (the person that carries the mic around to people who have questions during the Q&A after each talk)
These offer the following benefit to the student: exposure and opportunities to network with attendees at the conference in a normal way.
Here are some additional tasks that weren't in that other answer because they're often done by students at the host institution. They also may or may not be necessary, depending on available facilities and services at your conference location.
I've done these tasks for conferences hosted by my own group:
* Design and proofread conference program (before conference, obviously)
* Set up poster boards, hand out thumbtacks, and show presenters which board to go to for poster/demo session
* Print, hang up, and rotate signs showing people where to go/which session is going on in a room at any given time
* Give VIPs a VIP tour around the lab, if conference is held *at* your institution :)
# Answer
> 4 votes
**The aftermath:**
I just add here some notes about my feelings once the conference took place.
It is a great opportunity to even be remotely associated to such an environment. In such an environment exists the chance to meet people from the academy and the industry. If you have the rights networking skills you (as a student) can score some internship a possible future employment positions both in academia and industry. So in no way this opportunity is not considered a waste of time.
If you are a student volunteer these are some useful stuff one may need:
**Typical Conference Questions and other stuff to consider:**
* Where is the toilet?
* What is the WiFi pass?
* Have different adapters and converters in hand
+ port – to- port video adapters
+ country – to – country power supply adapters
* Extra batteries for the presenter
* Arrange poster guys based on their order of presentation, put all the posters in a pdf file, on the same laptop (yours or someone else)
* Ask demo presenters if they need monitor for their demos
* Before the beginnings of the session, strongly recommend speakers to try if their laptop fit with the cables used for connection to the projector
# Answer
> 2 votes
I've been to meetings where they had a student volunteer positioned in each room:
* they swapped out the name cards where the speakers will sit
* they replaced the water bottles at the speaker table with ones stashed behind the podium
* they helped out with AV issues, or called for expert help.
* they kept a count of how many people were attending each talk in the session.
This gave them a chance to attend talks, albiet with some minor distractions as they did so.
They were wearing brightly colored shirts labeling them as volunteers, so people also knew who could either answer their questions or point them in the right direction of someone who could.
At other conferences (eg, AGU with thousands of posters displayed per day), we'll often assign students as the session chair for posters:
* Grab a supply of pins from the main desk, and the signs for when you'll be at your poster
* Help people find their poster location (look it up online or from the printed program)
* Help people hang their posters (or at least get the top two corners pinned)
* Record any posters that were no-shows.
# Answer
> 0 votes
Depending on how competent the student is and how much you trust them, you can also task them with managing the abstract review process (i.e., if you are using something like EasyChair, you can make them a Session Chair, or even the SuperChair, if you think they can manage it). It's the kind of job that postdocs and faculty are reluctant to do, because it distracts from more urgent obligations and it has next to zero professional rewards at that level.
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Tags: conference
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thread-34473
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34473
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How to send end-of-the-year wishes in academic environment?
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2014-12-18T14:06:30.570
|
# Question
Title: How to send end-of-the-year wishes in academic environment?
Currently I am working in a research group where there is much emphasis on the interpersonal relations.
I want to write an email and send it to my direct supervisor, with whom I have closer relations compared to the others. But, I also want to send my wishes to the whole group included the head of the group, but I want to do it in a fashion which will sound mildly formal but with a sense of respect and hierarchy in it, and not friendly and too informal.
Any suggestions, or nice emails that you have received?
# Answer
There are many options which can be made by themselves or in some combination.
* You can design a "card" to attach to the mail which could be informative or aesthetically pleasing (but do not make it a huge file).
* You can, as I and my former adviser do, make a "Christmas letter" that summarizes the year both academically and private. You need to adapt to your audience here since the private section should not be too detailed if your are not really close friends, but comments on travels with a nice shot is never a bad idea.
* You can divide the send list up into different categories but the backside of this is that if you group people and group them wrong (from their perspective, it can become embarrassing).
* The previous point is also true for listing people in some order; so alphabetical, even in the way you list the e-mail addresses, is probably wise.
+ Do not emphasize Christmas and New Year *per se* since not everyone may be celebrating these primarily Western holidays. Use something more neutral formulation such as "Best Holiday Greetings" or "Best Wishes for the Holiday Season". Again, know your audience and adjust.
* You can send a general more formal greeting to a larger group and then follow up with a more personal greeting to specific people you wish to share more personal greetings.
So, think about the options and combine to taste.
> 5 votes
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Tags: etiquette, academic-life, research-group, group-dynamics
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thread-34457
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34457
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Is it realistic to apply to a Master at MIT, Harvard, Yale, Berkeley, Stanford with a Bachelor of a German Fachhochschule?
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2014-12-18T04:08:52.107
|
# Question
Title: Is it realistic to apply to a Master at MIT, Harvard, Yale, Berkeley, Stanford with a Bachelor of a German Fachhochschule?
I am a 31 year old German Bachelor-student in his 5th semester in a University of Applied Sciences, studying in Business Information Systems. The total time for receiving the Bachelor is 7 semesters.
I am starting to search for a good university for my Master (same area of studies) and I was thinking of the big ones like MIT, Harvard, Yale, Berkeley, and Stanford. Having checked on their websites, the costs got my main focus, as they are all quite expensive.
My question here is, whether there are studentships to support the costs. Does anybody know whether my idea of studies in these universities is realistic? How big can I expect my chance given my age, nationality, university in Germany, money situation?
# Answer
> 10 votes
**tl;dr.** I think it's unrealistic at this stage.
Note that the Masters degree in America is different than in Germany, in the sense that bachelors are typically longer and the Master and PhD are somewhat parallel in something called 'graduate school'. One question that arises is *to what purpose* do you want a Masters? Are you interested in doing research on the longer haul? Then it's a PhD you need. Are you mainly interested in the prestige?
My advice, if you are interested in doing academic research would be to already find a German university that will accept you in a Masters program (I don't know if it's possible...). You will be better armed to apply for a prestigious American graduate program.
More precisely about your concerns:
> my age,
It's fine, people start grad school later than that.
> nationality,
Nationality is a non-issue providing you are accepted in a program and have secured funding (see below). If anything it might take a bit longer for visa procedures, certainly not a killer criterion at any rate.
> university in Germany,
German institutions are generally highly regarded in America, the problem is not Germany, it's the type of your institution. A German 'university of applied science' (*Fachhochschule*) delivers vocational degrees. The focus is to give graduates a set of practical skills so that they can enter the workforce directly upon completion of the degree. It does not prepare you to enter a prestigious graduate school, whether in America or anywhere else. When applying, you will be competing with people who are far better prepared than you.
Top American graduate schools give a enormous importance to recommendation letters. It's already hard to find professors at German/Swiss universities who know enough about the American recommendation culture to write something competitive, I suspect few (none?) of the teachers at a *Fachhochschule* have experience in that matter.
> money situation?
*You will need funding*. For Masters you already realized how much tuition you will have to pay. Many student fund their studies with loans, and in the business schools it's common for employers to pay tuition. Departments sometimes pay tuition.
For PhDs, It's (almost) never the case that graduate students pay tuition out of pocket, that's also a reason why these programs are so competitive. Your potential adviser will have to secure hundreds of thousands of dollars to pay your tuition and stipend. For the reasons listed above, I think you will struggle to find funding, but it's unrelated to your current account balance.
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Tags: masters, university, teaching-assistant, international-students, bachelor
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thread-34478
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34478
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Ask an advisor (co-author) to contribute to manuscript other than just critiquing
|
2014-12-18T14:57:21.003
|
# Question
Title: Ask an advisor (co-author) to contribute to manuscript other than just critiquing
I'm nearing the end on a manuscript and will be submitting it to my advisor any-day for her feedback. She is a co-author. My question: Is it OK to ask my advisor to contribute more to the paper (other than just critiquing)? If so, how does one go about doing this without insulting their mentor/boss?
To be clear, the paper is in overall good shape. There are a few paragraphs that need some attention. But instead of her just critiquing the paper ("this paragraph needs more interpretation") or ("add more examples from the literature") (\<- I'm paraphrasing ;), is it ok to ask her to contribute actual sentences and interpretation?
# Answer
> 4 votes
> Is it OK to ask my advisor to contribute more to the paper (other than just critiquing)?
Yes, I think so.
> If so, how does one go about doing this without insulting their mentor/boss?
When I was in similar situations in the past, I asked my advisor specific questions about what it was that I needed help on, but I did not necessarily try to sugarcoat the request or anything like that. For instance, if a paragraph needed rewording, I would email my advisor something like "Paragraph Y seems a little wonky to me. While I work on Section X some more, can you come up with a better explanation for Paragraph Y?"
I found that the success rate of the above varied depending on how busy my advisor was. My advisor seemed to "get better" (from my perspective :) ) the more times I asked for specific help. Also, I wasn't afraid to speak up when my advisor offered general tips rather than the specific help/contribution I was after: I would reply and ask again. If on multiple iterations I did not get what I was looking for, I would piece together what they did give me and work with that. That's life.
As a side note, I personally found that trying to word emails etc. just so to avoid coming off as "insulting" etc. required too much effort on my part for little/no gain (you don't even really know if your "properly" worded emails come off the *wrong* way, so what's the point?). In the end, I came to the conclusion that my advisor and I were two adults working on a research project together. I like to think that our advisor/advisee relationship could be described as direct and respectful, and I think that should be the goal.
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Tags: advisor, authorship
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thread-34464
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34464
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Should I offer to pay (some of) the travel cost from the UK to the US for an interview?
|
2014-12-18T11:32:47.837
|
# Question
Title: Should I offer to pay (some of) the travel cost from the UK to the US for an interview?
I'm applying for tenure track jobs this year, and unfortunately the silence from universities I've applied to has been almost deafening so far. While I'm sure there are several factors contributing to this, one concern that has been nagging me comes from the fact that I am currently finishing up a postdoc in England, and I've been applying to North American institutions exclusively. My questions are:
> Would the potentially high cost of flying me to an interview lead to some institutions passing me over?
>
> If so, would it help if I offer in the cover letter to (at least partially) pay my way?
I am concerned because I feel that by far my best chances are for positions at smaller liberal arts schools or state colleges. My guess is that these types of institutions may have smaller search budgets than so-called R1 universities, and really for the cost of interviewing me they could interview two or three equally qualified people who live nearby.
At the risk of making this question too localized, I should mention that I am working under a very generous grant with a substantial research expense budget, and so the cost wouldn't necessarily be out of my own pocket, assuming I can give a research talk at the interview.
# Answer
> 40 votes
> Would the potentially high cost of flying me to an interview lead to some institutions passing me over?
I believe many universities, especially smaller universities, will balk at flying overseas candidates in for interviews. Often they will move down their short lists and only if they are unable to find a suitable candidate that is higher than you on the list, will they be willing to fly you in. This isn't a huge disadvantage, but it is a disadvantage. In my experience candidates often hurt themselves during interviews and rarely perform so well they substantially move up in the rankings.
> If so, would it help if I offer in the cover letter to (at least partially) pay my way?
I would not offer to pay for an interview directly. This would in essence be calling out the search committee for being cheap. A better strategy would be to mention in your cover letter that you will happen to be in the States, possibly even states/cities near by, on a couple of dates and you would be happy to extend your trip and come to them for a visit. It would be nice if you have an academic pretence for those visits (conference, seminar, or visiting colleagues), but even saying you will be in the States for personal reasons is fine. If you do not get an interview, you do not have to go to the States.
# Answer
> 10 votes
I have done lots of international interviews before with skype - it is quite common for university staff. I don't believe cost is a factor or that offering to contribute would help at all. They will set up a skype interview if they are interested in you.
A better suggestion might be to use your research budget to go to some US based conferences and present your work and meet some people. Perhaps stay an extra couple of days at each end. You might also arrange a research visit, where you go to a few relevant institutions to talk about collaborating on some project. That way you have the opportunity to make a good impression with some US based research groups, which is much more likely to land you an interview when they recognise your name among the applicants.
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Tags: job-search, tenure-track, interview, travel
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thread-34448
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34448
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Can one or two spelling mistakes in a statement of purpose hurt your chances for graduate school?
|
2014-12-18T00:26:11.853
|
# Question
Title: Can one or two spelling mistakes in a statement of purpose hurt your chances for graduate school?
I am wondering can spelling one or two wrong words in SOP hurt chance of getting accepted to graduate school? There might be a mistake about spelling one of my professor's name wrong.
# Answer
We once had an applicant for graduate study in mathematics whose statement of purpose explained why he wanted to become a "mathematition". This was not regarded favorably by the admissions committee. On the other hand, a misspelling of a professor's name might not even be noticed; it depends to some extent on whether the professor's name is "Blagoveshchenskaya" or "Smith".
> 8 votes
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Tags: graduate-admissions, graduate-school, statement-of-purpose
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thread-34481
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34481
|
Is it expected that a part-time masters student publish before transferring to a PhD?
|
2014-12-18T15:42:36.120
|
# Question
Title: Is it expected that a part-time masters student publish before transferring to a PhD?
After reading this question, I am curious as to the publication expectations for part-time students. I am a Mlitt Student (working full-time and studying part-time) and am in the process of switching from my (uncompleted) masters programme to a PhD programme. My own personal feeling is that if it is expected that a full time student publish before they get their PhD then the same should be applied for a part-time one. It may take me longer to do a PhD but should the same expectations to publish not be there?
As I'm in the process of changing to the PhD I'm not sure yet if there is a requirement to publish to gain it, which of course may make the decision anyway. I am aware as per the answers in the linked question that this can vary between different institutions and disciplines. I am in the Humanities.
I am mainly asking in the context that in my Mlitt it was expected that I write my research thesis and possibly present at a conference, but there appeared to be no real pressure to publish an article etc. If this is something that will change, I'll have to factor it into my work-plan.
**Edit(additional info):** When I originally posted this question I attempted to keep it a generic as possible so didn't include info from my own case. I think this example shows where there can be slight differences between what can be expected from a full-time and part-time student. In my university full-time students have to do a blended PhD(about 20% coursework, 80% Thesis) whereas due to working 9-5(or more) I'll be doing a traditional PhD of Thesis only (an option not allowed to full time students). Personally I don't think this should have major impact on expectations on students to publish but does highlight that as a part-time student I shall be getting(hopefully!) my PhD by way of a different process to full-time student so there may be different expectations.
The easy answer is 'Ask your supervisor' and I will but it would be great if someone was either a part-time PhD student or supervised one etc, could give some insight on if there is an expectation in academia that a part-time PhD student publish?
# Answer
> 18 votes
The expectation to publish does not depend on whether you are full-time, half-time or spare-time student, it is based on the general expectations on students in your field, department, or academic culture, or some combination. If a PhD thesis is a monograph then the main focus will be to complete such a thesis. this commonly does not preclude publishing as well. If you need to write a thesis that consists of published papers and manuscripts then that is what you need to do.
I doubt the advisor is the key player here although that person will be representative of what you can expect from your graduate school education in terms of expectations on your writing. So check what is written in the form of PhD these and you will know. Communicating your results will inevitably be required so some form of written result will be on the horizon.
# Answer
> 4 votes
While it (usually) isn't a deal breaker to not publish, failure to do so will hurt you in one way or another.
During my defense last week, one of the committee members suggested that the work wasn't significant, and commented on lack of peer-reviewed publications. That didn't prove that the work wasn't significant, but having a journal publication in hand makes fielding a question about significance as easy as quoting from a review report, while having none means that you will have to provide justification in oral arguments.
(Context: part-time PhD in Electrical and Systems Engineering, now "all but deposit")
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Tags: publications, phd, graduate-school, thesis, part-time
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thread-33038
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/33038
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Terrible grade in undergraduate research project, how will this affect graduate admissions?
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2014-12-11T04:36:46.717
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# Question
Title: Terrible grade in undergraduate research project, how will this affect graduate admissions?
I have graduated this year with a second class first division. In addition, I ranked sixth. However, the problem is that I scored a D+ in my undergrad research project. Now I am aiming to pursue a masters degree at UK. My supervisor did not show up regularly plus he was 2 hours far away from my place.
I am really worried if this is going to ruin my chances into getting accepted in a good university such as Glasgow, Sheffield, Bristol or Bath. Do you think I have a chance?
BTW: I am an international student majored in engineering.
# Answer
> Do you think I have a chance?
**Yes.**
I was accepted to a masters program with some bad grades on my undergraduate transcript, some courses with less then 40% marks. In graduate school I got a distinction and now I'm a postdoc.
Doing poorly in a single course won't ostracize you from all graduate schools.
> 2 votes
# Answer
Except at a handful of schools, taught MSc course in the UK are generally unfunded and not selective. Full fee paying international students are essentially the holy grail of students in the UK. With a 2.1 and 5-10k for fees you should have a large choice of good schools.
> 1 votes
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Tags: graduate-admissions, masters, research-undergraduate, grades, united-kingdom
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thread-34498
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34498
|
How much decision time is given for tenure-track offers
|
2014-12-18T19:52:38.193
|
# Question
Title: How much decision time is given for tenure-track offers
I've been applying for tenure track positions in computer science.
Recently I visited university X for an interview and they have hinted that they are likely to offer me a position after my second visit. Assuming all goes well, how much time can I expect to be given for deciding on that offer?
I have also applied to several other places where any decision won't be made within the next few months. So my worry is that I might receive an offer from X "too soon" and hence won't be able to also take into account other opportunities.
# Answer
In my experience, this depends somewhat on the level of the hire.
A search for a full professor, named chair, department chair, or dean might result in a long period of negotiations with the candidate. These kinds of searches often go "one candidate at a time" rather than bringing in all candidates for on campus interviews at nearly the same time. Since the process is sequential, there's obviously more room to give the candidate time to consider the offer.
However, when it comes to hiring a new assistant professor there are typically several reasonable candidates that were all interviewed on campus at about the same time. If the university suspects that a top candidate isn't likely to take the offer they may make an offer with a short deadline in hopes that they can still get their second or third choice.
In the past when I've made offers as a department chair (in mathematics) the offers were open for one or two weeks (with some possibility for an extension if there was negotiation going on.) I have had to say "no" to requests for extended time to consider an offer.
You can always ask for an extension of the time period, but I wouldn't count on getting one.
I've also participated in searches in other academic departments. The only reason for extended time on offers that I've ever seen was negotiation of startup packages- in the physical sciences and engineering new faculty often have very specific needs for laboratory space and equipment that have to be negotiated and this can take time.
> 19 votes
# Answer
> I have also applied to several other places where any decision won't be made within the next few months. So my worry is that I might receive an offer from X "too soon" and hence won't be able to also take into account other opportunities.
I'm sorry to be the one to tell you the bad news: if you get one offer "unseasonably early", then it is very likely that the intent of this offer is to "squeeze you": more precisely, to place you in the position of having to turn down a tenure-track offer without any other offers in hand. This is hardball, but it's legal hardball: at least they're squeezing you with a job offer.
I don't think there's anything you can do to respond to this until you actually get that first offer. At that point, you should:
* Write back immediately to the department which has offered you a job, expressing your delight and serious interest. Say that you will need to receive the offer in writing before you can respond to them in any way. (Often this delays things for a few days.) Make sure that whatever deadline you get counts from your receipt of the formal written offer.
* Write immediately to all the places which you would consider possibly preferable to the offer you've gotten. Tell them that you've received an offer from University X. If you haven't heard anything about your application then you can't really say much more than this. On the other hand if they've contacted you about an interview, then you should offer to reschedule the interview ASAP, in time to have the interview, get an offer from University Y, and consider which of the two (or more) offers is preferable.
* If you have any bites from University Y then you have to keep writing back to both universities, doing everything in your power to get two job offers simultaneously rather than sequentially.
Trying to deal with multiple offers with not fully compatible time frames is a rather stressful situation. To try to keep your stress levels down, remember how much more awesome it is than not having any offers at all. Also, don't be shy about asking for what you want or need: this is your life, after all.
**Added**: I didn't directly address the title question because Brian Borchers already did that nicely. But to corroborate: it is extremely unlikely that you will get a few months of deliberation. Really stretching things out -- including negotiations about startup, equipment, and so forth -- could get you maybe a month, but if you asked for that much in advance you wouldn't get it. Your potential employee simply can't afford to spend the entire hiring season waiting for one (tenure-track) candidate.
> 16 votes
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Tags: job-search, computer-science
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thread-34510
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34510
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What's in a 'vita'?
|
2014-12-19T00:41:58.590
|
# Question
Title: What's in a 'vita'?
A professor agreed to write me a letter of recommendation for a military program. He said 'yeah, send me a vita'. What is a vita?
# Answer
> 10 votes
This is simply shorthand for curriculum vitae, also called a CV or resume. He's just asking you to send him your resume so he can list stuff you've done when writing your letter.
# Answer
> 12 votes
A "vita" is just a short term for a *curriculum vitae* (i.e., CV) which is similar to, but not exactly the same as, a resumé.
There are many questions on this site, like this one asking about how to create a CV and many other webpages which can help with figuring out how to write one.
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Tags: cv
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thread-34471
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34471
|
How bad does it look if I asked the director of graduate studies if I can change my program of study from pure to applied math after admission?
|
2014-12-18T13:14:27.273
|
# Question
Title: How bad does it look if I asked the director of graduate studies if I can change my program of study from pure to applied math after admission?
Although I am primarily interested in studying pure math, for certain personal reasons, I had to ask such a question. What I fear now is the mismatch that'll be noticed between my Personal Statement, where I intend to write about my interests in pure math and this query which clearly exhibits the fact that I have as yet not made up my mind. Even if I re-do my personal statement to reflect an interest in applied math instead of pure math, the fact that I wasn't sure at this terminal stage of the application process might go against me. Is there any way to rectify my mistake?
For reference, this question is with regards to a university in the UK.
# Answer
Assuming your personal reasons are sound, a polite conversation cannot hurt you. Explain your reasons, and keep an open attitude. It is very common for people to change sub-fields (and fields) after their PhD, or even postdocs, so it will not strike as an big oddity.
Now, if it is possible or not, depends mainly on where does your funding come from; and if the university regulations allow it. This will be brought up in the conversation.
If your reasons for studying applied maths are your desire to clone green dogs, well, it will look bad.
> 4 votes
# Answer
Although I am primarily speaking from my experience in the US, my experience is that nobody will hold you to what you have written in your personal statement during your application. It is not a contract. You'll be lucky if anybody even remembers!
The point of the personal statement is (a) to show that you can think and write clearly about your research and preparation and (b) to ensure that your interests overlap with available resources in the department including both funding and faculty.
If you want to switch to something that the department (or individually faculty member admitting/funding you) can advise and support you in doing, people will likely not have a problem. If you want to switch to something that the people admitting you cannot supervise you effectively on, the problem is much more serious that you "looking bad" because you will either be supervised poorly or working on something you do not love.
If you heart lies in an area other than one you suggested in your personal statement, you should raise the issue before you say "yes" to a program so that you don't end up in a program that is poorly suited to supporting you in following your interests.
> 2 votes
# Answer
It will not go against you. I shows that you have an enquiring mind and are willing to change your mind as new opportunities open. To continue in a subject that is not right for you will be a really bad experience for you and may end up in failure - that's not good for you, or the institution. Go ahead and ask the question, but frame it as a positive decision, rather than a negative one.
> 0 votes
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Tags: graduate-admissions, masters
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thread-31174
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/31174
|
Is there typically a pre-screening process for doctoral admissions in the US?
|
2014-11-05T07:38:28.987
|
# Question
Title: Is there typically a pre-screening process for doctoral admissions in the US?
I am applying to doctoral programs in the US and I am wondering: is it common for applications to be filtered before they reach the hiring committee?
In the typical selection and admissions procedure for doctoral students, what happens after the deadline for applications has passed?
# Answer
For US universities applications are almost universally prescreened for completeness and meeting any stated minimum requirements. The prescreen in process is almost always extremely rigid when minimum requirements are set. The wording on website is often confusing since sometimes schools want to be able to make special acceptances to people who do not meet the minimums. This requires someone from the department to beg and plead with the admin team. One place there is generally no flexibility at all is TOEFL requirements. It would be perfectly reasonable to call/email the department and ask, large departments get many such requests every year. Just realize that the answer will likely be the minimum is the minimum.
> 6 votes
# Answer
Although it's hard to say that there is a "typical" process, most PhD admissions are handled both an administrative staff member (often with a title like *Graduate Program Administrator* or *Officer*) and by an admissions committee made up of faculty.
**The administrative staff will generally filter applications.** For example, if applications are incomplete (e.g., missing grades, test scores, or recommendations), the administrator will often remove these applications from the pool. If the department has firm requirements (e.g., minimum TOEFL scores or GREs), the staff will often remove applicants who do not qualify from the pool.
This smaller pool will be reviewed by the faculty. In many departments, this will be by the graduate admissions committee who may then reach out to individual faculty members who seem like potential advisors to strong applicants. In some other departments, the files of students may be sent directly to potential supervisors by the administrative staff.
Faculty will usually be able to see the unfiltered pool but will not often look at the applicants who have been filtered out by the staff based on the most objective criteria of application completeness or eligibility.
> 2 votes
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Tags: phd, graduate-admissions, application, united-states
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thread-25607
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/25607
|
What to wear for a PhD/ MSc thesis defense?
|
2014-07-10T08:11:00.390
|
# Question
Title: What to wear for a PhD/ MSc thesis defense?
Is it better to wear formal clothes for a PhD or MSc thesis defense or can we wear something as simple as a T-shirt?
# Answer
> 13 votes
Almost anything will be fine, provided you feel comfortable on them. The clothes you are wearing will influence the first impression, but you are going to be talking about your project for at least 20 min, and the confidence and clarity will wipe whatever the first idea was. Make sure they are you feel good on them, and don't use them for the first time this day in case they itch or something (specially important for underwear!).
The *right* level of formalism is very dependent on the culture and setting, but it is probably not so important. It will also depend on whether the event is public or not: if the audience are going to be the people that have been seeing you in normal clothes all year round, or if the public is going to attend and the University wants to shine. Of course, a frock and a top hat or just a swimming suit will look ridiculous, but anywhere in the middle would work.
For reference, I have been present to two PhD defences in Sweden (where they are quite lax in formalities). In one, the doctorand was wearing plain business-like clothes, slightly more formal than a normal day; in the other, he was wearing a normal shirt, quite *less* formal than his normal attire. And, for the record, both passed.
**Edit:** Jigg is right in pointing that some universities do require a certain dress code. In this case, it will probably be clearly stated by the centre. Being rejected is possible, but extremely unlikely, as it can get the university in all sorts of legal troubles. Also, these regulations can get to absurd levels (the story seems to be a legend, but the third comment may be legit).
# Answer
> 10 votes
Think of it as a job interview, but actually much more important than that. There is such a thing as unconscious bias - first impressions count and you should therefore aim to make a good one. If you look professional, then they will think you are professional, and are more likely to trust and believe in you. It may not be fair, but that is how it is. I recommend being smartly dressed.
# Answer
> 8 votes
In job interviews it's actually a mistake to dress up fully formally for jobs (like software) that don't require it. Your grad student culture has a range probably from t-shirts to business casual.
I do think it's important to say, "Hey, I'm taking this seriously, this is a serious occasion, and I'm prepared." Comfort is the other important thing.
In one sentence, wear something in the top third of your wardrobe, but not in the top tenth. Smarter/sharper is good, fancy pants dinner or gala attire is bad.
That being said, here's my attempt at male fashion advice (sorry, I can't really help the women here too much) if you really do feel like a more detailed breakdown will help you.
* Street shoes (c.f. sneakers)
* dark wash jeans or slacks
* collared shirt tucked in, or similar such as nice sweater
* belt
* neatly shaven to your level of grooming (beard or clean okay, just whatever you wear)
* not looking like you "need a haircut" but don't get a fancy or special haircut. Wear your normal accessories, whether it be watch or necklace.
* If tattoos are part of your look they've got you this far, don't worry about covering them or not ("within reason").
* Try not to look like a sloppy student who *never* dresses up: wear clothes straight from the cleaner.
* A tie if you like, in my mind I picture that as a nice addition but not necessary.
I think a jacket is too much: it will make you look too "other" compared to the professors. If you over-dress you will make yourself look "on the spot" more than you already are, and who wants that?
This might sound too analytical for fashion (unless you're really into fashion in which case it sounds fun!), but this shouldn't sound daunting. Just dress normal, normal, normal, nice.
# Answer
> 7 votes
You *can* wear something as informal as a t-shirt and, as others have said, it probably won't swing the decision one way or another. I've seen very informal defense dress from passing students. That said, **most people dress up *at least* slightly more formally than normal and many wear business attire.** If you're extremely uncomfortable or resistant to dressing up, don't worry too much. Otherwise: Why not?
Showing up wearing a suit and tie or similarly formal business attire is a strong signal that you are taking the defense seriously. Although they're not everything, first impressions matter and formal dress can also help you look (and feel) authoritative, knowledgeable, and a way you can show that you've taken the time to be prepared.
I am extremely casual on a day-to-day basis but I wore a suit for my defense. Although my own advisor teased me that my defense was the first time he'd seen me dressed up, the fact that he knew that I rarely dressed that way made it very clear how seriously I took the process. Would I have passed anyway? Sure. But even if the effect is one person challenges you a little bit less in the Q&A, that could be worth it.
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Tags: masters, defense, outward-appearance
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thread-34493
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34493
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What is the average salary of assistant professor in New Zealand?
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2014-12-18T17:55:42.700
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# Question
Title: What is the average salary of assistant professor in New Zealand?
What is the rough salary one should expect from a research university in New Zealand, say in mathematics or sciences areas, at the beginning assistant professor (called Lecturer in NZ) level professor?
# Answer
You can find the current collective agreements for all universities on the Tertiary Education Union's website. Entry-level salaries for a lecturer, and the low point of the senior lecturer range, at the start of 2021 were as follows (all NZD):
| University | L1 salary | SL1 salary |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Auckland | 83,602 | 106,285 |
| AUT | 73,966 | 91,226 |
| Waikato | 77,402 | 95,883 |
| Massey | 74,478 | 93,335 |
| Victoria | 79,276 | 99,870 |
| Canterbury | 79,671 | 102,142 |
| Lincoln | 73,018 | 92,723 |
| Otago | 82,416 | 103,678 |
The average is about NZ$78,000. These generally have annual percentage adjustments built in, so the base rate increases each year. There is generally also an automatic progression within a grade for current staff across several steps spread between the lecturer base and senior lecturer base, and it is generally possible to be appointed mid-grade as well according to experience (e.g. working time since PhD). All of this varies from school to school, and there are also other payments that may apply, so you should check the agreements for particular details you're interested in. If you're not a union member these rates will generally apply to you when you start as well (by law, historically, but the situation may change).
A couple of the agreements linked above have expired, and may have been replaced but not yet made available on the website, and some contain increments that hadn't come into effect yet. The general area of the numbers is right, though. There is a fair amount of variation between institutions, particularly the largest and smallest universities. There's also quite a bit of variation in how the scale works above that lowest-level entry point and how many steps there are (between 6 and 9 before moving to SL).
> 12 votes
# Answer
Wikipedia suggests that "assistant professor" is equivalent to "Lecturer" in the Australian and New Zealand Academic ranking systems.
My guess is that you can google any New Zealand university and they will list salaries for a Lecturer. For example, I searched for "university of auckland academic salaries" and obtained the following document
So if you were employed as a lecturer in 2014, you'd probably start at $76,535 (New Zealand Dollars; exchange rate as of 19th Dec 2014 is 1 NZ dollar buys .78 US dollars; so starting salary would be around $60,000 USD) and each year you'd typically go up an increment (i.e., about $2,500 NZD; $1,950 USD) until you hit the top of "lecturer". At that point, further pay rises would be contingent on applying for a promotion to senior lecturer.
The relevant section from the University of Auckland agreement is shown below.
> 8 votes
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Tags: professorship, salary, lecturer, assistant-professor, new-zealand
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thread-34508
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34508
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Should I do a PhD or Master in Statistics for a career in Data Science?
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2014-12-18T23:52:49.157
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# Question
Title: Should I do a PhD or Master in Statistics for a career in Data Science?
I am a Mathematics student with a concentration in Applied and Computational Mathematics. I have done a Mathematics research project with a faculty member, which resulted in a co-authored paper being refereed. This project was on image processing, and I was exposed to some large scale data analysis. The **original knowledge discovery** element of the project was very exciting, and that's what made me decide to go to graduate school.
However, I had a hard time deciding what I want to study. I am naturally interested in many things (I was an Art History major before switching to Mathematics), and not inclined to put forth serious intellectual effort in anything that would narrow my career possibilities afterwards. For example, for some time I was very interested in Financial Mathematics, but then realized that this may limit my career options to the finance industry. With my research experience, I could see that Data Science is an interdisciplinary subject with potential application in a vast number of fields. So Data Science is a possible "major" for my graduate study.
As for the programs, Master programs bearing the names of "Data Analytics", "Data Science" and the like don't appeal to me as much as Statistics MS/PhD with Data Science track. The reason is that many of the former ones seem to be more or less "fad" programs (I'm not wishing to offend anyone here, so correct me if I'm wrong) designed to meet increasing industry demands for skilled data analysts, and so may lack the systematic, deep mathematical rigor and generality (i.e., not confined to business applications) I appreciate in the latter programs.
So it seems a PhD/Master in Statistics would suit my criteria for (1) a widely applicable, interdisciplinary subject and (2) more rigorous, mathematical training of the subject. What do you think?
Please note that as of now I have no particular preference for industry or academia after program completion. Which of the two I will end up in will depend largely on how my job search goes. I know that the number of faculty positions is much fewer than the number of PhD students wishing to fill those positions; also industry may pay better, and I am not dead set on producing academic papers in prestigious journals. As long as I get to work on interesting problems, using data science as a tool, and make independent discoveries as contribution, I would be happy.
Edit: Since this post may be too broad, as @Stephen pointed out, I rephrased my question as follows: given my interests in (1) independent knowledge discovery, (2) diversity of knowledge domains and applications, (3) systematic training, and (4) a career in Data Science, my question is: Is a Ph.D. in Statistics the right path? @Stephen has given a thoughtful response, but I would like to hear from others as well.
# Answer
Interesting question, but likely to be closed as "opinion-based" or "too broad".
I personally have a math Ph.D., then started to do applied statistics in a "classical" academic environment (analyzing psychology studies), finally ended up in a Data Science-type job. I fully agree that postgraduate work in statistics would be the best preparation for a career in Data Science.
As @Vietnhi notes, there are three key ingredients for becoming a good Data Scientist:
* a solid grounding in statistics
* programming/hacking skills
* subject matter expertise
(See also Drew Conway's Data Science Venn Diagram, which I posted and discussed here).
Of the three, it seems to me like the statistics part is hardest to learn in a non-structured environment. From what I see in my day-to-day work and on CrossValidated, people will rather easily pick up programming skills and subject matter knowledge, but understanding randomness - and this is really what statistics is all about - is very hard. (See, e.g., here.)
So as long as there are no serious Data Science study tracks available (and I agree that most offerings right now are likely bandwagons people jump on), it makes sense to concentrate on statistics (getting a structured study path via the Ph.D. program), but really work to understand the actual tools for handling large data sets, and trying to get a certain amount of subject matter expertise in at least one field. Optimally, you'd do an applied stats thesis which requires you to actually work in a specific field and apply stats there.
You may want to look at Data Science.
> 5 votes
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Tags: graduate-school, statistics, data-science
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thread-34531
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34531
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Dealing with a friend who always leans on me
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2014-12-19T09:29:47.173
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# Question
Title: Dealing with a friend who always leans on me
I study Mathematics and Computer Science. I have a classmate who excessively depends on me when it comes to coursework . He wants me to explain definitions, proofs, share code, check his proofs and bugs in programs. It seems to me he does not pull enough efforts when he doesn't get things in the first try and approaches for help.
I have tried to advice by saying *"you should work on this for more time"* as most of his questions are trivial. I think that he *finds it easier to get help from somebody* rather than reading again or spending more time. I also think that I am spoiling him by helping. This is also ruining me as this eats up my time.
What is a good solution to my problem? How can I convince him to put more effort from his part? I tried to avoid him especially when exams get near, but he ends up finding me.
# Answer
He's a postgraduate, and so are you. A postgraduate degree is self-guided study. And while there's scope for group working and collective problem solving, hand-holding him is actually making his situation worse, not better.
In other words, by doing his work for him, you are hindering him. If he truly is a friend, then it's time for you to stop hindering him.
Explain to him that you have been preventing him becoming a fully-fledged researcher, and apologise for that; remind him that the purpose of the degree is to build research skills, self-discipline, and independent thought, and that when he asks you to do work for him, you're both complicit in preventing him from achieving these goals. And so it's got to stop, for his sake, and for your sake in not being complicit with what's going on.
> 7 votes
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Tags: etiquette, academic-life, interpersonal-issues
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thread-34528
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34528
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Can I put my NSF fellowship on reserve in order to investigate leaving academia?
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2014-12-19T08:50:01.780
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# Question
Title: Can I put my NSF fellowship on reserve in order to investigate leaving academia?
I'm currently a PhD student in mathematics at a well-ranked school. Unfortunately, after a few years of increasing frustration and self-doubt, I'm considering leaving academia and trying to start a different career.
I currently have an NSF graduate fellowship. As described in the information guide for fellows, one's "status" with regards to the fellowship can be either
* **Tenure:** Tenure is the period of time during which Fellows utilize the fellowship to pursue an advanced degree in science, mathematics, or engineering...
* **Reserve:** With prior Foundation approval, Fellows may reserve any two years over the five-year period to use an alternative means of support, *or to engage in activities other than graduate study...* (emphasis mine)
(There are also options for medical or military deferral. The full description of Tenure and Reserve status are in the linked document.)
Does this mean I can request to reserve my fellowship for the 2015-2016 academic year, using that time "test the waters" on another career, such that if I decide to stay in – or rather, go back to – academia, I would still have my NSF fellowship?
Of course if I do something like this, I would want it to be with my advisor's approval, though I haven't brought up this specific idea with them yet. Let's assume they are okay with it.
# Answer
> 5 votes
There do not appear to be any reservations on the purpose for requesting a deferral in the linked guide. You need to tell them in advance of filing the "Declaration To Utilize, Reserve Or Terminate A Subsequent Year Of A 3-Year Graduate Fellowship Award" and get their approval, but I don't think that there are many reasons for them to deny it. You might want to have *something* lined up like an internship, other job, or visit to a foreign university rather than just saying that you're taking a year away from studying. Though, I wouldn't be surprised if the latter happens, too.
Edited to add: You need to start talking to your supervisor and eventually the NSF Program Officer in charge of your fellowship.
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Tags: career-path, mathematics, funding, nsf
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thread-34431
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34431
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Stuctured vs Individual German doctoral program
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2014-12-17T15:18:34.410
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# Question
Title: Stuctured vs Individual German doctoral program
I am looking for a Ph.D. in a German-speaking country in Europe. I am looking at some possible institutes for applying on Ph.D. program. Some offer "individual" and some "structured" doctoral programs, and some offer both.
My situation is that I do not come from academic environment, which means that I don't have contact with any potential supervisor. I guess that if you go directly from Master to Phd (in academic environment), you should have thesis subject, which means you apply for Individual doctorate. Instead, I am coming from industrial environment, and I don't have yet thesis subject. I completed my Masters 2 years ago, and left academic circles.
My question is: why choose one of "structured" or "individual" over the other? I believe that structured is "easier" if you don't have potential supervisor or thesis subject, but I would appreciate guidance from those who know this system better.
# Answer
> 6 votes
I think there are some basic misunderstandings here to clear up.
* You do not necessarily have to have a pre-conceived thesis topic to do a PhD with an individual faculty member at an academic institution in Germany, particularly if you're in the sciences or engineering. This can actually be counterproductive, since usually the faculty member will have funding for a student to work on project X. If you're not interested in working on project X, you're not going to be a good fit for the project, whether or not you had a topic in advance or not.
* Having a pre-existing relationship with a potential advisor is useful, but not necessary for a project. Often times, they will be looking for the best individual candidate if no "internal" candidate is available.
The primary difference between "structured" and "individual" programs is that the structured programs tend to be a cluster of related PhD projects with a similar infrastructure holding things together, and potentially a different funding mechanism than traditional individual projects. There may also be some differences in the required duties outside of research (for example, there may be reduced teaching requirements, or even none at all). However, in terms of the long-range benefits, there is essentially no difference, except for listing a special program in addition to the faculty where your PhD was awarded. From a functional standpoint, the degree you'll get will be essentially identical.
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Tags: phd, germany
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thread-34455
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34455
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What are the most frequently cited textbooks in the physics literature?
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2014-12-18T03:14:52.453
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# Question
Title: What are the most frequently cited textbooks in the physics literature?
What are the most frequently cited textbooks in the physics literature?
**Note**: I am not looking for guesses, but answers supported by citations data. What are some good physics citations databases?
# Answer
> 5 votes
The answer you might be looking for lies in this recent Nature News article on the most cited scholarly works of all time.
Specifically, for evidence supported by real data I'd look at the Google Scholar top 100 spreadsheet file
In this, you'll find Google Scholar citation data for physics-related books like:
It depends what you define as a 'textbook' though, I suppose...
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Tags: publications, citations, books, physics
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thread-32726
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/32726
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How can I lookup the registering info of an ISSN number?
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2014-12-04T17:43:52.327
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# Question
Title: How can I lookup the registering info of an ISSN number?
While applying for an ISSN, applicants are asked to provide publisher name, country/city, contact info and editor name. How/where can I look up an ISSN number to get these info?
Of course for a single ISSN number, I can google, find the journal site and contact them via the website. But I am doing a research on a big number of ISSNs.
Moreover, how can I be sure it is not a fake number?!! Anyone can comeup with an 8 digit number, and call it an ISSN! IS there a main ISSN portal/service, where I can lookup ISSN numbers?
thanks
# Answer
> 2 votes
A partial answer:
You can check if the ISSN is 'fake' or not at this ISSN-Validator website. It doesn't provide much useful info though. All numbers entered are either 'invalid' or 'valid' with no further information given.
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Tags: publications, publishers
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thread-34459
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34459
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What are the major differences between PhD programs in mathematics and PhD programs in other STEM fields?
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2014-12-18T06:11:46.430
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# Question
Title: What are the major differences between PhD programs in mathematics and PhD programs in other STEM fields?
I am currently two years into a math PhD program at a mid-tier state school. I read a lot of advice about getting a STEM PhD on the Internet, but a lot of it seems very inapplicable to mathematics. I don't have a lab or a PI, I don't need data, and my assistantship consists solely of teaching. None of the advice I read sounds anything like the experience I'm having here.
Compared to other STEM fields,
* How common is it for math students to be supported by external funding (e.g. NSF GRFP) rather than a TAship? How common is it for math students to do internships in industry to gain practical experience? How common is it for math students to do outreach or volunteer work during graduate school?
* Does a math department generally provide support and guidance to students when it comes to finding and applying for fellowships and internships? Is it a common attitude that it is the student's responsibility, if he wants those things, to undertake all steps of this process by himself?
* Is it normal for math departments to disregard students' research interests in favor of mandatory coursework? For example, because all of my time is tied up in the 1st/2nd year courses and exams, I have been unable to do any research for the last two years, despite being very prepared and capable on my first day. (I published during undergrad and was chasing several promising ideas when I arrived.) When I asked to be allowed time to do research instead of taking classes, I was rudely shut down.
* How often do mathematics departments get together in social or community events, such as departmental happy hours?
* How is networking different in mathematics? Do professors generally have connections in industry or prominent members of their field, or is that a rare thing?
(**Note.** I'm sure it is evident from some of the above questions that I am feeling a little put off by my department. The point of this question is not to seek out sympathy or validation. The department just seems stubbornly uncooperative, and completely uninvested in my future, which is not what I was expecting. I want to know how common this is- whether it is unique to my department, or the nature of the discipline. But this is a peripheral point, the question I'm asking is about how these factors work in general, not just with me.)
# Answer
> 12 votes
In brief, many aspects of math grad school are very different from CompSci, for example.
The vast majority of math grad students are funded by TA-ships, although some have NSF and other fellowships. The (large) size of typical math depts is tied to their role as service departments, teaching lower-division math, and this is what funds the large number of math grad students.
Internships in some applied math fields are desirable, but non-trivial to arrange.
Outreach and volunteer work are not strongly connected with these other questions.
It is not that math depts "disregard students' research interests", but that, almost universally in the U.S., further coursework beyond undergrad work is ... wise. If one has an unusually solid background, there are usually procedures by which to "test out" of requirements. On another hand, I am well aware that a certain number of grad students do feel that they're all ready to do research, and that coursework gets in the way. The "problem" is that "research" at a professional level in mathematics is not necessarily an immediate continuation of the sort of "research" typically done in undergrad projects. Another "problem" is that mathematics is an old subject, and there is a lot of very useful, helpful, enlightening stuff already known... and whose relevance to any given research project is very difficult to guess based on ignorance. I am absolutely not in favor of "oppressing" students by pointless busywork, but I am equally opposed to ignorance. Accurate perception of a given situation is difficult, and both students and faculty often have pre-existing biases... Again, testing-out of requirements ought to be a viable option, if one is well-prepared. If one doesn't see the relevance of the requirements, I'd tend to interpret this as reflecting a need to better understand the *content* of the required subjects. (Because they *are* relevant.)
In particular, depts to not "disregard students' research interests", except as not automatically exempting students from "requirements". Further, there are many hours in a day...
As to social events... it depends.
Networking? People know people. "Industrial connections" would exist only for very applied people, although connections to applied science research groups inside the university are common.
And/but none of what the question describes strikes me as unusually "uncooperative". In my observation, it is very common that math grad school is quite different from what people are expecting, exactly insofar as many students expect to immediately "start research" (perhaps parallel to the impression given about other STEM fields' programs), rather than having any required coursework at all. Also, there seems to be a not-uncommon disaffection with TA-ing, as though this were lowlier than having a fellowship of some sort or research assistantship... and is construed, again, as "obstructing research". But without all these TA-ships, many fewer math grad students would have any financial support at all. (There's little grunt-work available in mathematics that would compare to the low-level research-support work in some other STEM fields, which does (by tradition) get the student's name on a published paper, etc.)
So, yes, mathematics is somewhat different from other STEM fields. Further, the fact that a program is not what one presumed it would/should be is not at all a strong indicator that something's wrong with the program (although, of course, there are dubious programs). The greatest resentment I see is among students who believe that they're fully-fledged "researchers", and are offended to not be immediately treated as such... While this message can be imparted rudely, and perceived as "a rude shut-down", the many issues of professional competence are not easy for novices to judge.
(One more time: one can see about "testing out" of requirements...)
Edit: prompted by Brian Borcher's comment... Teaching is an important part of an academic mathematician's job! The question of "how much" is secondary. The TA experience is very important to get up to speed on teaching, and, in unhappy cases, to discover early on that one hasn't the taste for it, if that is so. (I had one PhD student who discovered this unhappy fact in his own case, so he did not take the academic route.) Part of what one should try to learn is that "teaching is not a burden"... !!! ... to say the least. :)
# Answer
> 10 votes
While I think some of your questions point to genuine weaknesses in math departments (a lack of an internship pipeline, for example), a lot of them reflect a really unrealistic idea of what "cooperation" means. Your DGS, chair, etc. have met a lot of 1st/2nd year graduate students, and thus they know that very few of them are ready to do serious research, and in fact very few of them really know what that would mean. It wouldn't be looking after your interests to leave you to do research on your own, with no way of checking that you aren't just wasting your time. 1st year classes exist to cover basic material that any mathematician should know. If you know the material, it would have been reasonable to skip them (and usually departments will give students flexibility to do this), but as I say below, if they are taking up all your time, that gives the lie to your suggestion that you were already ready to do research.
*How common is it for math students to be supported by external funding (e.g. NSF GRFP) rather than a TAship?*
Rare, outside the very top schools.
*How common is it for math students to do internships in industry to gain practical experience?*
Rare in my experience in pure math departments.
*How common is it for math students to do outreach or volunteer work during graduate school?*
More common. I've known lots of people who taught (for example) in prisons as volunteers, or worked with K-12 students. Depends a lot on what's available.
*Does a math department generally provide support and guidance to students when it comes to finding and applying for fellowships and internships?*
For fellowships, they should but the reality is more mixed. In my experience, the problem is more that students aren't willing to go through the application process, so faculty have been burned a few too many times to be proactive about it. It might require a little initiative to get help with this.
*Is it a common attitude that it is the student's responsibility, if he wants those things, to undertake all steps of this process by himself?*
Yes. Graduate students are adults, and responsible for themselves. It might happen that someone in the department is looking for graduate students for an opportunity like this, but at the end of the day, it is up to you.
*Is it normal for math departments to disregard students' research interests in favor of mandatory coursework?*
This is pretty insulting: obviously the department requires the coursework because they believe it is in the students' interests. Of course, it's hard to have a system that fits everyone, but very few students could be successful in grad school in math without taking a couple of years of classes (again, with the possible exception of the best schools).
*For example, because all of my time is tied up in the 1st/2nd year courses and exams, I have been unable to do any research for the last two years, despite being very prepared and capable on my first day. (I published during undergrad and was chasing several promising ideas when I arrived.)*
If you were very prepared and capable, then your first year classes should have been easy, and you should have had plenty of time. If they were hard enough to take up all your time, you didn't know the material.
*When I asked to be allowed time to do research instead of taking classes, I was rudely shut down.*
I can't comment on whether it was rude or not, but I can't say it was a surprise that this approach did not work. Since you haven't mentioned a research advisor, I'm going to assume you don't have one. Very few students would be capable of doing this, and I have trouble imagining that your undergrad publications were so strong and independent that the department should have had faith that you were one of them.
*How often do mathematics departments get together in social or community events, such as departmental happy hours?*
Depends. Departmental happy hours aren't a strong tradition, but department teas are, and usually departments have a department-wide social event like a picnic or holiday party every semester or so.
*How is networking different in mathematics? Do professors generally have connections in industry or prominent members of their field, or is that a rare thing?*
Rarely in industry, usually with prominent members of their field, but this depends a lot on the definition of "prominent" and "field."
# Answer
> 8 votes
I'm going to focus on the third question: "Is it normal for math departments to disregard students' research interests in favor of mandatory coursework?"
In comparison with PhD programs in many other fields, PhD programs in mathematics in the US typically have quite a bit of required coursework and often include preliminary/qualifying exams that cover a very broad range of topics. In my experience, graduate students working in other STEM disciplines typically have fewer required courses to take. Thus the answer to your question is "Yes, this is quite common."
For example, as a graduate student I took required courses in abstract algebra, real and complex analysis, functional analysis, and topology, even though my dissertation was in computational optimization.
It's traditionally felt that mathematics PhD's should have a broad background in mathematics so that they can easily teach undergraduate courses in almost any area of mathematics. The required coursework helps to develop this breadth.
Keep in mind that the academic job market for PhD's in mathematics in the US is very different from the job market for PhD's in other STEM disciplines. Most PhD's in mathematics will end up working in teaching positions at community colleges and regional comprehensive 4 year colleges rather than in research oriented positions at universities. Having a broad background in mathematics (and experience as a TA) is helpful preparation for teaching oriented positions.
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Tags: graduate-school, funding, mathematics, internship, administration
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thread-30765
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/30765
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Does "submitted to Thomson Reuters" mean that a publication will actually be indexed?
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2014-10-29T01:05:07.653
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# Question
Title: Does "submitted to Thomson Reuters" mean that a publication will actually be indexed?
I have seen a few conferences that state on the call for submissions that the conference will be "submitted for indexing in Thomson Reuters Conference Proceedings Citation Index (ISI Web of Science)."
Does submission mean they will 'apply' and could be rejected, or are all submissions accepted?
# Answer
> 3 votes
It does sound like rather tentative wording.
Thomson Reuters cannot, would not, and should not accept all and any submissions of anything for indexing - it would swamp the system with spam.
So to me, it sounds like the conference has applied to be indexed, but it is certainly ***not*** absolutely guaranteed that they will be included in the Thomson Reuters Conference Proceedings Citation Index.
# Answer
> 3 votes
It only means that was it **submitted**. In order to be added to the TRCP index, the submission needs to **approved** by the Thomson Reuters staff before it will be added. If the information on the conference website is up to date it means they have not (yet) been rejected but that does not mean their submission or application will be approved. I have no idea how long the wait for approval is.
In the best case, this is a signal that a conference's reputation is not yet firmly established. Even if it is eventually accepted, submitting to a conference with no real reputation is a risky choice.
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Tags: conference, indexing
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thread-34555
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34555
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Why the taboo against naming discoveries after yourself?
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2014-12-19T15:57:39.750
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# Question
Title: Why the taboo against naming discoveries after yourself?
It is often considered a very bad idea to try to name a discovery (a law, phenomenon or an invention) after yourself.
On the other hand, there are many species names which seem to be a bastardized Latin of the discoverer's name. With gene names, I'm not sure, but I've seen many frivolous gene names, such as those inspired by cartoon characters. I wonder if you could get away with naming a gene after yourself if you wanted to.
In other cases, such as names of synthetic strains and plasmids, it is in fact preferable to use the researcher's name. Off the top of my head, I recall G**F**AJ-1 \- the surrounding controversy aside, given all the work she's done, what is so wrong about her wanting to name it after herself?
However, why is this so? Apparently, it can even advance to an extreme where many years after a discovery has become established and associated with Dr. Jones, when he writes a review article on applications of the Jones Effect he will still carefully avoid acknowledging this name.
Isn't it convenient to simply name something after yourself when no clever acronym exists? Isn't doing the work of the discovery enough to earn the right to name a thing? Doesn't the fact that the discovery is important enough to be published automatically imply that it's important enough to be named after oneself?
# Answer
In general, the name of a thing should indicate an aspect of it which is very important to the person assigning the name. A person who creates something and names it after themselves implies that they think the most important thing about it is that they created it. That would in turn suggest to anyone who isn't interested in the person who created it would likely not be interested in the thing thus named.
Thus, naming something after oneself is not necessarily a sign of ego, but rather the opposite. If Alex Johnson (made-up name) publishes a paper entitled "Alex Johnson's Laws of Quarkions", the title would suggest that the paper was primarily relevant in relation to Alex Johnson's other work and would have little relevance outside that. If instead the paper had been simply published "Laws of Quarkions", that would have a stronger implication that the author believed laws described therein to be universal, and thus relevant everywhere.
It is only after the importance of something becomes self-evident that the attaching of the creator's name to it really serves to elevate the status of the creator. Until such time, the attachment of the creator's name will tend to deprecate the importance of the thing thus named.
> 29 votes
# Answer
Traditionally naming after scientists has been considered an honour bestowed upon somebody by their colleagues. This is why there are plenty of such names in latin animal or plant names. one very good example is *Strigiphilus garylarsoni*, a chewing louse, named after Gary Larson, author of the *Far Side*.
Naming can also be subject to strict laws. In some countries, it is, for example, not possible to name official places after persons until after they have passed away. This is to prevent people to inflate their own reputation while alive (it is quite easy to see where such behaviour is going overboard). But, this is a digression.
The main point is that etiquette indicates that one does not name things after one-self, one can hope that the work is so appreciated by others that a naming occurs. It is probably also a good thing that everything we discover is not named after a person. I drove my Smith at 120 kiloJones per Dickens.
> 30 votes
# Answer
One reason is that academia tends to frown on self promotion of all sorts (not just naming things after yourself). This is certainly not a universal rule, and some areas are more tolerant of self promotion than others, but it's a good first approximation.
Another reason is avoiding conflicts of interest. A meaningful, descriptive name is better than naming something after its discoverer (imagine if black holes were called something like "Smith objects"). Furthermore, several people are often involved in any given discovery, either as coauthors or as authors of related papers, and it can be tricky to decide who really deserves the most credit. If you let people name things after themselves, they will naturally have a bias to choose that name instead of a more meaningful or appropriate name. Ruling this out of course doesn't eliminate all bias, but it's a start.
> 25 votes
# Answer
The one word answer is: culture. The culture of academia — and indeed many other areas of life — has a variety of rules placed on self-promotion and naming. These are, in many way, arbitrary, capricious, and often illogical or unreasonable, but that's just how culture is. It serves various functions, some good and some bad.
The general rule is: complimenting someone is an honor, while complimenting yourself is usually frowned upon. The cultural mores are that you should be concerned with other people's opinion of you and work hard to win their high regards, but you should be humble and uncertain of your own personal values.
This is partly due to a myriad of psychological mechanisms, like the fundamental negative bias (people are naturally better at spotting and remembering negative things), attribution bias, illusory superiority (everyone thinks they are above average), tactics to combat free-loaders/loafers/cons, and vested/conflicted interest.
In short: we are highly skeptical of people who are trying to tell us how great they are. Also, naming things is hard, at the same time as having something named after you is considered an extremely high honor — a truly grand compliment.
If I said, "Man, that Brian guy is really an amazingly great person" or if I discovered a previously unknown kind of rock and named them "Brian rocks", there are many people who would immediately have the urge to punch me in the face.
It is further generally recommended that you avoid doing things that make people instinctively want to punch you in the face. And so it goes in academia. You are free to ignore it and name a tower after yourself or try to place your own name on a discovery, but you should just be warned that some people might not react well to this.
Ultimately, it's just a weird social truth: it's always better to have people compliment you than to have to do it yourself. That's not to say you can't toot your own horn (especially when no one else seems to want to), but it's way better to get yourself a shill.
Man, that Superbest guy asks great questions...
Note: Not all cultures are this way. Indeed, in business it is generally accepted that you can name the business or product after yourself all you want, and self-promotion is often actively encouraged with far less limitations. This is, one might imagine, an area where business and academia don't always see eye to eye.
> 18 votes
# Answer
My sense of this is that a name on a scientific artifact is seen as a form of immortality. Newton's Laws will remain Newton's Laws for untold centuries to come, and Isaac Newton will be remembered as an important figure of science for discovering them, just as Carl Friedrich Gauss will be remembered, and Leonhard Euler, and Edsger Dijkstra, and Marie Curie, and so on. Even when the students who use their names don't know their biography, they honor their memory.
If you name something after yourself, you are saying that your accomplishment is as significant and deserving of going down in history as the ones that I have named above. Most scientific work, however, doesn't turn out that way. Even the work that does is mostly identified only by how it stands the test of time. So if you name something after yourself, you are effectively saying that you are so smart that you can see into the future and tell that history will judge your work as super-important.
What a massively egotistical assumption!
*Note: Some things, like synthetic plasmids, are exempt from this principle because they are not so much immortalizations as card catalog indices. You are not likely, for example, to find "Janet Wang's plasmid," but rather "pJanetWang-73j-v2" meaning something like Janet Wang's 73rd plasmid, type j, version 2.*
> 17 votes
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Tags: etiquette, terminology, personal-name
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thread-34566
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34566
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Do I need to mention having survived a life-threatening illness when applying for a new academic position?
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2014-12-19T18:46:25.390
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# Question
Title: Do I need to mention having survived a life-threatening illness when applying for a new academic position?
Do I have to (or is it wise or unwise) to mention having survived a life-threatening illness (such as cancer, a (early) heart attack, etc when applying for a new (non-leading) academic position?
Assume that my health condition is now good enough (and the past health troubles are not obvious from my outward appearance) such that from a medical point of view nothing speaks against my further persuing my academic career and interests.
Nevertheless, due the specific medicaments I have to take for the rest of my life and some remnants of the past health issues, there might be times my productivity might slightly be lessened. Also, even though the probability is not very high, it can in principle not be 100% excluded that the illness will come back at some point.
Of course I would not mention this in a written application, but should I talk about my health condition in the context of an interview or before things are getting serious and it comes to signing the contract?
BTW I currently live in Germany
# Answer
> 25 votes
**If you think it helps explain a work or productivity gap in your career, I would mention it and I would do so in writing rather than let your prospective employers speculate.** Because overcoming a major medical challenge can help you align your priorities and strengthen you in other ways, doing so can definitely be done in a way that leads one to conclude that it is a strength, not a weakness, of your candidacy.
**If your previous condition is not relevant in these ways, I don't think you have any obligation to bring it up.** Sure, your illness *might* return but *nobody* is 100% immune from serious illness impacting their ability to work or be productive. For that matter, severe chronic illnesses that unambiguously affect productivity (e.g., cramps, migraines, etc.) are simply not the kind of thing that people bring up while interviewing and candidates have no responsibility to do so.
Reminding prospective employers of this can open to the door to (illegal) discrimination based on your medical history and I don't think you are helping either yourself or your prospective employers by bringing it up. When you take an offer, it might be good to let your future department know about your history as background but you might even let this just be raised socially.
# Answer
> 7 votes
If you live in the United States, you are not obligated to provide any information pertinent to disability, including life-threatening illness. What with competition for jobs being so fierce, you may find yourself overtly or covertly discriminated against in favour of someone who is healthier. That's why the Americans with Disabilities Act was passed into law. Any questions regarding your health from an employer are also illegal, so you are not obligated to answer.
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Tags: etiquette, application, health
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thread-34574
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34574
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How to cite an updated report?
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2014-12-19T20:48:49.037
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# Question
Title: How to cite an updated report?
Research reports published on the webpage of the home institution are sometimes updated during the revision process. Suppose a first version was published in 2013, and the update came in 2014, and suppose the first version is not available anymore. The web page may say something like "XYZ, 2013. Revised 2014". Which date to use for citation?
Argument for
"2013": This may please the sensitive among the authors.
"2014": This is factually correct as I'm citing the content of this version which is also currently online. But what if they update again?
"2013. Revised 2014": This has its obvious benefits, but is probably too cumbersome to be consistently implemented.
# Answer
This is a frequent case when dealing with "live" documents such as standards, software packages, and technical manuals. There are two basic approaches to handling it, and which is better to use depends on whether the document bears a clear version marking.
* If there is a clear version and date stamp, then you treat each version as a different document, which happen to share similar names, e.g.:
> Arbuckle, J. *Feline Packet Exchange Protocol*, version 3.2, June 2011.
* If either version or date stamp are not clear from the document, then the date is the date that that you retrieved it, e.g.:
> Arbuckle, J. *Feline Packet Router*, retrieved from http://garfield.com/networkingprotocols/ June 14th, 2011.
Exact formatting depends on the style you are using.
> 1 votes
# Answer
I think the main problem here is the use of the term "published" just because it is *posted* on the web page. If a report is under revision, it is strictly speaking not published. Once published it should be fixed in terms of its content or it should carry some form of revision marking such as "Second Edition" or "version 2" in which case the different editions or versions must be continually available.
If you find some information in the 2013 draft which is later dropped, it means the authors no longer support that point for one or another reason. Hence it would be potentially bad to attribute such a point the authors.
So from this perspective I do not support any of your forms for referencing. It appears you should view the work as *unpublished* and only rely on the latest version as a source for information.
> 1 votes
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Tags: research-process, citations
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thread-34547
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34547
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Can a discoverer give the name he wants to his finding?
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2014-12-19T13:03:27.967
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# Question
Title: Can a discoverer give the name he wants to his finding?
Let's assume that some scientist discovers a phenomenon that has never been noticed before.
He wants to write a paper about it but he doesn't want to constantly write "effect of change of some properties blahblahblah". Can he therefore name this effect with a name of his choice? For example "*Discoverer's name*'s effect". Or "*fluffy puppy* effect" (just because he likes *puppies*)?
The same for constants. Can one name newly discovered constant "*my name* constant"?
This question can be simplified to: "what are standards for naming new physical entities?"
# Answer
> 22 votes
Usually the way this works is that a researcher discovers some phenomenon and publishes it without giving a name. Then someone else comes along and writes about "Jones' discovery" and before you know it the world talks about the "Jones effect".
Giving things a name yourself is done in some fields - for example, in MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) it is conventional that people who develop a new pulse sequence will give that sequence a "catchy" name (usually some clever abbreviation, never really their own name). So you have names like CAIPIRINHA (which is really the name of a drink, but stands for "Controlled Aliasing In Parallel Imaging Results IN Higher Acceleration").
In the end, the name that the community adopts is the name by which something will be known - so you are free to call it the "teletubby galaxy" but if everybody insists on calling it Andromeda-X42 you will be a lone voice. If you have the good fortune of discovering something new and valuable, name it wisely or be ignored.
Reiterating the point made by Nathaniel: suggesting that a particular phenomenon/constant/equation should be named after you is considered a major *faux pas*. Others will do it for you - when you try to jump the gun and suggest that it be named after you, you will come across as conceited. I can think of no example of a well known effect that a discoverer named for themselves. Some examples where they did not:
Newton's Laws (he called them "Axiomata sive Leges Motus")
Hooke's Law ("Explaining the power of springing bodies")
Josephson effect (for which he got the Nobel prize... not available for Newton or Hooke, or surely they would have qualified) was described by him (Physics Letters Vol 1, No 7, 1962) as "new effects":
* he didn't say "we present here the Josephson Effect".
The list could go on and an. If you are the greatest, you don't need to say so - others will do it. No offense intended, Mr Ali.
If you are interested interested, there is a follow-up question on a sister site, History of Science and Math: What famous laws were named by their discoverer?
# Answer
> 4 votes
Usually if the results are important enough, the scientists peers will name it appropriately. For instance, if I am the first to write a paper about the gyrostability of felines, I may talk about this "self-righting tendency" and if the context is clear, simply "tendency" or "effect". If I want to name it, and hope that the name sticks, I would choose something catchy and descriptive, but I probably wouldn't name it after myself. A common way to do this is to say something like, "the tendency for falling felines to self-right, which we will henceforth refer to as the Buttered-Side-Up effect, has been recognized since the 15th century {{citation\_needed}} but a satisfactory treatment has not been made to date".
# Answer
> 2 votes
There are several levels in your question. A researcher can certainly come up with a name for, say, and effect observed in research. This new name should be descriptive to stand a chance to catch on because it is only when accepted by peers in the field that the name may stick. It is also possible to name effects after their first discoverers and the same applies, if any agree on it it may become used. naming something after one-self is probably a really bad idea. Trying to be funny or ambiguous equally so.
As for constants, one can certainly name a constant anything you wish but if the constant has any wide relevance there are usually organisations that will have to accept names and numbers. some of this work is done within Bureau International des Poids et measures (BIPM) that maintains the SI-system. The different Unions within the The International Council for Science (ICSU) also organise working groups (equiv.) to work on terminology and propose standards for the different fields. within different fields there are varying additional international bodies that organizes nomenclature and terminology.
So standards are usually set by standardizing organisations. There focus on terminology , constants etc. that have wide significance and where accuracy both in terms and numbers are required. On top of that the scientific community self-organizes softer terms such as those of effects or theories but the success of introducing new terminology or what have you is always depending on the peers accepting it in a longer perspective.
# Answer
> 2 votes
Chemists who discover a new element of the Periodic Table have the right to name it. Marie Curie, who won a Nobel Prize in Chemistry, named her discovery "polonium" after her native Poland.
I would not be surprised to see this practice followed in other scientific fields.
# Answer
> 0 votes
You may absolutely call your findings whatever you want. I have seen it done many many times - but some people may consider you to be an 'arrogant jerk' (shall we say) for naming things after yourself - especially if they are trivial.
I have seen trivial things being named as if it were something incredible or ground breaking, and all I think is: *what a loser*. Adding two numbers together that both end with the number 3, does not deserved to be called "Peter's Second Principle of Arithmetic" (this isn't actually a thing, but makes my point)
Honestly, unless you discover a new element or your finding is truly notable don't name it anything. As others have mentioned, the academic community will name it for you if they deem it notable enough.
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Tags: terminology
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thread-34589
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34589
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When should I send thank you letter or email to my thesis committee members?
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2014-12-20T08:33:38.750
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# Question
Title: When should I send thank you letter or email to my thesis committee members?
When is the proper time to send a thank you email to the committee members? After the defense or after getting the certificate confirmation from the registrar office? To me saying thank you after defense is such a nice gesture. I just had a long conversation and question-answer session and everything is still so fresh in the mind of the members! But I would like to know about your suggestion (and probably would like to go with that too!).
# Answer
After the defense will be fine since by then the committee members have completed their job. What happens between that and when you have the final paper work done is irrelevant. Pointing at the discussion you have just had and finishing with a few personal comments/reflections will be fine. But, do not overdo it since long and talkative mails can be either too long to read or in the worst case seem constructed. So be yourself and be happy for what you have achieved ( I take it you will or have passed?)
> 3 votes
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Tags: etiquette, email, defense, thesis-committee
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thread-34520
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34520
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What attitude should a speaker have to going over time?
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2014-12-19T04:43:07.430
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# Question
Title: What attitude should a speaker have to going over time?
From John Baez's *Advice for a Young Scientist*:
> Your talks should be clear, concise, fun, exciting, and *never ever run over time*. For each extra minute your talk runs over, 10% more of the audience will decide you are a jerk and start fantasizing about you falling down a trap door.
After 11 minutes, 110% of your audience will start hating you.
That makes perfect sense, because that includes the people waiting for the room to open up for the next talk to begin.
But some people at my college like to take the opposite view. One lecturer never releases his class until he's run at least five minutes overtime. In the mandatory presentation class, the teacher maintained that going five minutes over the twenty minute talk period time was ok, but when one student went one minute undertime, she insisted that he repeat the assignment.
My question is: how should the speaker treat overtime?
# Answer
> 41 votes
Speaking for longer than the allotted time is unprofessional, and it can be very damaging and offensive in some circumstances. For example, if a conference schedules talks back to back, then it's not acceptable for one speaker to try to use part of the next speaker's time.
It may not be quite as bad in other cases, but it's still disrespectful to the audience. It tells the audience that the speaker believes his/her final words are more important than whatever else the audience might need to do, and it forces anyone with other obligations to risk drawing attention by leaving before the end of the talk.
Classes are something of a special case for two reasons. One is that the professor has a certain degree of power over students in the classroom, unlike a typical seminar speaker; another is that it's easy for professors to rationalize that they are going over time for their students' own good. Going over time is still problematic, but some people don't feel bad about it.
As for how to handle it, this problem should never even come up if the speaker is on top of things. It's important to keep track of the remaining time and adjust the presentation to omit details as needed to finish on time. If you screw this up, then you are out of luck if anyone is scheduled to use the room after you. Otherwise, you could apologize and offer an extremely brief summary of your remaining points. (I.e., if you suddenly discover that your time is up, that's when you should switch to the 30 or 60 second summary of your conclusions, rather than continuing with the seven minutes remaining in your talk as planned.)
# Answer
> 22 votes
I think the presentations teacher who is forcing students to repeat talks if they run too short is not working in reality. Her students will be very ill-prepared for real conferences, where such behavior is not likely to be appreciated.
As someone who has chaired a lot of sessions at conferences, I have to admit that I have **minimal** tolerance for people who try to run over their allotted slots. If your slot is 20 minutes, I will warn you when you have five minutes left and again at two minutes. If at 20 minutes, you're not on your conclusion slide, I will cut you off and ask the next speaker to set up their talk.
However, a lot of that issue comes up when one of two situations occur:
* The organizers of the event where the talk takes place do a poor job of managing the session and ensuring speakers stick to their time slots.
* The speaker is clearly unprepared for the time slot they have been allotted.
I recently attended a talk which should have been about 45 minutes long. When the speaker stopped, after nearly **75** minutes, he had only completed two parts out of *seven* in his outline. He had way too many slides, talked about each one for far too long, and generally ticked off the audience in the process.
As for lectures, as a student, I would tolerate a minimal overrun to "tie things up"—if the lecture is 90 minutes, for instance, a one- to two-minute overrun would be OK. But an extra 10 or 15 minutes would be unacceptable. As an instructor, I would rather end the class five minutes early and leave some material uncovered rather than run that far overtime.
# Answer
> 11 votes
Amongst the answers presented so far, I see a lot of strong sentiment, but am missing two things that I think are extremely important: 1) context-sensitivity, and 2) *how* a speaker should manage timing.
To the first point, the degree to which a speaker should be concerned with running over (or under) time is highly sensitive to the precision with which their talk is scheduled. Contrary to what most of the answers have said thus far, this can vary highly depending on venue.
* Lecturing a class is the most rigid context, as students often have other classes that they must leave to go to immediately at the end. You need to stop on time, period.
* Conference talks are typically designed for a five minute question period, which provides a cushion for going a couple of minutes over: you just get less questions.
* In settings aimed at discussion, such as workshops, there is often a looser schedule with more flexibility and buffer times built in. Here, one can feel comfortable running over somewhat longer as long as the extra time is primarily caused by interaction with the audience, as that is the purpose.
* In informal settings, such as an invited presentation in a group meeting, you can go over as long as the discussion takes you. In this type of setting, I have had a 15 minute talk turn into a 90 minute talk, because the people I was presenting to wanted to dig deep into discussion with every slide.
To the second point, for the more tightly constrained talks, it is important to also have a way of thinking about time management in order to ensure that one can end on time. A very useful method that I learned from one of the best speakers I know is to include an "accordion section" toward the end of the talk, containing material that is enriching but not strictly necessary. If you are running ahead of schedule, you can dawdle in the accordion section, explaining all of the lovely details. If you are running behind schedule, you can skim through.
For example, I might give a talk that ends with a couple of case studies. The first case study will get an in-depth treatment no matter what, while the second case study is there to show the generality of what I have been talking about. If I have enough time, the second case study can be presented in the same detail as the first. If not, then I can instead say something shorted, even to as short as, "X is fairly general, as can be seen by the fact that is works just as well in case study Y as well."
Thus, you should always plan your talk to be precisely on time, and include an accordion section that simplifies the task of controlling your timing. In settings where there is flexibility in the schedule, however, you should feel free to allow the audience to extend the time of your talk within the bounds of schedule flexibility.
# Answer
> 8 votes
The speaker should follow the guidelines given. Granted, normally one should limit a presentation to exactly 20 minutes. A range is much more common, and much more reasonable. Indeed, I would say the limit that was given was really 20-25 minutes (though not given in a very clear way).
It's like speeding. The posted speed limit is 65, so how should you consider yourself when you go over 65? You should slow down and fit within the posted limits.
In presentations, when you cannot fit your material within the allotted time, it shows your lack of preparation. If you just keep blabbing away, it shows your inability to follow your own structure. If you simply do not think the limit is important then you are showing a great disregard for the audience.
This is true of lecturers, too. If they do not care about the time limit they are simply being disrespectful. A philosopher would say being disrespectful to anyone is really showing your own disrespect to yourself.
In the end, people who do not follow the limits are saying they are special and the rules do not apply to them. Sadly, this attitude is all too common. Trying to change others is futile but we should do what we can to set a good example for others, regardless of our position.
# Answer
> 4 votes
Keeping to time is just basic respect, for your audience and for any fellow speakers.
Admittedly, it varies somewhat with context - the only presentation at a group meeting going over probably doesn't have many knock-on effects, whereas at a conference there's coffee going cold outside, parallel sessions getting out of sync, and generally far more going on and more people to annoy.
That said, a rule of thumb: Is your time worth more than that of everyone in the audience combined? No? Then don't finish late - even when they all filed in five minutes late (another pet hate of mine). Yes? No, it isn't.
At the courses and conferences where I've presented, I've always been the last speaker before lunch, where you're already struggling to keep the audience's attention before you start. With a bad chairman, half of that last slot can disappear easily; that speaker is then faced with either making everyone late for lunch or mutilating his/her presentation. Bad chair or not, it's disrespectful for earlier speakers to put other speakers in that position. Admittedly, my experience is that you get massive brownie points for getting back on track and saving the lunch break, and you can get some interesting conversations in the lunch queue as a result, but you shouldn't have to.
Within the department, where we're being kept from actual productive work, I like to count the people in the room, calculate a rough figure for their combined hourly cost, and hence work out how much of our hard-earned funding is being wasted every minute that the speaker goes over. Needless to say, I'm not paying attention while doing this.
The worst example of going overtime that I've experienced was at a conference with a number of lunchtime sessions. Someone whose name started with Sir was assigned one of the first ones, and he was still talking (and his audience still hungry) when the second sessions were over and we were meant to be back in the main auditorium. As it happens, that was the same room where we were booked to give the second session; we ended up giving a software demo standing in the hallway, with one of us holding a laptop for the other and people pressing in to see what should have been projected on the wall.
So, having been on the receiving end of it both as audience member and speaker, my personal tolerance for it is very low indeed. From discussions with many colleagues over many years, I haven't found one yet who's OK with it, even when they find the topic interesting.
# Answer
> 1 votes
It's very different to require a 20 minute presentation. It would follow that speaking more than 20 minutes is okay; perhaps the recommended time is 20-25 minutes but the professor is very strict about the lower limit to make sure you have that much material. Perhaps not the best didactic method but analogous to a minimum page length in writing.
You are trying to see a generalization where there shouldn't be one. There's a culture of being late in America just like there is a culture of going over on talks. It's problematic though, especially because some prefers eschew the boundary entirely and run well into your next class. So yes, that is a thing, and it is problematic, but you should not treat assignments as the same category.
# Answer
> 1 votes
Going overtime in a conference is a nightmare for the organising committee. Usually, there are parallel sessions focusing on different topics, and people try to make their own collision-free schedule to make the most of the conference, if one talk gets shifted, the people changing rooms will be affected. Also, it is common to have a few keynote speakers for the whole conference, but if one session is very delayed, you are either forcing the whole conference to wait for you (and then you will get the hate of 10x the audience of your talk), or make people miss the keynote (that is presumably of particular interest).
Exact timing of a presentation is difficult, but perfectly doable. You should rehearse it until you are confident. You can always take an extra minute from the questions, but then be aware that you are depriving another person from speaking.
# Answer
> 1 votes
Don't do it. If you do, don't expect attention from anyone after your allotted time. The busier people in the audience may very well need to leave at the scheduled end-time in order to make their next meeting.
# Answer
> 0 votes
I think the amount of time leeway in how long you can talk is proportional to how long you are talking. If you are supposed to give a 4 minute summary and it takes 6 minutes, that is too long. Similarly, giving a 4 minute summary in 2 minutes is too short. Alternatively, I think it is perfectly reasonable if a 60 minute lecture takes anywhere between 58 and 62 minutes. I think audiences will generally give you up to a 10% margin for error. Many talks, both research and teaching, also include a small period of time for questions at the end which provides a nice buffer.
For a typical teaching scenario a 1 hour time slot is often only 50 minutes of teaching and you might allocated your self 3 minutes for questions at the end. This means you should be aiming for your class to take between a 43 and 51 minutes. If you hit 51 minutes, you apologize and tell the students they can stop by your office to ask questions and that there will be a chance for questions at the next session and you let them out 1 minute late. If you finish early you can ask for questions. If you do not get questions you can recap the syllabus and schedule for a few minutes and let them go 5 minutes early.
# Answer
> 0 votes
There are many contexts where it is extremely important that talks fit the allocated time as precisely as possible. Some other contexts benefit from more flexibility. A speaker may be able to precisely predict how long it will take to present a certain corpus of material, but it's much harder to predict how long it will take to present the amount of material the speaker has *which the audience will be interested in*. In some contexts it may be better to have the speakers guess what the audience will want to hear and present a fixed corpus of information, but in others it may be better to have speakers adjust the lengths of their presentations according to the audiences' levels of interest. The latter approach would likely be better most of the time *but for the fact that speakers and audience members may have conflicting time obligations elsewhere*. The problems created by conflicting time obligations, however, often outweigh the benefits of such flexibility.
If in a certain context a speaker could go overtime without creating difficulties for himself, the audience, or anyone else who would want to use the space, then it may be good for the speaker to adjust the length of his talk according to what the audience wants to hear. Such situations are not the norm, however. If a particular conference or convention has many activities which people will be able to do at "any time", and most visitors will be expected to want to spend a lot of time on such activities, then it may make sense to have talks which might benefit from going overtime be followed by "free time".
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Tags: presentation
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thread-31905
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/31905
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If the editor handling my paper is a retired professor, then would it be fine for me to inquire about my paper status?
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2014-11-18T14:31:44.593
|
# Question
Title: If the editor handling my paper is a retired professor, then would it be fine for me to inquire about my paper status?
I have a paper under review at a journal for 2.5 months.
Given: 1) it is a short paper taking only two pages, 2) I know that the editor handling this paper is a retired professor, and 3) I have submitted several short papers (the number of pages is \< 5) to this journal and all of them were handled by this editor. Yet according to the past events, 1 month is the longest for a first decision. Then if it is fine for me to send a polite, short email to inquire about my paper status in order to "remind" the editor?
# Answer
The time frame to a point where a question can or indeed should be sent varies depending on the typical time for that journal, or of similar journals in your field. To me 2.5 months does not sound too long, a decision after one month sounds very quick if I consider a normal set of reviewers also should make their evaluations in that period.
If you think sufficient (relative to what you perceive as "normal") time has passed you can certainly send a short e-mail asking for information. If you have an excuse for asking, in addition of just wanting to know, your mail is far less likely to be perceived as "pushy". But, regardless, editors will get hit by such mails fairly regularly and despite some of them or the bulk of them being a source of irritation at times, the question is not strange by any means. It is all down to the tone of the mail.
The fact that the editor is retired should not affect any aspect of the review procedure so I do not see any reason to take that fact into consideration. The journal must appreciate the work the editor is doing, otherwise the editor would likely not be there.
> 7 votes
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Tags: publications, editors
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thread-32912
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/32912
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Should I list my work as dissertation or conference paper?
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2014-12-08T17:58:34.793
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# Question
Title: Should I list my work as dissertation or conference paper?
I have a dissertation under the supervision of my advisor. Then my university hosted a conference and we decided to make it a paper. The paper will soon publish on the conference's website, but it won't have peer-review. Should I list my work as a dissertation or a conference paper?
# Answer
In a CV you try to organize your important personal information in a clear and useful way for others to see and gain a good perspective. In this case you have a thesis. It should clearly be listed so that it is clear it is one of the outcomes of your degree. It is commonplace for people to turn a thesis into papers but that usually involves rewriting the material substantially. Such papers will be listed under headings such as, for example, "Peer-reviewed articles", "Conference contributions", "Abstracts", etc. In your case you could add your article under a heading such as "Conference contributions", Non-reviewed articles" or "Other articles" (the later only makes sense if you have a heading "Peer-reviewed articles") and make sure it is clear that the heading also implies the articles are not peer reviewed.
If your article and your thesis is, in fact practically the same text with the same title, it would not be advisable to follow the guidelines outlined above. the reason is that it may seem to a reader of the CV as if you are trying to inflate your publication record. In that case you could perhaps make a note in the CV in conjunction with the thesis that it has also been published under the same name or to add it under a different heading but stating that the paper is the same as the thesis, thereby taking the possible edge of the double appearance.
In the end it is clearly not a problem to publish thesis material after a degree and still count both the thesis and the resulting article but the basic rule is that a specific text should not be counted twice. It would then essentially count as self-plagiarism. So just act responsibly and be open and honest about issues that can cause confusion or raise eye-brows.
> 4 votes
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Tags: publications, cv
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thread-34330
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34330
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What unforeseen dangers might exist when choosing an open access textbook for a new subject?
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2014-12-15T16:07:39.423
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# Question
Title: What unforeseen dangers might exist when choosing an open access textbook for a new subject?
I must create a new module (first time to do from scratch). In the past, I've had either existing course descriptions, textbooks, etc. as a base on which to structure a module which is new for me. This time, I have nothing (blank canvas).
My thought is to use an open access textbook and some initial looking makes me believe I can find something either usable as-is or that will allow me to mix-and-match the chapters into something suitable.
I'm concerned about what, if any, dangers might not be obvious to me at this stage but might cause significant problems for the students, myself, or the department later (say, after the semester begins).
After reading this question, I still find myself wondering.
If anyone has designed a course using an open access textbook in the past, what are the key considerations which should be considered for first-timers?
# Answer
It's important to check the license used by the author to make sure that it's compatible with your use of the open access textbook.
Issues to check include:
1. Does the license allows you to redistribute the book to your students (e.g. by putting it on your course web site) or whether students have to get it from the author's web site. I would not be willing to use any material that I couldn't distribute to my students, because the author might pull it from the web at any time.
2. Does the license allow you to modify the work (e.g. fix typos or more broadly edit the work)? How are you required to describe any modifications?
3. If there are any restrictions on "commercial use", does your course constitute commercial use? Some people have argued that for-profit higher educational institutions can't use Creative Commons NC (CC-NC) licensed materials in courses.
Many open access educational resources are licensed under the Creative Commons license with varying options (CC-BY, CC-NC, CC-ND, etc.) The Creative Commons web site has clear explanations of how those licenses work. Many other resources have been put up on the web with no specified license. If there's no license specified you should contact the author and ask for permission to use the material.
> 14 votes
# Answer
I think Brian's answer is perfect, but let me be a bit more clear: the answer is *none*. As others have said better, one crucial quality for material course is *quality*: if you had an excellent "closed" textbook and a mediocre open access one, you should choose the better one, for the sake of your students. But in this case I don't think you can actually choose, and this is for the better: you can start off with an open access textbook, and you probably can make it better. "Openness" of things boils down to their license. They are often (as said) Creative Commons:
* **CC-BY-SA** allows you to do whatever you want with the original material, and create your own derivative works *without even asking*, provided that you release your material with the same license. For example, Wikipedia articles have this license: everyone builds on the previous version of the page, the license persists, the article (often) gets better.
* **CC-BY-NC** allows you to do everything *without even asking*, provided that you do not have a commercial purpose. Brian's response hints that this is maybe tricky, but I'll come to that.
* **CC-BY-ND** is rare, but **CC-BY-NC-ND** is common: it is the strictest version of Creative Commons, and in practice you can use and share the material, but not have commercial purpose and create derivative work *without asking*.
This is important: you can't do it *without asking*.
Of course, you can directly ask the author, and I doubt very much you can't negotiate a way to use the material as you want. It is possible you'd have to pay, but this is the norm with closed textbooks. Creative Commons are licensed used to share our creative works: the *open access*-*open knowledge* movement advocates for a more flexible copyright system in which people are allowed to share and build things together.
The only thing you should pay attention, thus, are the different licenses of the different materials involved: if you want to create a new textbook, for example, you should check them and ask/negotiate permission if needed. Copyright-wise, things can't get *worse* than with closed-access content.
Hope this clears a little.
> 7 votes
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Tags: teaching, books, open-access, course-design
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thread-34581
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34581
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Quantity vs Quality of Publication during PhD
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2014-12-20T00:34:59.307
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# Question
Title: Quantity vs Quality of Publication during PhD
My question is similar to this one but it applies to PhD who wants to find a postdoc position after graduation.
I am a PhD student who publishes a new paper as soon as there is an improvement in my research. Each year, I manage to publish 2 or 3 papers into high quality conferences but not the top one in my field.
Recently, a senior researcher suggests me to combine few improvements into one paper so that it will have more improvements in comparison to the previous one. It will result in less papers per year but increase the difference in term of research contribution between them. She argues that, in order to get into a good postdoc programme, the quality of paper is more important than the quantity and I should aim for top conference in the field with very high quality paper instead of good-but-not-great conference.
I wonder if my colleague's suggestion is correct and I should reduce the number of published papers per year in order to increase the difference in research contribution between them.
My field is computer science but answers from other fields are also welcome.
# Answer
> 15 votes
I don't know what publication rates are typical in computer science, but in mathematics it is true that quality is more important than quantity, when it comes to getting postdocs and competitive research positions.
This does not mean quantity is irrelevant. But postdocs are partially given based on your promise as a researcher. To that end, one truly excellent paper may be enough to land a job (along with good references), because it suggests you have the potential to produce more excellent papers. On the other hand, 10 truly mediocre papers is not likely to be as impressive, because it only shows you can publish lots of mediocre papers.
# Answer
> 14 votes
I need to disagree somewhat with the other answers posted. Publication quality is very important. Do not, however, confuse quality of a publication with the impact factor of the venue where it is sent.
If you have completed a piece of work that is significant for a narrow community, then you should publish it in an appropriate place for that community to be able to find it. This can be a high quality publication and good for your citation indices, even if it is not a high impact factor venue, if it is the right place for the paper.
High impact venues typically require research that is more broadly relevant. High impact venues are definitely better for your reputation and future career. You cannot, however, turn several narrow papers worth of research into a broad paper just by stacking their results together. Rather, you need to take a step back and look deeper into the work that you are doing. The postdoc from the answer by @user3550416 is a good example: those five new-species publications in obscure journals are probably in the right places, and the important decision is to start looking for deeper analyses rather than more species.
Finally, getting obsessed with high impact can get you into big trouble because you are placing more weight on less outcomes in an unpredictable process. If you are shooting too high for the work that you are doing, you might end up going a *long* time without a publication, and feeling increasing pressure because each individual publication is so high stakes. Likewise, you place yourself in danger of getting scooped, which is much less of a worry if you are publishing at regular intervals.
In short: do not think of this in terms of adjusting the unit size of packaging a homogeneous product. Instead, look at it in terms of how you scope the work that you are doing in order to make your research products more broadly relevant.
# Answer
> 9 votes
My idea of how to evaluate the candidate is completely orthogonal to what you are asking.
1) What counts towards evaluating your research potential is what you proved and what tools you developed. You can put 15 theorems into one paper, and the theorem count will still be 15. You can repeat the same idea in 20 different variations in 20 papers and the idea count will still be 1. You can have 3 tricks and publish 7 papers with all possible non-empty combinations of them and the trick count will still be 3.
2) What is derived from how you split and group your results for publication is your maturity as a writer. At the graduate or postdoc level, as far as I can tell, almost nobody cares about this aspect because it is commonly assumed that the choices here are made not as much by you as by your mentors and advisers (especially if the publications are either joint with them, or just thank them for helpful advice anywhere in the text).
3) Ideally, a single paper should contain a single statement. This statement may be simple or complicated, long or short, a startling novelty or a small twist of a routine, etc., but it should be a statement that can be understood and digested as a single block like a sentence in a book. Of course, it is not always possible, but still this is what (in my eyes) determines where to put a comma and where a full stop when writing. The other considerations are far less relevant because you write not for the members of hiring committees, but for unknown people for most of whom you exist merely as a combination of the ideas you share and who do not care in the slightest about your personal status or reputation.
4) With all that said, if you want to land a good job, you need to show up on radars. So, write sparingly and concisely, but talk profusely. Don't hesitate to go to conferences, to meet with people, and to use any other opportunity to get acquaintances. Quite often "I see John is applying..."; "Yeah, Peter told me he would..."; "They also consider him at..." can secure you a position better than "Look, this theorem is just brilliant!"; "Theorem by whom, you said?"; "I cannot tell much because it is so far from my field, sorry...". The second approach works too, but you need to be really good to just throw things into the wind and see how they soar higher and higher. Most of us, poor mortals, need to hold the strings of our kites firmly and pay attention to their tension :-).
# Answer
> 6 votes
With time number of publications will be almost everything. The quality of the publications is usually determined by the impact factor of the journals in which they are published even though this under no circumstances is a guarantee for the quality. Now someone may easily object to this description but the point is simple. As a senior researcher you will have so many papers that no-one will read and evaluate them and so people resort to proxies for their evaluation. So what about your situation?
for early career scientists your list of publications is not that long and so it is more likely that people actually read all, some or parts of the papers apart from judging where they have been published. In an early career your number of citation will not be large since it takes time for the impact of a paper to become known. All this points at the importance to not just be prolific but to also to have some stamps of quality in the list. This does not mean that publishing smaller or shorter studies in lower impact venues are bad.
I would argue that a healthy mix showing you are productive but also capable of quality productions is a good way. To provide a number is pointless because it is difficult to plan and succeed in publishing according to some plan within only a few years so people do generally expect quite varying types and number of publications. A short and condensed narrative that describes your research efforts can also help set the specifics of your list of publications in perspective.
# Answer
> 5 votes
Coming from the marine sciences field, the impact factor (prestige) of the journal where you publish is more important than the number of papers you're able to churn in the **short-term**.
I know a post-doc who has published at least 5 papers in 3 years describing new species in different, but rather obscure, journals. This same person shared with me that he is currently working on papers with more analytical content to be submitted to more prestigious journals. He needs higher-profile publications to really boost up his resume.
So my recommendation would be to wait until you have some substantial findings that could lead to a quality publication in a high-profile journal or conference.
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Tags: publications, research-process, postdocs
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thread-34075
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34075
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Number of reviewers
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2014-12-11T14:30:11.950
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# Question
Title: Number of reviewers
What is general rule regarding the number of reviewers? Date under manuscript status "under review" has now changed for third time within two months. What could this implicate?
# Answer
> 3 votes
It is very common to use two reviewers although other numbers occur as well. The process of getting reviewers to accept to do a review can be a long and hard process. In your case the delay may well be the result of an editor receiving negative answers to requests which means the editor will contact further persons. whether or not the date change in the manuscript handling system reflects this is hard to say without knowing what system is used and how it may be set up for the specific journal. My bet would, however, be that you see the editors multiple attempts to find reviewers to accept. At some point in the process, you can e-mail the editor to ask about the progress of your manuscript but you need to assess when the time is becoming too long and this will differ between disciplines and journals within that discipline. As an editor, it can be very annoying when people start sending such mails prematurely when one is in the middle of trying to line up good reviewers. But, as stated, it is a judgement call.
# Answer
> 0 votes
In my field (biology) most of journals use two reviewers, but the third reviewer is normally called if the first two significantly disagree.
# Answer
> 0 votes
The number of reviewers can vary. In my experience, it is normal for a paper to be by two anonymous referees (in double blind review, also blind to the authors) and the final decision will be made by an editor or associate chair who, generally, is not blind to the identities of the authors of the reviewers.
In situations where this is significant disagreement, additional reviewers can be added.
This can even vary within journals. For example, PLOSONE assigns an editor who can reach out to as many reviewers as they like or accept papers outright. Last I checked, the median number of external reviews at that journal was 2.
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Tags: journals, peer-review, paper-submission, editors
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thread-34618
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34618
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Where can I go to get IRB approval?
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2014-12-21T01:16:26.757
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# Question
Title: Where can I go to get IRB approval?
I want to conduct research independently once done with school. Where can I go to get IRB approval? I know that some businesses have collaborated with universities to get IRB approval but want to know more. What is the process? Do universities normally give IRB approval to non-university members? Where else can I go?
# Answer
Most university IRB's won't involve themselves in research that isn't conducted by employees and students of the university. The alternative (widely used by pharmaceutical companies) is an "independent IRB" (the term is an oxymoron since the IRB isn't part of the institution that is doing the research...)
See the consortium of independent IRB's web site for some information about these IRB's.
http://www.consortiumofirb.org/
> 4 votes
# Answer
No.
The purpose of an IRB is to protect the institution from allegations of unethical behavior. There is no reason for the university to do a review of non-affiliated projects -- in fact, it makes the university liable for the research it approved, thus increasing its liability.
Alternatives would include:
* Asking for university affiliation and then undergoing review.
* Asking your professional association if they provide a review service
* Self-review if your organization is large enough
> 2 votes
# Answer
This completely depends on your country and its laws. Some countries have National IRB, run by the government. The most common users are businesses and national research labs. Unless you have an affiliation or collaboration to the university, you do not do IRB through them.
> 2 votes
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Tags: irb
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thread-34616
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34616
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(Master's Degree) What are they 'precisely' looking for in a Statement of Purpose, and does a SOP matter when one has excellent GPA?
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2014-12-20T23:37:28.087
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# Question
Title: (Master's Degree) What are they 'precisely' looking for in a Statement of Purpose, and does a SOP matter when one has excellent GPA?
(*N.b. All my questions are concerning applying for a Master's degree*)
I have read a lot of websites, articles, extracts from different books about the Statement of Purpose (Motivation Letter). I'm still not quite sure how to write a 'breathtaking' SOP to blow the reader's brain.
For example, I don't know how to present my interest in my field of study in a brilliant way to amaze the person reading it. I am very interested in my field and I can think of million things I can do with it, but still I don't know the best way to present that interest. Most people say that I need a 'grip', an interesting story from my own life that made me become interested in my field of study. But let me be honest, I have none, not everybody has that sudden 'turning point' in their life. My interest in my field of study just happened over time; one day I saw that, hey this is pretty a fascinating field of study and it totally matches my interest in different fields, I can apply the knowledge gained from this field to almost anything. So nothing extraordinary, it just happened with no reason.
I have also read hundreds of samples online, and they all look totally the same, they say that SOP has to be distinctive, but that's exactly what I didn't see in the samples I read - they all start with a memory of their childhood and finish with how much they'd love to contribute to society and mankind and become a researcher.
I am really lost about writing a SOP. I think I'm even more lost because I have read thousands of articles and books and have heard a lot of different opinions for the past 2 months. I am not sure what a "superb" SOP is, and I am not quite sure what the admission committee looks for...
Finally, I have a tiny last question; Does the Statement of Purpose matter as much if one has a GPA of 92%?
# Answer
What I'll write is based on my experience with mathematics Ph.D. admissions in the U.S. How far it generalizes beyond that may depend on the circumstances. (I'd bet much of it would still apply to a research-based master's program in computer science, but perhaps not to an MBA program.) Note that U.S. graduate programs in math primarily take students who have just graduated from undergraduate programs, so the target audience is not so different from those applying for master's degrees.
> I'm still not quite sure how to write a 'breathtaking' SOP to blow the reader's brain.
It's impossible to write a breathtaking or superb statement of purpose, and I mean literally impossible: such a statement does not exist. Even if Einstein and Shakespeare collaborated to write one for you, the best they could do would be to write a good statement of purpose. Once your statement hits the ceiling, there's nothing more it can do to help your chances of admission, and the ceiling is low enough that a substantial fraction of applicants reach it. If I had to make up a number based on my impressions from reading applications, I'd estimate that a third of all applicants write a good enough statement of purpose that trying to do better would be a complete waste of time, and many of the others at least write pretty good statements. \[By contrast, the ceiling is vastly higher for letters of recommendation, as well as for accomplishments as an undergraduate.\]
It's certainly possible to write a terrible statement of purpose. If you come across as a jerk or seem incompetent or dishonest, you can ruin your chances of admission, no matter how good the rest of your application is. Even a statement that has nothing outrageously wrong with it can hurt your application if it's poorly done.
Unfortunately, there's a lot of bad advice on the internet. Some of the common recommendations, such as childhood memories or inspirational quotes, will not help at all since they simply aren't relevant to the admissions decision. At best, they come across as a little naive (and committee members will groan about another applicant who was inspired by Marie Curie), but they probably won't hurt your application if you include genuine content in your statement of purpose as well. At worst, they will fill up your entire statement and render it useless.
Similarly, you don't want to write a "unique" statement of purpose. It makes sense to include explanation if there's actually something unique about your application, but there's no value in writing a statement that's gratuitously different from everyone else's. The admissions committee isn't trying to understand what makes you a unique and special snowflake, but rather what makes you a good prospect for graduate school. That's not a genre of writing that generally benefits from wild creativity.
So what are committee members looking for? This varies a little from person to person, of course, but here's a first approximation:
1. Do you know what you're getting yourself into? Do you have a good feeling for what graduate school entails and what's involved in your chosen field? Do you sound like you know what you're talking about? (Don't bluff! It's better to demonstrate an impressive undergraduate-level understanding than to look like you're pretending to have even deeper insight.) There are any number of ways to mess this up. You can sound clueless, you can display crackpot-style fantasies, you can sound like you are choosing grad school to put off having to get a job, etc.
2. Can you summarize and highlight aspects of your background in a way that shows some maturity and perspective? This could include undergraduate research, an undergraduate thesis or capstone project, favorite courses, outside reading, etc. Some students do things that sound impressive from a one-line description on the CV, but when they explain in more detail it sounds a little hollow, like they never really got into it or learned much from it. Others are able to take similar experiences and fashion a more compelling case for going to graduate school. For example, if you are describing undergraduate research, it's generally not enough just to give a brief descriptions of your results. You should also explain the purpose and motivation behind the research and reflect on the experience. (Maybe it pointed you towards what you'd like to do in grad school, maybe it showed you what you don't want to do, maybe it made it clear what you need to learn, etc.)
3. Can you explain anything that's unusual or worrisome about your background? You don't want to overemphasize these things (your explanation should be just part of your statement, preferably not right at the beginning or end), but this is your chance to put everything in context and explain why any apparent flaws should not worry the committee.
4. Do you have compelling plans for the future? You certainly don't need to have your whole career mapped out (that comes across as silly), or even your whole time in graduate school. However, it's best to show that you are moving forward thoughtfully and sensibly, rather than just applying to grad school because that's what comes next.
You shouldn't panic about writing a statement of purpose. Remember that your goal is not to write something brilliant, but rather something good enough. (For example, there's no way you could demonstrate amazing plans for the future or profound insight you derived from reflecting on undergraduate research. That just can't be done in a document of this length and style, so you just need to aim for good plans and good insight.)
It sounds like you are caught in tons of stress and planning before trying to write anything. What I'd recommend is this: Take a few hours and write a first draft, while keeping in mind the questions I listed above. Then get feedback from friends and mentors, and pay the most attention to feedback from people who have served on admissions committees. Probably you'll decide to make some minor changes and be done with it. The worst case scenario is that you somehow did a lousy job, in which case you should reflect on what people didn't like about your first attempt and try again. Either way, you'll have a decent statement of purpose by your second attempt, and probably the first.
> Does the Statement of Purpose matter as much if one has a GPA of 92%?
Some aspects (such as explaining poor grades) may be less relevant, but most of the things I listed above still matter.
> My interest in my field of study just happened over time; one day I saw that, hey this is pretty a fascinating filed of study and it totally matches my interest in different fields, I can apply the knowledge gained from this field to almost anything. So nothing extraordinary, it just happened with no reason.
You're right that this is nothing extraordinary, but that's fine, and it's very far from having no reason at all. A bad statement of purpose says "I've loved area X since I was a child and have always dreamt of contributing to this field. Admission to the University of Y will help me achieve my dreams." That's nothing but a fancy way of saying you'd like to do X, without giving much of a reason. Instead, a good statement of purpose could say "Area X fascinates me because it brings together my interests in A, B, and C. \[...further explanation...\] Among the many applications, D and E particularly appeal to me. \[...further explanation...\] Faculty members U and V work on related topics, which is why the University of Y would be an excellent fit for my interests."
If you can elaborate on your reasons that are "nothing extraordinary", you'll already be well on your way to writing a good statement of purpose.
> 28 votes
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Tags: masters, statement-of-purpose, motivation
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thread-34626
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34626
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How common is use of word "PhDs" to describe PhD holders in formal documents?
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2014-12-21T04:00:09.227
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# Question
Title: How common is use of word "PhDs" to describe PhD holders in formal documents?
The context is that this usage can be useful to describe people with PhD degrees while saving on extra characters in a formal document.
Example: "The position is typically reserved for PhDs" (instead of saying "PhD holders").
The question is relevant here to know how common is it for professors/academics to use this term in formal contexts without being frowned upon.
# Answer
> 4 votes
Extremely common, in both general usage and in my exposure to professors/academics. Unless you have some reason to believe there would be objections to it, I think you're anticipating a problem where none exists.
(On the other hand, "saving characters" is an awful reason for doing anything, especially these days when memory is cheap and printing is easy. If you use this form, use it simply because that's how people talk.)
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Tags: phd
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thread-34631
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34631
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Is it appropriate for a PhD student to write reference for a PhD applicant?
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2014-12-21T12:02:00.920
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# Question
Title: Is it appropriate for a PhD student to write reference for a PhD applicant?
I am a PhD student, and was recently approached by a (very bright) student in an exercise class I teach, requesting a reference letter for his PhD application. This makes me wonder: Is it OK for a PhD student to write a reference for a PhD applicant?
There are obvious reasons why I might be able to say something informative: I saw a lot of his solutions to assigned problems, and I saw him work through an extended period of time (as opposed to say, a lecturer, who only sees his grades, and possibly final exam). However, I am concerned that I am not senior enough for my opinion to be taken seriously. Is it a legitimate concern? Would the student be better of asking someone more senior?
# Answer
I think this is in part a cultural question. For example, in the US, I think letters from current graduate students are not given nearly as much weight as from more "senior" professionals. However, in German schools, it is quite common for senior doctoral students to write letters of recommendation for undergraduates, particularly in disciplines such as engineering, where the group sizes tend to be quite large, and in many cases the professor in charge of the group may never meet the undergraduate in question.
> 16 votes
# Answer
In the United States, there is nothing against it, but it is better to get the letter from a professor if possible. Usually, especially with a junior graduate student, the graduate student's supervisor will be involved in the work as well, in which case the recomender really should be the professor.
That said, there are situations where the graduate student is the right person to recommend, because there has not been a professor significantly involved. If the only options are:
1. a letter from a graduate student explaining in detail how they have worked with this student and praising the excellent research that the student has done, versus
2. a letter from a professor saying "this undergraduate exists and other people have told me good things"
then the letter from the graduate student is the right way to go. As a graduate student, I ended up writing some letters like this for undergraduates who worked for me. While it's impossible for me to know how their admissions committee rated my letter or what other letters they had, the people that I recommended did end up in Ph.D. programs, so it at least must not have been a problem to have me recommend.
> 9 votes
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Tags: recommendation-letter
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thread-27557
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/27557
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How to publish under a Creative Commons license?
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2014-08-24T02:22:03.687
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# Question
Title: How to publish under a Creative Commons license?
I will defend my PhD thesis soon and I currently have a bunch of papers in a finalization phase. As first author of these papers, and as my work is funded with public money, I am very uncomfortable with the idea of giving my rights to a private editor, for ethical reasons. I would like to release my papers under a Creative Commons-like license or in the public domain (CC0?) but I want them to go through a peer-review process.
How can I do this? (And why do so few researchers seem to be concerned with these ethical problematics?)
# Answer
Let me build upon excellent Wrzlprmft's answer, adding a few things:
* there is a *de facto* open access standard license, and that is **CC-BY**. It is similar to public domain, and I'd strongly suggest not to use CC0, as you would waive also the *attribution* of your work. CC0 it is used for databases and data, where CC-BY licenses are trickier.
* institutional or disciplinary archives as ArXiv are heavily used in some academic communities (eg. math, high energy physics) but they do not provide peer review. It is customary within those communities to archive pre-prints. You should try to understand the customs in your very own community: it's very important if you want to make the best choice (and if you want to foster open access publishing in your discipline).
As per your last question: **why do so few researchers seem to be concerned with these ethical problematics?**
Because their priority is their **academic career**. Academia is built on personal, scientific reputation, and the current system (with Impact Factor and other scientometric indicators) is completely unbalanced towards old, authoritative closed-access publications that provide the "authority" a young researcher needs to gain reputation between its peers. You need to publish a lot, and in reputable journals. You will advance, get grant, get tenure on your publication (and citation) record.
Open access publishing (as a model) is relatively young, thus it is difficult for open access publications to gain the same reputation as those other journals; thus researchers don't want to publish there, thus the old, closed-access system survives.
Often, the rational, selfish choice of the researcher is enough for the ethical choice to be bypassed. Ignorance of alternative models (and ignorance of the intrinsic flaws of the current closed access system) do the rest.
> 7 votes
# Answer
I will address two aspects of Creative-Commons licences seperately:
**Open Access and not giving somewhat exclusive rights to a journal**
The reason why journals do not give everybody access to their articles and want some exclusive rights on the article is that they need to pay their expenses (typesetters, copy editors, printing, maintaining editorial managemetent system, …) and do so by selling articles and issues (mostly to university libraries and similar). You can change or circumvent this by:
* Publishing in an open-access journal. In this case, it’s usually you and not the reader who pays for the journal’s expenses. Since there is no need for the journal to get exclusive rights, you can usually publish the article under a Creative-Commons licence. Note that some funding agencies give you money exclusively for publication costs, which you can spend on this. Be aware though that there are more black than white sheep in this field. Finally, the price of publication is debatable (but so is the price of pay-to-read journals).
* Nowadays, many journals offer pay-to-publish open-access options, which are like the above, just that your article is published in a classical journal instead of a pure open-access journal.
* Many journal allow the authors to disseminate preprints, e.g., via the ArXive. Though they still get some exclusive rights to the article and there may be some restrictions, there is de facto open access to your article. SHERPA maintains an extensive database on what kind of preprint publication is allowed by which journal.
As to why researchers do not care more about this: The old publication system is an established structure which takes time to change. Theoretically, we could do with one central, globally funded open-access publication system (in particular by avoiding printing costs). Also note that in technologically inclined fields, publishing preprints is very common, so there already is open access to most publications and thus less incentive to change the system.
**Allowing others to build upon your work**
This aspect of the Creative-Commons licence mainly makes sense for works of art or widely used texts (such as licences), which somebody would actually want to directly build a work upon.
Building your work directly on a **research article** would be a very unusual thing to do, as instead of modifying the original article, you would rather publish a comment or a new article citing this article. Do not forget that building upon the ideas of an article is allowed anyway (unless they are patented), it’s just building on the text or the figures, which would be changed by putting the article under a Creative-Commons licence. Finally, it would arguably be more harmful than useful, if anybody could publish an altered version of your paper, as this would lead to confusion for readers of work which cites your paper.
With a **review article** it makes more sense to allow others to edit your article, which is the idea behind Scholarpedia.
> 5 votes
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Tags: publications, open-access, creative-commons, public-domain
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thread-34635
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34635
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How to Direct the Reader to the Background and Terminology Section?
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2014-12-21T14:35:39.697
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# Question
Title: How to Direct the Reader to the Background and Terminology Section?
While writing a thesis, suppose that, one wants to inform the reader that he/she needs to have a basic knowledge of some topic to understand the following.
If the term is explained in Background and Terminology, how should I say this?
> For the readers who are not familiar with the term *blah-blah*, we explain it in detail in Section 1.2.
or
> We strongly encourage our readers to read Section 1.2 to obtain information about *blah-blah*.
or, what else?
# Answer
I personally don't like making presumptions about the reader's knowledge when I am writing. Someone may, for example, be familiar with a term or concept but use it in a difference sense than the paper does. This is especially true in cross-disciplinary work or when there are unsettled scientific issues in play. I thus prefer a value-neutral statement.
For example, a general pointer might be:
> See Section 2 for a review of the background and terminology of this work
while a pointer for a specific element might be:
> We thus conclude that this snark is frabjous (for more details on frabjous evaluation, see Section 2.4).
> 4 votes
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Tags: thesis, writing
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thread-34640
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34640
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What is the proper email etiquette when contacting potential supervisors on short notice?
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2014-12-21T16:56:15.347
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# Question
Title: What is the proper email etiquette when contacting potential supervisors on short notice?
I am currently an MSc student in the UK and am hoping to apply for PhD at the same institution. I have found some potential supervisors but was wondering what is the correct way of wording my email given that I have only about 3 weeks till the application deadline and it's currently the holiday season (end of term). Some things to note: 1) my current field of study is immunology and I'm hoping to apply for a PhD in Medical Sciences, 2) it won't be possible to meet the supervisors in person since I'm back in the States for the holidays.
# Answer
The first few tips is be cordial and be brief and to the point.
Make sure you use the correct title and spell the name correctly, in fact make sure the entire mail is spell checked and grammatically correct, anything else sends a bad signal.
Begin by stating your purpose for the mail and provide a short but detailed reason for why you approach the person in question. In your case you should also explain the "short notice" and excuse yourself very concisely for the inconvenience this could bring on.
Follow up by providing a brief statement of why you are interested in the subject but also the school and/or research group. Continue by describing your background and how you see your background being an asset in working in the PhD field.
All this should not be more than 2-3 paragraphs of maybe 5-10 sentences. A short e-mail which manages to say the essentials will be more likely to succeed than a long and very long-winded detailed account (that no-one would take the time to read).
The tone of the mail should be respectful but do not excuse yourself or play "underdog", be confident, brief and to the point. that will impress more.
Finally attach a CV and provide any MS thesis papers you may have.
> 3 votes
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Tags: phd, etiquette, application
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thread-34642
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34642
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Citing someone directly with additional information in footnote
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2014-12-21T17:49:02.153
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# Question
Title: Citing someone directly with additional information in footnote
I would like to directly quote some sentences of another author who uses a word *A* which is a synonym for a word *B* I'm using in my text. Note: I would like to use my word *B* as the word *A* is very rare.
So I placed the text of the author into quotation marks and a footnote at the word *A* stating that in the following the word *B* will be used in my text. At the end of the quotation I put the source of the quote.
Is that correct or could it be misinterpreted as a footnote of the text I'm quoting? Should I add e.g. "Authors note:" before my footnote text?
# Answer
> 5 votes
My preference would be to avoid the footnote altogether, as I find them distracting. Keep the quote verbatim, give the source, and then explain the terminology in the next sentence of your text:
> Smith claims that "the best breakfast is a soft boiled ovum" \[Smith87\]. (Smith's "ovum" refers to what our paper calls an "egg.")
Another option, if you don't really care about showing Smith's exact words to the reader, is to make the change in the quote itself, indicating the change with brackets.
> Smith claims that "the best breakfast is a soft boiled \[egg\]" \[Smith87\].
# Answer
> 2 votes
I have no idea what your field is ... so I'm going to give a slightly different piece of advice than Nate Eldredge's answer.
When writing in Chinese philosophy, it is acceptable practice to at the beginning of your paper indicate that you are going to use Pinyin throughout including in quotations and then to change all quotations to Pinyin rather than marking each and every instance of such a change with \[\].
I have seen a few other places where similar conventions are allowed for changes in the common name used for a text, e.g., *Practice in Christianity* instead of *Training in Christianity* the for the Kierkegaard \[Anti-Climacus\]' text.
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Tags: citations, quotation
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thread-34648
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34648
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Three month delay in reviewing the revision of paper, Editor doesn't even answer the email
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2014-12-21T20:30:23.540
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# Question
Title: Three month delay in reviewing the revision of paper, Editor doesn't even answer the email
I've submitted a paper in an ISI journal, i.e. in Taylor and Francis. The first submission date of the manuscript was 30-May-2014. We received the first revision result on 27-July-2014. Hopefully, the result of reviewing our paper was optimistic as the paper status was accept with change; we had only some minor comments. We submitted the answer of revision on 15 Aug. They didn't reply our revision yet.
So, I've sent an e-mail to the Editor in chief, but he didn't even reply our email. The handling editor identity is not available for us. What is your proposal in this case?
# Answer
> 4 votes
I agree that three months seem a little excessive for checking your revisions and providing a verdict. Since you received a minor revision on your first version, there does not seem to be any point of additional review so the manuscript must be with the editors still. Since the review process seems to have passed fairly quickly, there does not seem to be a general problem of a slow journal. Therefore, there can be a very reasonable explanation for the delay.
So, the only option forward is to contact the editors again. You should also check to see if there are more than only one "point of entrance" to the editors of the journal. If there are you may try another. Also, in case you have not done so, do check your junk mail folder to see if some form mail from the journal has been redirected by mistake. This occasionally happens if journals use such systems. Unfortunately there are no other routes to go other than to repeat the attempts to contact. A reasonable period is perhaps around three weeks between contact attempts.
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Tags: journals, peer-review, email, editors
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thread-28671
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/28671
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Are there tools to implement an institutional open access policy?
|
2014-09-18T14:47:05.940
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# Question
Title: Are there tools to implement an institutional open access policy?
Many universities have adopted open access policies, giving their employees an incentive to make their scholarly articles freely available online.
To enforce this policy, universities should ideally keep track of the research output of their employees, and remind them to upload their papers if they are not freely available yet.
This is a rather time-consuming task: I wonder whether there are tools to facilitate or automate this process.
Such tools could perform some of the following tasks:
* Track the published papers and match their authors with the employees list (probably using some bibliometric platform like crossref.org)
* Locate freely available versions of these papers
* Run a repository where the papers can be uploaded (there are plenty of tools available for this task)
* Manage waiver requests from researchers who want to opt out of the policy
* Provide statistics about the publication practices within the institution
# Answer
I hope you checked with the library of your institution, since these are the people who are typically involved in that sort of things.
There are softwares to create institution repository of articles (often pre-prints) to allow free access and comply with most government funding regulation. There are probably many options, but one of these softwares is called infoscience and is used by institutions like the CERN in Geneva.
This system allows researchers to have an up-to-date, automatically populated publication list with links to the downloadable documents, enables keyword search, run stats, etc. It is useful as well if you are writing an annual report of your group/department, etc.
> 2 votes
# Answer
Building on Cape Code answer, what you seek for is an *institutional repository*. There are many, but it depends by the single institution. You should ask yours.
Software used are often DSpace and Eprints (but there are others): these systems let users upload pre-prints and other documents; release them with Creative Commons licenses, use DOIs (sometime provided by the very same institutional repository); provide digital preservation, provide statistics, etc.
The *open access* movement has a strong component in librarians, who in the last decades built protocols and best practices.
Every institution is different and offers different services.
> 4 votes
# Answer
I'd go for a simpler approach. Just ask the researchers to fill in a simple online form whenever they publish an article. Make it extremely simple: just the DOI (or alternative citation if not available) and a checkbox if it is open access with a link to it. Don't make it take more than a minute to submit.
As a compensation, you can, for example, provide Natbib files free to download and a nice list of OA articles, so other researchers can find easy to cite and find your articles.
It is not much work if everybody does their part, and you just need to make it easy enough and worth to do it.
> 2 votes
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Tags: open-access, tools, policy
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thread-34663
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34663
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Should I mention my blog in my SOP?
|
2014-12-22T04:23:32.633
|
# Question
Title: Should I mention my blog in my SOP?
I did a bunch of code projects like implement a algorithm or use the code from a paper on a different dataset. These may not be unique (they may be, but I am not sure). I wouldn't say that these projects have the best efficiency/accuracy for a particular problem. But these are stuff that I was just messing around with and got some interesting outputs. I maintain a blog about all these activities that I do. These projects are related to machine learning, a subject in which I am interested in pursuing a MS degree.
Should I mention these blog posts in my SOP?
My SOP is a research statement, and these are not entirely research projects, but they do reflect my interest in machine learning. Would mentioning these projects benefit me in any way?
If you do recommend that I mention them, how should go about that?
# Answer
> 8 votes
**Yes**. You could mention it in your SOP and/or in your CV.
I have received some applications from students in which they mentioned a technical blog, and so far it has always left a positive impression. In my opinion, keeping such a blog demonstrates:
1. Maturity in writing and communicating (especially if your blog communicates something technical in an informal way that is not sloppy).
2. Organization of thought and effort.
3. Initiative.
4. Love for learning ideas relevant to your discipline.
# Answer
> 5 votes
In a notorious question in Academia.SE, JeffE has stated this:
> * What have you already done? What problems have you solved, or at least worked on? What independent projects have you been part of? What were your key contributions? What did you learn? What did you teach the world? How do your results compare to what was already known? What original ideas are you most proud of? Be specific, technical, credible, and confident (but not arrogant). **Refer the reader to your web page for more details**. Have a web page with more details: preprints, project reports, source code, videos, etc.
So yes, yes you can.
However, personally, I would like to mention it in my CV.
# Answer
> 0 votes
On the one hand, having a blog shows initiative. It shows you are interested in your subject and spend a lot of time learning on your own.
On the other hand, when I think of these blogs I don't think of my PhD classmates. I think of foreign students who have no formal credentials or experience and are desperate to prove themselves outside of the system. This is doubly true if no one reads your blog, or if it's written in poor English. Most of my classmates have no time to write blogs because most of their working time goes towards classes, research, or projects that involve other people.
I would say that if you have real credentials, you should not mention your blog, because it lumps you with those other guys. But if your application sucks otherwise, you may as well mention it because it's all you've got.
(I have a similar opinion on Coursera classes, which is another path taken by students who are desperate to prove themselves outside of the system. Except Coursera classes are even worse because it's harder to measure what the student learned.)
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Tags: graduate-admissions, statement-of-purpose, website
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thread-34636
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34636
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How to focus on a single area during PhD?
|
2014-12-21T14:54:56.503
|
# Question
Title: How to focus on a single area during PhD?
My PhD supervisor says that I am overly curious and spend too much time studying lots of different area. However, he does say I am generally doing well and on the right track.
I am usually keen to meet new researchers, and I also spend time helping other PhD students to understand papers, even if they are not directly related to my field. I tend to keep studying a topic until I feel I fully understand it.
This has led my supervisor to believe that I am not working up to my true potential and just moving among areas too much. I have asked him directly and he says I just need to focus on one thing at a time, which I have started doing. I am just curious as to whether it is normal for PhD students to change and be immersed in different topics frequently, or am I just thinking too much? What strategies can help with staying more focused?
# Answer
> 16 votes
The main point of a PhD is to learn how to be a scientist. Involved in this is to focus on the work that needs to be done but also to pick up the necessary skill to solve the problem. As an advisor, I would get nervous if a student kept moving into new areas without a plan as to what these would be useful for. So from that perspective, if a student made good progress on the research, diversions would not be a concern; without progress, it would be a problem. Where you stand in this is not for anyone to say except based on a discussion between you and your advisor.
During my own PhD, I spent a fair amount learning tools that were only of marginal use in my own work. I am now very happy I did because as now a long-time faculty member, I have come to realize that the time I had as a PhD student to immerse in topics, is hard if not impossible to recreate after the PhD. I therefore advise PhD students to use their time wisely since the tools they learn during their PhD make up the core of their future toolbox. Contacts with other researchers and research directions is a similar issue in my mind. BUT, I always had in my mind that I needed to show progress and stay with my own research tasks as a priority. Balancing between the core work and forays into other areas is a necessity.
From your question, it does not sound as if you have a good balance and I therefore think you need to discuss the thesis work more with your advisor to make sure it is clear and structured to you. Only then will you be able to see your won progress and judge when you are on track.
# Answer
> 7 votes
In terms of ways of keeping focused, I think it's important to keep in mind that it is your job (as in, full time employment) to produce a cohesive block of research. Learning other things is also part of the job, but a smaller part. It might be helpful to allocate specific bits of your time to different tasks you need to do - eg spend some mornings reading new stuff related to your thesis, afternoons on doing the actual research, Friday afternoon reading whatever you're interested in (I'm not saying this is the right balance, just an example).
# Answer
> 5 votes
There's nothing wrong with being curious - that's crucial for being a successful research scientist. Your supervisor telling you that you are *overly* curious is with respect to completing your PhD studies in a timely fashion.
You have started to discipline yourself and to concentrate on one topic at a time. There is a potential problem of finding interest in a number of topics on first look, and superficially getting involved, then getting attracted to something else before completing something substantial in your previous topic. As Peter notes, the PhD is the formal process of finally demonstrating your capacity to be a scientist. Part of that is dedicating yourself to a topic, addressing it with all the skills expected of a professional scientist, presenting your results and drawing a suitable conclusion. You need to do these things. I think your supervisor is concerned -- rightly -- that you are unlikely to do this if you continue to allow yourself to be distracted.
Strategies - Discuss with your supervisor a topic that you agree is mutually interesting and shows promise for research. Have that topic more in the forefront of your mind as you go about your work. Write it down and stick it to your computer monitor. Ask yourself if what you are doing is more or less likely to further your progress towards achieving what you need to do to be awarded a PhD.
# Answer
> 0 votes
During the first or second years it's fine to do that, venturing around for areas.. this is important as this is the literature review phase. But towards the final you must focus on your experiment and write up. And focus towards that. This includes deactivating your Facebook or delaying checking email until you write something in your thesis.
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Tags: phd, research-process
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thread-34665
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34665
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When shall one write a mathematical expression as a separate line in a paper/Ph.D. thesis?
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2014-12-22T06:25:22.137
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# Question
Title: When shall one write a mathematical expression as a separate line in a paper/Ph.D. thesis?
When do we write a mathematical expression on a separate line, and when do we write it inline with the text?
I believe that the answer is the same for researching papers and Ph.D. theses, or maybe even textbooks; but please correct me if I am wrong.
Here I am referring to a paper/thesis on mathematics. When one writes a mathematical paper, sometimes one writes a mathematical expression in a separate line such as in the following example:
> We know that the identity
> a<sup>2</sup>+b<sup>2</sup>=c<sup>2</sup>
> holds true if ....
While sometimes one writes the mathematical expression inline with the text, such as in the following example:
> Let f:X-\>Y be a one-to-one map, ...
My impression is the longer the expression is, the more likely it is written in a separate line. But is there any (possibly unwritten) rule for it?
# Answer
> 14 votes
In the areas in which I work, there are no formal rules and it is left up to the author when to separate an equation and when to embed it in the text. When I am writing, I find that there are three fairly straightforward principles that work well for me in determining whether an equation (or other mathematical statement) deserves its own line or can be inline with the text:
1. Will I need to refer to the equation elsewhere? If so, it needs its own line, and equation numbering as well.
2. Is it more than ~1/3 of a line long? Anything so long that it is likely to get broken across lines and otherwise be a typographical mess should be pulled out onto its own line. Numbering is not required.
3. Do I want the reader to "pause" and contemplate the equation, or do I want it to "flow" as part of the sentence encompassing it?
This last needs a little bit more explanation... let's elaborate on one of the examples from the original question. If I write the sentence this way:
> We know that the identity a^2+b^2=c^2 holds true if the system is in condition X.
then the equation should be inline, because the sentence is really about condition X, rather than about the equation. If, on the other hand, the reader's attention should be directed to the equation, then it is better to use something like the following form, with the equation on its own line:
> We know that if the system is in condition X, then the following identity holds:
>
> > a^2+b^2=c^2
Note: these principles reduce to a similar effect as the style guide given by @silvado
# Answer
> 10 votes
The book "Handbook of writing for the mathematical sciences" by N. J. Higham shortly discusses that point in Section 3.7 ("Displaying equations"). I cite the first sentence of that section:
> An equation is displayed when it needs to be numbered, when it would be hard to read if placed in-line, or when it merits special attention, perhaps because it contains the first occurrence of an important variable.
In all other cases, equations should be put inline (being a mathematician, the book author does not mention this explicitly).
# Answer
> 4 votes
You may want to check the book Mathematics into Type published by the *American Mathematical Society* (AMS). See particularly section 2.5 in the Updated version (1999).
There are basically no fixed rules for what should be typeset as so-called *display* (on a separate line) versus run into the text. Length of the equation as well as importance are key parameters in making such a decision.
*Length*. Long equations will be difficult to set and to read if set into the text. Hence they need to be set in display mode.
*Importance*. If an equation is important to the text then it is likely better to set in in display mode since it will be easily seen.
Running everything in display is not useful. in-text equations save space while display equation break up the text. From this it is evident that the mix should also consider the length of the final text and the readability of the text.
There may of course be specific instructions for individual journals so check, in your case earlier PhD theses for hints, perhaps with the book mentioned above in one hand.
# Answer
> 1 votes
As with any style question, work through these rules from the top, and stop when you have an answer:
1. Read the style guide / advice to authors carefully, and follow its advice. It will often contain the answer.
2. Ask your editor / supervisor, and follow their advice.
3. Copy the style from recent works that are in the same category as yours; so if yours is a review article to the Journal of Studies, copy the style from recent reviews in the Journal of Studies; if it's a PhD thesis to the Institute of Thinking, copy the style from recent PhD theses to the Institute of Thinking. This will only be successful if there's an obvious pattern present. Look at several works, don't just pick one: you're looking for a *pattern*, not just a single *precedent*.
4. Follow best practice in typography and graphic design. If your own eye isn't yet trained, ask someone who does have a good eye for these things. One way to assess this is to try several things, and pick whatever's clearest to a reader new to the material. But don't do this too often: you don't want to exhaust the goodwill of your style-checkers.
(you might wish to swap around numbers 2 and 3, e.g. if you know that the rules have not changed recently)
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Tags: publications, thesis, mathematics, writing-style, formatting
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thread-29133
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/29133
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What is the optimal balance of time spent on research vs. volunteering/leadership/organizing in grad school and beyond?
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2014-09-29T02:27:09.600
|
# Question
Title: What is the optimal balance of time spent on research vs. volunteering/leadership/organizing in grad school and beyond?
In graduate school I have found that along with being a producer of good research, fellowships/post-doctoral advisers/faculty search committee are also often interested in what one has done *outside* of research (or teaching/TA-ing) as well. Examples of such activities include (but are not limited to) volunteering with younger students in science, organizing a journal club, mentoring undergraduate researchers, etc. In some cases, the importance of these activities is immense: for the NSF CAREER award, for example, having outreach is a substantial part of the application.
However, clearly, spending all of one's time on these activities is not the best idea, since then no research gets done.
So, my question is:
**What is the optimal fraction/amount of time to spend on "outreach" activities like those mentioned above, which are explicitly not research or teaching activities, for someone looking to pursue a career at a research university?**
# Answer
I believe the optimal amount of time spent on these other activities is as little as possible.
Graduate students are notoriously overworked and underpaid. In essence, they are trying to see how much work they can get you to do for them, for free. In situations like this, where they attempt to get you to prove how much of a 'team player' you are by essentially providing them valuable work without them having to pay for it, you need to be on your guard and make sure you aren't taken advantage of.
You will need some of these 'extra-curricular' activities. But they are a means to an end. Essentially you must demonstrate your willingness to go 'above and beyond' the explicitly listed duties of your job without neglecting the official duties. It can be a tight balancing act.
There isn't a hard and fast ratio, like 70% research/ 30% leadership. Instead, you will need to be skilled at determining your peers/superiors expectations for you in this regard and meeting/exceeding them, and this will vary from institution to institution and individual to individual. A lot of potential feedback is likely to be of the 'you must read between the lines' variety.They are unlikely to say "You aren't going to get the position unless you do more work for us for free". Instead they might hint "you are doing great in your research, but it would be very nice if you would take more initiative and perhaps be more of a mentor to younger students" - indeed, anything phrased as definitively as that is equivalent to being posted in bright red flashing letters.
In general you will be pressured to spend more time on these activities than you can afford to, or is necessary for your career. Finding out where that level is (somewhere between 'nothing' and 'everything they ever ask you to do') may be a matter of trial and error.
I would spend time on the research unless you get the distinct feeling you are not meeting expectations in the extra-curriculars department.
> 2 votes
# Answer
Short answer: You should spend "some" time on volunteering and leadership activities.
Unlike an undergraduate student, a graduate student is primarily focused on research, so you don't want to spend "a lot" of time elswhere. Even so, proficiency in other activities is something of a "tiebreaker" against another candidate with comparable research activities that doesn't have "outside" activities.
This is in contrast to undergraduate work, where "leadership" is the "whole game" for some students (for later life)--provided they pass their courses.
> 1 votes
# Answer
It has to factor in *what your goals are* for 5 years from now. Are you *truly interested* in the field in which you are doing research? Or do you actually need to think about changing tracks to make some of the volunteering your career? What would give you joy in daily work?
If you are committed to the research field, then think about the *relevancy* of the volunteering. If your goals include highly competitive academic positions, you will need to be publishing 2 solid articles per year to survive. Solid research even now is the foundation without which nothing happens.
The volunteer work should be meaningful ideally to both you and those who hire you either academically or in industry. Joining too many organizations with little contribution may make you feel you are doing something but won't add to your credentials. Focusing on perhaps at most 2 and rising to some official capacity or being able to document accomplishment is deemed essential according to many who have succeeded.
What kind of *"cake"* do you seek to make out of your work life? Volunteering is frosting for which you feel good. But you need to work on the cake foremost.
> 1 votes
# Answer
One point I'm missing in the answers so far is that you learn skills with many such activities that you need later on. As a postdoc, people will expect that you *can* teach and supervise a small group as well as doing research on your own. The same is true if you want to become a group leader in industry.
So unless you're the natural born group leader and teacher, you'll need to put in a certain amount of time to try out how these things work. When and where you do this is maybe less relevant\*: I learned a lot of this volounteering in a student group as an undergrad. You may also convince people that you learned teaching by fincancing your studies giving private lessons.
I have learned more about group leading looking after students doing research practicum, and after students doing their bachelor/master/diplom theses. In terms of getting research done, research practicum students typically require a multiple of the time I need to do the work. (And I find it important to be clear about that beforehand, and also to communicate this clearly to everyone, in particular to supervisors and students.)
In terms of learning how to formulate a decent research project, how to find someone capable and willing o work on it and how to supervise such work, I don't see many alternatives to putting in the effort.
I'm less enthusastic about looking after a 101 labwork practicum. I do get out a thorough update on my general professional knowledge, but the time put in to knowledge gained ratio is really bad. You can still learn skills like teaching and grading, though.
Note: during most of my PhD I've *not* been paid for the research, the wage I got was for looking after a labwork practicum. However, this was non-negotiable in the sense that while I could have refused the contract, I'd still have been assigned as TA. So at the end of the day, there wasn't much volounteering about this. It was part of "everyone has to make their contribution to keep the institue alive". Where I'm now, teaching practicum is officially required during the PhD in some faculties.
* With the exception that *starting* to learn these skills as a postdoc is very late.
> 1 votes
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Tags: career-path, time-management, mentoring, outreach, service-activities
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thread-31681
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/31681
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How best to present long equations in two-column papers?
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2014-11-13T19:42:00.697
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# Question
Title: How best to present long equations in two-column papers?
How best to present long equations in two-column papers?
I've tried splitting them in two or more lines along operators, but that still looks a bit weird to me, especially when parentheses have to be carried along across the lines. Also, I've considered stretching them across both columns, but that seems only an acceptable solution if the equation is of outstanding importance, e.g. the final result and not some middle section of a proof.
# Answer
> 10 votes
When I have had occasion to deal with obnoxiously large equations, I find that there are four strategies that do well for me. In order of readability, they are:
1. Shrink the font: if you are allowed (any many venues do allow this), you can usually shrink the font on an equation a few points without affecting readability.
2. Map separable terms of the equation to new variables, which can be given their own independent definition lines. This can really help readability in a complex equation as well.
--- *The line of desperation* ---
3. Break the equation across two lines: this works up to about 1.6 lines worth of smaller-font equation. When combined with adjusting font size, you can often adjust where the break occurs to make it look reasonable.
4. Move the equations to a full-width figure, where you can play all of the same games.
# Answer
> 10 votes
I suggest you check chapter 3.3.4 in the book Mathematics into Type published by the *American Mathematical Society* (AMS).
The book sets up specific rules for breaking the equations and also how to align these after breaking. The rules are too complex to be reproduced or duplicated well here so anyone interested should download the book using the link above for reference.
# Answer
> 1 votes
What a programmer would do is break the formula into sub-functions along boundaries that reflect the way the formula itself breaks up into individual concepts, define those, and then define the top-level formula in terms of those. I can't see any reason that wouldn't work here, at least to some degree...
(This is like @jakebeal's suggestion to define new variables, but taking it one step farther to point out that when several of those variables are of the same form, you can define a parameterized function rather than having to spell out every one.)
In my experience, what a pure mathematician would do is the same thing, but they'd call their functions operators and assign them symbols rather than names. :-)
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Tags: publications, writing, formatting
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thread-34693
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34693
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Should I talk about a unpublished paper in my SOP?
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2014-12-22T19:11:21.043
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# Question
Title: Should I talk about a unpublished paper in my SOP?
I have a draft of a unpublished paper that I hosted in Arxiv that I will be attaching with my application. Should I talk about the inspiration behind it in my SOP. Like how is the method behind the paper different from the existing methods for the same problem?
There seems to be this general consensus that anything flimsy or story-like needs to be avoided. Does talking about inspiration for a paper qualify as flimsy or story-like?
The paper is a single author paper that I never talked about with my recommendors so I am afraid that if I don't talk about it, people reading my SOP will not read it at all.
# Answer
> 4 votes
**Talking about an unpublished article that has inspired you is certainly fair game for a SOP essay in a graduate application.**
Certainly the inspiration, and the differences between your approach and different, existing methods would be highly interesting to me.
I love to see undergrads who take initiative in research - they tend to make good Ph.D. students. Taking ownership and initiative in your project is a key step of maturity in grad school. So if you have *already* done so, that's a great sign.
And yes, if it's only in Arxiv and you haven't mentioned it to your letter-writers, I'm not likely to read the paper if it's not otherwise mentioned in your SOP.
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Tags: graduate-admissions, statement-of-purpose
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thread-34700
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34700
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Decision and PhD. Take a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity or pursue a life dream
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2014-12-22T21:21:15.373
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# Question
Title: Decision and PhD. Take a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity or pursue a life dream
Young male student soon to receive an Engineering Degree unsure about the next steps to follow. Undecided whether to go for a PhD directly or do a Master studies first (if he goes for the Master, he will first have to do a thesis work anyway). Has to decide between a PhD position to which he has promising chances to get a scholarship funded by a top company in the world, or apply for a prestigious scholarship for a Master's degree to which he stands good chances and that could probably lead to study in a top US university. His goal is to study at a top university and do research at the highest level. Seeks advice from experienced or knowledgeable advisors and academics about what to do next.
# Answer
It seems like you're choosing between
1. A (nearly) guaranteed PhD offer at a middling university.
2. A fully funded master's program that you *may or may not* be accepted to, but may offer you the opportunity to jump to a better PhD program *if* you get the Fulbright scholarship and perform well in your master's.
Some factors you may consider are
1. If you take the master's offer you will spend a lot of time preparing for a PhD. You will need to perform extra well for two years to secure your letters of recommendation, and it will look bad if you don't accomplish anything significant during that time. In the end you might not get into your school of choice, and then you will have worked very hard for no visible gain. How confident are you that you can (1) get the scholarship, and (2) perform consistently well once you're actually there?
2. A master's degree will give you more background in computer science, and you will learn more about theoretical CS than "it involves both programming and mathematics." A *lot* of things involve both programming and mathematics, and getting more experience (in coursework and research) will let you better evaluate your options before jumping into a long commitment. Most theoretical CS students I know entered their PhD program knowing they wanted to study "approximation algorithms," "cryptography," etc, not just "theoretical CS" or "some field that involves both programming and math."
It's also kind of a red flag that you're undecided between a PhD and a master's, and I think before you go for a PhD you should have a stronger opinion on this. If you are uncertain about your career and your research area you will be at a significant disadvantage compared to your classmates who aren't.
3. If your first choice is the PhD offer, you can easily apply to both and turn down the Master's offer, but if your first choice is the Master's offer, it would be awkward to apply to both and turn down the PhD offer.
> 4 votes
# Answer
You should ask yourself what is your dream destination, and make decisions that will lead you to the destination. Is studying at a US University a destination or point in a journey?
If I read your post correctly you are already accepted to UK. So, on one hand you have the opportunity to go in UK, or on the other hand possibly be accepted for Fulbright which will maybe get you to US. What is the alternative if Fulbright/US do not pan out?
Last note, never underestimate the value of a good advisor, even from a lesser University. Attending the best school with an adviser who will not advocate for you, limits your options later on. Again, what you choose depends what your destination is.
> 1 votes
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Tags: phd, masters, advisor, mathematics, computer-science
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thread-18873
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/18873
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Should limitations of a methodology with proposed solutions be discussed in the Limitations Section?
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2014-04-03T14:22:57.343
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# Question
Title: Should limitations of a methodology with proposed solutions be discussed in the Limitations Section?
My methodology is online ethnography. This methodology has certain limitations such as identity play, falsification, and artificiality of data. However, its proponents have suggested some strategies for coping with these limitations and my study is based on them.
I am confused because I think the limitations section is concerned with limitations of a study that were not solved or accounted for, and that are to be avoided in future research.
So, should I discuss these limitations, that have alternative approaches or proposed solutions, in the limitations section? Thank you
# Answer
> 4 votes
With the caveat that this is discipline specific, you could discuss your questions in several places in your article.
First, you can begin to nod at this briefly in the methods section of your article. Every methodology has some drawback or limitation and my advisers always told me to acknowledge this in the beginning. For instance, while doing semi-structured interviews, I admitted that my sampling was convenience and snowball based and restricted to 30 participants. However, I followed this up by citing 2 papers which talk about appropriateness of sample size in grounded theory approaches and theoretical saturation and why this is not hamstringing my paper completely.
Second, one of the ways of validating qualitative studies from a methodological perspective is to look at issues of credibility, transferability etc. One of their solutions is to do member checks (especially for interview based studies) In one of my current projects, I did do member checks and talk about this approach as mitigating some of my methodological drawbacks in the **Discussion** section of my article.
Third, you can definitely talk about this in the limitations section of your paper. There is no panacea to solving a human-centered research problem (and indeed various nuanced facets of every research project, however thoroughly investigated they might be are almost always incomplete) In the limitations section of my papers, I put down both theoretical as well as methodological limitations of my work and discuss potential ways to approach them in future work or follow up studies.
# Answer
> 1 votes
While I do not directly address your question, the following might help you to find a point of view that allows you to structure your work. Also note that I am from an entirely different discipline.
> I am confused because I think the limitations section is concerned with limitations of a study that were not solved or accounted for, and that are to be avoided in future research.
With exception to the rare case that you can fully reduce the effects of a limitation of your methodology to a neglible magnitude, it remains a limitation and thus further work can improve on this aspect.
Moreover, a limitation of a methodology that is neither addressed by countermeasures nor argument (i.e., you can argue that the limitation’s effects are limited) is not only a limitation but a flaw – with some exceptions such as if that limitation only became apparent in hindsight or your main work is to explore the methodology rather than just to apply it. Any claims resulting from a methodology that has errors of fully unknown magnitude are worthless.
Finally, unless your advisor or some other relevant person has dogmatic views on how your thesis is to be structured, your structure should be determined by your content and not vice versa. In particular, it may be wise to address certain aspects only once and thouroughly – and not in multiple places and in parts. For example, you may consider titling a section along the lines of *Limitations and how to circumvent them.*
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Tags: research-process, thesis, methodology
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thread-34704
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34704
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How to find ISSN number of IEEE Sponsored (or IEEE related) Events?
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2014-12-22T23:54:56.460
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# Question
Title: How to find ISSN number of IEEE Sponsored (or IEEE related) Events?
My University of Technology requires me to limit my research paper publications to certain venues, which have an associated ISSN number. How do I find out the ISSN numbers for IEEE Sponsored events, such as in Croatia (Europe), when I can't find an ISSN number on their Web pages? Here is the IEEE related conference URL: http://iwcmc.org/2015/? Thanks so much!!!
# Answer
> 1 votes
You can look at this list https://www.ieee.org/documents/2005\_present\_list\_of\_titles.xls from IEEE of upcoming events, and events from 2005 to present with all corresponding publication numbers.
As a comment points out, many of the listings do not have ISSN numbers. However, you can look at line 10935 of the excel sheet and see your conference.
IWCMC. The IEEE conference number is 34432 and ISBN 978-1-4799-5345-5
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Tags: publications, ieee
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thread-34678
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34678
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How to politely decline an interview for a PhD program?
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2014-12-22T13:51:03.337
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# Question
Title: How to politely decline an interview for a PhD program?
I've applied to three US universities (A, B, C) for PhD programs. Universities A and B offered me interviews on two separate weekends, which I accepted. I then made travel arrangements with Universities A and B for interviews.
I was then offered an interview with University C on the same date as my University A interview. I asked C for an alternate date, which happened to be the same weekend as my interview with B. I informed C of this and gave them a list of dates that I was free to interview but was told that those were the only two dates possible at University C.
I asked A and B about changing my interview date but was told that I could not since travel arrangements had already been made (through the university/a university-sponsored travel agency).
Universities A and B are both higher on my list than University C, so I've decided to decline University C's interview.
How can I do this politely? I don't want to burn any bridges with University C.
---
Related question: What should be done about conflicting invitations for graduate school interviews?
# Answer
You have asked for an alternative interview date, gave them a list of options where you're available, and made efforts to reschedule conflicting appointments. I don't think there's anything more that could be expected of you, so it should not be perceived as impolite if you just inform University C that unfortunately you can't come to any of the two offered interview dates due to conflicting appointments. If you want, you can explicitly mention interviews at other universities - that will make it clear that you're genuinely interested in doing a PhD, and it will be understandable to most academics that everybody has a ranking of opportunities in such situations.
You could offer to retract your application, or state that you expect that they won't consider your application any further, but I don't think any of these would be required.
> 34 votes
# Answer
They seem to have all the facts already. Just tell them that you had already made travel arrangements to visit A and B on the dates that C wanted you to come out, and that you have to regretfully decline to come to C. They're not going to be mad at you.
> 74 votes
# Answer
I don't see any reason they would be upset by you telling the truth. In fact, trying to get too deep in explaining *"why I am choosing to go to A and B instead of you"* could potentially be more "offensive", if that's what you're worried about. Concerning politeness, I would call if possible; quickly, too. There's no reason to leave them waiting to hear back from you if the answer is 'no'!
Be short, sweet, and to the point.
"I am sorry to say that I won't be able to attend an interview on either of the dates provided. If a time comes up other than those provided, please let me know. I apologize for any inconvenience."
It's also possible to leave an opening for a possible interview with University C later that way.
> 10 votes
# Answer
Personally, I would recommend simplicity and honesty. Tell them what you have told us: I’m sure they will understand your problem. They are people too.
> 7 votes
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Tags: phd, graduate-admissions, etiquette, interview
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thread-34530
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34530
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Failing postdoc?
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2014-12-19T09:18:31.250
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# Question
Title: Failing postdoc?
After a successful PhD in computer science (including some awards from top conferences, internship at top industry research labs, and a good number of citations to my ~15 papers) in a top-10 US school, I got a postdoc at a top-3 US school.
I had a number of postdoc offers and chose the one whose topic more far-related to my phd thesis, in order to learn new things, get out of the box, and show that I'm not a one-trick dog (or doc? ;) ). The topic is different but not too much far away (i.e., I didn't move from theory to systems, rather from algorithms to (applied) machine learning).
I've been in my new position almost 6 months and feel like a complete failure. I can't go on with one of the projects I was assigned to and it is not for lack of trying: I just don't understand the results I'm getting because I don't know the field well enough and I can't figure out what I am actually supposed to do to improve them.
My supervisor gets quite "adversarial" when I ask for feedback and I try to explain what I don't understand. On the other hand, he says that I'm very helpful on other projects, helping the students, and a valuable addition to the group, and he would have told me if it wasn't so. Indeed I think it is true and I'm doing a good job on other projects (which are not "mine").
The project I'm failing at could have a great impact on science (not just CS) on the long term, but I feel like any engineer trained in the field could lead it to completion, so I don't find it particularly exciting. I guess I'm missing the excitement I got when I had to prove theorems during my PhD. Right now, the project involves just messy data analysis, and a lot of try-and-error coding (mostly error), all without much feedback from the supervisor (who actually told me to ask the students...which I did and they weren't exactly helpful).
Anyway, this is getting me extremely stressed (I actually started seeing a therapist about this), and I'm thinking of moving away from this position, although I may have the possibility of renewing for another year (if my supervisor would even still consider the option, which he gave me when I started)
What are the pro/cons of moving away after 1 year with not exactly much positive work done yet, especially of which I could claim ownership? I believe that right now my supervisor would not, in the future, write me a very positive recommendation letter, in my opinion.
Note that I already have offers for next year, on topics more related to what I did during my phd.
# Answer
Not really an answer, but some advice: it's normal to need time to get going as a post-doc. Usually you end a PhD at the end of a fairly large project. You have completed what you've been building up to. Therefore you need to start pretty much at the beginning with new projects as a post-doc, and it takes time before they come to completing. After that you'll usually have different projects at different stages, so the start of post-doc time is likely to be unusually slow results-wise.
In terms of the question: the main problem with trying to move when you've not produced much recently is in not being able to secure a job. If you've already got offers, you might want to think more about the personal side of moving jobs.
PS. You might like to look up 'imposter syndrome'.
> 13 votes
# Answer
You specifically asked about the pros/cons of leaving after one year without much to show for, so I will start with that. In my experience, you build credibility over time. And the more of that your resume shows the better.
Imagine the following situation:
You leave this position now and move to another school. Likely not in the top-3 anymore. Your next university takes you, after all you come from a top-3 school, even without published results one could assume you profited from that. But now, after another year, funding completely dries up at your new university and you have to leave again. Now you already have two very short post-doc employments on your resume. It might start looking like a downward spiral. If you decide to leave academia then, you would have to explain why it took you two years at different schools after completing a PhD to figure out that you were not cut for academia.
I am not suggesting that this is bound to happen. I am just pointing out a negative scenario to consider. And there will always be people who made something like this work.
An argument in favor of leaving would be, if you cannot at all imagine turning the situation around, "wasting" more valuable time and ultimately having nothing to show for after 2-4 years - or however long you stay.
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But aside from the pros/cons, I believe a careful examination of your situation is called for.
You say, "*I just don't understand the results I'm getting because I don't know the field well enough and I can't figure out what I am actually supposed to do to improve them.*", however, later on you point out: "*any engineer trained in the field could lead it to completion, so I don't find it particularly exciting. I guess I'm missing the excitement I got when I had to prove theorems during my PhD.*"
With regard to the struggle of not knowing what to do, I would respond: You have a PhD! You should have acquired the ability to do a thorough literature search and familiarize yourself with almost any topic within a reasonable amount of time. Especially, if your new field is not too far from your old one. Read publications, text books (if they exist) and talk to others in your new field. Is your new supervisor the only faculty member at your top-3 school that deals with this matter? Or are there others with a similar interest? After six months, you should have gained some understanding of what you are doing and what the results mean.
This brings us to the second part, the lack of excitement. As a general advice for career choices, I would recommend putting down a list of expectations that you have with regard to what you do. And then assign each item a priority. But only assign each priority once. Based on your question, this list could contain:
* I want to conduct research at a top-3 university
* I want to conduct research in a field with which I am familiar
* I want to conduct research in a field that I find exciting
Once you have assigned a priority to each of those, only one has the top spot. Follow that top priority. If you current position does not satisfy that, move on.
> 9 votes
# Answer
If you've realized after a year that you want to go back to doing theory research, you should simply do that. It's not "bad" to leave a post-doc after a year and take a different one (I did that, though for different reasons). When you apply for permanent jobs, if you don't have a letter from your current host, that should be fine as long as you have good letters overall, including one from your PhD advisor. Your overall record will matter a lot more than what project you did where.
In trying to figure out what you *should* do, I would suggest simply figuring out what you *want* to do. It is sometimes possible to "overstrategize."
> 3 votes
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Tags: advisor, computer-science, postdocs, supervision
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thread-23969
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/23969
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Why shouldn't I take a risk to make my thesis have better design?
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2014-06-26T05:14:18.360
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# Question
Title: Why shouldn't I take a risk to make my thesis have better design?
I am making a final dissertation for my graduation. I want it to have a better design than the boring traditional. When I read this and this, I think that the downside is because it makes the thesis more clearer, any good or bad thing will be crystal clear. However, a default Word 2013 theme is easily to get and takes you not much effort. I don't want my thesis to be colorful so much, but I also don't want it to be monochrome. Elegance isn't necessary to be black and white.
My university requires me to have the format in form, but I think it's boring. Should I take a risk to make my thesis have better design? If not, why? I need a reason.
Do I really want to graduate? Of course I do, if not, I will happily take that risk immediate. I know that's a risk, and you may have to pay for that. My inspiration is coming from Dance your PhD. Of course I won't dance on my defense day, I just want to say that bad representation is wasting time. You can say, "it's all your choice". I just want to make my choice to be right.
What if I losing point from this? I hope that people will think again when they do a thesis. If they do, then I'm willing to lose my point.
Why does the font need to be Times New Roman, not Calibri?
# Answer
If you want to improve your Universities recommended/required thesis formatting, you should go ahead. But, **submitting a differently formatted thesis, just to spite them is not the right way to go**. And it will not accomplish anything.
*All scientific publications have a required format.* You submitted to a conference that prescribes double column, but your paper is single column? Automatic rejection without reading the paper. You don't like the formatting of the journal best suited for your work? Tough luck. You submit a 10-page paper to a conference with 8-page limit? Reject.
It is simply how scientific publishing works. If you want to publish your *original* content, you have to follow the *well-established guidelines*.
If you really think that **changing your Universities required formatting is a worthy goal**, and want to do it for non-selfish reasons, for all the generations to come, you should do it in a proper way. Try to use proper channels, and do it like a responsible adult with an idea, not like a child doing things out of spite because they don't like the way the world turns.
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*Some things you might try:* Make examples of a sensible new format. If there is any current templates, make some for your own formatting. If you can find some proof that your formatting is better, that's good (e.g. it is proven that some fonts are more readable and better than some others). Find the right person, in charge of that. Try meeting with them, and leading a sensible, non-heated discussion. Argument you opinion and proposition. Explain why you think the current design is outdated and why and how you think the new one will be an improvement. Offer your help in implementing the new system and offering new guides and materials. Finally, if you succeed in changing something, you can feel content you did something good for future generations. If you don't, at least you know you gave it your best try, and you tried to do it in the way with best chances of success.
> 14 votes
# Answer
Are you interested in receiving your degree? Then submit a thesis meeting all of the university's requirements. If you think the formatting is so terrible, feel free to post a differently-formatted version on your website or whatever.
> 28 votes
# Answer
Most of the restrictions for thesis formats came from the years when theses were transferred to microfiche storage. Standardizing the format made sure that the reproductions would be as legible as possible.
Similar issues are still in effect, except with respect to electronic scans and the like. Choosing consistent designs and formats makes life easier for everyone. Even though it may not be your personal preference, you should follow the guidelines. The university can choose not to accept your thesis if its format strays too far from the official guidelines, which will force you to spend valuable time (and possibly money) preparing a revised version.
> 6 votes
# Answer
Regarding serif and sans serif font, the conventional wisdom is that serif fonts are easier to read (especially on paper). This argument is often used to justify the requirements. Of course, another related factor is just the desire to have all theses be in a uniform style--it looks neater! There seems to be no conclusive evidence that serif fonts are actully easier to read, but I must admit that I strongly prefer a serif font--Times New Roman or Cambria being among my favorites. In a similar situation, I recently had to submit a paper in Calibri, which was a strong insult to my aesthetic sense. My personal post of the paper is in Times New Roman!--but I submitted per the guidelines.
Others claim that sans serif fonts are better for reading on a screen (note that this site is entirely in sans serif!). However, there is apparently *no empirically valid data* to support either claim. Alex Poole does a nice job of reviewing the convoluted history of this dispute.
So although there seems to be no clear evidence that either type of font is actually better, you are bucking conventional wisdom, tradition, and university policy by advocating for sans serif font in your thesis. I'd say use the serif font for the official version, and then, as JeffE and Tim suggested, post a 'prettier' version everywhere else. If you are determined to try to change the status quo, follow penelope's excellent advice.
> 2 votes
# Answer
What is good or bad is not easy for anyone to judge. Typesetting a document, including selecting fonts, is in essence a profession which through technology has been put in our hands. This has resulted in significant downgrading in quality although some enlightenment has also occurred. The problem is that it is easy for someone to chose a type face and set it as you see fit without actually knowing how it appears to the reader. This is why it is common to come across thesis and reports that are quite awful in type-setting and therefore unnecessarily difficult to read.
Times-Roman, is a type face developed to be space saving. This means it may not be the prettiest but it is easy to read and you can fit more text per page. There are other similar fonts that are less condensed and more easily read such as the popular Garamond. Sans serifs are relatively commonly seen in texts, despite the fact that they were not designed for such use. The are generally no well suited for large volumes of text. There are hybrids such as Optima that works a little better but using Sans Serifs in the text body is not a good idea, typographically speaking. You can pick up any book on type-setting and type faces to learn more. A good example is perhaps Robert Bringhursts *The Elements of Typographic Style*. Hartley & Marks Publ.
When it comes to colour in a thesis, it can easily be stated that colour improves readability of diagrams and illustrations. The downside is that the colour is poorly reproduced in a B/W copier or when printed on a B/W laser printer. There is thus still incentive to be selective when using colour. unfortunately all plotting software (from things like Excel to R and Matlab) provides colour as default and so turning multicoloured plots into B/W involves extra work. Part of being professional is, however, to make such decisions and simplify. I think this can be seen as part of your professional development through graduate school and shown in your thesis. What must be colour should be colour, nothing else.
So trying to provide some direct feedback. To redesign what you see as boring may sound simple, you comment on choosing some built in Word does not sound very thought through. I believe you should approach the layout of your thesis as professionally as you do your science. You therefore need to get yourself familiar with a little bit of typography and graphics design. The latter can be done by looking at the books by Edward Tufte, particularly his The visual Display of Quantitative Information. If you just put your thesis in the hands of software designers, you have no control over what you actually get. You need to assess what is better or worse in typography and graphic design. The alternative is to be *boring* and stick with the standard thesis format and I would actually suggest that if you want to save time. In addition, you of course need to figure out what the university allows, there should be some guidelines available.
> 2 votes
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Tags: thesis, design
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thread-32131
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/32131
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How to use copyrighted images in an article?
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2014-11-22T23:58:19.510
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# Question
Title: How to use copyrighted images in an article?
I have developed an educational software in which I make use of some copyrighted images, for example from Disney, and am now writing an article about it.
How should I reference or cite that those images are copyrighted? Should I put it on a footnote or just blur the images inside the article?
I would not like to have problems of an article rejection because of that.
# Answer
> 2 votes
The images are copyrighted. You are not allowed to put it in the article unless you obtain an explicit (and preferably written) permission by the copyright holder to use it there. If you obtained a permission to use it for research and you would like to consider it a permission to publish it in an article, you better consult a lawyer, but the odds are that you can't do that. As well, do not forget to check whether the journal's copyright transfer is not conflicting with the permission you obtain from the picture's copyright holder. You'll very likely need an exception from the Editor to be allowed to use the image.
To see that this is an issue, remember that the usage of the famous Lenna picture led to legal complaints raised by PlayBoy who is the copyright holder. They decided to cancel the complaints, but it was just their choice. (Source: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~chuck/lennapg/lenna.shtml)
# Answer
> 0 votes
I would cite images using footnotes using either the MLA or APA image citation guidelines. However, there are some extra citation requirements for disney images see the walt disney terms of use web page http://www.waltdisney.org/terms-use pay particular attention to the section on fair use.
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Tags: writing, copyright, graphics
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thread-34685
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34685
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Is it poor grammar to replace normal phrases with mathematical symbols in sentences in a mathematical paper?
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2014-12-22T14:39:05.520
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# Question
Title: Is it poor grammar to replace normal phrases with mathematical symbols in sentences in a mathematical paper?
English is not my native language and when I read mathematical papers, sometimes I saw sentences such as
> The matrix A has rank ≥ n.
I am wondering if this sentence should be considered as grammatically wrong. I think the correct expression should be
> The rank of the matrix A is greater than or equal to n.
Are expressions such as "The matrix A has rank ≥ n" considered as acceptable in mathematical papers/theses/textbooks?
# Answer
> Are expressions such as "The matrix A has rank ≥ n" considered as acceptable in mathematical papers/theses/textbooks?
No, it's often considered poor style to incorporate fragments of equations like this into text. I wouldn't go so far as to say it's ungrammatical, but many people consider it bad writing. Some others don't care about this issue, which is why you sometimes see it done, but this is more common in informal or unedited writing.
The issue is that "rank ≥ n" is mixing together English and mathematics within the same construction. If this doesn't bother you, imagine a more dramatic case like "n + five". (By contrast, when someone writes "if x ≥ y", the inequality "x ≥ y" is a self-contained unit within the sentence.) There's no logical reason why mathematical writing conventions couldn't allow this sort of mixing, but they don't.
Saying "The matrix A has rank at least n" is shorter and cleaner than "The rank of the matrix A is greater than or equal to n", but they are both acceptable. I'd recommend avoiding "The matrix A has rank ≥ n" (I can't think of a good reason to prefer it, and avoiding looking bad is a reason not to use it).
> 36 votes
# Answer
*(Copy Editor and mathematician speaking)*
I, for one, allow these mixed constructions when editing the articles. I do know that it is not the best grammatical style, but not everything in math is easy to put down in proper English grammar. The two rules of thumb I use for these boundary cases is: Is the text clear to the reader? Can you *easily* make it grammatically correct?
For instance, the sentence "For matrix A, the equation rank(A) ≥ 5 holds." is cryptic and long. A better option might be "For matrix A, we have rank(A) ≥ 5." or "Matrix A satisfies rank(A) ≥ 5." I would be fine with "Matrix A has rank at least 5." However, this gets complicated if you have more such expressions in a row, like in:
> ... which is defined as a non-real algebraic integer in modulus \>1 whose Galois conjugates except its complex conjugate are in modulus \<1.
vs.
> ... which is defined as a non-real algebraic integer in modulus greater than 1 whose Galois conjugates except its complex conjugate are in modulus less than 1.
I prefer the first option. This went through the AMS language editorial, as far as I remember, without any problem.
> 19 votes
# Answer
I let it pass if the sentence is unambiguous and can be pronounced normally when reading without any special effort like in "If $A$ is $\ge B+C$ and $f:\[0,A\]\to\mathbb Z$, then... (If the quantity/parameter/number $A$ is larger than the sum $B+C$ and the function $f$ maps the interval $\[0,A\]$ to the set $\mathbb Z$, then...) because in this case the extra words just slow the reader down. However, when seeing any ambiguity like "If A, B, C." (which comma is "and", and which is "then" here?) or something that, if attempted to be read as a sentence, violates not only the rules of the grammar, but also those of common sense as far as structuring sentences is concerned and which, if one needs it to be said at the board in a classroom, will have to be split into separate sentences and totally restructured to be comprehended by ear, I usually object.
Side note: what's the point of not enabling mathjax on Academia?
> 7 votes
# Answer
In principle, it is generally acceptable to mix together mathematical and prose statements, as in your example: either construction would be technically be grammatically correct.
In practice, which to choose depends on how you want your reader to think about the statement that you have written. Prose emphasizes the relationship, in your example focusing the reader on "greater than." A mathematical statement tends to instead be thought of as a unit, in your example focusing the reader on "rank." You should thus choose accordingly.
One exception: small integers referring to counting within a small range should always be written as prose. Some examples of this distinction:
> We selected eight conditions to test.
>
> We found that 8 of the 73 samples were positive.
The boundary of "small" is a bit hazy: certainly less than 10, usually less than 20.
> 2 votes
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Tags: mathematics, writing-style, grammar
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thread-34644
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34644
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Is it ethical to blog about your publications to communicate your research without being restricted by the journal?
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2014-12-21T18:51:06.280
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# Question
Title: Is it ethical to blog about your publications to communicate your research without being restricted by the journal?
I've always been interested in communicating research to the public. I also strongly believe that research publications should be in the public domain, especially if the work was funded with public money. I found the responses to this question to be pretty interesting, and they got me thinking about scientific blogging as a solution.
So my question is -- can I put up my scientific findings on my blog or webspace that is not written exactly like my published article but contains essentially the same data and results?
**Edit**: I am **not** suggesting blogging as an *alternative* to publishing, but as an additional mode by which I can communicate my research and not be handcuffed by any publishing magnate.
# Answer
I think the answer is **yes**, but you should aim higher: the line you're drawing in the sand is uncomfortably close to you and that's causing more work for you than is necessary.
Namely, trying to put the essential content of your papers on your own website for the purpose of freely disseminating your work seems wrongheaded: instead, you should be putting your own papers on your webpage and/or freely available preprint servers like the arxiv. In order to do so fully *legally* (which is not necessarily the same as ethically: it is possible to feel that the law is unethical, in which case the ethical thing to do could be to break the law, but be willing to live with the consequences of that) you need to arrange this as a condition of the publication. This is **absolutely feasible** with all of the major scientific publishing companies. How common the deal is seems to depend on the individual journal and on the standards of the field. In my field (mathematics), I do not know of a reputable journal which would not allow its authors to post on the arxiv. (Once I dealt with a journal which initially asked me to remove the copy of the paper from my homepage. After some back and forth, the editor in chief told me that it was absolutely okay for me to do that and he was surprised that the editorial assistant had said otherwise. In retrospect, this was a clear warning that I was dealing with a shady journal.)
I gather that in some scientific fields, there are "popular" journals which do not allow authors to put papers on the arxiv (or, alas, there may not be an arxiv or clear equivalent) or -- gasp! -- on their own homepage. I find this strange, because in my understanding in most scientific fields the majority of journals are owned by Elsevier, Springer, Science Direct... -- i.e., by enormous multinational, multibillion dollar publishing magnates which are not renowned for their generosity or enthusiasm for open access. But when you publish a paper in (e.g.) mathematics in one of these journals, the copyright notice that you sign allows you to post the paper on the arxiv and your own webpage. I find it hard to believe that the copyright notices for different journals by the same publisher would be so different on this point. So the battle has already been won in these hardest places. If there are trade journals specific to your field which are less generous to authors than the evil empires I've mentioned above: well, if you care about this sort of thing, **don't publish there**.
In terms of putting copies of published papers on the arxiv, in light of the comments above let me share my understanding. What you publish should not include any journal-specific formatting: it should not *look like* a Journal X publication. As a general practice, most authors upload to the arxiv *before* submission, and then only upload a new copy if some kind of significant, content-related change was made. In particular, if an error was pointed out, then it would be good to correct that. If the journal did copyediting for you -- which is not the same as directing you to do copyediting after acceptance -- then maybe it is best all around not to incorporate those changes in the freely available version: on the one hand, aside from formatting, this is the only place in which the journal itself is contributing to the paper; on the other hand, going back and manually incorporating the copyediting for an entire paper could take some time and effort.
To respond to what was said in the comments: in my opinion, whether your revisions were motivated by a referee report should not have any bearing on whether you want to change the freely available version. If you are making changes in response to a referee report, then including that information in a "comments" section on the paper would be a classy move. But as a frequent author and referee, I feel strongly that the changes you made in response to the referee report are not proprietary to the journal in any way (or in any other way from the rest of the content of the paper).
**Added**: The task of checking out policies of publishers and journals with regard to preprints is not something that an individual researcher needs to address from scratch: there are several online repositories of information about this. Here is one.
> 22 votes
# Answer
> can I put up my scientific findings on my blog or webspace that is not written exactly like my published article but contains essentially the same data and results?
This is completely OK with the copyright: as you describe it, the blog post would be a new work. It is even clearer if you want to reword it so that it is readable for a larger audience. Copyright is about a particular piece of work, it does not prevent anyone from using the idea expressed in the work.
Problems could arise if the blog is copy & paste from the paper (figures?, tables?). However, I'd say that blog format and paper usually more or less require different renderings of figures and tables, and producing a new figure/table containing the same data is OK as far as I know.
I do copy and paste the abstract assuming that the publisher won't object to *their* paper being more prominently visible. I always put a link to the official version (as well as to the manuscript, e.g. on arXiv or on my personal web page, as the copyright transfer allows)
Note that I chose not to put in the additional work of writing yet another new text, and instead basically link to the paper.
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Detail thoughts:
* The copyright of the publisher does relate to the facts (data points in the figure/table).
* Thus, if the paper has a LaTeX-looking LaTeX table you put together and the blog has a HTML-looking HTML table you put together, there shouldn't be trouble.
* I'm not sure about, say, microscope images. But then you may have chosen one of several photos for the paper, and there is maybe a second-best photo for the blog.
* For graphics, again, the plotted data is not owned by the publisher. I often prepare at least two versions of my plots: for presentations I choose a different layout (larger text, sans serif font) than for the paper (serif font, often smaller text compared to the actual plot canvas). I'd anyways think that the presentation version is more suited for the blog.
* In the end, you'll have to read the copyright transfer agreement as this lists which rights you retain.
* Or maybe even to tell them before transfer of the copyright that you grant them the non-exclusive right to reproduce the schematic diagram in figure 7b (if you know in advance you'll want to reuse it).
* My experience in asking for permission to include tables and figures into another paper (with citation of the original) is that I got the permission without hassle.
* I'd argue that the blog post you describe is at least as different from the article as, say, a presentation you give. But IANAL
> 4 votes
# Answer
I'm not an expert on the copyright part of your question, but previous responses are more detailed.
The short answer to the *ethical* part though is: *yes, of course, and thank you for doing that*. Scientific research is too important to just let the scientists understand that. The aim of *open access* is to spread scientific results and notions to the largest audience as possible. It is also good for you as a scholar (you gain readers and widen your audience, you're more likely to receive citations).
Remember the goals of the Berlin Declaration:
> Our mission of disseminating knowledge is only half complete if the information is not made **widely and readily available to society**. New possibilities of knowledge dissemination not only through the classical form but also and increasingly through the open access paradigm via the Internet have to be supported. We define open access as a comprehensive source of human knowledge and cultural heritage that has been approved by the scientific community.
I don't see how your blogging and explaining your scientific results does not comply to those words. Making science accessible for everyone is one of the deep, perennial goals of academia: more, it is crucial for democracy.
So, thanks!
> 3 votes
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Tags: publications, ethics
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thread-34690
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34690
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Is there any research direction which is closely related with map reading?
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2014-12-22T17:47:17.367
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# Question
Title: Is there any research direction which is closely related with map reading?
I like maps very much, any common maps, geographic, historic, statistic, etc., or I would say reading maps is my favorite hobby. I can sit at table and read maps for several hours without any stop.
I was studying courses about math and physics in university. I am planning to pursue a PhD degree in the future. It would be great if I can convert or leverage the my map hobby as my career.
So my question is, considering my background, Is there any research direction which is closely related with map reading? If difficult to find such position in academia, is there any jobs in industry can greatly fulfill my idea?
# Answer
> 1 votes
Since I'm not really sure what is available in the GIS field for research I won't try to answer that part, but when I was in university I did some consultant work for a GPS company called baseline geo.
They had me in to help with some database stuff, but much of what they did seemed to be making custom gps/gis maps for various clients. For example they might have a client who is a fisherman that needs a map of all his fishing areas, or where his traps are. Another example could be a wildlife preserve where they need to keep track of the animals with gps trackers in realtime. Either way it would fit both your skillsets. This is just a industry example and you seem to me more looking for a research position or ideas.
# Answer
> 1 votes
I'm sure you are aware of OpenStreetMap: "a collaborative project to create a free editable map of the world" (Wikipedia article).
Last year, a friend of mine was hired by a research center , Fondazione Bruno Kessler, in Trento (Italy) to develop software related to OpenStreetMap and Wikipedia (among other things)\[1\].
This is not actaully "map reading", but surely the OpenStreetMap is a thriving project which could benefit from your competences and passion. Many data companies are interested in it.
\[1\]: For what is worth, I think his position is still vacant, but I don't know where you live.
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Tags: research-process, computer-science
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thread-31680
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/31680
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Effective open-ended student evaluation questions
|
2014-11-13T19:10:26.460
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# Question
Title: Effective open-ended student evaluation questions
As we reach the end of the semester, the students in my class are being asked to do their evaluation of my teaching, as is common at most universities. As with most evaluations that I know of, I have been given an opportunity to provide open-ended prompts for the students to respond to.
I would like to craft open-ended questions for the students that will help me to improve my class/teaching style. This class was a large (~100 students) lecture, so I would like to focus the questions on how to improve myself in teaching large classes. Has any research been published showing which questions (or which types of questions) generate answers that are most effective at helping teachers to improve at teaching large lectures? If no research, is there any anecdotal evidence of "most helpful" questions?
# Answer
Actually, based on my experience, it is better to ask the questions to the students at the end of the **next** semester.
During the semester, an average student usually concentrates on passing the course, rather than thinking about the outcomes of the course. I think one realizes what the course gave him/her after about one semester. And this is the time that they use their knowledge of your course to understand or pass another course.
Of course, the questions are highly dependent on what you want to improve. However, it is always more clear what to improve when the students have a chance to use the course outcomes without any expectation of the grade. If a student says "I wish you underlined the importance of Unit 6. Thus I could understand XX201 better", this is a good feedback, whereas "This course is sooooo hard." is not.
As for the questions, this is what I ask to my students after one semester. Not like a questionnaire, but face-to-face:
1. Do you use what I've taught you for this semester?
2. Are there any redundant topics that I've covered?
3. How would you study if you were to take the course this semester?
> 8 votes
# Answer
I asked a similar question in April. In my case, I was specifically interested in a very short survey that I could ask students to fill out out after every every single class so I could make adjustments to lectures, class organization, and readings as the course progressed.
As I detailed in my answer to my own question two quarters later, I went ahead and used a series of four open-ended questions very successfully. Since late September when I left that answer, I have used those four questions very successfully in another class as well.
> 3 votes
# Answer
I will provide a no-answer (which someone can delete if need be).
It seems you are primarily looking for feedback on your teaching in order to improve. In so doing you are looking for questions to have the students provide that input. Although I admire your trust in students, it is a bit like the blind leading the deaf. The likelihood that you will receive in-depth feedback on how to improve seems small. I am sure you will get lots of pointers about many details so it is not pointless but you should probably consider one or a few other approaches in parallel.
First, consider looking into a university pedagogics course. Hopefully your university provides such courses for teachers where experience is the foundation for the teaching. Second, ask fellows to attend your class(es) and provide feedback from their point of view. Third, have a fellow video-tape a lecture from the back of the room (communicating with the first rows is not difficult but the back of the room is different).
> -1 votes
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Tags: teaching, reference-request, evaluation-criteria
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thread-31484
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/31484
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How can I make sure I'll get credit for my work when working with unwanted and untrusted collaborator?
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2014-11-09T19:14:02.843
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# Question
Title: How can I make sure I'll get credit for my work when working with unwanted and untrusted collaborator?
I am taking a course with a major final project. I was looking for a topic when my co-advisor noticed this. He suggested that I do a project related to my master thesis, and I agreed since I didn't know what I was going to do. He suggested that we do a certain design in half between me and a colleague of mine during a brief meeting with the course instructor. The course instructor asked if we are going to team up and I said no (I am not a team player). I submitted a proposal saying what I will do and as stretch goal, I will complete the whole design on my own.
I ended doing a very smart design in one week and my co-advisor was very impressed. He said that one part of my design could be patented. The whole design can make it to top conferences. Now he is saying you both, me and my colleague, should work together to finish the whole design. I still have 3 weeks to go and I have almost finished his part too. I feel very mad now and I don't want to give him any credit that he didn't deserve(His is part is much simpler than mine).
He is asking me to show him my design and I am not comfortable with that since he, in two occasions, performed "unethical actions" during these projects. He could easily claim that this is his work as well.
On the other hand, I don't want to start a fight with my co-advisor who suggested a paper that helped me in my design. He also knows my design and likes my colleague much more than me. He could easily tell him do this and that.(I feel like I made a mistake showing him, my co-advisor, my design).
What would be a smart move in this situation ? What words should I use to explain this to my advisor ? I just want to protect myself and get the credit for the work I did.
# Answer
Communication is needed and you need to communicate to your co-advisor your feelings rather than second-guessing things and increase your frustration. You may lack some aspects of the picture that your advisor's see. So I would suggest the following:
1. Prepare everything to as close as the final product (manuscript) you can at this point. Add your name as sole author (unless anyone else deserves co-authorship at this stage)
2. Present the work to your co-advisor for discussion and point out what "little" is left to do and discuss what remains to be done. This can then lead to understanding of what other could contribute that is not accomplished in your work.
3. Once you have the situation a little more clear and depending on the outcome, state how you would like to see the distribution of co-authorship and take any discussion that follows.
Hopefully this will put you in a clearer position when considering taking on additional collaborators.
Please also check the tag or search for *contributorship* here on academia to et input on what should be involved in adding names on a manuscript (here is a link to one example).
> 8 votes
# Answer
Please do not take this personally, because I do not know you or your abilities. I am only guessing by what you say but consider that a complete Internet stranger like me, gets a negative vibe from your words. And this is not a good thing. In detail:
> I still have 3 weeks to go and I have almost finished his part too.
You never do that. Would you like the other-party to do exactly this on your part of the design? And perhaps even doing it better than you? No, you would not. You can offer suggestions / improvements on his design **after he finishes** and only in a way that does not offend / belittle him. You have a task - he had a task. Do your part and stick to it.
> I feel very mad now and I don't want to give him any credit that he didn't deserve.
You should be mad at yourself because you are a lousy team-player. Programming skills and intelligence can only get you up to a point. If you do not play well with others, you will usually be the first to get the boot. And the sad part is, that in that case no one will miss you. Consider this, at your next cooperation.
> He is asking me to show him my design
How does your colleague knows that you finished his part of the design too? It is obvious that not only you did something wrong (doing his part of the design) but probably bragged about it. That is totally immature, childish and unprofessional.
> He likes my colleague much more than me
I wonder why. And why do you care who he likes most?
> I feel like I made a mistake showing him, my co-advisor, my design.
Of course you made a mistake. You wanted to brag. You could actually used the time you spent on your colleague's design to improve your design. Or you simply believe that your design does not need any improvement. If you believe that, you are seriously mistaken, because everything can be improved. So, focus on improving your design and checking for errors that have escaped your and your advisor's eyes.
I believe you must be an undergraduate from your previous posts (I may be mistaken). If you are and you want to go to grad school, please humble down. Some of the things you are suggesting sound pretty paranoid. You thought of hiding part of the work from your co-advisor, so that he would not share this with his "beloved" student, who you seem to antagonize. Your design (which you finished in a week) will be patented and it could make it to the top-conferences.
You do understand that all these sound a bit strange.
Also, grow up. All of you (you, your 2 advisors and your coleague) have a common task / goal. You all are going to be co-authors if the project comes out. Understand, that you will not get more credit by overtaking other people's work but just burn some bridges. So, work towards the project's goals and not toward your personal goals.
On your next project, make clear to everyone that you do not want to cooperate, because you want to do everything on your own. Although this is not a good long-term policy and sooner or later cooperation is a key to a good research output.
> 5 votes
# Answer
While most research projects involve collaboration, I will assume that this was a student project where there was a legitimate option to either work alone or with a partner. You chose to work alone. Honestly, if someone had a history of fabricating results, I would also not risk publishing or presenting with them.
I see 5 issues to resolve/consider:
1. One issue seems to be where you're academic project (where you had the option of working alone) ends and where the publication, presentation or patent begins. The co-supervisor may think that you have already fulfilled the personal academic project with your design so far and that to bring it to the point of publication/presentation, additional steps need to be taken. To fulfill these additional steps, they may think it is best to bring in the other student.
You need to honestly ask yourself if the other student may have something to add (a different skill set, etc.). The co-supervisor may like the other student and just want to do him a favor, but he might just be thinking of what is best for the project.
2. Another potential issue is what has the other student been told. Perhaps the other student worked on his portion of the design for his individual project and the idea is now to combine them. Even if this not the case, the fact that you chose to complete the other students contribution, even after being told that was his job, does not help your case. For future reference, you should have addressed this issue immediately- making your case for completing the whole project alone before moving forward. Right now, it could look like you knowingly completed the other students work to force him out of the project. Although based on what you say, I can see why you would do this, I am not sure it was the most mature approach.
3. The patent issue. Depending on your location (or maybe it is an international law), you may have a legitimate claim to the design. I am not an expert in intellectual property law, so please consult an intellectual property lawyer before proceeding. But, legally, you already at least co-own the intellectual property rights to your design. See this legal blog post for an example of student intellectual property. The law overrules academic norms,seniority etc. Although it may be unusual for a student to come up with a successful patentable design, no one here knows whether this is what you have. You may be in the small percentage of students who do, in fact have something of value. Please realize that you need to think this through, read through the legal literature and consult a professional if possible. You might take a risk (reputation wise) asserting a legal claim, but if you are really sure it will pay off, maybe it is worth it. But please be sensible and humble here. In the mean time, document, photograph, time-stamp, send e-mails to yourself...these steps won't hurt and could help if a disagreement arises later.
4. The role of the co-advisor. If ultimately presented/published, this person may be assuming they are the senior author/PI. The PI would be an author and thus, would have a legitimate say in your work. You say you want him to 'back off', but if they consider themselves the PI on a collaborative project, they are not overstepping their bounds.
5. The unethical behavior of the other student is another issue and one you need to consider. If you know this is 100% true and you exhaust your other options, you might need to bring this up. I'll call the other student John. Say "I am in an uncomfortable situation that I think I need to bring to your attention. John fabricated the results of his mid-term project. I know this because \[present your evidence\]. I am concerned about the long-term implications of publishing work with an unethical collaborator. As you know, this could impact all of us. So, as uncomfortable as this is, I need to bring it to your attention and ask for your help." But, check your schools rules-you may have been required to report this as soon as you knew, so be careful. Depending on the rules and culture, this may be a last resort.
But, the most important thing you can do is try to get a clear idea of expectations and roles. Perhaps you could ask the course instructor to help you. He gave you the option of working along and might be able to sit down with all of you and sort things out. Calmly ask for help, stay away from accusations and speculation and see what he says.
> 3 votes
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Tags: publications, authorship, plagiarism, collaboration, interpersonal-issues
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thread-3458
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/3458
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Are there any universal rules for bibliographic references recognised all over the world?
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2012-09-27T13:41:08.143
|
# Question
Title: Are there any universal rules for bibliographic references recognised all over the world?
There seem to exist many bibliographic reference styles and many universities have their own guidelines too. I wonder, whether there exist any universal guidelines for formatting bibliographic references in publications?
# Answer
There is no truly "universal" system—that's why packages like EndNote and BibTex both come with hundreds or even thousands of different bibliography styles.
That said, there are some common approaches—the Modern Language Association and Harvard formats are quite common in the humanities. The sciences have more widely spread systems, but I think the most common I've seen is the "abbreviated style," containing authors, journal, volume and page info and year. (There are some variations within that style based on different publishers, and some publishers, like ACS, are now starting to take advantage of electronic distribution by including full titles.)
> 6 votes
# Answer
**The answer is no.** Within fields, there are often a single style which makes some approaches and components more common or even that makes a single style dominant.
Get yourself some software like BibTex, EndNote, Zotero (my personal favorite), or similar so that you can simply rely on someone else to automate importing the data into a database and outputting according to whatever rules a particular journal or venue requires.
> 2 votes
# Answer
As aeismail said, there are no truly universal rules and the bibliographic reference styles differ across scientific disciplines, and even within these there is often large variation. So normally, you need to consider the journal/conference/... the publication you are writing is aimed at and consult their rules. Most of the time, you will find quite strict requirements articulated in the venue's "submission guidelines", or "author's corner" sections - usually on their website. If still not sure, contact the responsible editors/PC chairs to advise you.
> 0 votes
# Answer
As everyone says, there are no universal systems, although there are a few very popular systems. Of course you should use reference software, but if you are asking which style you should use for general purpose citations outside of publishing, I would just pick one of the most popular, depending on your discipline.
* Chicago style seems flexible and perhaps the least field specific.
* APA style is popular in the life sciences and psychology, of course. But, I don't know if it is so popular in the humanities.
* MLA style seems to be the most popular in the humanities.
If you are not instructed to use a specific one, all of them give the necessary information in a bibliography/reference list format (that is, the full title, authors, dates). I think the issue that might be field specific is in-text citations, but that is not your question. If you pick one and use it consistently in any given document, I am certain it will be internationally understood.
Keep in mind you do not need to learn all the details- just select the option in the software and make sure any imported references (from old PDF's, etc.) are correct. I like Mendeley.
> 0 votes
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Tags: citations
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thread-20128
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/20128
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How to answer the question "tell me about yourself" in a Masters degree interview?
|
2014-05-01T19:19:13.550
|
# Question
Title: How to answer the question "tell me about yourself" in a Masters degree interview?
A good friend of mine had an interview for a psychology Masters degree. The interviewer asked my friend: **"Tell me about yourself"**.
* How should one approach such a question?
* What do the admission committee expect to hear?
# Answer
> 9 votes
In this occasion, the interviewers want to know your background and your motivation of further study in this particular subject. They want to give the opportunity to the right person.
For example, I was once involved in the admission interview (although I didn't have the final say in the decision making). Based on my observation, those who had strong motivation but average GPA won over those with weak motivation and high GPA.
# Answer
> 7 votes
> How should one approach such a question?
By telling them about yourself.
> What do the admission committee expect to hear?
Something about yourself.
Relax. It's not a trick question. (Or if it is a trick question, you don't want to go there.)
# Answer
> 5 votes
I would recommend approaching it as your opportunity to guide the interview in the direction you want it to go. As a professional psychologist, you would often have to introduce yourself and your work to others. What any given committee expects to hear is anyone's guess, but maybe the average committee would at least be happy to see you present a clear, succinct, professional summary of your interests and experiences.
Contrary to some implications that are starting to appear between the lines of responses here, psychologists are not necessarily more conscious of or trained in interviewing than others. Some of us specialize in interviewing, self-report, projective assessment methodology, psychoanalysis, and other forms of open-ended, qualitative research, but many (maybe most) of us do not. In defense of the extremely general, almost meaningless prompt, "Tell me about yourself," it is useful as a way of forcing the interviewee to initiate conversation on the topics of personal relevance, and may elicit those topics that an interviewee identifies with most strongly in a more direct way than other questions. Even if one were to ask questions based on prominent items from an applicant's CV, one could not be certain that those items weren't placed there after strategic deliberation or in capitulation to hiring committees' expectations. Asking a question like this that might easily be answered by glancing at an applicant's CV may catch an interviewee off-guard, forcing some on-the-spot self-reassessment in the underprepared, or giving hints of a person's true identity and interests without all the dressing and polish people usually apply to their CV entries.
Still, psychologists aren't necessarily more aware of these uses of the question than hirers of different backgrounds, and expecting these tactics to be deliberate may give too much credit to some interviewers who engage in them unwittingly. In some cases, it may just be a way of forcing the interviewee to guide the interview for lack of personal will to do so, or for lack of having had the time or desire to review an applicant's credentials directly beforehand. Either way, consider it a challenge, and come prepared to rise to the occasion on any open-ended question. Can you introduce yourself in a way that's impressive, professional, interesting, and not overwrought or revealing of personal weaknesses? Can you handle ill-formulated questions and vague statements of interest in a constructive manner when put on the spot and given an opportunity to demonstrate your expertise? The answer to these questions had better be "**yes**", because you'd certainly have to perform these functions as a psychologist.
# Answer
> 4 votes
This is your chance to take the ball and run with it. I like to give some background that shows my history as it relates to why I am the right candidate. Glib or short answers will make you less likable, and going off topic or ranting opens you up to other judgement that may not be favorable. I would start from the timeline of whatever moment started the trajectory which ultimately ends up with you being in this interview, giving more weight/time to the things that you are most proud of. For example, I have always been interested in X, ever since my father brought me to see that Y in '92. for the last year, I have been exploring the inner workings of Z, and have contributed my time to some projects that seek to improve upon ... I am hoping to continue my efforts here, and am particularly interested in working on P.
# Answer
> 1 votes
```
*How should one approach such a question?
What do the admission committee expect to hear?*
```
If I were you I would approach this question like you were writing a cover letter for a regular job. Everything you talk about should always relate to why you want/qualified to be apart of this program. And you should talk about what your goals are after you have require this degree. Also,do your research on the culture of the program as well. If possible talk to a student who attended the university. I am not an expert but this is my two cents in this matter.
Good Luck
# Answer
> 0 votes
I remember seeing this question on interview preparation articles or most asked question lists, and I must say this question makes no sense. The question seems so simple yet very hard to answer. I don't recommend replying with "Could you be more specific?" because it may seem like you are incapable of answering a simple! question. This is more likely to be the first question if you ever face it, sort of to break the ice, and you can simply introduce yourself and mention your professional interests and your purpose, very briefly. After this question, they will move to the specific questions that actually make sense.
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Tags: graduate-admissions, interview
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thread-34735
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34735
|
Extremely mild punishments for academic misconduct
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2014-12-24T07:11:29.940
|
# Question
Title: Extremely mild punishments for academic misconduct
After looking at My professor is rigging data and plagiarizing. What can I do?, I read through some of the case reports of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and I noticed that punishments seem to be very light. When COPE receives a case, sometimes an attempt is made to contact the institution, and then the institution does nothing: perhaps the wrongdoer is too politically powerful, or the institution doesn't have any will to act. Sometimes the investigation simply fizzles out after nobody bothers to look at the lab journals, even though the lab journals presumably exist. Sometimes the journal is told how to avoid such problems in the future, but no punishments are forthcoming for the existing case.
This is very different from what I believed before - that if someone did decide to falsify/steal data, their employment would be terminated, and nobody would ever want to associate with them again.
So my question is: *where is the discrepancy between how I perceive the consequences of academic misconduct, and what COPE reports as actual cases?* Is it perhaps because most of the misconduct cases are from no-name departments and journals that do not care about their reputation? Or are my impressions of the consequences of misconduct incorrect?
In fact, I have experienced this on my own: one non-mathematics professor at my school took my mathematics manuscript, added his graduate students as coauthors despite their having no relation to the work, and tried to submit it to a journal. I don't care about this specific publication, as it is so worthless that I prefer it to be rejected as to not be associated with me. The professor thinks it is significant only because he knows nothing of mathematics. But it does make me question the kind of integrity I assumed of academics. He is a chair professor at a top10 university, and his (non-mathematics, science) department is very well-respected, so brand name is not the cause here.
# Answer
The situation you describe in your last paragraph does not sound like business as usual at all: on the contrary, it sounds so bizarre that I am having trouble picturing it taking place. (This is at a top 10 university *in the US*??) I suppose there must be more to the story, but: granting what you say, indeed this professor does not have the right to publish the paper without your permission. Especially if you think the work is not valuable enough to be published, you should absolutely contact the journal ASAP to withdraw the paper.
Unfortunately I suspect that you're correct that punishments for faculty who plagiarize or commit other forms of academic misconduct are distressingly light, in particular for many of the reasons that you suggest. If someone is caught intentionally falsifying data or -- the horror, the horror -- submitting a knowingly false proof, then the community as a whole is going to feel victimized and take some steps to ostracize or ban this faculty member. However, if it's a case of stealing material from a student: it pains me to say this, but often the easy course is to slap the faculty member on the wrist and look out to be sure that this behavior is not repeated in the near future.
I don't know what other people are doing, and I have heard more stories of faculty skullduggery on this site than in the rest of my life combined. But for whatever it's worth, 99.9% of all faculty members I've ever met would sooner break into my office and steal my computer than steal a paper from a student. If the trends are different in other fields and/or other parts of the world (and I think they must be, to an extent), I am really sorry to hear that. Academia without academic integrity is one of the most hollow pursuits I can imagine.
> 10 votes
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Tags: ethics
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thread-34741
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34741
|
will lack of experience make it impossible to change my subject of study?
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2014-12-24T14:16:54.013
|
# Question
Title: will lack of experience make it impossible to change my subject of study?
I'm 33 years old and I have my master's in physics from a relatively good university in my country.
I have 6 years working experience as a foreign commercial executive which I hated every minute of it, but I needed to make some money. I have to add that I have visited different factories in different countries during the missions I went.
About two years ago, I resigned and diligently went for learning everything about electronics and microelectronics which were always my desire. Now, I feel quite confident in embedded systems programming and everyday I study so hard whatever related to digital electronics but I have not yet applied for a job in this field.
I know this is what I always wanted. I have average grades in university and good GRE.
What are my chances to get admission for PhD in electronic engineering in one of US universities?
# Answer
Age won't matter much.
"Experience" may matter. Any program has prerequisites, and there's really no way to jump to PhD without that essential knowledge.
I don't think you're going to get into the PhD program without first getting a Masters or having equivalent work experience. The Physics background plus independent study *may* be able get you into a Masters program.
I suspect you'll have better odds if you do the Masters in your own country, and then apply for a PhD program (in the US or elsewhere).
> 1 votes
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Tags: phd, changing-fields
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thread-34725
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34725
|
Where can I find good examples of personal statements [BSc, MSc, PhD]?
|
2014-12-23T21:21:30.040
|
# Question
Title: Where can I find good examples of personal statements [BSc, MSc, PhD]?
In my country, there is basically no culture of personal statements for university admission. However, now I find myself in the need of writing a convincing one (note: my field is ***mathematics***). I've been searching the web for some examples to get to know what an academic personal statement looks like, but unfortunately I couldn't find any good example.
So my question is:
> Could you point out where I can find some *well-done* personal statements from which I can really see what a good one is like?
I would appreciate if you could point out references to personal statements for admission to ***(a)*** bachelor degree, ***(b)*** master degree, and ***(c)*** PhD \[indeed, I have to do mine for a quite peculiar purpose and for this reason I'd prefer to read examples from each of the above categories\].
# Answer
I think you will be hard-pressed to find actual statement of purpose on the Internet. The one submitted to the departments are destroyed after the application process because of obvious privacy issues. Generally the applicants do not publish their own statements for several reasons. Your best bet is to ask some people you know that might have written one and can send it to you.
Another option is to have a professor or a postdoc help you with your draft because they have probably been in committees routing through these statements and will have a good idea if you are heading in the right direction. There are many ways to write a good statement, you should be able to write a statement from the general guidelines that you can find in the other answers on this website. After all the statement is meant to test your capacity of developing your ideas and your writing style.
> 4 votes
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Tags: graduate-admissions, statement-of-purpose
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thread-34743
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34743
|
What's my chance of getting into a good math or statistics graduate program, if I don't have impressive grades the first three semesters of college
|
2014-12-24T15:59:32.023
|
# Question
Title: What's my chance of getting into a good math or statistics graduate program, if I don't have impressive grades the first three semesters of college
I'm a sophomore majoring in math and statistics at a large state university who has top 30 math programs. I really want to go to a very good math graduate program. However, my first three semester is full of Bs, and overall GPA is 3.5. And I happened to have a C and W on my transcript. My major GPA is pretty good though, a 3.98. But I'm still afraid that first year and half is going to hurt my chance of going to graduate school really bad. What do you guys think? Do you know where I stand? Anything I can do to counterbalance my unfavorable GPA? Thanks.
# Answer
> 2 votes
You major GPA of 3.98 is what counts most. "Full of B's" and overall GPA is 3.5 means "half A's, half B's," which is not at all bad. The one C and one W aren't great, but don't necessarily hurt you much. "Everyone" knows that when you take courses outside your major for "balance," you will likely get "worse" (and a few bad) grades. That's especially true the first three semesters.
I'd expect your GPA to rise to about 3.7 as you take more courses closer to your major in the later years. As long as you "finish" on a strong note, that's (mostly) what counts.
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Tags: graduate-admissions, graduate-school
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thread-34745
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34745
|
Publishing as sole author on politically charged topic
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2014-12-24T16:09:02.917
|
# Question
Title: Publishing as sole author on politically charged topic
I have been working on a manuscript on a politically charged topic, I will be able to complete this work mostly on my own so I should be able to submit as the sole author.
However I am concerned to submit as the only author because of the nature of the topic and because I do not have any previous publishing record so my submission might be overlooked. Should I try to get someone else more known on board, or try to publish this on my own since I have done all the work?
# Answer
> 3 votes
I want to begin by acknowledging that I am stepping far outside my core expertise by answering this question: as a mathematician, the chance that I would write an academic paper on a politically charged topic is essentially zero.
I firmly believe that PhD students have the right to work on whatever they want in addition to their assigned thesis work and duties. (In fact, everyone does.) When I read other questions on this site in which students in the laboratory sciences say that their advisor tries to shut down their side interest in X, I got dismayed.
Being a PhD student requires a great deal of single-mindedness. I think it's nice for a PhD student to have at least one project or publication which is not directly connected to the subject of their thesis work: that shows breadth. However, this should not come at the expense of their thesis work. Sometimes people with very independent personalities put more time into their independent work than their guided work, and this *can be* a good decision, but they should still get guidance on that decision!
In this case, I am a bit concerned that the OP may be going out too far on her own. This is a side project which has some difficulties -- including political ones -- to the extent that the OP is wondering whether she needs more faculty assistance. She also says that she has not published anything previously. So the OP has chosen in my opinion a rather tough side project. How much effort will it take to bring this project to successful completion (including publication)? The OP doesn't know; that's part of the question.
I recommend that the OP **talk to her advisor** about this project, including the question of how much time to spend on it and whether to try to publish it now, later or never. If the paper is *sufficiently* politically charged, then it has an unusual property among academic papers: publishing it may damage the OP's reputation in certain circles. This is already worth a serious conversation with the advisor.
Finally: adding coauthors solely to increase the chance publication is both unethical and a suboptimal strategy for the solo author. I have a different idea: if the paper is hard to publish because the author is so junior, the author can just put the paper in her pocket until she is less junior, and then try to publish it later. (There is also something to be said for not having your *first* publication be controversial, at least in many academic fields.) What a PhD student needs to do most of all is complete the strongest possible PhD thesis, and this strategy ensures that the OP is not getting derailed from that.
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Tags: publications, authorship, paper-submission
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thread-5832
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/5832
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Do journal editors disallow paper from college X to be reviewed by someone from college X?
|
2012-12-18T04:03:42.463
|
# Question
Title: Do journal editors disallow paper from college X to be reviewed by someone from college X?
What is the general opinion among editors about whether my paper should be submitted to review to academics from the same University/department? Will this ever happen? If it does happen, isn't this bad for the quality of peer review because the reviewer might have a good relationship with the person who submitted the paper and may be biased consciously or unconsciously towards giving a favorable review?
# Answer
Conflict of interest rules vary between journals, and some are far stricter than others. In general, it's not clear where to draw the line for what's appropriate. Asking someone from the same department to review their colleague's paper would generally not be done, even if no rule forbids it. Beyond that it's a little less clear, and you can make up all sorts of borderline cases. (It's considered fine for people from different University of California campuses to review each other's papers. What about someone from the Harvard biology department reviewing a paper from the Harvard medical school? I don't know, and it's not clear to me that there's a simple rule for deciding what constitutes a conflict of interest.)
Handling conflicts of interest responsibly is an important and difficult part of being a journal editor, since there are all sorts of relationships that are not as easy to detect as a shared departmental affiliation. For example, some people have been best friends since they were in grad school, while others may be enemies or rivals.
Sometimes when evaluating a submission it's valuable to get advice from someone who has specialized knowledge you need, but who also has a conflict of interest. In that case, you should be aware of the conflict and try to adjust for it (for example, by asking the person for objective information rather than opinions). By contrast, it's much more dangerous to rely on someone who has a conflict of interest you are unaware of.
> 14 votes
# Answer
The principle is to obtain an objective review. One basic point is therefore to avoid any petsons with a conflict of interest. It is pretty clear that chosing someone from the same department is very likely to involve a conflict of interest, either by (or equiv.) obtaining an uncritical review or the opposite. Chosing someone from the same university (or equiv.) is perhaps less problematic but for an editor trying to stay clear of possible problems it is likely just as well to avoid such persons as well. The problem is of course larger than this since possible conflicts of interest can exist with many regardless of their location. The honours based system then dictares that reviewers should also decline to review if they believe they cannot provie a fair review or if the involvement can cast such suspicion. We are, however, not living in a perfect world soeditors also have the possibility to moderate apparently unfair reviews.
> 0 votes
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Tags: publications, journals, peer-review, editors, conflict-of-interest
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thread-34791
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34791
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What is a right way to criticize a published method in my paper?
|
2014-12-25T20:01:21.200
|
# Question
Title: What is a right way to criticize a published method in my paper?
I am writing a research paper, and am fairly new to writing. I am working on a research topic that has not been touched too much. There has only been one other paper published regarding the same topic.
In this other paper, they have a fairly strange methodological approach that almost doesn't make use of the method at hand. My paper is an *improvement* of their approach; I am wondering what would be the best way to criticize their approach to present my own approach.
`As Bob et al. failed to notice, we can actually do this...`
# Answer
> 22 votes
There's no need to harshly criticize the authors of the first paper, however strange it seems, even if their approach is plainly wrong. After all, as you say, it appears that they are the only ones who actively worked on that research topic before you.
So, be constructive and build upon what they've done. For instance, you might write something like:
> Bob et al. \[1\] developed an algorithm to square the circle. This algorithm can square the circle in 198 steps. Here we present a modification of the original algorithm which can square the circle in just 87 steps. This modification is based on the observation that blah blah...
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Tags: publications, etiquette
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thread-34788
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34788
|
Funding during graduate study (phd, masters) in math in the US
|
2014-12-25T18:16:51.287
|
# Question
Title: Funding during graduate study (phd, masters) in math in the US
I have some questions and concerns in mind:
1. When somebody says a program is "funded", does that mean the money is conditional (whether he TAs or not) or unconditional? Or is it clarified in context?
2. Is there such a thing as entirely unconditional funding? If it's not tied to teaching, will it always be tied with progress (or something else)?
3. Are there programs that will ask you to take out loans? In other words, do (most) schools generally have *some* sort of funding available? How does this depend on rankings/tier? Is there a specific ranking, say 50, below which you'll mostly likely need money through loans? Does it depend on type (masters or phd)?
4. For the sake of avoiding confusion, what are different sources? Fellowships, scholarships, the department, "TAships" (what is an exhaustive list?)
My personal concern is whether or not I can depend on being funded, even if I'm not a very strong student (or if I'm a student coming from a different discipline).
# Answer
> 3 votes
> When somebody says a program is "funded", does that mean the money is conditional (whether he TAs or not) or unconditional? Or is it clarified in context?
The vast majority of funding is conditional on some amount of teaching, TAing and/or grading. The exact amount varies from program to program and, often, within a given program, both from student to student and from year to year. Various government-sponsored fellowships will cut out all teaching obligations for entire years, but there will be other years in which teaching is required. Most students spend five or six years in a math PhD program in the US, and most prestigious fellowships don't fund all of that time: e.g. the NSF graduate fellowship provides three (very highly paid) full years of support. You should also be aware that some teaching experience is desirable bordering on mandatory for future career success, so even a candidate who needs to do no teaching whatsoever (e.g. a foreigner supported by their own government) usually does at least one or two classes.
> Is there such a thing as entirely unconditional funding? If it's not tied to teaching, will it always be tied with progress (or something else)?
NSF funding is not conditional on teaching (the above link makes this clear). Yes, all funding is conditional on satisfactory progress. It has to be, because continuation in a PhD program is conditional on satisfactory progress and funding is conditional on being in the program.
> Are there programs that will ask you to take out loans? In other words, do (most) schools generally have some sort of funding available? How does this depend on rankings/tier? Is there a specific ranking, say 50, below which you'll mostly likely need money through loans? Does it depend on type (masters or phd)?
The majority of PhD programs in mathematics only want to admit students who have (in some technical sense, anyway) full funding, through a combination of stipends and teaching. Students who want to pay their own way are generally admitted in "non-degree programs" or in *ad hoc* temporary situations. I don't know of a PhD program that advises students to take out loans. In fact, I would advise the contrary: you should not attend a math PhD program unless you have full funding. What constitutes full funding may be higher at a top program (but also depending upon the location of the program, the wealth of the institution and other factors) but so far as I know, less prestigious programs are no less likely to fund their students.
Master's programs are different: in many cases, it is harder to get funding for a master's program, though it is certainly still possible. In some cases there is an across the board raise from the master's program to the PhD program: e.g. the same TA duties done by a master's student may earn less than if done by a PhD student. Still I would not advise any student to pay tuition to enroll in a math master's program in the US.
> For the sake of avoiding confusion, what are different sources? Fellowships, scholarships, the department, "TAships" (what is an exhaustive list?)
There is external funding and then there is internal funding. External funding comes from a variety of sources, especially the government, especially the NSF. Internal funding comes from the department and/or the university. It is usually divided into a stipend -- which is what you get paid just by being there -- and an instructorship, which is what you get paid for doing tutoring / grading / TAing / teaching. For more precise information you should consult the individual department.
> My personal concern is whether or not I can depend on being funded, even if I'm not a very strong student (or if I'm a student coming from a different discipline).
The entire funding package should be given to you in detail when you are admitted. It will not be a year-to-year deal: it will be *guaranteed* (conditional on satisfactory progress, which essentially means not getting kicked out of the program) for N years, where N is a number that will be given to you in advance and usually lies in \[4,6\]. Asking how often students get funded in years N+1, N+2, N+3 are good questions, by the way.
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Tags: graduate-school, mathematics, funding
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thread-34795
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34795
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Does listing several research directions in SOP give the impression that I have a shallow research interest?
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2014-12-25T21:08:39.790
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# Question
Title: Does listing several research directions in SOP give the impression that I have a shallow research interest?
I am applying to MS in CS degree. In my SOP I wish to talk about four distinct, non-overlapping research directions. Two of these pertain to computer vision and the other two pertain to machine learning. (I am interested in how computer vision utilizes the theory of machine learning.)
Now my question is, if I talk about all four of these distinct, non-overlapping research directions and quote a paper each in these 4 directions, will it give the impression that I have a shallow superficial research interest? Also I don't have any particular research idea in my mind for any of these directions yet.
As I am still in college, I don't get enough time to conduct research on these directions. My college coursework keeps me busy for most of the time. So as of for now I can't narrow down to one of these directions.
Over the course of the last four years, I read papers whenever I got time and I saw a pattern in all these papers. I realized that the papers I read fall into these distinct directions. I realized how one paper builds on top of the other. It's just that I was casually reading this stuff not with an intention to contribute to either of these directions. But if you ask me to write a grad level thesis I would definitely choose one of these four directions.
Edit: The papers are pivotal papers to those directions. None of them are older than 2012 and they have established that direction. So omitting them could potentially jeopardize the coherence of my SOP.
# Answer
> 1 votes
As I read your question, it seems to me that you have *one* area of interest: Machine learning applied to computer vision. Consider revising to emphasize that.
You mention quoting papers. Unless they're papers you wrote, consider leaving that out. Admissions committees want to know *your* interests and accomplishments.
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Tags: graduate-admissions, statement-of-purpose
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thread-34792
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34792
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Earning a Phd at an older age
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2014-12-25T20:30:37.893
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# Question
Title: Earning a Phd at an older age
I have a masters degree in Physics and I have worked in Italian high school for 15 years. Now I'm 47 and I wish to have a bachelor or masters degree in Math, because I'd like to change job. How difficult might be for me to have a Phd after the degrees, considered my advanced age (even if I don't feel it)?
# Answer
> 4 votes
I'll give an answer which is specific for the PhD in Italy. In other countries, things can be/are different.
> Now i'm 47 and i wish to have a bachelor **or** masters degree in Math
If you want to apply for a PhD in Italy, you should have a Master's degree. Since you have already an MSc in Physics, you can probably stop to a BSc in Math, but I suspect that this would strongly limit your chances of being accepted for a PhD in Math.
> How difficult might be for me to have a Phd after the degrees, considered my advanced age?
In principle, no more difficult than if you were 20. In practice, it depends on several factors.
I want to highlight one practical factor: Do you plan to drop your current (or another) job during the PhD or do you plan to pursue the PhD while employed? In the first case, you would have to cope with the fact that you should get a scholarship and that PhD's scholarships in Italy are around EUR 1000/month \[\*\], which is probably difficult to accept when one is about 50 years old with 15-20 years of work experience. In the second case, it might be difficult to find an advisor willing to accept you as his student, considering that you would not be able to work full time on your PhD. Moreover, it would be difficult for you to follow the mandatory courses which are requested by some universities.
\[\*\] Currently, they can vary (free of taxes) from about 1100 €/month to about 1500 €/month (rare).
# Answer
> 1 votes
It doesn't get easier as you get older, but neither does age make it impossible or even difficult. What is needed is the self-discipline to do the work. I was nine years older than you are when I started the Ph.D.
The important thing to remember is that the Ph.D. is training for research. In the United States, at least, the work of the Ph.D. student is very different from the work of the undergraduate or even the master's student. Substantial independent work of high quality will be expected of you.
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Tags: phd, age
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thread-34799
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34799
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B- in a Major Class Last 60 Credits (Mathematics)
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2014-12-25T22:44:28.330
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# Question
Title: B- in a Major Class Last 60 Credits (Mathematics)
I'm a mathematics undergraduate at a research university, and recently got a B- in Advanced Calculus I this semester as a junior. I would like to know how much this could affect my chances for getting into graduate school for a PhD in applied mathematics.
The reason is simple: time management. I received a research scholarship in Biology and spent too much time on this commitment (it was my first major project). However, my mentor is confident this project will get me a first authored publication within a decent journal.
My other classes that semester were straight A's. As a result my overall GPA is now 3.79 and my major GPA 3.72. I completed an AA in high school, so all of my electives have been in statistics, maths, computer science and graduate level genetics.
However, this is not my first bad grade: I also go a B- in physics and withdrew from a chemistry course my freshman year but was quickly diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome and given reduced course load + double test time. These are the conditions under which I got my B- in Advanced Calculus I.
I would greatly appreciate an expert opinion (I'll also talk to my math adviser next semester). My research interests lie within gene expression/regulation, so I really want to enter a PhD program in applied mathematics that is also associated with a NIH funded center for System's Biology (such as UC Berkeley, Stanford or MIT).
Next semester I'm taking Advanced Calculus II under the same professor, a course in C++ and a 6000 level PhD track course in Genomics/Proteomics/Transcriptomics with 3 exams and 4 semester projects (I have a 4.0 in all the prerequisites). Any advice?
# Answer
> Any advice?
Yes. Since you have a designated adviser, I recommend talking to them about it. They can guide you through the rest of your program. You can talk to them when classes resume, which is fine, because you have long term considerations in which absolutely no action is needed or helpful over the semester break.
Your question here is not really practical or answerable. Yes, it is better to get higher grades than lower ones: you heard it here first. Obviously if you could retroactively increase your B- grade, then your hypothetical PhD application would be at least slightly stronger. No one B- is going to make or break a PhD application. If you are having time management issues, then you should take steps to address them...starting with talking to your adviser. You might consider delaying taking the sequel to the course you got a B- in to shore up your knowledge, acquire better time management skills, or both. On the other hand you might need to take this course right away in the context of your program as a whole.
Finally, I notice that you seem to have more success with biology than mathematics: compare a likely first-authored publication with a B- grade in an intermediate level course. If you apply to a program in mathematics, then your math skills will be compared against others whose interests are solely or primarily in math. If you apply to a program in biology then your math skills will likely be found to be very strong and set you apart from many of the other candidates.
Enjoy the holiday break.
> 2 votes
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Tags: graduate-admissions, undergraduate
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thread-34752
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34752
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How to tactfully request removal of my name from co-authorship?
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2014-12-24T21:43:08.807
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# Question
Title: How to tactfully request removal of my name from co-authorship?
I wrote a mathematics manuscript (see Extremely mild punishments for academic misconduct), and sent it to a professor, who then attempted to have it published after adding coauthors to the paper. His misconduct is not my concern. My concern is that the manuscript is not of publication quality, and I would prefer that my name not be attached to it. Virtually all of the manuscript is written by me, and all the work was done by me, so I can't claim that it is not my product.
My question is: What excuse do I use to have him take my name off the manuscript?
I would prefer to remain on good terms with this professor. I would also prefer not to mention in any way that the manuscript is worthless, because it solves a problem that he had been attempting unsuccessfully for quite a while, and such a statement would be deeply challenging to his pride.
# Answer
You have a third choice:
Do not forget that all the authors should sign a contract before publishing a paper. I am not telling you not to sign it. However, it would be a good approach if you told your professor
> I am sure that huge improvements can still be made on this paper. Could you please delay the submission and let me work on the paper for another period of time?
This way, you told that paper is not of publication quality and implicated that you're not comfortable with your name on it. If the professor still insists on publishing, only then you may say
> It's not like I'm not trusting your judgmental skills but when I know that I can do better, I cannot do with less. So please do not misunderstand me but I don't want to be a coauthor of a work that is less than my potential.
If your professor is professional enough, he will hear what you say.
Maybe not the best solution, but I would go with this one.
> 6 votes
# Answer
I think cagirici's advice is sound but, of course involves a bit of confrontation. In fact there are no actions other than letting the whole thing pass that would not involve something that would do so. It sounds to me as if your work although not of publication quality at this time really is yours. This makes the action from the professor problematic to say the least.
So what can you do. First, regarding unwanted co-authorships: you could argue that you want to see the contributorship of the new co-authors. Search here on academia and on the web for the term contributorship and you will find many good hints on what can be counted as enough contribution to be on the paper. One link, I often use is to the ICMJE. I realize the thoughts of coauthorship/contributorship varies between fields so you will have to imagine how to set the rules in perspective for your field.
Second, about just adding authors: clearly from your post the ownership of the work is yours so to have somebody else add authors is not right and you have the right to say no. You can even dump the professor and go elsewhere.
If you really want to leave your work in the hands of others you could just say that you are happy to see someone trying to take your attempt and turn it into something useful and that you do not feel you should be part of that development and that your "meagre" contributions in your view doesn't merit co-authorship. After that type of grovelling, you may wish to have a drink or two. I personally think such actions would be going too far and you really should take the bull by the horns and try to see how a proper paper could emerge and with contributors that really contribute. You can at least start by talking to the professor about the merits of your draft and how the professors sees it developing and being published in the end
> 4 votes
# Answer
Just publish the paper and move on. No one is going to hold you accountable for publishing some paper that is not spectacular. Academics are judged by the number of successes and not penalized by the number of subpar efforts. Don't create a confrontation that is not necessary as this person is going to have an effect on your future.
> 4 votes
# Answer
First, I'd say try as hard as you can to see if what you've done is already known. It sounds like there's a good chance for this to be the case if it's simple mathematics (which I infer from your question and the comments). (Math Stack Exchange might be useful here.) If so, you can just provide the professor the reference and say it's already known, so you can't publish it. Problem solved.
If not, answer this: is the problem a pure mathematics problem, or a problem in another area that just has a simple solution for mathematicians? If it's the latter, then it may not be so embarrassing to publish something with simple mathematics. Alternatively, if the question itself is pure math and interesting, but just has a simple solution, you could aim for a "recreational" journal like Math Magazine (I think that's the name of one).
Otherwise, here's one possible route that *might* work, but it really depends on the professor and the situation. You can tell him that it's his problem and that your mathematical contribution was not enough to warrant coauthorship (both true), so please not include you as an author but just mention you in the acknowledgements.
> 3 votes
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Tags: writing, etiquette, authorship, interpersonal-issues
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thread-34781
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https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34781
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What can I do if I find errors in someone's thesis?
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2014-12-25T15:49:28.297
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# Question
Title: What can I do if I find errors in someone's thesis?
I was browsing someone's thesis from a US university. I found several typos and missing (incomplete) sections. There was no plagiarism and dishonesty though. What would happen if I write to their advisor? Can some action be taken or is it a closed case once a thesis is accepted and signed.
# Answer
Generally no official action can or should be taken regarding errors in a dissertation (assuming they are not a sign of dishonesty or fraud). However, it could be worth pointing out errors to the author in case he/she is preparing a publication based on the dissertation. I wouldn't do this if it's from long ago or you see that the material is already published, but you could be providing a useful service to the author otherwise. (If these errors have already made it into publications, then it's worth reporting them to the authors if they are substantive, so they can decide whether to publish errata, but it may not be worth reporting typos. I'm a perfectionist and would like to know of typos in my publications, but others might be annoyed.)
But you certainly shouldn't write to the advisor. That comes across like you are reporting bad behavior to an authority figure, so it's not appropriate unless that's the message you want to send (for example, if you discover plagiarism). Instead, you should communicate directly with the student who wrote the dissertation. If you can't figure out how to track down the author, then you can assume he/she isn't pursuing a research career and you don't need to worry about it.
> 25 votes
# Answer
I do not know really. After all, it is the adviser, who bears the primary responsibility for checking the results of the thesis (the student is not mature enough most of the time and the rest of the committee do not care much this way of the other).
My personal experience with this was that my adviser gave me a 50 page thesis of his former student (written like 5 years before) and asked me to close the gap between the lower bound of $m$ and the upper bound of $m\log 1/m$ for some quantity depending on the small parameter $m$. With my usual laziness, I decided just to see what I can get myself instead of reading anything someone else did, and after a few weeks I had a lower bound of $\sqrt m$ with a short and very clear proof, which, obviously contradicted the upper bound in the thesis.
Now, it is today that I'm a middle age cynical person with fairly low opinion of human abilities and standards of behavior, including my own. At that time I was a young boy to whom my adviser looked if not like a semi-god, then, at least, as an impeccable mathematical professor of intelligence bordering on supernatural. ***It was absolutely impossible that he could pass anyone with a wrong result!***
So, I set up looking for a mistake in my own argument. By the end of the second week of search I was feeling like in a few days I would need to be sent to a mental asylum if I spend just a few more hours on it. The argument was absolutely clean. The heretical thought crossed my mind that the thesis *might contain an error, after all*, and I started to sift through 50 pages of dense text in which I didn't even know some words. In three more weeks I had read all of it and saw no error either. Back to my proof. Watertight. Back to the thesis and its half-page long computations. Nothing. When I finally found the mistake in the thesis (which was as stupid as $\sin x\to 1$ as $x\to 0$ done en passe in the middle of a long sophisticated limit computation with trigonometric functions), I was half insane.
Moral. *If you see an error in a (at least, mathematical) work, by all means, let it be known!* It can save if not the life, then the sanity of someone in the future, while all you can harm is something as ephemeral as "self-esteem".
The story is real though I omitted the names (some of which are easy to figure out and some are not).
The best way to report the error is, of course, to figure out what should really be there yourself first and to offer both the criticism and the way out simultaneously. Some good joint papers have been written exactly this way :-)
> 13 votes
# Answer
You should do nothing and hope that the people who find the errors in your own documents are kind enough to do the same. (There is at least one error in my own master's thesis and at least one in my doctoral dissertation. There are also errors in textbooks by respected authors. I've found one in a fifth edition of a book; I checked and it's in the first four editions, too.)
If the document were a book, a web page, or something else amenable to revision, one would send the author a polite note. The "do nothing" advice is for a "one and done" document like a thesis or dissertation.
> 8 votes
# Answer
I think that not finding an error in a thesis would be much more impressive. If you've never seen errors in a scientific piece of work before, it is that you are not very attentive. You probably know of the famous Excel error of Reinhart-Rogoff. Actually, this kind of thing happens all the time, in the best papers too. And it's normal. Scientists are human beings. That is why science is about replication. I don't even speak about typos and such. 90% of scientists writing in English are not English native speakers, so of course they (we) make a lot of mistakes. And so what ? Is it better to spend 100 hours reading again and again the same paper to correct a handful of spelling mistakes without any consequences, or should this time be better employed solving scientific problems ?
> 8 votes
# Answer
There are at least two errors in my thesis. One I corrected in preparing a portion of the thesis for publication. The other remains unresolved, but I believe it can be patched up. I'm sure there are some others as well. It bothers me that they are there, but not to the point that I lose sleep over it. At this point in my career, it is probably almost irrelevant. I work in another area now, but I would like to go back and fix them some time, when I can find the time.
> 4 votes
# Answer
What are you really hoping to accomplish by emailing the person's advisor? It sounds like you want to have the student's "case" re-opened and that you possibly disagree with the person's worthiness of his or her qualification. This is a huge deal (not a small one, by any measure). I think you are opening up the proverbial can of worms, and for no good reason I might add. Sorry to be blunt, but is this your business, really? (The question is only semi-rhetorical, but I think the answer is "no".)
Please read the responses of "Anonymous Mathematician" and Bob Brown above --- they are quite on the mark.
If the author wrote the thesis relatively recently, then do let him or her know directly (not through the advisor), as your constructive criticism could be useful as he or she prepares publications. If the person submitted their thesis some time ago, check to see which publications, if any, arose from it. Maybe the gaps have been closed in those publications.
These things are all that you should do. Leave it alone, otherwise.
A committee of experts at some point decided that the person's thesis was worthy of a degree. They may not have cared that certain gaps existed in the write up. What was presented in the thesis was sufficient and interesting enough for them. The student succeeded in demonstrating a sufficient expertise, by their standards. The thesis may not live up to your own personal standards, but that doesn't matter at all. When you are on a graduate committee, you can apply your standards as you see fit.
If no academic dishonesty has been committed, then I say that you should leave this issue alone. Focus your efforts on your own work and achieving something that meets your own standards.
> 3 votes
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Tags: thesis, errors-erratum
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