id
stringlengths 8
14
| url
stringlengths 40
58
| title
stringlengths 2
150
| date_created
stringdate 2008-09-06 22:17:14
2024-03-31 23:12:03
| text
stringlengths 149
7.14M
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
thread-34804
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34804
|
Should I talk to my professor about my grade?
|
2014-12-26T03:37:36.720
|
# Question
Title: Should I talk to my professor about my grade?
I just found my grades for the fall semester, in an introduction to international relations class that I took, I got a B.
I got a 93% on the midterm, which was worth 25% of the grade.
I always came to class prepared, having done the reading, and actively participated, so I probably got an A in participation, which is 5% of the grade.
There was a mock UN simulation which was worth 20% of the grade that I felt my group did pretty well on, but I never got an actual score back. I made some small mistakes, but worse case scenario, I think I got around an 85%.
My final paper, worth 25% of the grade, everyone said that it was a really good paper, and that it deserves an A, even people who took the same class from her, as well as writing tutors that I went to.
The other 25% of the grade was reserved for quizzes that according to the syllabus, we're supposed to take place every two to three weeks. However, she only gave us two. The first one, she failed everyone, and said that she did that to scare us, and make sure that we read the material. The second one, I got an A on.
I asked her about the quizzes, and she said that they were used for extra credit, which doesn't make sense according to the syllabus.
I am really confused about why I got a B, and I think that she might have made a mistake.
Should I talk to her about it when I go back to school, and if so, do you think that she made a mistake?
# Answer
To expand Bob Brown's answer, yes, you should talk to your professor **politely** with the objective how to improve your study **in the future**.
In my opinion, your grade is probably on the borderline between A and B. You need to ask her what grade you got for the final paper (worth **25%** of the grade). *\[E\]veryone said that it was a really good paper, and that it deserves an A* is not enough for you to say you did get an A on it. You need ask her how well was your final paper.
Generally speaking, it's not easy to change a grade after it's out of the professor's office unless there was an obvious calculation error.So, don't expect she will change your grade from B to A unless your final paper was extremely well written.
I won't be surprised if she tells you that your final paper was okay but not good enough for an A. In that case, you should ask her what you can do to improve your writing skills so that you can get better grades for the future essay writing assignments in other courses. Good luck!
> 7 votes
# Answer
Yes, you should talk to your professor. Do not use the word "mistake." Just ask how your grade was calculated.
> 4 votes
# Answer
You can always come and say that you suspect a clerical error somewhere and want to check the calculations. Such a request is totally reasonable and I see no reason to get it rejected because when 4 people (1 professor and 3 TA's) grade 120 students, a few grading errors are inevitable and when one instructor grades 10 students and something distracts him, errors are still possible.
However, the only thing you can insist upon is what is *explicitly* (yes, explicitly, nobody cares about how you (mis)interpret the words: the Supreme Court role here belongs to the instructor and the instructor only) written in the class syllabus. Again, no argument should ensue if you just say: "Look, it says 120 points is an A, and I have 123".
Everything else is at the discretion of the instructor. You *can* make a sad face and say "Poor me! Just getting my very first non-A grade after all that hard work!" (or something else with the same meaning) and it *may* work, but don't get offended or frustrated if it doesn't. As long, as the formal computation yields B, getting anything better is a favor that may or may not be granted in exceptional cases, but not a right to fight for (no "Give me a perfect grade or give me death!", please. Remember that even if your name is Patrick Henry, you are standing not in front of convention delegates, but in front of His Majesty Colonial Army officer, so his choice may be not quite the one you expect... ;-) )
> 4 votes
---
Tags: advisor, etiquette, grades
---
|
thread-34814
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34814
|
What is meant by rewarding No-Grades when one's adviser remained satisfied towards one's research?
|
2014-12-26T08:07:57.500
|
# Question
Title: What is meant by rewarding No-Grades when one's adviser remained satisfied towards one's research?
Being a PhD student (in U.S), if one's adviser looked satisfied (if remarked "good" in satisfied mood) towards one's research during all the semester but at the end of semester rewards you "NO Grades" in your research-credits, what does it mean? And how to put one's surprise before him? (note that the same adviser awarded 'Progress' Grades in research in other semesters)
Secondly is it normal that PhD advisers do that while looking satisfied towards them?
# Answer
Before jumping to conclusions, first review your university's grading policy. There may have been changes to the classification system.
If, after reviewing it, you find that the grade is indeed "negative," then you need to have a conversation with your advisor. Do not come with an accusatory tone, as that will end badly for everyone. I would ask something like:
> "I'm a little confused about my thesis grade. I thought I was making satisfactory progress this semester. Could you explain what I need to do to improve?"
This will give your advisor an "out" if there was just an administrative mixup (for example, if it's a bubble form that was improperly filled out) or some other problem. On the other hand, if there's something serious, then you'll know. But usually a good advisor will level with you if there's serious issues in your work.
> 4 votes
---
Tags: advisor
---
|
thread-34825
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34825
|
Can I selectively send scores of my general and subject GRE to the university that I am applying to?
|
2014-12-26T15:37:34.147
|
# Question
Title: Can I selectively send scores of my general and subject GRE to the university that I am applying to?
I made an account for general GRE and subject GRE. I have a pretty bad score in subject GRE. Few universities are not asking for subject GRE score and it would be better if I don't send them subject GRE score. When I try to send my score to university ETS sends both the scores from my account. Is their any way, I can only one score from the account?
# Answer
GRE offers a ScoreSelect function.
> After test day, you can send additional score reports for a fee and select from these options for each report you'd like to send:
* Most Recent option — Send your scores from your most recent test administration.
* All option — Send your scores from all test administrations in the last five years.
* Any option — Send your scores from one OR as many test administrations as you like from the last five years.
You can only send by test date, though, so if you took both tests on the same day, you'll have to send them together. If this is the case, then I don't believe you can get around it.
> You will select by specific test dates, so your scores are all from the same testing session.
This applies to both general and subject GREs.
> The ScoreSelect option is available for both the GRE® revised General Test and GRE® Subject Tests, and can be used by anyone with reportable scores from the last five years.
> 2 votes
---
Tags: gre
---
|
thread-34821
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34821
|
What are the downsides of publishing your statement of purpose on the Internet after you've already been admitted to a PhD program?
|
2014-12-26T13:42:23.920
|
# Question
Title: What are the downsides of publishing your statement of purpose on the Internet after you've already been admitted to a PhD program?
After getting into some top schools, I linked my statement of purpose on my personal website so it could serve as a resource for others. Are there any reasons this might be a bad idea?
# Answer
> 12 votes
In general, I think this sounds like a great idea. I would further say that the same essential content is often a good starting point for your personal professional website.
The only potential downside that I see is that in the future you might look back with embarrassment on naive ideas in your statement where your feelings have evolved over time. If you have enough self-confidence to be OK with with that, it's fine: nobody will expect a mature researcher to believe all of the same things they did when just starting grad school.
# Answer
> 2 votes
I think it would be a good idea. I often field letters from applicants asking about how to frame an SOP and have trouble pointing to good (and bad) SOPs as examples.
That being said, you should add a note to the top of your SOP saying that you've submitted it to turnitin.com and other plagiarism detectors -- even if you haven't and never intend to, it should serve as a deterrent for a lazy applicant who just wants to copy/paste your text in and submit it as their own.
---
In comments, I was asked if graduate admissions use plagiarism detectors. The graduate school at my R1 started doing so a year or two ago. The results are included with the dossier. The admissions committee is free to ignore it, but the DGS or Chair is asked by the Provost about applicants whose statistical coincidence is higher than the norm.
---
Tags: statement-of-purpose
---
|
thread-34826
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34826
|
Will it hurt my masters application if SOP focuses on my research interests, but the program has only a few courses on that subject?
|
2014-12-26T15:54:58.817
|
# Question
Title: Will it hurt my masters application if SOP focuses on my research interests, but the program has only a few courses on that subject?
I want to pursue a master's in Computer Networks with an interest to learn Software Defined Networking. For some of the universities that I have applied, I have summarized like 'I would love to go deep into networking particularly software defined networking' Now will this be a negative if the colleges have only few courses on the subject?
# Answer
Talking about your specific research interests in a SOP is great. If the specific interests are a good match for the program, they'll love it. If they are a poor match, you probably wouldn't have been happy or gotten the training you wanted in that program.
More importantly: **Take a deep breath.** (1) Your SOP for a masters program is not going to be scrutinized as closely as you seem to imagine. You are overthinking things. (2) It's too late to do anything.
Good luck!
> 5 votes
---
Tags: graduate-admissions, masters, statement-of-purpose
---
|
thread-34810
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34810
|
How to say please erase\cutoff my lower gre score information from my application
|
2014-12-26T06:18:49.227
|
# Question
Title: How to say please erase\cutoff my lower gre score information from my application
Want to admit an abc university. GRE is not a requirement for them originally, BUT since i have taken it, my score is REALLY lower than what they can consider. This is an academic program and in case of having a GRE test, UNFORTUNATLY, their policy is that it cannot be too low. 12% is not acceptable. Need help to write a letter about erase/cutoff gre information from my submitted application and give me admission on.
If have any query please ask,thanks in advanced.
# Answer
> 5 votes
Here's an answer assuming you have already sent them your scores. If not, then you don't need to do anything.
There may well not be any mechanism set up for removing information from a submitted application, but it can't hurt to ask. You should be able to find contact information for graduate admissions somewhere on the website (for example, here is where you'd find it for the Berkeley EECS department). You can send a short e-mail saying something like "I applied to \[name of program\] this fall and accidentally submitted GRE scores that do not properly reflect my background and accomplishments. I understand from \[web page\] that GRE scores are not required, so please remove them from my file. Thank you!"
They might not actually do it: just because they don't require GRE scores, it doesn't follow that they must ignore them if you submit them and then change your mind. But I don't think asking them to remove the scores will hurt your chances of admission.
I'm puzzled by the whole idea of having a strict cut-off for an optional test score. It makes me think that either the department is doing something weird or they aren't communicating clearly. In any case, though, submitting a very low score when it's optional looks weird and could hurt your application, so asking to remove the score from your application seems sensible.
---
Tags: graduate-admissions, gre
---
|
thread-34831
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34831
|
What should I include as "evidence of effective teaching methods?"
|
2014-12-26T18:15:48.993
|
# Question
Title: What should I include as "evidence of effective teaching methods?"
I'm in literature and applying for a tenure-track position. One of my job applications is asking for "evidence of effective teaching methods" as one of the documents I am to submit.
Does anyone have any idea of what this should be?
Research to date has given me very little. My usual go-to sources for job application information and help have not had anything to address this sort of thing.
Sure, there are teaching philosophies and teaching statements, both of which I've written in the past.
Evidence of teaching ability, in my field at least, includes your teaching evaluations and letters, your teaching philosophy, and a few syllabi relevant to the job search at hand. But, there is no clear-cut answer to that one either. And it varies a lot, depending on who you ask.
As for my own pedagogical experience, I would imagine this could include some sample assignments? Perhaps a narrative of what innovative teaching methods I've used in the past, perhaps some student comments from evaluations that speak to methodology in particular?
But, I'm really guessing here, and I was hoping someone who has dealt with this particular item in job applications would have some idea of what this might be.
Thanks for the suggestions on how to clarify the question.
# Answer
> 10 votes
From the perspective of someone who has been on a search committee this would normally mean your teaching evaluations -- either as a TA or as the instructor on record. Any teaching awards you might have won in this regard would also count
But we also recognize that not everyone has had TA/IOR experience. So it could also include:
* Evidence of having taken teacher training / professionalization seminars
* Sample syllabi and assignments
* Student/faculty/participant feedback from guest lectures and guest talks
This question is deliberately broadly worded so as to not exclude people who haven't had to teach. You can include a cover sheet to this item category (i.e., when you upload your PDFs you include or prepend a cover sheet) that notes how you have interpreted this and let the committee know that you are willing to send more material if requested.
Why is this material requested? After the search committee makes its decision, your file goes to the Provost's office. The Provost will want to see "evidence of teaching effectiveness" as well as "evidence of research" as part of the portfolio. It's simpler for the committee if you can make this case for them ahead of time.
---
Tags: teaching, job-search, faculty-application, methodology
---
|
thread-34753
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34753
|
How much duplication is permissible in letters of recommendation?
|
2014-12-24T21:51:11.163
|
# Question
Title: How much duplication is permissible in letters of recommendation?
Anybody has idea, how much copying is allowed in a recommendation letter and whether they really run a copying test on the letters of recommendation?
# Answer
> 26 votes
While our university occasionally submits statements of purpose, research statements, and writing samples through plagiarism detectors (and gives the admissions committee the results), I have never seen this done to letters of recommendation.
There are just very limited ways of saying nice things about students. I use the same variation of an opening for all my letters, with only minor changes in intensity (I am very/slightly/marginally pleased to write this letter of recommendation) and close with the same sentence on all of them.
I wouldn't worry.
---
Addendum given the changes to the the original question: I don't know if people have seen the output of plagiarism detectors but they don't provide a simple YES/NO answer. Instead, they provide a statistical quantification of how much unquoted text *might* be drawn from other sources (e.g., 3-5% of the text appears duplicative). Each report is several pages long with parts of the student text highlighted and possible prior sources highlighted.
The reports are quite "noisy" with many false positives -- notably in one case that I remember, highlighting text in the *bibliography* because the citations matched citations in other bibliographies. \[facepalm\]
Running LORs through plagiarism detectors would serve no useful evaluative purpose in terms of how the admissions committee views the *candidate*.
# Answer
> 16 votes
There isn't much creativity involved in most recommendation letters. And frankly, that doesn't matter. The important thing to a school or employer is that the individual who signed the letter believes it accurately describes you.
Yes, it would be nice if every letter was rewritten completely de novo. It isn't very surprising when it doesn't happen that way.
Don't worry about it. The worst that will happen is that they'll contact the recommender, he'll say you're a good candidate, and that'll be the end of it.
# Answer
> 12 votes
> Anybody has any idea, how much plagiarism is allowed in a recommendation letter and whether they really run a plagiarism test on the letters of recommendation?
I have read literally thousands of academic recommendation letters, and I have never run one through plagiarism detection software. I don't understand why you did that *after* the letter was submitted: what were you hoping to gain?
You also sound slightly naive about how "plagiarism detection software" works. Such software does not directly detect plagiarism; it only makes a more or less compelling case for it according to the degree of similarity. The letter is a highly structured, ritualized writing style. Having 10% of a letter be the same as some other letter is not itself problematic, and it certainly need not imply "10% plagiarized".
A recommendation letter is not an academic paper, and most people who write many (graduate school) recommendation letters keep a basic template and fill in information accordingly. Therefore a lot of recommendation letters are going to be a lot more than 10% alike without there being anything problematic. This is another reason why putting a graduate recommendation letter through a plagiarism detector is not a very plausible thing to do.
In summary: I think it is overwhelmingly unlikely that anyone except you will know what percentage of this letter the plagiarism software reported as copied. I doubt you'll have a problem.
On the other hand, I am not quite willing to say that including an entire paragraph in a letter that one found on the internet is a good practice. It depends a lot on what the paragraph is. If the language in that paragraph is boiler-plate or standard, then I certainly don't care. (In particular, I hope you would have told us if the copied paragraph was the very last one, e.g. something like "In summary, Ms. X is a very strong candidate and deserves the highest consideration. Please do not hesitate to contact me if you require further information.") However, if the paragraph contains distinctive, poetic or especially clever language and your writer lifted it from the internet because he liked someone else's clever language better than his own: well, it has nothing to do with *you*, but I don't think is a good practice, and it doesn't fill me with confidence about his writing skills or professional ethics.
# Answer
> 5 votes
Almost every prof I know uses a template for recommendation letters, and adds a paragraph or two specific to the student. I'm not surprised a about the reuse of a paragraph and similar wording.
Remember, the purpose of a letter of recommendation is to make the case that you are a good student, and will be a dedicated, ethical researcher, not to introduce new research or new ideas. A letter of recommendation would likely not pass several requirements of publish, professional research as it does not present a novel idea, nor does it have external references.
A recommendation letter is a vote of confidence in the individual. Its difficult to see how similar content between letters would hurt either the recommend-er or the recommend-ee, so long as the recommendation accurately reflects the opinion of the recommend-er.
# Answer
> 3 votes
This seems like a strange question to me, because if I were a new-ish prof asked to write a letter of recommendation, the very first thing I would do would be to type "letter of recommendation template" into Google (12.9 million hits), and use the first one that seemed to fit. Since I think I am not much lazier than the average new prof (and in STEM, have the advantage of being a native English speaker), I'd expect the majority of letters to be created the same way.
# Answer
> 2 votes
I am surprised that nobody has mentioned the possibility that the supposed "plagiarist" recommender used his/her own text, which was also coincidentally found online.
While a cut-and-pasted paragraph of 50 words strongly suggests copying of some kind, it is not necessarily the case that the 50 words were plagiarism (i.e. usage of another person's text without attribution).
It could very likely be the case that the recommender posted up one of his/her old recommendation letters online, and it got picked up as a template text by the anti-plagiarism software, which then detected the similarity. I would not at all find it surprising that my recommender(s) were reusing parts of their old recommendation letters, as they clearly have much better things to do with their time than write a completely new recommendation letter for each application.
In fact, it could even be the case that your recommender did not even post his/her letter online. Assuming your recommender has also forwarded their recommendation letter to his/her past students, it is not a stretch to consider that the student could have posted that letter online.
With the limited information, I find it rather uncalled for to immediately jump to the conclusion that your recommender has committed plagiarism.
# Answer
> 1 votes
Well, the title isn't quite asking the same question as the question body.
The direct answer to "Is there any copyright on letters of recommendation?" is that it depends on the country you're in (because copyright law differs from one country to another), but if you're in the UK or the USA then copyright automatically attaches to the creation of an original written work such as a letter. No need to register the copyright or declare it. Letters of recommendation are not exempt by virtue of their subject matter.
> copyright in the United States automatically attaches upon the creation of an original work of authorship
WP: Copyright law of the United States
So the general answer is: Yes, letters (whatever the topic) do fall under copyright law.
> "how much copying is allowed in a recommendation letter"?
Copying from oneself is fine (so long as one still owns the copyright in the work being copied). Copying from someone else is not, unless they've given you permission to do so.
---
Tags: recommendation-letter, copyright
---
|
thread-34748
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34748
|
Online venues that promote networking among scholars -- alternatives to Academia.edu and ResearchGate
|
2014-12-24T18:00:02.253
|
# Question
Title: Online venues that promote networking among scholars -- alternatives to Academia.edu and ResearchGate
Are there alternatives to Academia.edu and ResearchGate if one is searching for a venue that promotes "informal" (\*) cooperation and networking among scholars (specifically, in mathematics and science)?
(\*) As far as I know, the aim of two sites mentioned above is mostly sharing papers rather than opinions, insights, and interesting material of various sorts related to research. I would like this alternative site to be more informal: a scholarly social network rather a mere preprints repository.
# Answer
> 3 votes
I have found a neat commented list of academic networking sites at the web site of Library Services -- Information Services at the University of Kent (UK) and an article reviewing a few academic networking web sites. Another, shorter and comment-free list is here. These lists mention, in addition to the sites from the other answers, the following sites (I list them in no particular order)
Also Zotero, just like Mendeley, offers some networking capabilities.
Finally, here is one more fairly new site which is not on the above three lists:
https://chroniclevitae.com/
A number of academic networking sites that existed in the past have already went out of business or became a kind of an archive and do not accept new posts and new members (e.g. the Nature Network). I have removed such sites from my list.
# Answer
> 3 votes
Have you tried linkedIn? They have tons of mathematics groups on there you just have to use the search bar. Or have you tried joining a meetup group? You can go to www.meetup.com and find groups of you interest that are near you area. It is not solely online but it is a great way to meet different people who have the same interests as you.
# Answer
> 3 votes
I would probably try with some groups at Mendeley. It is both a social network and a place where you host, post, share papers and links.
Also, regarding mathematics, this question on MathOverflow seems to be helpful.
---
Tags: online-resource, networking, social-media
---
|
thread-34740
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34740
|
What options do rejected applicants have if mistakenly told they were admitted to a program?
|
2014-12-24T12:13:04.420
|
# Question
Title: What options do rejected applicants have if mistakenly told they were admitted to a program?
I was reading up the Reddit page here, which described a case of admissions error, in which:
1. The person obtained an acceptance for a PhD program in writing.
2. The person personally called the university and confirmed acceptance of the program
3. The university then said that they had made a mistake, cancelling the acceptance.
What would be some things that the person can take, and if some of these actions required specific conditions, what would be the conditions be?
For the purposes of answering this question, we will assume that there is no stipend involved, and the acceptance was confirmed by the departmental admissions staff.
# Answer
> 4 votes
I've been putting off answering this because it's really a legal question, not an academic question, and I'm a computer scientist. In my one business law course, I learned that the essence of a contract is an offer and an acceptance. We have those.
If I were in this boat, I'd probably suck it up and apply elsewhere. If I really-really wanted to go to the school that first accepted, then rejected me, I'd consider paying a lawyer a few hundred dollars to call the counsel for the university. My lawyer would say something like, "My client is damaged blah-blah and has cause of action blah-blah. However, we do not want to be unreasonable. All we want you to do is honor the offer you made in writing and later confirmed verbally. Um, and keep these circumstances confidential from anyone who could assign a grade to or otherwise evaluate my client."
There is a *huge* down side to doing that. It is that the circumstances are quite likely to leak out. Then one is facing professors who know how one was admitted.
# Answer
> 4 votes
I don't think anyone has enough experience with this rare sort of situation to say with confidence how best to handle it. A lot of it depends on the details. For example, how much time elapsed before the mistake was noticed? Correcting the error a few days later might not be so bad, while a few months later would be crazy. How close to being admitted had the student been? There's a big difference between someone who narrowly missed being legitimately admitted and someone who is manifestly unqualified.
I'd recommend against getting lawyers involved except in extraordinary circumstances. The problem is that the culture of academia is based on reputation and trust, and this culture does not mesh well with the legal system. If a student manages to gain admission to an unwilling department by legal threats, that fact alone will outweigh all other aspects of the student's reputation for many years to come. (For example, hiring committees will wonder what else this person might decide to threaten legal action over or in what others ways they might prove disagreeable as a colleague.) And there's no way to keep it secret: it will be one of the most interesting pieces of gossip in years, and enough people from the admissions committee will know what happened that someone is sure to leak the news more broadly.
For comparison, I've seen a couple of people ruin their reputations by litigating tenure cases, so that this fact is what they are best known for by far. It's really not a good outcome. That might be worthwhile if the prize is tenure, but it's certainly not worthwhile for admission to graduate school (no matter which school).
It's still reasonable to make an argument for why they should honor the acceptance and to explain the hardship that rescinding it would cause. However, it's important not to exaggerate the difficulties. For example, in my experience with graduate admissions it's rare for students to take irreversible steps immediately upon receiving an acceptance (for example, withdrawing/declining at all other schools). If someone told me they turned down all other options the same day they received a mistaken offer, I'd be a little skeptical, and I'd at least expect them to recognize that this was unusual and explain further. Of course the longer the mistake went uncorrected, the greater one would expect the hardship to be.
If attempts to convince the school to honor the acceptance fail, then the least one could expect them to do is to help fix any problems they caused. For example, to get in touch with any other schools the applicant turned down, explain that the error was entirely theirs, and help try to convince the other schools to reinstate the applications/offers. (The reason is that if a student says they had an offer from X but it turned out to be a mistake on X's part, many people will assume the student misinterpreted something rather than that X genuinely misled them.) Of course this isn't guaranteed to fix everything, but I expect some maneuvering behind the scenes could at least help.
---
Tags: graduate-admissions, rejection
---
|
thread-32353
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/32353
|
Letter of recommendation from employer for MS in U.S. universities
|
2014-11-27T11:35:56.213
|
# Question
Title: Letter of recommendation from employer for MS in U.S. universities
Is a letter of recommendation from an employer required to be on the official letter head of the company?
Also is it okay if I give the recommender's personal email?
# Answer
> 4 votes
Nothing in particular is *required* for a company letter of recommendation. Pretty much any established company will have some sort of letterhead, though, and your recommender using it will feel more "professional." Likewise with corporate vs. personal email addresses.
# Answer
> 1 votes
Regarding personal vs corporate email, I would strongly recommend using the corporate one. If nothing else, because it gives some assurance that the person on the other side is who he claims to be. Would you take this seriously?
> I am recommended by the President of the USA, you can find him at barak\_obama\_mr\_president@hotmail.com
Also, consider that in industry, LoR in many countries are just brief cold objective statements:
> mihir S worked for Company.inc from 2003 to 2014 in the position of Junior Developer.
>
> Yours trully,
>
> Mr CEO
But an academic letter is expected to present you as an excellent candidate. Make sure the head of the company understands the difference and is happy providing a *strong* letter.
---
Tags: masters, recommendation-letter, united-states
---
|
thread-34857
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34857
|
Normal length of time taken to arrive at a phd admission decision?
|
2014-12-27T15:23:29.580
|
# Question
Title: Normal length of time taken to arrive at a phd admission decision?
I would like to know, if possible, how long it takes on the average to reach a first admission decision for doctoral programs?
Let us say a doctoral program promises to inform the applicants of the outcome three months after the deadline for submitting application packages. Does this really mean that to reach a decision requires exactly three months?
# Answer
In my experience it's common for academic departments to have a graduate admissions committee that meets periodically to make admissions decisions and decisions on financial aid. Sometimes decisions on financial aid are made separately from decisions on admission.
In our department we review applications as they come in and typically respond with a decision on admission within a few weeks. However, decisions on financial aid are made only a few times per year. For example, we'll meet in early April to decide on assistantship awards for the fall semester.
Under this system, if you applied for admission now, we'd review your application and reach an admissions decision by the end of January, and you'd either be told "no", or "you've been admitted but we'll make decisions about financial aid in early April."
I've seen other institutions where all of the applications are held until one meeting where both admissions and financial aid decisions are made at the same time. Under that system, you probably wouldn't hear anything at all until the committee met and made its decisions.
A couple of other comments:
1. Applications are often sent to a central office ("graduate studies" or something similar) and then distributed to the departments to make admissions decisisons. In my experience, there are many incomplete applications received by our graduate office. We don't see them in the department until and unless all of the required materials have been submitted. You can and probably should check with the office where you sent your application to make sure that the complete application has been received.
2. Christmas (December 25) and New Year's Day (January 1) are important holidays in the US. Traditionally, fall semester classes end before Christmas and spring semester classes don't start until after New Year's Day. Many colleges and universities are effectively closed for a few weeks around these holidays. You shouldn't expect to hear anything from any university in the US until after New Year's Day because of these holidays.
> 4 votes
# Answer
I am assuming that you are referring to programs that offer *rolling admissions*—that is, programs where you can submit an application at any time of the year.
The key words in your question are **on average**. If you consider all of the applications received by the committee, it will take the committee approximately three months to reach a final decision on a randomly chosen application. However, that is definitely not an exact number—in clear-cut cases, they could reach an answer much sooner. Similarly, applications received during "peak" periods or during the summer—when many faculty are on travel and therefore not as readily available to meet for such decisions—it may take a bit longer.
Part of the reason for this is that several layers of decision are usually involved: first the applications need to be reviewed, and individual members of the admissions committee will have a chance to weigh in. Then, if needed or part of the program's process, interviews will be conducted. After that, the application will still need to be approved by the entire admissions committee, and possibly departmental-level approval will also be required.
If you have not heard anything after three (or better, three and a half) months, then a *politely worded* email to the admissions office to ask about the status of your application would be appropriate.
On the other hand, if there is a single admissions cycle per year, the decision-making schedule is usually more or less the same each year. Thus, regardless of when you actually submit the forms, notification of the decision comes at the same time for everyone.
> 3 votes
---
Tags: phd, graduate-admissions, application
---
|
thread-34859
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34859
|
How damaging are writing errors like typos in faculty application documents?
|
2014-12-27T16:05:09.550
|
# Question
Title: How damaging are writing errors like typos in faculty application documents?
How damaging are writing errors like typos in faculty application documents? Do search committees usually tolerate a couple of small errors in cover letter, sample publications, etc?
# Answer
> 27 votes
To me, typos in a faculty application suggest one or more of the following:
1. Detail - you do not pay enough attention to details.
2. Rigor - you were not rigorous enough to ensure the document is error free by double checking and letting other people check the document.
3. Importance - if the application was important enough you would have made sure it is error-free, therefore it may not be very important to you.
4. Culture - you come from a culture where typos are acceptable, and did not bother to adapt.
Having said all that, in the end it is just a tiny factor amongst many more important factors. If you are awesome, this probably won't matter.
# Answer
> 14 votes
It's a minor factor, but certainly one that does influence my judgement of an applicant. If I'm down to deciding between two candidates to interview and they otherwise look to be about equally good, this is something that could be a deciding factor.
Since you're likely to be in competition with many other applicants, it's in your interest to make sure that there aren't any typos in your application.
# Answer
> 7 votes
**It varies enormously among the faculty evaluating candidates.** There are faculty I've worked with who read applications extremely closely and point out the existence of typos, misspellings, and formatting errors in faculty meetings when we are discussing candidates. Some people are bothered by small errors and see them as a strong signal of a lack of professionalism, respect for the application process, attention to detail, and potentially as evidence of an inability to teach students how to write well.
Personally, I don't read application materials with an eye for these kinds of mistakes so only the most glaring and disruptive mistakes will even be noticed. When minor issues are pointed out (e.g., in a faculty meeting) I don't think it affects my feelings on candidates.
If the former type of person is a search committee chair or member, an applicant with typos in their material might be in big trouble. If the search committee is made up the latter type, it might not matter.
Since there ***are*** at least some of the type who care deeply, and since small mistakes *really are* evidence of a lack of attention to detail and time spent on the application process, **take the time to carefully proofread your documents.** If mistakes tend to slip past you, ask others (either friends or a professional proofreader or copyeditor) for help.
# Answer
> 5 votes
It depends on the conditions, for sure.
If there are a lot of applicants of your quality, then they should look for some criteria to eliminate people among applicants. And that criteria, in your case, would be the grammar of the cover letter.
If your work is outstanding, then they probably would overlook a few typos.
However, keep in mind that there can always be a pair of grumpy(!) professors in the committee.
# Answer
> 2 votes
There is literally **no good reasan for you** to have typos of any kind in your application, whether it be for faculty or student positions.
While more difficult than simply running the text through a spellchecker, you should definitely go to some effort to find someone to proofread your application for spelling and grammatical issues.
Since there is a nonzero chance that at least one person in the application committee is a pedant for spelling/grammar (and such people are clearly overrepresented in the academic community), it would be rather risky to submit any piece of application without having it proofread by a native speaker first.
---
Tags: faculty-application, errors-erratum
---
|
thread-34854
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34854
|
What has the effect of publishing salaries been?
|
2014-12-27T12:16:51.573
|
# Question
Title: What has the effect of publishing salaries been?
In the US, many (most?) states have laws which require the publication of full salary details for all employees of state universities. For example, California has a full online database of all state workers it seems which includes UC Berkeley amongst others. Salary details to varying levels of approximation are also available for public university employees in some countries outside the US. In which countries are academic salaries published? has more details .
What effect on state (or public) universities has this publication of academic salaries had? Specifically,
1. Have they had to pay more on average in salaries because private sector competitors (including private universities) now know exactly how much to offer someone to entice them?
2. Have they found it more difficult to recruit people from the private sector (including private universities) who might not want their financial details to be public?
3. Have there been any other negative or positive side effects?
# Answer
> 8 votes
> Have they had to pay more on average in salaries because private sector competitors (including private universities) now know exactly how much to offer someone to entice them?
I've occasionally heard of these lists being used to identify woefully underpaid faculty members who might therefore be disgruntled and easier to recruit. However, I don't think this has had a substantial effect overall on salaries at public universities. Most faculty members don't inspire bidding wars between universities, and recruitment is based on many other factors beyond just salary.
For context, note that average salaries vary substantially between universities, and these differences are sometimes pretty widely discussed in the community. Even in the absence of data on individuals, that's potentially useful information for recruitment. However, there seems to be no trend towards salaries evening out. Instead, they tend to end up balanced with factors like desirability of location.
> Have they found it more difficult to recruit people from the private sector (including private universities) who might not want their financial details to be public?
Not to a noticeable extent, at least for ordinary faculty positions. This could be more of a factor for mid-level administrators, whose salaries might come under greater scrutiny. (By contrast, the salaries of top administrators are public information for every non-profit university in the U.S., public or private, because they must be reported on IRS Form 990.)
> Have there been any other negative or positive side effects?
Transparency about salaries has a weird mixture of effects. On the one hand, it makes the overall patterns clearer, and anyone can judge for themselves whether the results are fair. For example, it's easy to gather data on whether women are being paid less, whether there's salary compression or inversion, whether different people receive comparable salary increases upon achieving tenure, etc. I don't know of any formal studies (which could be interesting), but there's at least a fairly widespread belief that this transparency helps cut down on abuses.
On the other hand, it can also increase disgruntlement. The actual salaries are almost guaranteed not to align perfectly with what would seem just to any given person (because of course different people have different visions of what would be appropriate). I've certainly looked on occasion at salary lists and wondered why on earth X was being paid 15% more than Y, and I once talked with a friend who had discovered that he was Y in such a case.
# Answer
> 4 votes
The UC system has made a concerted effort to keep salaries at its flagship schools (UCLA, UCB) competitive with those at other R1s (including private ones) in order to attract and retain top faculty. They haven't always succeeded. If you look at AAUP faculty salary data, UCLA and UCB salaries are close to but are rarely higher than their peer private institutions (Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, Caltech, etc.).
That being said, this has largely been possible through the large scale shift in funding at the UC from the state to private funding sources (tuition+alumni gifts+research administrative overhead+endowment+sports franchising).
Other state schools have not privatized as much as the UC system and have kept salaries and tuitions modest.
Now as to whether the publishing of salary data of individuals has had an effect, this is unclear and to my knowledge no one has analyzed it in great detail. However, there are some side effects to publishing faculty salaries:
* Greater legislative and voter scrutiny of faculty salaries (i.e., "why does a professor at a public school make $180,000"?) puts pressure on chancellors to either reduce salaries and risk faculty flight or to move towards privatization of income
* Salary compression between ranks becomes much more visible
* Salary inequity between genders and disciplines becomes more visible
---
Tags: salary
---
|
thread-27411
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/27411
|
Is Scimago a good way to rank conference impact?
|
2014-08-20T12:36:19.867
|
# Question
Title: Is Scimago a good way to rank conference impact?
I have seen that the Scimago Journal Rank make a rank of journals that cover different topics and classified them into quartiles. For what I know conferences also made their proceedings books, but I was dubious if they could be compared agains journals like Scimago does.
I say this because I believe that journals have most ot the time a higher impact than conferences, and compare them side to side (journals and conference proceedings) it is not such a good idea.
The question that I have is if Scimago could be a good way to rank a conference impact, and also if there is another computer science conference ranking that uses the same quartile calculus as Scimago?
Any help?
Thanks
# Answer
> Is Scimago a good way to rank conference impact?
## No. It isn't.
At best, Scimago is a good way to obtain a modified "PageRank" of a publication in the graph of citations between Scopus-indexed publications in a three-year window, with each citation weighted by the similarity of the citing and cited publications, as measured by their common citation profiles.
Even if you accept that Scimago's abstruse formula is an accurate indicator of "impact"—which is debatable for numerous reasons—neither the raw citation data nor the precise definition of "cocitation profile" (on which the formula depends) are available to independently verify Scimago's rankings.
In particular, a few spot checks suggests that Scimago's coverage of major computer science conferences is spotty, and that the data it extracts from those conferences (even for relatively straightforward things like "number of citeable documents") is not particularly accurate.
> 3 votes
# Answer
This depends a lot on particular area. In some areas, proceedings of the best conferences are comparable with decent journals, while in others conferences are more social events. Computer Science in general is more a conference-oriented area, so proceedings usually have decent impact.
To check it in particular subarea, if you have access to Scopus (other services probably have similar features), try the Analyze Journals tool, to compare some conferences and journals in your field. In my case (Computer Vision), the top conferences are beaten only by the top journals.
For more info on different habits in different subareas I recommend: *Wainer, Eckmann, Goldenstein, Rocha: How Productivity and Impact Differ Across Computer Science Subareas. Communications of the ACM, 2013.*
edit: **I just re-read your question and noticed your actual answer was about something else. There I can point you again to Scopus (which has both journals and top conferences) and their SJR/SNIP...**
> -1 votes
---
Tags: journals, conference, ranking
---
|
thread-34880
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34880
|
What does "scientific report" mean?
|
2014-12-28T08:21:44.347
|
# Question
Title: What does "scientific report" mean?
An Australian bioinformatics job ad talks about writing "scientific reports" in the selection criteria.
Wikipedia has an article on Technical reports, which it says are also called scientific reports, but that definition, of basically grey literature, doesn't seem plausible.
Does it have any other meanings, such as a hypernym of scientific papers, conference talks, and conference posters?
# Answer
I would construe "scientific report" here to encompass all forms of scientific publication and communication, including peer-reviewed papers as well as possibly internal technical reports. Remember that a technical report is just something that hasn't gone through peer review.
The exception would be if this were for a corporate position, where publication may be more difficult. In such cases, one would expect "grey literature" to be the primary "publication" mode.
> 6 votes
---
Tags: job-search, terminology
---
|
thread-34882
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34882
|
How important is the thesis document for judges on the day of the thesis defense?
|
2014-12-28T08:38:18.093
|
# Question
Title: How important is the thesis document for judges on the day of the thesis defense?
I want to defend my thesis in the computer networking field on master degree . all things are done. And now I want to write my thesis document. Is this document important for judges in the defend day or not to evaluate my thesis.
I ask this question because I think they just pay attention to your suggested method and result and presentation.
Is the document are so important for them? because if they do not pay a lot attention to that I do not like take a lot of effort on that maybe you say that I can put that on the internet for any citation By our language is not English.
If the answer is yes. I mean they pay attention to the document in case of evaluating my thesis. What parameter are important for them. Or better to say, I should bold which part or how to write my thesis in order to the judges pay attention to that? and they say themselves this student try hard and I should give him good score ( D: )
# Answer
> 16 votes
> Is this document important for judges?
You are really asking the wrong question. Any official document that bears your name **eternally** is **important for you** and your future. You are a MSc student with probably small number of publications (if any) and a MSc thesis is an important milestone on your transition from a student to a researcher. It is also a quite large document (much larger than the typical scientific publication), so writing an excellent document at this scale is a valuable lesson even if you want to work in industry, where technical reports / documentation and deliverables are quite common.
Conclusively, you must always strive for excellence and always do the best you can. You must change your student mindset from "Would doing A would get me a better grade" to the adult mindset "Is this really the best I can do **within the time constraints I have** or could I do better?". So you should focus on producing the best thesis document you can (within your time constraints) regardless of how lenient the committee might be on judging it.
# Answer
> 3 votes
I have written three master's theses, out of which one turned out to be mostly for my own interest, one turned out to be pretty much useless, and the third was actually passed on to my later PhD supervisor. The latter scenario may happen when you decide to proceed in academia, or perhaps even in industry - future employers may show interest in it to assess your strengths and weaknesses.
In any case, for future employers theses, and for that matter your theses-supervisors (being potential referees), are **far more important** than any of the grades you made on any of your exams. So personally, I would say, **yes MSc theses are important** for your later **career**.
The answer by @Alexandros may be a more direct answer to your question, mine may be providing a more long-term drive to deliver a qualitatively good thesis!
---
Tags: thesis, defense, thesis-committee
---
|
thread-34887
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34887
|
Should I mention in my manuscript's cover letter that I am a PhD student?
|
2014-12-28T14:36:54.270
|
# Question
Title: Should I mention in my manuscript's cover letter that I am a PhD student?
I am a PhD student in Mathematics. My adviser told me that I can submit our manuscript to some journal. So I am writing a cover letter and I am just wondering if I should mention in the cover letter that I am a PhD student.
# Answer
If a cover letter is needed at all, its purpose nowadays is usually to include information for which there is no appropriate form in the journal’s submission system (which can inlude suggested reviewers, unwanted reviewers, informations about prior submissions, etc.) – see also these two questions.
I do not see how the information that you are a PhD student is relevant to the editor or anybody involved with the paper, so I wouldn’t mention it. Every spurious information in that letter just wastes the editor’s time. I submitted a few papers as a PhD student (with and without coauthors) without mentioning this fact and did not encounter any problems that I would even remotely relate to this.
> 12 votes
---
Tags: journals, paper-submission
---
|
thread-34893
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34893
|
Do's and don'ts when writing an academic book
|
2014-12-28T17:30:31.150
|
# Question
Title: Do's and don'ts when writing an academic book
I am currently writing a book in mathematics. I have written a few pages and often stumble upon the question "is this good pedagogy" or is this "good typography". The chances of my work getting published is slim, but I am using it for a personal collection of notes and ideas in addition to learning writing a longer text. Below is an excerpt from my notes
An older version of my notes can be found here.As now the notes are dividied into a somewhat strict pattern with lemmas, propositions, corollary with theorems reserved for the main purpose of each section. I have a ton of questions about layout, design how formal to be in my writing, and how spiced up I should make the text. I see modern calculus books like to divide the text into blocks (a different color for theorems, proofs etc) while published articles tend to keep a much more minimalistic presence. I just do not know if I am on a good path, or if I need to do some fundamental changes.
To summarize
* What are the do's and dont when writing longer notes (mainly aimed at undergrads).
* Are there any books or literature on writing longer academic texts?
# Answer
There are many books and online resources on mathematical writing. These range from style guides that deal with issues from type setting to copy editing to books that talk about mathematical writing at a somewhat higher level. Here are a few of my favorite sources:
Nicholas J. Higham. Handbook of Writing for the Mathematical Sciences. SIAM 1998. http://www.worldcat.org/title/handbook-of-writing-for-the-mathematical-sciences/oclc/697886419
Steven G. Krantz. A primer of mathematical writing : being a disquisition on having your ideas recorded, typeset, published, read, and appreciated. American Mathematical Society, 1997. http://www.worldcat.org/title/primer-of-mathematical-writing-being-a-disquisition-on-having-your-ideas-recorded-typeset-published-read-and-appreciated/oclc/797735421
SIAM Style Manual for Journals and Books. http://www.siam.org/journals/pdf/stylemanual.pdf
> 4 votes
# Answer
In general, my advice would be
1. look at other books or lecture notes and copy the things you like, change the things you don't;
2. get feedback from your target audience;
3. don't overthink it for your first draft: you can (and likely will have to) edit it multiple times anyway.
But mostly I want to recommend Paul Halmos classical essay, How to write mathematics, L’Enseignement Mathématique, Vol.16 (1970).
> 3 votes
---
Tags: writing, books, writing-style
---
|
thread-19081
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/19081
|
How to find less-competitive faculty positions in the US universities?
|
2014-04-08T16:24:26.150
|
# Question
Title: How to find less-competitive faculty positions in the US universities?
I plan to move to the US, and thus, looking for a less-competitive faculty position to start there. Later, I can find better jobs, but at this stage, I just need to find a position.
For an outsider, all the job ads are similar. How can I find which job is less-competitive.
As an example, is it really less-competitive to apply for a faculty position in Alaska or less-interesting states (due to geographical reasons, I do not know which).
**NOTE:** This is the additional question separated from my previous question, as advised by a moderator.
# Answer
> 15 votes
Although (see my comments), I cannot recommend this sort of career path, here are two ways for an outsider to determine which positions will be less competitive:
1. Teaching load and pay. If the pay is poor, and the teaching load is high (say, 4/4 or higher), then the position will be less competitive.
2. Look up the average SAT scores (easy to find via Google) of American schools to which you are applying. This is a reasonable (although not perfect) guide for the quality of the undergraduates that these schools enroll. Schools with lower averages will have less competition for faculty positions.
That said, *all* faculty jobs are highly competitive.
# Answer
> 13 votes
The U.S. academic job market (at least in my field, mathematics) is very competitive, regardless of the institution and its perceived quality. Now, competition comes in various flavors. We have a lot of people looking for few jobs. That automatically creates competition. You need something to make yourself stand out from the other candidates.
My school is less-competitive as far as admission of students is concerned. Our student body is not that strong overall, although we get a fair number of really bright kids. We also have a 4/4 teaching load, and faculty salaries are relatively low. Our last job search was conducted almost ten years ago and we received in the neighborhood of 200 applications. At more research oriented schools, you may be competing with more applicants, and applicants who have very strong resumes relative to research. So, you're likely to be competing against a larger and more talented pool. This makes the situation even more competitive.
I thought that I was going to follow your intended career path, start out small, be able to spend some quality time with the family, and produce some great work that would allow me to move up to a better school. Didn't happen. I've been able to do some research, but not nearly enough, or of high enough quality, to allow me to move up. There are a couple of factors to keep in mind working in a less competitive environment, especially with a high teaching load. Your research time will be limited, and you won't have a lot of resources at your disposal (great library, colleagues who are fluent in your area, etc.). So, think carefully about what you want to do. Mine has not been a bad career, but it is not what I imagined starting out. As a general rule, it's easier to move down than up. So, I'd apply to the best places for which you're qualified and hope for the best.
# Answer
> 4 votes
Well as you mentioned, depending on the geographical location, reputation of the university, strong graduate (PhD and masters), and the size of the institutions you can make a good guess about the competitiveness of getting hired.
As for your reasons, I've heard from many scholars that it's better to wait longer and get a proper position than starting in a teaching-only university and burning yourself.
Any thoughts ?
# Answer
> 3 votes
Note that second- and third-tier are often much less willing to sponsor H1B visas compared to R1s. This is not only because they have less money and less expertise with this, but some simply don't see the investment as worthwhile.
This puts a considerable hurdle in your path.
---
Tags: university, job, job-search, united-states, faculty-application
---
|
thread-34901
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34901
|
Indicate Journal name for "under review" and "accepted/in press" publications on CV
|
2014-12-28T19:23:40.977
|
# Question
Title: Indicate Journal name for "under review" and "accepted/in press" publications on CV
there are similar questions on how to list on CV publications that have not passed the accepted or in press stage when applying to junior research positions ( PhD/postdoc).
I am not clear if such publications should include the journal name or not, and what would be the reason for either choice.
# Answer
Everyone I know feels that "accepted / in press" is just as good as appeared: the delay between acceptance and publication has nothing (or anyway, too little) to do with you. You should certainly list them on your CV, no matter who you are. I don't even list these as in a different category as the ones which have already been published: the only difference is that (roughly speaking; electronic publication and DOIs complicates this somewhat) I can't tell you the bibliographic information if it hasn't appeared. I think it is very important not to list a paper as accepted without listing the journal, because therein lies the route to verifiability that your paper has been accepted.
In my opinion, you should list submitted articles on your CV no matter who you are. (I would be interested to hear why @aeismail feels differently about this.) This advice comes from someone who works in a field (mathematics) for which recently submitted articles ought to be freely available: if you want to get credit for having submitted an article, then whoever you are trying to get credit from ought to be able to see the article. Ideally they don't have to ask for it specifically (because maybe they won't), so you should include a weblink to submitted papers on your CV. (This last part is more for people who are in a potential-hire situation...which is not restricted to grad students and postdocs. Nowadays, lots of academics are in a potential-hire situation or would like to be.)
In mathematics, each paper takes a long time: the period between when you say "Aha, I can prove the theorem" -- and e.g. start to give talks about it -- and the period which it gets accepted is probably over a year in many cases, and closer to two for serious, important work in many cases. Who is reading this part of your CV and isn't interested in what you've been working hard on for the last year or two?!?
Whether to list the journal submitted to is a well known question mark. I do not put this information on "external" documents -- i.e., the CV and the publication list which are on my professional website. I do usually list it on "internal" documents -- annual reviews, grant applications, job applications (well, it's been a little while). There are a lot of nuances here: one is that it is really hard to know how much credit to give someone for *submitting* a paper to journal X. After all, anyone can submit a paper to the most prestigious journal in their discipline, and in many cases they will spend a nontrivial amount of time before rejecting you. So you want to be careful about this. Nevertheless, where you submitted a paper is an important piece of information about how you feel about the paper, which is worth including in various cases (e.g. grant applications, where the panel will be suitably skeptical). Another issue is that one commonly submits to more than one journal (not at the same time, but in sequence) so the information about where you submitted a paper is likely go out of date, so is less suitable for a sporadically updated CV and more suitable for a CV guaranteed to be complete up to such-and-such a date.
Note also that in my discipline, many people -- especially young people but not always -- also include papers which are "in preparation" on their CVs. This is, frankly, a little shaky: I have papers on my own CV which have been "in preparation" for getting on a decade. But the above philosophy still applies: if you've been working on something for five years and you're 75% done, then shouldn't you say something about it?
One last piece of advice: it behooves you to make absolutely clear *the distinction between* all these categories. I get annoyed as a hirer when people use categories that don't fit easily into any of these boxes: e.g. some job candidates list papers as **provisionally accepted**, **conditionally accepted**, or **accepted pending revision**. What a hiring committee litmus test that becomes: their proponents will insist that these be counted as actual publications, their detractors will insist that they don't count as any more than submitted, and people in between will get a headache.
(I don't mean to imply that it's necessarily the candidate's fault. Sometimes the journal tells me that my paper has been provisionally accepted, and when I need to create a CV for a grant application that gives me the very same headache: please give me a paper status that has a clear, unambiguous meaning! They do enjoy their little games, the journals...)
> 14 votes
# Answer
I would definitely include publication titles for "in press" articles, since they've already been accepted (and you could provide the confirmation email if asked to do so!).
As for "under review" articles, I would only list them in the CV at all:
* If I were a graduate student or postdoc
* If I needed to demonstrate that the articles were under review (internal performance reviews, etc.)
In both instances, I would also include the journal name.
> 6 votes
# Answer
An accepted article is as good as a published article and you should include it in your CV / Resume. As pagination - issues etc are not yet final, including a DOI with the details of the articles is good practice. You should also try to publish pre-print versions of these articles if your publisher allows that to get some further exposure.
In my area (Electrical Engineering), a submitted article does not mean much. It takes almost no effort to prepare a couple of articles and submit them to even the highest ranking journals for review, only to have them rejected a few months later. In many cases, it is seen as an effort to fluff publication records. If the manuscript has been through the first or second stage of reviews and you need to show some more publications (and honestly who doesn't?) then you can include them but the distinction that the paper has been through some stages of review, together with the name of the journal, should be clear.
> 2 votes
---
Tags: publications, phd, application, cv
---
|
thread-26487
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/26487
|
In which countries are academic salaries published?
|
2014-07-28T15:39:07.647
|
# Question
Title: In which countries are academic salaries published?
This is a simple question but I am not sure how to find out the answer. Where in the world are the salaries of (senior) academics published and freely available? I found this amazing web page from Canada. Is it unique?
---
So far we have learned: (See answers and comments for more details.)
* Many US states give full salary details for public university employees.
* The province of Ontario in Canada gives full salary details.
* Switzerland gives full salary details (although no URL given yet).
* In Denmark you can infer the salary fairly accurately from seniority and job classification.
* In Finland (and possibly Norway and Sweden), everyone's basic tax records are public information although you can't access it online.
* In Germany salaries for individual professors are secret, but salaries for other researchers can be inferred from public salary tables.
* In the UK salaries for individual professors are secret, but salaries for more junior academics can often be inferred from published salary tables.
It would be great to get a fuller picture for Europe. What is the situation in France, for example?
# Answer
> 13 votes
Short answer: Germany. Somewhat.
To explain in more detail, there are four common modes for researchers in Germany:
1. Unpaid. (Typically PhD students in social sciences. Poor sods.)
2. Scholarships. ("Stipendiat"; PhD students and post-docs)
3. Employee of the state. ("Wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter"; PhD students, post docs and (rarely) non-professor senior researchers)
4. Civil servant. ("Beamter"; professors and senior researchers)
The first needs no explanation. The second kind is -- from the perspective of how our system used to work traditionally -- a bit of an abomination with little to no regulation. The amount of the scholarship tends to be similar to the salary employees in similar circumstances get but is, ultimately, for the awarding institution to make up.
Now, for employees and "Beamte", there are well-defined salary tables which anybody can inspect. Be aware that these are *gross* figures. Depending on your circumstances 30+% won't even see your bank account; you can use the provided calculators to get an idea of the parameters and results (if you know enough German).
* PhD students usually get (some percentage of) a TVL E13 position, post-docs can get E14-15 depending on their responsibilities.
* Senior researchers with life-long positions usually start at A13 and can move up to A16 in leading positions.
* Professors used to get C1-4 but that was changed to W1-3; junior professors (with or without tenure) get W1, full professors W2 or W3 depending on the position.
However, professors are eligible to negotiate for higher salaries
+ during the hiring process ("Berufungszulagen"),
+ in case of above average performance ("Leistungszulagen") and
+ when they get offers from other universities ("Bleibeverhandlungen").
Therefore, the real salaries of professors differ wildly (i.e. by integer factors). These figures are not public, not even in one department.
# Answer
> 8 votes
(The following answer focuses on France)
## Researchers
In France, *CNRS researchers* (largest governmental research organisation in France) are paid according to the class they belong to (monthly gross salary):
* chargé de recherche de 2 ème classe: between 2 200 € and 2 600 €
* chargé de recherche de 1 ère classe: between 2 300 € and 3 900 €
* directeurs de recherche: between 3 000 € and 6 000 €.
In addition to the base salary researchers get some bonus that can go up to 1275 EUR per year:
> Each grade has several levels that determine the remuneration of researchers . The gross monthly salary research managers is between € 3,000 and € 6,100 (assessments in September 2007) . In addition to the base salary directeurs de recherche receive a yearly research bonus ranging from 650 to 1275 EUR (depending on the corps and grade) and , where applicable, family supplements.
---
## Professors
The following two Wikipedia pages contain the salary grid for Maître de conférences and Professeur des universités:
\- Professeur des universités
---
## Research engineers
Gross salary for research engineers working in public institutions:
*Ingénieur de recherche de 2ème classe*
* Début de carrière : 1907,68 euros
* Milieu de carrière : 2 546,66 euros
* Fin de carrière : 3 301,39 euros
*Ingénieur de recherche de 1ère classe*
* Début de carrière : 2 694,83 euros
* Milieu de carrière : 3 398,63 euros
* Fin de carrière : 3 801,46 euros
*Ingénieur de recherche hors classe*
* Début de carrière : 3 046,73 euros
* Milieu de carrière : 4 079,28 euros
* Fin de carrière : 4 458,97 euros
---
For the sake of comparison, the monthly gross median wage in France is around 1717€, and the average monthly net income is 2128€.
# Answer
> 7 votes
Most US states have Freedom of Information Laws that allow for people to request this kind of information of public schools. You will find numerous databases usually run by some sort of local news organization that publishes this data. E.g. The Texas Tribune Goverment Salary Database.
I don't know of a central resource for such things in the US. Public schools are typically run by US states, so the information is very distributed. Also, due to the nature of the laws, the information can be as much as a year old in many cases.
# Answer
> 6 votes
In Denmark (and probably other countries with similar, highly centralized wage bargaining systems), salaries for faculty at public (i.e., in Denmark, all) universities are determined by a single contract negotiated between unions and the national government. All faculty in Denmark are paid according to the same scheme, which is based on a combination of seniority, job classification (assistant/associate/full), and some smaller fringe benefits. These contracts are public information. Here's the one that applies to my current position. I'm sure you could find similar documents for other countries.
# Answer
> 5 votes
In the UK the UCU has negotiated a single salary spine that ranges from £13,953 to £58,172. Only Professors exceed the top end of the scale so it is possible to make an educated guess at the salary of Lecturers and Readers.
Each university sets their own limits where Lecturers and Readers fall on the salary spine and the exact starting point on the spine is individually negotiated. For example, the Manchester scale has Lecturers between spine points 37 and 44, while the Nottingham scale has Lecturers between 36 and 43. Readers are between 45 and 51 at both Manchester and Nottingham. I am ignoring the spine points between the standard maximum and the super maximum since progression in that region is extremely difficult (and generally results in promotion). Typically, you move one spine point a year so if you know how many years someone has been a Reader/Lecturer, then you can make a very good educated guess at the salary. For all but Lecturers who have been appointed in the past 3 years, you should be able to estimate the salary within +/-10%.
# Answer
> 4 votes
The best resource for info on US salaries is the annual report on faculty salaries produced by the AAUP. In most states, faculty salaries at public universities will be public information, but since such a large number of US universities are private, this information may be misleading. Further, the AAUP report also helpfully distinguishes salary info in terms of seniority, the field of research, the geographical region of the country and the Carnegie classification of the university as well. A full professor in Law or Business at a doctoral program in the Northeast will make much, much more money than a lowly assistant prof who teaches English at a community college in the South, for instance.
# Answer
> 3 votes
As in many other European countries, salaries in **Italy** are not negotiated individually but are a function of academic rank and seniority.
There is a small variable component that depends on the region where the university is located. The raw tables for my university (Pisa, Tuscany) are here and here for some newer positions (all these links are in Italian only). There is an additional bonus for children and family (raw tables for my institution here).
In theory one can compute the salary of each professor from these raw data, if they know their seniority and family status. In practice, the computations are absurdly complicated unless one is a professional bureaucrat. I am a mathematician, and I'd have no idea how to compute my own salary using those tables. :)
You can get a ballpark amount from the tables **here**, published by an independent union expert. The net monthly salary is in column k, and the gross yearly salary is in the rightmost column.
(Quick legend: *T.P.* = full time; *T.D.* = part time; *1^ fascia* = full professor; *2^ fascia* = associate prof; *ricercatore* = assistant prof; *confermato/ordinario* = tenured; *non confermato/straordinario* = tenure track).
# Answer
> 3 votes
Most (if not all) Australian Universities publish their salaries in their HR pages. A simple search of the university name + salary would bring the correct page straight away. See for example:
Just as a few examples.
Positions and salaries here are also tiered. Academic positions are:
* A (1-8) as an Associate Lecturer with an A6 being the lowest tier that someone with a PhD will be employed,
* B as a Lecturer (or usually a researcher with a couple of years of experience)
* C as Senior Lecturer
* D as Associate Professor and
* E as Professor
# Answer
> 2 votes
Also in Israel, from the website of one university (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev):
http://in.bgu.ac.il/hr/DocLib/Pages/salary\_tables/salary-senior-Jan2013.pdf
It's in Hebrew, so you can't understand much of it I guess. To sum it up:
* Top right: Professor
* Top left: Associate professor
* Middle right: Senior lecturer
* Middle left: Lecturer
* Bottom right: Senior teacher
* Bottom left: Teacher
In each table the rightmost column is number of years in the job, and the leftmost column is the total monthly salary amount, in ILS. So if you want to find out how much someone is getting paid, find out his rank and compare with the list.
# Answer
> 2 votes
In Switzerland, being a confederation (well, nowadays more like a federal parliamentary republic), there are two levels of universities: federal and state universities. To the best of my knowledge there is no nominative list of individual salaries, as the law in Switzerland typically protects personal data (or at least, tries to).
For the federal level, i.e. the ETH in Zurich and the EPF in Lausanne, the range of first salary is given in a document (in German) available on the federal government's website. The salaries are in the order of (see top of page 8) 148k-270k CHF depending on the type of professorship and other factors that are negotiated individually.
For the state level, there is presumably more disparities between institutions. For example, the university of Lausanne publishes the salaries of the assistant professors (125k) in a document on its website but states that the salaries of full professor is determined individually.
On the subject, this article in the NZZ gives comparative salaries for professors between Switzerland and many other countries.
# Answer
> 0 votes
A great resource containing lots of data for European countries is on the European university institute. More detailed information on the academic careers in various countries is on another page of the same site.
---
Tags: salary
---
|
thread-34851
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34851
|
What are the benefits of a poster award?
|
2014-12-27T09:05:00.610
|
# Question
Title: What are the benefits of a poster award?
What are the benefits of poster awards? Is being awarded at a conference really useful for one's career (e.g. when applying for a PhD or a job) or is it just scene? In other words: Can I say that having such award on my resumé is better than just nothing?
# Answer
In my field the thinking is
* It draws attention to posters from conference participators.
* It provides encouragements to individuals (students) to make an extra effort
* It encourages discussion about "good poster design"
The selection criteria is always focusing on good communication of good science, never one or the other. Since such awards are given only to students and there ids usually also a similar student presentation award both selected by a set of valued senior scientists, the award should be and is seen as a merit.
> 13 votes
# Answer
Peter Jansson's answer provides a good description of the general benefits of poster awards mostly from the perspective of the conference organizer. My answer focuses on your latter questions.
A poster awards is definitely a positive signal of your quality as a researcher. If it was from a major conference (and perhaps even if it is not), it might do quite a bit to distinguish you from other prospective students in a PhD program applicant pool. Although its value while applying for non-academic jobs is more dubious, it can only there as well.
**It is clearly better than nothing** and you should put it on your resumé or CV.
> 5 votes
---
Tags: conference, awards, poster
---
|
thread-34899
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34899
|
Does your university name matter?
|
2014-12-28T18:58:28.083
|
# Question
Title: Does your university name matter?
If you are seeking an engineering job, do employers care about which university you attended? Do they look at your grades, or bias their decision based on the college's reputation? There are stories of Ivy League graduates struggling to find employment, while another person at a small, virtually unheard-of college grabbing that opportunity. So if you are attending a prestigious school, and your grades are lower than someone who is attending a small, high-school-like school, how will that affect your employment opportunities?
# Answer
> 6 votes
> If you are seeking an engineering job, do employers care about which university you attended? Do they look at your grades, or bias their decision based on the college's reputation?
If you have a solid foundation in the skills that matter for your engineering discipline/sub-field, and can convey that to recruiters in a phone/on-site/on-campus interview, then I would say that to a first-order where you did your degree does not matter *so long as you can get the recruiter's attention.*
Getting the recruiter's attention is the trickier part for those coming from lesser-known schools. For example, at the engineering schools I'm familiar with, new grads can find a lot of good fresh-out career opportunities by attending on-campus engineering career fairs and the like. The downside of attending a lesser-known engineering school is that they may not have a decent attendance of engineering companies that come to the campus for recruiting purposes in the first place. This puts the burden on the student in getting a recruiter's attention.
Engineering students (and students in other fields, I'm sure) from any institution can greatly benefit from networking with peers at other institutions and those already in industry. For those from lesser-known institutions, networking can be an invaluable tool for opening doors to career opportunities. Also, while obtaining an internship may be equally as difficult as obtaining a full-time position for those from lesser-known schools, participating in several internships along the way to obtaining your degree if at all possible (and performing the duties of the position well) would really go a long way to improving your chances of success.
# Answer
> 4 votes
Many firms tend to prefer certain schools -- drawing exclusively from CalTech or from MIT, etc. Some hiring managers tend to feel that this builds coherence and loyalty within the engineering ranks.
(Heavens forbid that you put an MIT engineer with a Caltech engineer on the same team unless you want to have them compete against each other.)
Some hiring managers have intense loyalty towards their own school and want to promote their own.
Others simply choose the best available in a specific domain.
It all boils down to the hiring philosophy of the company.
My own advice is that you should choose the program that you feel has the best fit with your interests. There's no point in going into a 'good' program if it's weak in your own area of study.
# Answer
> 2 votes
As much as we'd like it not to matter, many large employers *do* have "preferred" schools, whose graduates don't have to go through as much scrutiny.
That said, the effect is diminished when you're applying to smaller firms, where there are less layers of HR involved in the hiring process.
# Answer
> 2 votes
**Does it matter: yes.** Everything matters. Next question please! Upvote at your leasure!
The question you should ask is **"How much does it matter?"**
The answer really depends on how well you know your field. A brand-name school is most likely to help you get through an initial screening, but unlikely to land you the job. If you're on the fence, technically, and you need a large number of interviews to land the job, a brand-name school may be the ticket you need. On the other hand, if you actually know your stuff, you won't be so dependent on "good luck" in the interview, and you can afford to get missed in the screening once or twice... all you need is one interview and you're set!
Alternatively if your activities stand out, you wont need the brand-name school to sell your way past the screening process -- what you've done will speak more than your alma mater.
# Answer
> 2 votes
Traditionally, yes but more and more companies are beginning to move past that. Government jobs however are different. They would select based on school and also background.
But, anyone who has worked in a diverse environment would know all that very surface level. Engineering is all about finding solutions to problems. It always depends on the company's business model, hiring policies, alliances and other factors. It is not as clear cut as school where an A is an A regardless of the person getting it.
The whole "go to a good a school, graduate and get a good job" line is very misleading. It might work out for a lot of people (especially back then when a select few go to college) but do not depend on it to work out for you (unless daddy's the boss, then why are we even discussing this). Depend on yourself first and keep at it till it does work out. It sucks but you will be able appreciate every bit of it much better than you struck gold at first strike.
---
Tags: job-search, job, engineering
---
|
thread-34933
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34933
|
Do hiring committees actually give preference to underrepresented groups?
|
2014-12-29T11:32:48.067
|
# Question
Title: Do hiring committees actually give preference to underrepresented groups?
For reference, I am a woman of color in mathematics and I am applying for academic jobs.
I noticed that many of these applications say something like "Women (and other underrepresented groups) are encouraged to apply," or "We especially welcome applications from minority groups, women, persons with disabilities,..."
Yet there is also a non-discrimination clause saying " All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability, etc. ..."
**Is preference actually given to these underrepresented groups? What impact does knowledge of the underrepresented group the applicant is a part of have in the reviewing process?**
# Answer
While I am in a corporate position, our process has some similarity, and I also discuss these issues frequently with colleagues in more traditional academia.
What I have observed is that at the level of faculty or other primary investigator hiring, direct comparison of candidates is almost always impossible: it is always apples vs. oranges because every candidate is qualitatively different in what they bring to offer the department. Thus there is no opportunity for a simple positive discrimination like "given two equally qualified candidates, pick the underprivileged one."
Instead, any strong candidate will have an advocating faction whose interests they would support, and opposition from another faction whose interests would be better supported by a different candidate. These pragmatic interests are likely to dominate over diversity considerations in the final decision in many cases.
Where diversity considerations are more likely to factor into the process is earlier on, when candidates for interview are being selected. Here, demographic information can be used so that a group can notice, "Hey, we're only planning to invite white males... maybe we are being biased in our evaluation and should look deeper into the candidate pool." It probably still isn't enough to make up for the implicit negatives, however.
> 22 votes
# Answer
I think this depends on the policies at the individual institutions.
For instance, here in Germany, I believe that institutions are required to ensure that their search committees have, where possible, female faculty members on the committee, as well as representatives from the human resources department to ensure that qualified female candidates are not excluded on flimsy grounds. I have also heard of searches where the faculty especially recruited female candidates to apply. (The recruiters are not the same faculty as on the search committee, reducing conflict of interest issues.)
However, in the US, I think the issue is more to ensure that candidates of all backgrounds apply (through job fairs at conferences, targeted advertising, and so on), and ensuring that all candidates are treated equally during search committee deliberations, rather than biasing the choice toward members of underrepresented groups.
> 10 votes
---
Tags: job-search, faculty-application, recruiting, diversity
---
|
thread-34939
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34939
|
Lost Interest in Electrical Engineering. Still have a Math degree to complete. What to do?
|
2014-12-29T14:37:46.140
|
# Question
Title: Lost Interest in Electrical Engineering. Still have a Math degree to complete. What to do?
I just finished my 5th semester of a compact, dual degree (MS in mathematics and BE in electrical and electronics engineering) course from BITS Pilani, India. It's hitting me really hard now that I just don't want to be an engineer at all. I was really enthusiastic about this programme when I joined it, but with 5 more semesters to go, I'm near clueless about what to do once I'm out of here.
I still like mathematics though and my grades in those courses have been fairly decent, but the university grades me for the entire course and so I'd barely make it a 2.7 or something like that on a scale of 4 at the end of it. If I keep going like I am, more or less.
I like statistics, probability and operations research but even though I can tolerate the mathematics degree which is a lot of pure mathematics, that part of it isn't something I want to pursue.
I have, however, recently developed interest in financial analysis. I have taken introductory courses in economics and management, to fill up the elective credits I had to and so I have a little bit of an idea about how this stuff works, and I'm really enjoying learning more of it. But I have no clue where to go, or what to do.
I want to be certain that I can make it to a decent program, preferably MSF or MBA Finance, in the US, UK or Germany (or any other place where financial markets are really intense and interesting) with those sort of grades and maybe a few projects (which I intend to take up in the next few semesters) related to financial analysis, but mostly math.
I would really appreciate if you could help me find a path to accomplish what I am setting out to, point me to alternative programs I can get in that can get me where I want to be or advise me on what the focus should be on right now, working on a few more projects, or improving my grade; or something else.
# Answer
> 1 votes
Statistics/probability/data analysis is also a reasonable path to consider, and is a good bit more general than financial math, which you might also decide you don't like down the road.
Paul Graham (of Lisp fame) says that you should try to stay "upstream" with regard to your choices. To put it more concretely, you should not specialise too quickly, and try to keep your options open.
Statistics/probability/data analysis is a very marketable choice these days, and will still leave the door open to financial math if you still want to pursue it a bit later.
However, aside from ISI there aren't really any good places in India to learn statistics. And I don't think India has much of a statistics research community. You'll have to go somewhere else.
An autobiographical snippet: I got a PhD from a Statistics Dept in applied probability. The degree was supposed to be in financial math, as it happens. I was trying to study it, but didn't really make any headway. So my degree wound up being about something that was originally supposed to assist with the financial math. As you can see, things don't always go the way one had planned. So, bear in mind, you might like the subject now, but whether it will like you and things will work out, that is a separate question. It's a question of commitment.
---
Tags: masters, mathematics, economics, cross-referencing
---
|
thread-34919
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34919
|
How do I stop feeling unwelcome in my department?
|
2014-12-29T02:05:29.923
|
# Question
Title: How do I stop feeling unwelcome in my department?
I could not find a PhD advisor and the person in charge of my PhD program suggested that I leave with a master's degree. He said that I was good at carrying out tasks but I did not have the motivation to advance the state of the art in my field. Some time later I found an advisor in a different department, and he seems to like me. But I still cannot get over what the graduate coordinator said, and now I hate visiting the building because I feel I do not belong and I don't want to talk to anyone I know. What should I do?
After I found an advisor the graduate coordinator said something like "I knew you had it in you, I just wanted to see how much you wanted it." But I don't know if he really means it, and if he did, I think that's kind of a mean thing to do.
# Answer
> 12 votes
You mentioned that your new advisor is in a new department. So, can you cut the losses with the old department?
But, although the comment stings, and your feelings are understandable, being able to handle it is part of completing Ph.D. To complete a Ph.D., you need (within a reason) to go against the grain, latch onto something, not listen when you are told it can't be done, and pursue it against the odds. In the process you grow a thicker skin and not let doubtful comments get and define you.
So, it is possible that your advisor meant to test you, and see how determined you are to continue the process. I am not saying that it is the best approach, but I have seen this happen.
# Answer
> 11 votes
Well, all you can really do is to clench your teeth and work. It may take a few months to a few years before you get to the point when you'll be certain that you are worth something and then a few more years before you finally realize that your brain is ridiculously slow, blind, and malfunctioning and you slide into the normal stable depression state any working mathematician lives in (I'm not so sure about other sciences but do not see why it should be any different there) :-).
The point is that what people see is what you produce: above a certain level, you are judged by your output, not by your working habits and other "test" criteria. On the other hand, above the same level, you spend the rest of your life walking a narrow path between being dissatisfied with yourself to the extent of quitting and being not enough dissatisfied with yourself to strive for improvement. You just have veered too much to the left, that's all.
As to the graduate coordinator, the second phrase puzzles me way more than the first (the first one makes sense and I can easily say it myself when I see that the things just do not work out after a few years, the second one looks more like a lame excuse for saying the first). Well, who cares? If you can do something, you'll see it yourself. If not, some other people will take care of showing it to you.
As to the feeling of "not belonging", the internet won't help here. Either talk to your psychiatrist (if you believe in psychiatry), of just take time out and do some physical activities on fresh air.
Above all, remember that we have all been there at the beginning of our careers: stupid worthless students struggling with the most routine homework and learning that the first problem of solving which they were proud was actually put on the test just to console those who cannot figure out anything interesting.
So, veer a bit to the right (not too much though) and continue walking forward (and, of course, as it was said in the final song of Monty Python's "Life of Brian", always look at the bright side of life...)
# Answer
> 3 votes
In many departments, the ability to match up to a source of funding is a *de facto* qualifying exam. If no adviser is stipending you, and the department needs to cover your stipend, you are a burden on the department. In current funding environments, departments often need that money for other things -- especially carrying faculty salary during funding lapses.
This creates a funny situation for students who can't find an adviser. They haven't failed a formal qualifier. Is there something "wrong" about the student such that no adviser accepted them? Maybe, maybe not. Could be the research interests didn't match up. Programs do their best to try to match the research areas of accepted students to those of faculty who can support students-- but sometimes they miss. Could just also be that such a student isn't the best student, and that potential advisers feel that there will be too much work in dragging them through to a degree. Could also just be that there were better students in the group who attracted the offers from advisers, and no one with funding was left to pick them up.
In any case, I recommend trying to be a little introspective about how you could have made yourself even more appealing to potential advisers such that you could have paired up earlier. In the career path you've chosen, you'll perpetually be selling yourself. Use this as an opportunity to figure out how to sell yourself better. If you want to feel more welcome, publish as much as you can, and early. Apply for every funding opportunity you can reasonably apply for. Take your teaching responsibilities seriously. Show your department that you're the opposite of a burden.
---
Tags: advisor, emotional-responses
---
|
thread-34900
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34900
|
How to cite a chapter from a report with different authors?
|
2014-12-28T19:07:08.303
|
# Question
Title: How to cite a chapter from a report with different authors?
I have to cite a multi-chapter report. Every chapter has different authors. Should I cite with the name of the main author and then the specific chapter? Or should I use the first author of the chapter I am citing?
If the main author is Smith but Jeff is the author of a chapter where Smith is not in the authors’ list, should I cite with “(Smith et. al 2000, Ch 6)” or “(Jeff et. al 2000)” and then add a citation for each chapter in the cited literature section?
# Answer
In your example, you are citing the **chapter** author's work, not the work of the compiler/editor of the book as a whole. According to the APA *Publication Manual*, use the following reference format for this situation.
> Author, A.A. (1967) Title of chapter or entry. In A. Editor & B. Editor (Eds.), *Title of book* (pp. xxx-xxx). Location: Publisher
Of course, your intext citation would reference the chapter author too, not the book author/editor. The same general format holds for other reference styles as well.
> 0 votes
# Answer
If authors are identified for the chapters, then this document is best treated as an edited collection. In this case, the chapter authors are the author and the chapter title the title. The overall report title is then the collection title (filling a similar role to journal title) and the "main" authors the editors.
The exact details of how this is formatted depend on the style where you are submitting, but if any names are appearing in the main text, they are of the chapter authors.
> 2 votes
# Answer
> should I cite with **(Smith et. al 2000, ch 6)** or **(Jeff et. al 2000)** and then add a citation for each chapter in the cited literature section?
I've checked *The Chicago Manual of Style* and the *New Oxford Style Manual* and it seems that the second style is preferable. I don't know if there is a standard way to abbreviate if one has to cite many different chapters.
However, if you're writing for a journal, there might be a preferred style, which can be described in the journal style guide or applied directly by the typesetter.
> 0 votes
# Answer
Remember that the reference in the text is "only" a flag to enable the reader to find the important information, the reference, in your reference list. With the "author-year" form the in text information provides a knowledgeable reader with a flag that can make the reference known without looking into the reference list but in a system where references are provided with only numbers (Vancouver style). So the important information is in the reference list.
With that background, it is clear that referencing the authors of the chapters is the way to go. If no clear author exists for chapter the compilation or book editor can be referenced but adding the specific chapter number in the reference (assuming the chapter IS numbered). There is no major point in adding the chapter number to a reference pointing to a chapter given by its author. All such information will be given in the references. Even if more than one chapter has been written by a specific author (team) you can still provide only the usual "author-year" but label the references, for example, (Smith et. al 2000a), (Smith et. al 2000b) etc. All will be explained in the reference list.
So as a conclusion, use references as if the chapters where articles in a journal but be careful by providing all necessary information about full publication information of the chapter (number and name of chapter) as well as book editor, title, publisher etc. in the reference list. Please refer to journal instructions (equiv.) for details.
> 0 votes
---
Tags: citations, citation-style
---
|
thread-34929
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34929
|
What do I put on my publication list if I have no publications?
|
2014-12-29T10:43:05.620
|
# Question
Title: What do I put on my publication list if I have no publications?
I am applying for a lecturer position at a university, and one of the application materials is a publication list.
I am a graduate student in my last year of PhD, and I plan on focusing my job search on teaching positions. I currently have no publications, nor will I have any anytime soon.
It looks like on the application, I have to upload something in order to submit it. **What do I upload if I have no publications?**
I was considering just a page that says "no publications" but I thought I would check here before I make a move.
For context, I am a student in mathematics. I have been told that it is not unusual to have no publications as a math PhD student.
# Answer
> 10 votes
If you do not have publications (including papers "in press") then the publications list can be left empty. If you have papers. You can, however add headings for publications "under review", if you have any or "manuscripts in preparation", again, if you have any. You may also have unpublished reports of different types. Such contributions can also be listed under a separate heading. What can be included is difficult to say but in my case, I used to include annual reports I had to write to a super-computer center and a research station, both which were collated with others and printed by the organising body. So any report sitting in a drawer is not valid.
Obviously the a "manuscript in preparation" will not be very strong but it will at least indicate that something is ongoing. But, note that a manuscript in preparation should be something worth reading to make it to such a list. In a situation like yours any written material prepared for some official body and with some distribution, can be used to indicate your activities. There is a grey zone which is undefinable (which is why one generally avoids such listings later in the career), so do not put in anything. In short, you need to be able to show these "claims".
# Answer
> 0 votes
Some online application tools are not considering the possibility that you have no publication record. Your idea is ok OP, I would do the same if I was in your position. An empty page is not good since the potential employer can think of a wrong application and dismiss it.
Anyway let me say that you should have some publication to apply to a university position, the suggestion of Peter Jansson are good. Try to follow them.
# Answer
> 0 votes
I think your *cover letter* is one of the most important parts of your job application. It's what I always read first when recruiting. In it you can describe - in a nonapologetic way - why you will be good for this particular institution (presumably with its focus on teaching). Since you are getting a PhD you can legitimately say that you know what mathematical research calls for, perhaps that you enjoy it, even if you don't see much cutting edge publication in your professional future.
---
Tags: publications, application, job-search, faculty-application
---
|
thread-34947
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34947
|
Should papers presented at local conferences be put in list of publications?
|
2014-12-29T16:39:58.660
|
# Question
Title: Should papers presented at local conferences be put in list of publications?
I have two papers presented at state and national level conferences. These conference proceedings were not published in any journal. Now, should I list these papers in my list of publications or not?
# Answer
> These conference proceedings were not published in any journal.
Were they published at all? If there were no proceedings, then they don't count as publications, because nothing was actually published. (You could still list them as talks rather than publications.) If there were official proceedings in which other people can read and cite the paper (not just an abstract) even after the conference is over, then it's a form of publication, regardless of whether the proceedings appeared in a journal or as a stand-alone volume.
There may be other considerations you should take into account when including this material in your CV. For example, were the papers peer reviewed? Does your field consider them to be archival publications? However, these are more of an issue of how meaningful the publications are, rather than whether they count as publications in the first place.
> 7 votes
# Answer
Depends a little on your field. What do other people in your field do?
But maybe list it as a presentation rather than a publication.
Because in some fields, conference handouts are freely available on the personal websites of the presenters and it's totally acceptable to cite other people's conference handouts.
> 1 votes
---
Tags: publications
---
|
thread-34950
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34950
|
Should I put my papers which are not written in English on my social-media profile?
|
2014-12-29T18:28:06.550
|
# Question
Title: Should I put my papers which are not written in English on my social-media profile?
Is it OK to put my non English internal conference or journal paper on my social media profiles such as Google Scholar, Academia, Research Gate, etc? and also, should I translate their title and other information into English?
# Answer
> 11 votes
Yes, it is. English is a *lingua franca*, but that doesn't mean that all scholarly literature **must** be in English. Make sure your paper is in a institutional or disciplinary repository, if you like the idea of your paper to be *open access*. Translate it, as Davidmh suggests, to make it even more available.
Regarding indexing in Google Scholar, that depends by the site you archive your paper into. You can make some arrangements to be indexed, but in my experience even if you suggest resources to GS you cannot be sure you'll be.
# Answer
> 4 votes
It is your work, you can of course take credit for it. Translating it will help the international audience to get a feeling of what you do; nevertheless, in the interest of archiving, you should keep the original title next to it. In case it is not clear, indicate that the original paper was in another language.
---
Tags: publications, language, google-scholar, social-media
---
|
thread-34941
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34941
|
How can physicists help in theoretical biology, besides math and fresh perspectives?
|
2014-12-29T14:59:28.060
|
# Question
Title: How can physicists help in theoretical biology, besides math and fresh perspectives?
By googling this keyword: `"theoretical biology" and physics`, I get many interesting pages, such as:
All pages I found mostly (or only, if I remember correctly) focus on the advantages of the physicists are their math background and being a neophyte so sometimes able to bring fresh perspectives to a problem. But that means a mathematician is also adequate to this.
My undergraduate dissertation is about biophysics, so I actually know that there are things that a physicist can help in biology. But mostly I see them in molecular biology. What else can physicists actually help with given their background?
# Answer
> 2 votes
One important contribution of physics to many areas is that physics is the origin of much of our understanding of complex systems phenomena, including emergence, chaotic systems, network effects, and phase transitions. Many areas of biology are still trapped in a hyper-reductionist framework (e.g., is FOXP2 the gene for speech) rather than realizing that such questions are poorly framed. Many biologists are embracing systems thinking, but the tools of physics are still not very widely dispersed overall, and collaboration that brings together such expertise with biological expertise (non-biologists are often frightfully naive about many realities of biology) can be of great value.
There are many other possibilities too, but this is a very important category that I think may be a good start...
---
Tags: collaboration, physics, biology, multidisciplinary
---
|
thread-34957
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34957
|
Should scholarship/fellowship monetary amount be listed in CV?
|
2014-12-29T23:09:45.407
|
# Question
Title: Should scholarship/fellowship monetary amount be listed in CV?
I know there are similar questions but here I would like to focus on scholarships and fellowships that pay tuition and/or a stipend. This is for a CV for PhD or scholarship/fellowship applications, so early career stage and whatever that my imply on the length of the CV.
Given a candidate with 3-5 of these ranging from $1000 to $15,000. Should the amount and what the amount covers be listed? Or just list the institution and award name?
# Answer
> 4 votes
In general, I would leave out the financial amounts of scholarships and fellowships from CV's. If it's a small dollar amount, putting it on diminishes the amount of the award. If it's a well-known award (such as an NSF fellowship), or at least well-known in your field (for example, a fellowship or scholarship by your field's professional society), the details are already sufficiently well-known that they don't need to be mentioned.
I might only list them if they were (a) rather substantial in value and (b) not well-known enough to be on most people's radar screens (at least in your field). At the same time, listing just a few sort of calls attention to the fact that the other awards might not be so large. So again, I'd lean towards not including them at all.
---
Tags: funding, cv
---
|
thread-34961
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34961
|
Are there any personal blogs writing review of academic papers?
|
2014-12-30T03:48:12.090
|
# Question
Title: Are there any personal blogs writing review of academic papers?
Are there any personal blogs writing articles on research papers?
# Answer
> 2 votes
Yes, lots! For example, some of my personal favorites are DrugMonkey, Neuroskeptic, and In the Pipeline. Such blogs tend to have a lot of posts besides just paper analysis as well---general academia, war stories, the rest of life.
---
Tags: research-process
---
|
thread-34966
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34966
|
Given a downloaded PDF of a publication, is there any way to detect if it's a journal or conference paper?
|
2014-12-30T06:47:37.907
|
# Question
Title: Given a downloaded PDF of a publication, is there any way to detect if it's a journal or conference paper?
I have some downloaded papers and I am going to store journals and conferences in separate folders. My problem is that by having a simple look at the PDF file, I cannot detect if that paper is journal or conference. Some papers mention it. However, how to detect the others?
# Answer
> 6 votes
Just search for the title of the paper as a phrase, online. That will almost always lead you either to the journal, or to the conference.
If that doesn't work, go through the list of authors one at a time, and find their university home pages, if they exist; from there, look for their list of publications: that will often have the full citation, and that will let you know whether they are journal or conference papers.
You could also try searching on one or more of the online reference compilers, such as CiteULike, Sparrho, Zotero, Mendeley, or even serial spammers ResearchGate
There are also existing tools such as Mendeley Desktop that will try to find a pdf's metadata for you, with varying degrees of success.
---
Tags: publications, journals, conference
---
|
thread-34959
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34959
|
Should you list undergraduate work on your CV?
|
2014-12-30T00:28:05.413
|
# Question
Title: Should you list undergraduate work on your CV?
Given that undergraduate projects and publications can be of a lesser quality than later works, some may be discouraged from adding them to their CV. On the other hand, perhaps a CV should simply be a raw record of your work, good, bad, and middling.
# Answer
> 10 votes
Your publications are your publications, and unless they have been retracted, you should list them all on your CV. It is up to the reader how to interpret your undergraduate work, and you have minimal control of that in the rather raw format of a CV, whether or not you list them. But consider: if you do list them, then your degree history makes it clear they are from undergrad and to be judged accordingly. If you do not list them, however, then the reader may easily come across them anyway online and be left to wonder what awful shame you are attempting to hide.
# Answer
> 7 votes
As jakebeal said, you don't really have a choice. A CV is supposed to contain a complete list of your publications, end of story.
But I don't think you need worry. Nobody expects your first papers to represent the best work of your career. If you are early in your career (e.g. undergrad or grad student), it is much better to have some papers on your CV, whatever their quality, instead of none. And if you are later in your career, nobody will pay much attention to your earliest work. You might be judged based on your best papers, or your latest papers, or your total number of papers, but not on your first papers.
As to your enumerated concerns:
(A) There's nothing wrong with that. If you do any amount of collaboration in your career (and you should), you will be a coauthor on papers where the main idea came from someone else. That's fine, as long as there are also some where the main ideas are yours. (If you have great ideas, wouldn't you want other talented people to be willing to help bring them to completion? So you should be willing to do likewise, within reason.)
(B) Nobody writes exclusively great papers; every CV has papers that are not so good. Good papers get noticed, not-so-good papers (unless they are plagiarized or egregiously substandard) just get ignored. Mediocre papers don't directly hurt you, they simply don't help you. So don't worry about having written papers that aren't great.
(C) As above, the start of your publication history is not something that people care about, so there's no particular advantage in going to great lengths to ensure that your first (acknowledged) publication is super awesome. If you write that super awesome paper eventually, it will overshadow the others, and if you don't, at least you'll still have something to show.
Note also that a common convention on a CV is to list papers in *reverse* chronological order: newest papers first, and earliest papers at the end, where nobody is likely to pay them much attention.
# Answer
> 0 votes
The general rule of thumb: List all in a reverse chronological order. (Thanks for pointing the omission)
The answer to your question will have some subjectivity. In many cases, a person might have done some extremely novel work worthy of elaborating briefly in CV. This enhances chances to get into graduate school or jobs of his/her liking. Most of the jobs people do (from the statistical stand-point) are volunteering or 'Do-it-this-way' kind of projects.
Even if your project/research is not a major endeavor, there is no harm in adding a piece on information. But make sure that you are not incessantly harping on it. Your CV should be a concise document which highlights your skills, interest and character. The person evaluating you should get sufficient information about you. Too much details on any one thing (about a minor project especially) tends to work against you, from my experience.
---
Tags: publications, cv, research-undergraduate
---
|
thread-34970
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34970
|
How to get permission from Google to use Google Scholar Data, if needed?
|
2014-12-30T09:40:48.773
|
# Question
Title: How to get permission from Google to use Google Scholar Data, if needed?
As you maybe aware, Google does not provide any API for Google Scholar product and despite lots of request still there is no interest from Google to provide API for it. So, I am currently working on a product that can utilize publicly available information from Google Scholar page and render them so researchers and academician can use the data and embed them in their own website.
However, while I am developing the system, it happens sometimes that Google blocks my request to fetch scholar page (I parse HTML page). So, I am thinking that there might be a mechanism in their side that blocks request from applications -rather than human. So, it may suggest to get approval from them.
**Do you have any idea that:**
1. Do people need approval/permission from Google to use its Google scholar information? The product I am building is probably donation based for basic version and paid for some other version (not yet confirmed).
2. If people need permission, how should they approach them? I searched the entire scholar page here and found nothing related to get permission. Also there is no forum for Google Scholar according to this place.
Thanks
# Answer
Google Scholar, as you said, does not provide API, nor a complete documentation. In the comment Davidmh cites this question, and I think that settles everything:
* Google Scholar robot.txt disallows bots
* Google service *Terms of Service* says
> Don’t misuse our Services. For example, don’t interfere with our Services or try to access them using a method other than the interface and the instructions that we provide.
So, in the end, you **don't have permission** for a script that fetches multiple pages at a time.
Following this Quora question, I found scholar.py, that is not an answer to your question but could be of use (I have not tried it).
Furthermore, I also asked the developer of the H-Index GS Calculator, to get another opinion, but I'm sure the "one-click" nature of the plugin complies with the ToS. A bot does not. Maybe you can change your system in this direction.
**UPDATE**: the developer says the in the past he wrote the GS team the same questions, and they replied
> 1. you can do stuff, respecting the ToS (so, no bot)
> 2. they will not provide an API, for legal constraints with affiliated digital libraries (ex. Scopus, WoS, etc.).
Also, his calculator has a *throttler* that reduces the number of queries per minute, to mitigate the issue. There are few simple techniques to "cheat", but, we are at the boundaries of the ToS :-).
> 32 votes
---
Tags: google-scholar
---
|
thread-34977
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34977
|
In Elsevier Editorial System, how do I resend a paper with "Submission needing revisions" status?
|
2014-12-30T15:23:16.963
|
# Question
Title: In Elsevier Editorial System, how do I resend a paper with "Submission needing revisions" status?
I've received a letter from the editor about minor revision to my paper and, if I want, that I can resend revised manuscript. The paper is currently under "Submissions needing revision" in Elsevier Editorial System (EES).
Do I need to notify the editor by mail or somehow through EES that I will resend the revised version or just send it again right after making changes/replying to reviewers' comments?
# Answer
The expected action would be for you to quickly but thoroughly make the necessary revisions to your paper. Sometimes the journal, through the electronic submission system or through the decision mail, provides a time frame for revisions. in my environment minor revisions is commonly expected within 3 weeks and major revisions within 6 weeks of receiving the comments. This is by no means a universal time frame so you should try to figure out what applies in "your" journal.
What is important is that you address each of the comments received and provide a clear account for how you have done so. You should make the revisions as quickly as you can. If you are uncertain about the time frame, send an e-mail to the editor and ask. Since a minor revision is likely to be follow by acceptance if revisions are made successfully, also go through and make sure your manuscript adheres to journal style requirements. This is usually given by an "Instruction for Authors" (or equiv.) but can also be gathered from looking at a recently published paper in the journal. Pay particular attention to the reference system.
> 1 votes
---
Tags: publications, peer-review, paper-submission, editors
---
|
thread-34979
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34979
|
Why do US universities have strict formatting requirements for dissertations?
|
2014-12-30T15:57:47.283
|
# Question
Title: Why do US universities have strict formatting requirements for dissertations?
Recently, I got a mildly panicked email from a friend/collaborator who was preparing the final manuscript of his thesis. He had just noticed that page numbers were a fraction of an inch closer to the page edge than the regulations of his university specify, and he was concerned that the lady in charge of filing dissertations would notice and reject the manuscript. This concern wasn't unjustified: I personally know a couple of people who had to reprint their dissertations at the last minute because they had the type of formatting errors that you need a ruler to notice.
In the end, I was able to tell my friend how to modify his TeX markup to avoid disaster, but I was left wondering: why are (some) US universities so obsessed about aspects of a dissertation that nobody will ever care about, or even notice? I did my PhD in Europe (Netherlands), and nobody there cares much about the formatting of your dissertation, so long as it doesn't look silly.
# Answer
I think this is a historical issue more than anything else. Until quite recently, dissertations were usually sent for microfilming, microfiching, or both, for later reproduction and distribution. As a result of this, they needed to be carefully formatted so that they would reproduce correctly when photographed. Thus the requirements for font size, margins, line thickness in graphics, positioning of page numbers, and so on.
In recent years, this has not been so important, but that doesn't mean universities have completely relaxed the rules regarding formatting. There is definitely an interest in having a consistent "look and feel" for theses from the same institution.
> 27 votes
---
Tags: thesis, formatting
---
|
thread-34969
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34969
|
Wrong font used for statement of purpose and résumé
|
2014-12-30T09:21:19.153
|
# Question
Title: Wrong font used for statement of purpose and résumé
I used wrong font for my statement of purpose, rather than the one prescribed under the department’s specifications. Will this hamper my chances of admission into that university?
# Answer
> 17 votes
As far as I can tell, the reasons behind font prescriptions are usually:
1. To avoid silly or unreadable fonts such as Comic Sans or blackletter fonts.
2. To avoid biases.
3. To be able to quickly assess the character count of a document.
4. To prevent the circumvention of page limits or similar by using a narrow font or similar.
(Whether one should care about character counts or page limits to the extent that the last two points matter at all is another discussion.)
Now, the if rules were only made with these purposes in mind, they would be something like:
> The statement of purpose must be set in a traditional sans-serif font such as …
or if the restriction is due points 3. or 4.:
> The statement of purpose must be set in Arial, Helvetica, Liberation Sans, … or any metrically similar font (in 11 pt with double line spacing …)
Unfortunately, the people making these rules usually do not know sufficiently much about typography or are even aware of that not everybody has Arial and Times New Roman pre-installed on their computers. Similarly, some applicants may be confused by such instructions. Therefore you end up with prescriptions that just require a Arial or Times New Roman, though probably nobody really thinks that you must use those very fonts.
---
Thus to evaluate the impact of your font choice, you first have to find out for which reason the font prescription was made. To this purpose, ask yourself questions such as the following:
* Are other aspects such as font size, linespacing and borders prescribed as well? If yes, the prescription is likely due to point 3 or 4.
* Is there any prescription on the length by other means as the word or character count? If yes, it’s almost certainly point 4.
* Is a wide variety of fonts offered? If yes, the description is probably due to point 1, perhaps 2.
Finally, you need to consider, how much your actual font choice sabotages this purpose. Some examples:
* If Times New Roman was prescribed due to reason 1 and you chose another traditional serif font such as Georgia or Baskerville, it will likely be without consequences. Even, if you used a traditional sans-serif font, you might fare well, as whoever is reading your submission may not even be aware of the prescriptions in this case.
* If Times New Roman was prescribed due to reason 4 and you used Liberation Serif, which was designed to be metrically equivalent (i.e., each character takes up the same space), this will likely be without consequences. You need to have a trained eye to even spot the differences between the two, if you are not specifically looking for them:
* If you used Comic Sans and it was not the prescribed font, this will likely have disadvantages, no matter what the reasons behind the prescription are and even if there was no font prescription to begin with.
However, at the end of the day, you can only guess the intentions behind the prescriptions and your document may get into the hands of some pedantic who radically enforces for these rules for their own sake (especially, if submissions were to be made in a format that allows to easily control the used font). Thus, if you want to be sure, only time (or asking the university) can tell.
# Answer
> 3 votes
The short answer is: no, it will probably not hurt you, as long as the font you used is normal-looking and/or similar-looking to the original font. In that case, few people will even notice the difference.
---
Tags: graduate-admissions, statement-of-purpose, formatting
---
|
thread-34987
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34987
|
Large distributed research network
|
2014-12-30T18:11:34.837
|
# Question
Title: Large distributed research network
I remember having heard of a large distributed computer network being operated by several universities. As far as I remember, it would be possible to get several (hundreds) of virtual machines to perform computations, testing, evaluations, etc.
Unfortunately, I do not remember this network's name, but I have the feeling that it was similar to "ResearchLab" or "ScienceLab". However, I was not able to find a network with such a name...
Hope that anyone out there can help. Thanks a lot!
# Answer
You're probably thinking of PlanetLab.
> PlanetLab is a global research network that supports the development of new network services. Since the beginning of 2003, more than 1,000 researchers at top academic institutions and industrial research labs have used PlanetLab to develop new technologies for distributed storage, network mapping, peer-to-peer systems, distributed hash tables, and query processing.
>
> PlanetLab currently consists of 1335 nodes at 645 sites.
More generally, there are lots of "testbeds" (as these networks of distributed resources are called), including Emulab, PlanetLab, ORBIT, DETER, Seattle, and many others. Each has various advantages and disadvantages, depending on what you're trying to do. These are often *federated* so that users can access resources from multiple testbeds; projects like GENI and FIRE are federations of testbeds.
> 6 votes
# Answer
I am currently aware of two large research networks of this type:
* EmuLab allows experimentation with large numbers of virtual machines co-located within a facility at the University of Utah.
* GENI is a large-scale distributed networking testbed that also allows reconfiguration of the network switching hardware.
Both are primarily sponsored by the US National Science Foundation as public testbeds. I have previously used EmuLab myself and found it delightfully easy to use. I have not personally had an occasion to use GENI; the company I work for runs the GENI project office, though, and I hear that the testbed has been working out well.
> 5 votes
---
Tags: computer-science, experiment-design
---
|
thread-34988
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34988
|
Would I be disqualified from academic positions in mathematics if my PhD is in cognitive science?
|
2014-12-30T18:33:52.980
|
# Question
Title: Would I be disqualified from academic positions in mathematics if my PhD is in cognitive science?
I'm currently working on a PhD in cognitive science, but my research and interests straddle the line between cognitive science and mathematics. Right now, I am most interested in pursuing an academic career, and I've begun looking at job openings for postdocs and assistant professorships just to see what's out there (fully realizing those exact positions will be long gone by the time I graduate). I noticed that some positions listed in statistics/mathematics programs seem to fit my overall interests and skills; however, they almost universally state that a PhD in mathematics or statistics is required to apply.
When the time comes to apply for positions, should I even bother applying to the ones where my PhD is not technically among the ones listed on the job opening? Obviously, if my PhD was in a completely different field than the position in question, my chances of getting it would be low. However, what about positions where my research is within the scope of the field in question, even though my PhD is not (e.g., my PhD is in cognitive science, my research deals with statistical approaches to study cognition, and the position is in a statistics department)? Would I be disqualified on a technicality?
# Answer
In mathematics in particular, the question that search committees will have about you is your willingness and ability to teach a variety of undergraduate mathematics courses. If you have significant experience teaching main stream undergraduate mathematics courses, then you should make sure to highlight this in your application. If you have no such experience, then it will be a significant negative factor in your application.
> 16 votes
# Answer
Different departments handle hiring decisions differently. If your discipline hires according to "we need someone in field X to teach classes in Y and do research in Z," then it's probably not going to help you so much if you don't do X, Y, or Z. On the other hand, if they're recruiting according to "best talent available," then you could be outside what they're looking for and it's still okay.
However, the important point is this: **if you don't apply, you won't be hired.** So if you're already sending out *N* applications, why not send *N + 1*?
> 7 votes
---
Tags: mathematics, job-search, changing-fields
---
|
thread-32981
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/32981
|
For a future in physics, should I pursue a dual major as opposed to just taking extra physics courses in mathematics degree?
|
2014-12-10T05:13:07.657
|
# Question
Title: For a future in physics, should I pursue a dual major as opposed to just taking extra physics courses in mathematics degree?
I'm an undergrad studying mathematics right now. I have a very big interest in mathematical applications of physics, and I have been debating whether or not I should change my degree to a dual major (math/physics), because of this annoying little fear that only the math degree won't prepare me for a career in physics research later down the road, at the graduate level. However, the Mathematics is the degree I want (I believe there are more opportunities - I'd also enjoy going into a \[bandwagon?\] research field like Artificial Intelligence)..
Would a BS (and of course grad school) in Mathematics alone be enough to prepare me for a decent graduate school future, if I decided to pursue research in theoretical/mathematical physics? Or would it be better for me to tack on the dual major in physics? I would rather not stay in school an extra year and a half (it's already taking long enough after the A.S. in computer science!), but if it's necessary, I could do that.
I found another thread on ASE about this, with someone recommending that of course a mathematics major take physics courses - and I have.
**My specific question is if it would behoove me to pursue a *dual* major as opposed to just taking extra physics courses (or a minor).**
This is essentially the bare minimum I have to do for just the mathematics major.
These would be the physics courses I could tack on. The darker colors are required for the dual major, the lighter ones are electives.
The grad program I'm looking at, by the way, has a Master's program in Math that offers courses like Riemannian Geometry, Riemann surfaces, Group Theory, etc, which I think are useful in theoretical/mathematical physics at the graduate research level. Here's a picture
Thanks!
# Answer
*(Speaking from the perspective of a US grad student who did double major, but who has no direct experience working on a grad admissions committee.)*
> if it would behoove me to pursue a dual major as opposed to just taking extra physics courses
In general, the extra degree itself probably isn't much added value for what you want to do. You have your statement of purpose and the rest of your application to show what specific knowledge, skills, and interest you have. Grad schools will look at your transcript, seeing every course you took anyway. **If you take enough physics courses, it shouldn't really matter what your diploma says.** And by the time you finish grad school, your undergrad major will be even less important to people.
The question is **how much is enough physics?** I don't have any course descriptions to work with, but "Principles of Physics" *sounds* like a survey course for non-physicists, the kind of thing you won't learn anything useful from. If you want to do research in physics, you'll need a graduate-level understanding of physics, and for that you'll need plenty of undergraduate-level physics. You should have *at least* a core foundation of
* special relativity,
* classical mechanics (Lagrangians and Hamiltonians),
* electromagnetism,
* statistical mechanics, and
* quantum mechanics
by the time you finish undergrad. Now since you are planning to do primarily math for the PhD there might be some flexibility in that you can hold off on some of this until grad school, but note you will still need even more physics knowledge to do research. If you don't know any physics discovered in the last 100 years, there's no way you can discover anything new, and all the subjects I listed are at least 100 years old.
To be sure, *some* math is very useful for physics. But just knowing differential geometry doesn't mean you know general relativity, and particle physics is more than just the pure group theory you'll see in a math course.
**On the topic of labs:** I've met a fair number of student mathematicians-interested-in-physics who say labs aren't important for what they want to do. That *might* be true for what I would call a mathematical physicist, but I don't believe it for theoretical physics. *Some* exposure to a laboratory setting is important for knowing what physics really is. This is based on my own experiences, as well as advice I got from my (Nobel-prize-winning, theoretical physicist) undergrad adviser. The thing is, undergrad physics courses are unfortunately largely doable with blind symbol manipulation. Those who are good at it (and mathematicians usually are) often end up thinking physics is just easier, less abstract math. But physics is an *empirical science*, which math most certainly isn't. A (well-organized) lab will show you how much more there is to *thinking like a physicist* than solving the Schrödinger equation with yet another potential. And if it turns out thinking like a physicist isn't your cup of tea, it's better to find that out earlier.
**In summary:** Decide what classes you want to take, keeping in mind that you'll need a number of actual physics courses, taught by physicists, if you want to do *physics* proper (rather than, say, prove pure math theorems deemed important by those with more of a connection to physics). If that list of classes is a superset of the physics requirements, sure, do the extra major -- if nothing else it might impress an industry recruiter should your career go in that direction. If it isn't a superset, just take the physics courses of interest and skip the extra major.
> 3 votes
# Answer
My answer is specific to the course lists you have linked to, and written from a US point of view.
I recommend taking
* Modern
* Electromagnetism (at least a whole year)
* Quantum (also whole year)
* Mechanics
* Some kind of statistical mechanics. 2311 may or may not be sufficient.
Electronics lab is for experimentalists. Since you say you want to do mathematical physics, I don't see any point in that (unless it causes you to change your goals). Take those electives that interest you.
Also, check the admissions requirements of graduate programs you are interested in.
> 1 votes
---
Tags: mathematics, changing-fields, physics, major
---
|
thread-34997
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34997
|
what to do when someone has same name as yours and in IEEE search they show both peoples paper?
|
2014-12-30T23:32:43.910
|
# Question
Title: what to do when someone has same name as yours and in IEEE search they show both peoples paper?
I recently published a paper on `IEEE transactions journal`. in my paper link, when I click on authors tab and then my name, another pages is opened and shows many papers but they are not mine. it seems, someone else has same name as me. Is this case common? what should I do?
# Answer
> 3 votes
Yes, this is a very common problem.
1. You should publish with the most complete version of your name possible (e.g. use your middle name.) Think very carefully before changing your name (e.g. if you get married.)
2. You should establish profiles with services that keep track of publications by author (including Google Scholar, Thompson's MyResearcherID, and ORCID) and then "claim" your publications using these ID's.
---
Tags: authorship, ieee, personal-name
---
|
thread-35007
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35007
|
Is it possible to get back into academic research after being dropped due to funding problems from 6 year postdoc?
|
2014-12-31T05:18:09.060
|
# Question
Title: Is it possible to get back into academic research after being dropped due to funding problems from 6 year postdoc?
Due to funding issues, I was dropped as a postdoctoral researcher with a 2 week notice. Due to seniority (6+ years) and funding climate it has been exceedingly hard to find a position within academia in the US. I was good at research. I have publications. I have skills. But I am "old" and where it was easy to get a postdoc, now it is difficult to find anything at all. I do not have an institution, so that makes garnering funding in the US very difficult, and I am not competitive with the other candidates for Assistant Prof positions. Most "training" programs will not take anyone more than 5+ years out of PhD. I just want to continue my research, now nowhere to do it. I have seen "Research Assistant Prof positions" and other non-tenure track opportunities but these are few and far between, I wonder if that means the competition is as fierce or worse than for TT positions. I have been looking for positions for almost a year now...and that cannot look good. Is this just a pipe dream to continue in academia and research? Any recommendations as to how to get back in?
# Answer
> 13 votes
I think that you need to decide whether what you really want is to be in research or to be in academia.
It sounds to me like you right now you are considering only positions at major research universities. With respect to that, you are indeed in a very bad position: competition is fierce, funding is getting tighter, and if you don't already have a network of people interested in you at this stage in your career, you are likely to find it difficult to secure a position of this sort.
There is, however, a much larger universe of possibilities if you really want academia *or* you really want research.
* If you really want to stay in research, there are often a much larger number of positions in various flavors of government, non-profit, and industrial research, including many that are very similar to academia. In some fields, the amount of cutting-edge research being done outside of academia is actually much larger than the amount being done inside of academia, if one was to count up the whole bizarre ecosystem of startups, foundations, consultancies, pilot projects, little-known sub-departments in large companies, etc. Life is typically somewhat less stable in this world than with tenure, but likely no worse than you have known as a postdoc and in many cases much better. By your user ID and 6-year postdoc (ouch!), I'm guessing you're in a biomedical field, and this is *definitely* the case for much of biomedical research.
* If, on the other hand, you really want to stay in academia, there are a much larger number of positions at institutions whose mission is primarily educational. A key challenge there will be if you have not been doing any teaching at all as a postdoc, but you'll likely be quite competitive in terms of your intellectual credentials.
So yes, your dream of going directly from postdoc to tenure track is likely not going to happen, just based on the numbers and how you describe your current status. If you step into the demi-monde world at the borders of academia, however, you can likely find a path to continue your research and, if it is fruitful, may even find yourself coming back into traditional academia through a side door.
---
Tags: phd, non-tenure
---
|
thread-34999
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34999
|
How beneficial is speaking at non-academic conferences to future computer science career?
|
2014-12-31T00:44:19.137
|
# Question
Title: How beneficial is speaking at non-academic conferences to future computer science career?
How beneficial is speaking (or holding a workshop) at non-academic software development conferences (like PyCon, Strange Loop or LambdaConf) to future computer science career (applying to PhD and further)?
# Answer
That *really* depends what you mean with "beneficial". One of my junior PhD students recently went (partially self-funded) to a relevant developer conference, and he felt he benefited greatly (probably much more than from an average scientific conference).
* He was able to establish great contacts to industry. This included potential partners for studies and interviews (lately a big part of our research), as well as potential internship opportunities. *(as a sidenote, this mainly happened because this specific student is an excellent networker - you can't just go to a developer conference and hope that useful contacts will spring up automagically)*
* He got a lot of perspective on how industry sees the current challenges of our field (as opposed to other researchers). This gave him interesting ideas for his PhD, and also tremendously boosted his motivation, as he saw that many of the things we are working on are actually quite interesting to big industrial players (such as, in our case, Facebook).
* He was able to give a presentation about our ideas, and they were perceived really well (much better than he expected, truth be told). This gave him presentation practice, forced him to collect and structure our early ideas, and further strengthened his commitment to the topic.
Now, since you specifically ask whether attending such a conference will be valuable for:
> (applying to PhD and further)
I think you can safely ignore this aspect. In pretty much any career phase, nobody is going to read your CV and think "that guy attended this conference, he must be great". I don't even list attended conferences (of any type) on my CV anymore, simply because it seems so irrelevant to a recruiter.
**Edit:**
@ff524 correctly notes that you were specifically asking about *speaking* at an industry conference, not just attending. I am not entirely sure about this, but I would assume that this *may* be a small positive factor for applications on a junior level (say master of PhD student), depending on the conference:
* Nowaydays, many of the industry conferences in my field are organized like un-conferences. That is, everybody can speak if they want to (*maybe* pending some light review for on-topicness et cetera). In that case, you are back to square one - speaking at a conference where everybody is allowed to speak does not count for much. It maybe speaks to your motivation, but really that seems like a very small and insignificant factor.
* If the conference is more like a traditional conference, where speakers are typically either invited or you need to apply in some way for the honour of speaking, presenting may be perceived as a sign towards your esteem, but this really requires that the reviewing professors know this specific industry conference, think highly of it, and know that speakers are competitively selected. I would not count on this to happen, but it surely won't hurt.
For any application after graduate student level, your research credentials are so much more important than any talks at industry conferences that you can safely ignore them for future applications.
> 4 votes
---
Tags: conference, computer-science, industry
---
|
thread-35006
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35006
|
How long should I wait for the receipt acknowledgement?
|
2014-12-31T05:14:02.950
|
# Question
Title: How long should I wait for the receipt acknowledgement?
I submitted my paper by e-mail one week ago. How long is it reasonable to wait for the receipt acknowledgement? What to do if they won't acknowledge receipt of the paper?
# Answer
> 7 votes
Most journals work with electronic submission systems but some still work with manual handling. Regardless, both systems require a person to handle the manuscript once it arrives. Since the past week has been the Christmas holiday for many and persons working with journals such as editors are usually not employed to work with the journal but do it aside their regular job, it is not strange that not much will happen during the holiday season.
I am sure you will receive notice of your submission sometime in the next couple of weeks into the new year, once the persons responsible will have a chance to have a look.
As a side note, as an editor, I can see that the number of submissions is slightly increasing before summer (holidays) and Christmas/New Years (holiday season). Authors, naturally, want to get their works away before taking time off, unfortunately, editors and reviewers, naturally reluctant to take on reviews during the holidays, do the same so the increased flux of manuscripts creates something of a traffic jam at these times. From this perspective, submitting a manuscript away from these times of the year will likely result in, at least slightly, faster response and turn-over times.
# Answer
> 3 votes
You don't mention when the deadline is. If the deadline is a good two months away, waiting a week or so is nothing to be alarmed about.
Moreover, you've asked this question on the week between Christmas and New Year's – a time when many offices resemble ghost towns. Given that New Year's Day falls on a Thursday this year, I'm guessing it's sitting in someone's inbox, and there's a good chance it will remain there, unread, until Monday, January 6th. Even then, there may be a backlog of email and other submissions, so give it another week after that.
If the person responsible for reviewing submitted papers works in academia, there's a chance it might even go longer than that, depending on their institution's academic calender. (In other words, they might not get back into the full swing of things before the semester begins.)
---
Tags: journals, paper-submission, editors
---
|
thread-35021
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35021
|
Best margins for master thesis written in LaTeX
|
2014-12-31T13:34:22.077
|
# Question
Title: Best margins for master thesis written in LaTeX
I'm writing my Master's Thesis with LaTeX and I'd like to know what are the best margins I should use.
My university doesn't force any template. LaTeX default margins seems to me too large. Do you have any recommendation?
In addition, I would like to know if I should keep two different margins for even and odd pages. I'm using the book class.
Thanks!
# Answer
Your question may not be completely appropriate for academia.sx but probably not for TeX.sx either.
Anyway. rather than focussing on the width of margins you can consider the width of the text area. Research (I do not have references at hand at the moment) has shown that around 65 (within the range 45-75) characters per line is optimal. This means that if you switch type face or size, the number of characters will change. Hence the same text area may not be optimal for 10, 11 and 12 pt or conversely your text optimal area will change with type face and size. To some extent, this is built into LaTeX which is at least partly why the margins may seem less than optimal.
So to approach the question of margins, try to select the type face and the type size you want to use and then check the resulting text area size for line lengths between 45 and 75 focussing around 65 characters.
The question of right and left page margins is a matter of simplicity. If you centre the text area on the page the areas will appear the same on all pages. When viewed as a pdf the text will not move around from page to page which can be slightly annoying, particularly if inside and outside margins have widely different widths. So will your text be read frequently in digital format use simple margins, if the print is important differing in- and outside margins may be preferable. Just make sure any printer does not screw up the margins by removing or missing printing blank pages that will result in a shift of left and right hand pages.
> 4 votes
# Answer
You can find a good and easy-to-read resource on changing margins with the `typearea` package here: http://www.khirevich.com/latex/page\_layout/ A more detailed discussion of margins, text density and binding corrections is found in the manual for the KOMA-script bundle (which, incidentally, is a good alternative to `book` if you want a class that guides you more directly in the formatting of a long document).
Asymmetric margins can be obtained with the `twoside` option to `book`.
> 1 votes
---
Tags: thesis, latex
---
|
thread-28210
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/28210
|
How to change to Mathematics PhD program following M.S. in Computer Science?
|
2014-09-08T17:35:23.927
|
# Question
Title: How to change to Mathematics PhD program following M.S. in Computer Science?
I wonder if anyone can give me some advice about how a computer science graduate shifts career to mathematics? I'm currently doing a Master's degree in computer science and i was thinking about doing a PhD in pure mathematics? so I was thinking is this transition feasible? how can I make this leap of faith?
Kindly note that currently -after graduation- I nearly don't do mathematics anymore, currently all what I am doing is writing software and administrating open source operating systems. In undergrad levels I took an introductory course in discrete mathematics and some calculus courses.
someone told me: Yes, the transition is feasible but it requires I take some courses and attend some math classes even as a special student (no degrees, no exams). But I thought I can get other opinions and views.
# Answer
Take a look at Is it easy to change your major after starting your PhD or masters, if it is necessary?, which is somewhat similar.
In particular, unfortunately, it sounds like your current mathematics background is very far from what would be needed to enter a math PhD program - it's maybe 1/4 of the coursework that would be expected. You would need to have preparation equivalent to that of a BS in mathematics, and that sounds like it would be the equivalent of 2-3 more years of full time coursework for you.
To be honest, I don't think that the coursework you describe can even have given you much of a sense of what pure mathematics is, much less what it is like to do research in the area. One needs rigorous proof-based classes such as real analysis and abstract algebra.
I would not really advise you, or anyone, to even think about grad school in mathematics before they have enough of a background to reasonably understand what it involves.
> 14 votes
# Answer
It's always possible to go into another field, especially ones that are somewhat related (i.e., you'll have an easier time going to mathematics with CS than if you had a Psychology degree, for example).
**The Bad**
> In undergrad levels I took an introductory course in discrete mathematics and some calculus courses.
That's about one or two classes more than even most humanities majors have to take. I'm assuming you've taken at most integral calculus (Calculus II in the US).
You're going to need to take quite a few courses to be prepared for a PhD program, and have a chance at doing some useful research afterwards, considering you want to do *pure* math.
Undergrad math majors usually take (to prepare for grad school) courses such as:
* Real Analysis (at least two semesters)
* Modern/Abstract Algebra
* Vector and/or Complex Analysis
* Geometry and/or Topology
* Combinatorics/Graph Theory
* Number Theory
Many schools also require a course on proofs/logic/set theory before you can do many of those, as well. It could behoove you to also know about functional analysis, and differential geometry/riemann surfaces before you enter as well, though you may be able to take those as graduate coursework.
So you're looking at a good amount of time and effort before you can even competitively apply.
**The Good**
Having a master's in CS is a very useful thing. After all is said and done, you will be a very big asset in industry and R&D. A computer scientist who knows mathematics is a very dangerous person ;^)
Good luck, and I'll be cheering for you.
> 4 votes
# Answer
The easiest transition is probably to focus on mathematics programs where you can study topics closely related to computer science. You didn't mention in the question which areas of mathematics you are interested in studying. There is a significant amount of overlap between "theoretical" computer science and mathematics, although you have to take time to find the schools where this is studied in the mathematics department.
Even at such schools, though, a mathematics PhD includes a significant amount of "general" coursework. For my PhD in mathematical logic and computability theory -- which is one of the closest mathematical topics to computer science - I passed exams in abstract algebra and real and complex analysis. The exact topics you would need to study vary by school.
One option that has not been mentioned -- which has advantages as well as disadvantages -- would be to take a master's degree in mathematics first. This would certainly give you the background needed to be prepared for PhD studies. The main disadvantages are that it takes a year or two of your life, and that the funding for master's programs is not as generous as for PhD programs.
> 2 votes
---
Tags: graduate-school, career-path, computer-science, mathematics, changing-fields
---
|
thread-35029
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35029
|
Should I send recommendation/reference letter to universities that don't require it?
|
2014-12-31T15:35:50.870
|
# Question
Title: Should I send recommendation/reference letter to universities that don't require it?
Sending recommendation letter to some universities is optional, but some others don't even mention it in their required documents. Is there any point in sending recommendation letter to such universities?
# Answer
Most organizations that have set requirements for applications refuse to look at any supplementary materials that are submitted in order to be fair to those who did not submit supplementary materials. The National Science Foundation, in many cases, reserves the right to return proposals without review that have certain kinds of unrequested or forbidden supplementary materials. I think it's best to only submit what was asked for.
> 3 votes
---
Tags: recommendation-letter
---
|
thread-35018
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35018
|
Is it rude to write in a journal paper "the proof is left as an exercise to the reader"?
|
2014-12-31T12:28:36.967
|
# Question
Title: Is it rude to write in a journal paper "the proof is left as an exercise to the reader"?
Many books, particularly in mathematics and related disciplines, contain sentences like "the proof is left as an exercise to the reader", which actually mean that the claim should be easy to prove for anyone reading until that point.
Can I write such a sentence in a paper submitted to a journal? Or will the reviewers consider it rude to omit a proof in such a way?
# Answer
> 33 votes
There are two separate issues here: omitting the proof, and calling it an exercise.
It is relatively common to omit some proofs in research papers. In particular, proofs that are long but routine, or that re-use the same method as other proofs in the paper, are often abbreviated or removed. It depends on the intended audience for the paper, to some extent. You will get a sense of this by reading more research papers. But caution is needed: one of the first places to look for errors in a paper is in results where the proof was omitted!
The question whether to call something in your paper an "exercise" is more difficult. I wouldn't be surprised if some people do it -- but some people don't write very well. The audience for a paper includes your peers, and you are not really in a position to assign them homework. There are other ways to indicate that a proof is easy besides calling it an exercise: "the following theorem follows directly from definitions", "the proof of the following theorem is routine", "the proof of the following theorem is similar to the proof of Theorem 1.3", etc. Giving a small hint of how to prove the result can make the paper stronger, and it helps any readers who are not experts in the area.
# Answer
> 3 votes
I think it depends on the context: If it is a research paper, it is definitely rude. As a referee, I would return such a paper to the author to fill it in. If it is a review paper or aims at education in math then it’s fine in my opinion. A different story are textbooks with or without exercises, where it is apropriate.
---
Tags: mathematics, writing-style
---
|
thread-35000
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35000
|
How to add a timeline to my CV?
|
2014-12-31T01:58:28.307
|
# Question
Title: How to add a timeline to my CV?
I had my CV reviewed by an academic professor, and she advised me to put a timeline on my CV. The problem is that after I ended up my bachelor studies, I spent some years working because I was the only support for my family and I was also saving for my graduate studies. After that I followed some undergraduate courses in a foreign country, that was because I was rejected to do a master's degree; the reason was that the courses I followed in my bachelor degree were not 100% Computer Science oriented, but more to the IT field.
So after finishing that, I started back working in my country and after saving for some years; I finally managed to get accepted for MSc studies. The problem with this is that there are some overlaps like:
bachelor studies---work for saving for further studies---undergraduate courses in a foreign country in CS----work again for saving some more---MSc studies----working again
So it is some sort of a mess, so if somebody from a doctoral admission office sees my CV; he will be a little bit wondering about why I have those overlaps.
The question is pretty simple, how can I add a sort of timeline that could help the reader to have a quick view about my academic and working experience? and also how can I explain that in my CV? or should it be in my motivation letter?
# Answer
> 3 votes
Not putting the summary of your educational information at the top of the CV would look strange (since that's essentially the universal standard).
However, what you could do afterwards is have a "blended" list of your educational/research and professional experience (in backwards chronological order):
```
X1-Y1: Most recent experience/job/schooling/miscellaneous
X2-Y2: Next most recent
X3-Y3: Next-next most recent
. . .
```
and so on.
But I don't see how there would be any real confusion if you use a standard layout and explicitly write out the start and end dates of the different experiences you've had, unless some of *those* also overlap. (Even then, though, I think you could explain part-time work and study accordingly.)
---
Tags: cv
---
|
thread-35036
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35036
|
Sign copyright agreement before paper acceptance?
|
2014-12-31T17:09:16.213
|
# Question
Title: Sign copyright agreement before paper acceptance?
I am submitting a research paper to a journal and they asked me to sign the copyright agreement in favour of the editor before the paper is accepted. Is this right? And what happens in this case is if the paper rejected?
# Answer
This is rather normal for **non open-access articles** in my field (Physics), however all journals I have submitted to until now had a clause that the copyright transfer is voided if the paper is not accepted or withdrawn. For example IOP’s copyright agreement contains the following sentence:
> In the event that the Article is withdrawn prior to acceptance, or is rejected, this agreement shall have no effect and no party shall be bound by it.
If such conditions are included, requesting such an agreement at an early stage seems somewhat reasonable to me, since it would be a waste of time to review your paper if you did not agree with these terms.
If such conditions are not included, this is a clear warning sign that the publisher may be up to nothing good. However, even with such a clause, problems may arise, as the publisher may just instantly accept your article.
For **open-access articles** (pay-to-publish), a similar situation holds, however, the copyright agreement usally requires less commitment from you, as you should retain most rights on your article (since the journal does not make money with being the only one making your article available). This not applying to the copyright agreement is another warning sign of a predatory publisher.
**In both cases**, you should read the copyright agreement carefully and ensure the reputability of the publisher.
> 20 votes
# Answer
Unfortunately, a number of large-scale publishers expect you to sign over the copyrights before the article is accepted. For instance, the American Chemical Society, as well as the Materials Research Society will continually hound you about the transfer agreement until it's submitted, and moreover will not formally accept the article until they have the transfer agreement.
> 9 votes
# Answer
Have you checked this journal against Beall's list of Preadatory Publishers and Preadatory Journals? There's little reason to sign over the copyright until the article is accepted, and this practice seems sketchy at best to me.
> 3 votes
# Answer
Many big publishers will often start asking pretty much immediately (I don't know if this is policy or just brain-dead software configuration). You can generally safely ignore these requests until the article is actually accepted, however, because until then the idea of copyright transfer is moot. That is certainly the policy that I follow, and it hasn't caused me any trouble yet.
> 3 votes
# Answer
Do not sign any copyright release before the paper is accepted, in any case.
The irregularity of this practice is itself a bad sign about the legitimacy of the journal.
> 0 votes
---
Tags: paper-submission, copyright
---
|
thread-35025
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35025
|
Release software before the accompanying publication gets reviewed or accepted?
|
2014-12-31T14:27:24.767
|
# Question
Title: Release software before the accompanying publication gets reviewed or accepted?
Is common practice to release an academic software before the publication of the accompanying paper in a scientific journal?
What are the pros and cons of a prior release?
Edit: I am not concerned about patents, software will have an open source license.
# Answer
My experience in computer science has been that papers are rarely about software per se, but rather about the science that is either enabled by or instantiated in the software. Computer science also typically seems to have a fairly open culture where people don't worry much about being scooped. As such, research software is often available on open repositories like GitHub or Bitbucket long before it is published---it's just that nobody notices or pays attention to it before there is a significant paper to motivate them to do so.
So, to finish answering the question:
* Pros: demonstrate commitment to openness, people might use it before publication
* Cons: you can't do this with something you want to patent
> 7 votes
# Answer
This may be field-specific, but within neuroscience, the typical path seems to be as follows:
1. Publish papers detailing new signal processing/statistical analysis/etc techniques
2. Write software that makes use of these techniques
3. Continuously add techniques, refine the code, and improve the UI (well, sometimes)
4. Write a paper on the software itself
The main benefit of this approach is that the algorithms that power the program are vetted via peer review and the general community even before you attempt to write the first line of software code. The only novelty to the software is that it makes the techniques available to a larger audience, specifically, those who can't write their own analysis code. Even better, as you write and publish new algorithms and analysis techniques, you can eventually add those to the software.
Some software that follows this approach is SPM and MNE, among many others.
> 5 votes
# Answer
This varies very widely by field, but also by PI preferences; in my experience, younger faculty (and newer software packages) are more likely to be open early. My experience in Chemistry has been similar to what @eykanal describes (especially when patentable methods or results are involved)...
BUT: software often contains bugs, which may change the results you get in ways that are not obvious from a paragraph description of the algorithm. In some cases, this has lead to huge, sweeping errors (like a retraction of papers cited 729 times), and some journals or funding agencies are adopting policies that encourage release of code alongside the **first** paper that uses it. If it's not already part of your peer review process, releasing the code early might become a requirement in the future. (It is difficult to properly review findings when they depend on subtle, unstated decisions in potentially buggy code)
So, just be sure to separate what you are *expected* to do from what best accomplishes your goals. Norms involving software are still evolving, and it's a good idea to evaluate your strategy based on time, resources, and expected audience.
> 4 votes
# Answer
Note: In the US, the time window for submitting patents starts when the invention is first disclosed "publicly" (which can include publicly demonstrating it even if you don't discuss how it works) and ends a year from that date. Depending on your plans for this work, you may or may not want to release earlier than you must.
> 2 votes
---
Tags: publications, paper-submission, software
---
|
thread-35031
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35031
|
What is the meaning of “In Proceedings Of ...”?
|
2014-12-31T16:26:04.497
|
# Question
Title: What is the meaning of “In Proceedings Of ...”?
I saw the phrase “In Proceedings Of ...” many times on Google Scholar. What is the meaning of that?
For example, “In Proceedings of the International Conference of ...”. Does that mean that you send this paper to that conference and they accept it?
# Answer
When it comes to conferences, if there were submitted papers, and they were published as a volume, that volume is called the proceedings.
A paper that was published in the proceedings must have been accepted by the conference.
Sometimes the proceedings are published as a standalone work, and sometimes they are published as a special issue of a journal.
It should be noted that some societies publish a journal that has "Proceedings" in the title, such as the "Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences" or the "Proceedings of the Royal Society". These should be distinguished as standalone journals and not confused with the proceedings of a conference.
> 32 votes
# Answer
Consider this an extended comment to complement Bill's answer.
* Articles published in *conference proceedings* have lengths that can vary from one page to several or many pages, depending on the conference. Each conference specifies the length requirements. Some conferences do not publish proceedings, but give to the participants a list of short abstracts. This is typically called the *Book of abstracts*.
* *Proceedings* might be published not only by conferences but also by schools. For example the *International School of Physics "Enrico Fermi"* publishes a series of proceedings collecting articles and lecture notes from the school's courses.
* At least one conference that I'm aware of does not call the published volume proceedings, but *digest*. This is the *Conference on Precision Electromagnetic Measurements (CPEM)*. I don't know if there are other conferences which don't use the name proceedings.
> 6 votes
---
Tags: publications, conference
---
|
thread-35048
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35048
|
Should postdoc be listed under Employment and or Education on CV?
|
2014-12-31T22:03:11.437
|
# Question
Title: Should postdoc be listed under Employment and or Education on CV?
From what I have seen, most people list postdocs under Employment/Experience on their CV. But recently I saw one that listed a postdoc under Employment *and* Education.
Is this typical/appropriate?
NOTE: According to comments on this relevant question and its answers, postdocs are kind of regarded as students, in some cases.
# Answer
A postdoctoral associate/fellow/whatever is usually an employee. While the purpose of the postdoc is educational, it is not "education". A postdoc is (usually) not taking classes, following a curriculum, and completing other activities toward the earning of an academic degree/certificate/whatever. Postdocs should have a contract, do not pay tuition (or have tuition paid for them), have a definite end date to their employment (although that can be renewed), etc. Since a postdoc is an employee, it should go under employment.
However, in some fields and countries, it may be custom to place the postdoc under education because the postdoc is the journeyman stage of your academic career. Ethically, it should not be listed in both places.
> 12 votes
# Answer
NSF Grant Proposal Guidelines (GPG) 2015 Biographical Sketch have PostDoc listed under both Education (although they call it "Professional Preparation"), and presumably it would be listed under the "Appointments" section too. See http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/policydocs/pappguide/nsf15001/gpg\_2.jsp#IIC2f
> 5 votes
# Answer
I would more unequivocally state that the only example I can think of a postdoctoral situation where it would be appropriate to list it under the "education" section of a CV is if one is pursuing a *Habilitation* in the countries that use such a system. In such a case, one is acquiring an actual "qualification" that can be recognized. In traditional postdocs, such as those offered in the US (and most other countries), there is no degree track, and no course requirements or anything else that the postdocs are following.
> 4 votes
---
Tags: postdocs, cv
---
|
thread-35079
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35079
|
How to describe computer skills in an application form? (Master's degree)
|
2015-01-01T19:19:26.760
|
# Question
Title: How to describe computer skills in an application form? (Master's degree)
In a part of the application form I was asked to describe my computer skills. How should I do this? Is mentioning them as a list (bullet points) enough, or should I be more detailed?
I'm talking about professional skills (e.g. programming languages)So should I, for example, list all the programming languages I know, or should I give detailed information (for instance, the duration I have been working with each language)?
# Answer
> 2 votes
Computer skills can be divided into several area such as Basic Skills (Windows, Office), Business skills (Mail, Internet, Communication) to more professional skills Programming, Administration, Database, Network, Consulting, but these are really big areas. There is also Academic Computer Skills where should be software regarded to academic world (Latex, Open Source....)
It is a really wide field, so maybe you should give more specific information about study programme for more information.
---
Tags: application, computer-science
---
|
thread-35076
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35076
|
Do US universities publish cohort ranking - position in class?
|
2015-01-01T18:17:56.023
|
# Question
Title: Do US universities publish cohort ranking - position in class?
When you take the GRE, you get the percentile score. Do US universities publish such distributional data about how to interpret their grades? Can it be requested specifically?
I ask because if you are charged with evaluating applicants, it would be helpful to know how they performed compared to their peers during their bachelor or master's degree. For example, in the UK first honors is around top 9% of the cohort.
# Answer
The US has no organized system of class rank comparisons. Some individual universities (or departments within a university) may track this, but at the university level the educational approaches are so diverse, even for different options within a single department, that direct rank comparison would make little sense in any case. It is for this reason that a number of high ranked universities (MIT being one example) explicitly refuse to create such ranking comparisons.
> 6 votes
# Answer
My university does not publish cohort rankings. It does award some degrees "with distinction" but these like other awards are given by departments on the basis of nomination by faculty, and not by grades.
Remember that you only get grades for coursework, which is a tiny part of your graduate experience.
> 0 votes
---
Tags: united-states, undergraduate, ranking
---
|
thread-35094
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35094
|
My supervisor wants me to include another professor's name in my paper while... what should I do?
|
2015-01-02T07:28:53.330
|
# Question
Title: My supervisor wants me to include another professor's name in my paper while... what should I do?
My supervisor wants me to include another professors name in my paper just because he was declared as my second adviser on the project. But the problem is that this man has not done anything but giving foolish and useless comments on my work. By foolish, I do not exaggerate since my supervisor thinks the same but it seems that he made a deal with the other one. What should I do? I can't really tolerate the fact that he will get acknowledged for the work which he doesn't know anything and didn't do anything about.
# Answer
Is it possible that you misjudge *why* your advisor wants to see the other prof. on the paper? You say that the reason is that he was "declared as my second adviser on the project" ... but then you go on to explain that he actually *was* part of the discussions leading to the paper, so it does not, or at least not entirely, sound like a courtesy co-authorship to me.
Of course, you (and maybe even your advisor) do not value the input he had, but unilaterally throwing him off the paper for this reason is a dangerous road to go down. If he had *any* part in actually doing the research or writing the paper, I would at least talk to the guy first and ask him whether he thinks that he contributed enough to become an author.
However, prepare that there is a non-zero chance that the answer to this question will be *"sure, I advised you regularly on the project since it's start, why wouldn't I be a co-author??"* (and mean it!). Decide in advance how you will react to this. Note that, if the prof. feels this way, there is likely no way to remove him from the paper without him being annoyed or worse. Your task then becomes to decide whether you want to add him to the paper purely to keep relations intact (or not).
> 6 votes
# Answer
Have you simply talked to your supervisor about it? You have a valid point, and don't need to worry about upsetting the professor (he likely won't be) by leaving his name out of the list since he hasn't contributed anything towards the actual content of the paper. Your supervisor is more than likely just trying to do a 'fair' thing for the professor since he "helped out".
Anyways, the best thing to do would be to simply speak your opinion. If you have real evidence (or there is a mutual knowledge) of the lack of contribution, you'll be fine.
> 1 votes
---
Tags: publications, advisor, authorship
---
|
thread-35087
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35087
|
Is it useful for a student trying to get an undergraduate research position to have a personal website?
|
2015-01-02T01:52:12.820
|
# Question
Title: Is it useful for a student trying to get an undergraduate research position to have a personal website?
I'm studying a Bachelor in Engineering Physics undergraduate program and I know that most of the people that does research or that teaches have his/her personal website with their publications and their curriculum. I even know a friend of mine that has his own personal website. This made me think about creating one for myself. However, I don't really know if it really matters to have one now. I don't know if it is important to give my undergrad curriculum via personal website.
The things I'm including in the website will be:
**CV**
**Portfolio**
**Contact Information**
**Research Interests**
**About me** (section where I can talk about me in an extracurricular way)
So, will it matter if I do my website and include it in my signature whenever I send a mail to a professor looking to have a research stay or a research project with him?
# Answer
As just going through a round of interviews for hiring students to a research lab, I would say it is beneficial for you to have a website, on the condition that it is informative of your work. Out of your list, the only one that I would view as beneficial is a portfolio. Without the portfolio section, I would say it is not beneficial.
When people apply to my lab, they send their CV. This usually includes some bullet points of work, school, extra curricular, etc. The hardest part to extract from a CV is the type of work or actual capabilities of a student. When receiving multiple applications, the ones that had a website were taken positively. I was able to see not just the bullet points, but what type of work the student has previously done (Just be careful to be honest and full disclosure, if it was a group project, specify your role).
On the other hand, if your website gives no extra information than the CV, I would be a bit annoyed if I was directed to the website only to learn nothing more about the applicant.
> 3 votes
---
Tags: cv, research-undergraduate, website
---
|
thread-34889
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34889
|
Using previous student essays as examples
|
2014-12-28T16:10:11.937
|
# Question
Title: Using previous student essays as examples
I teach English as a second language to pre-college adults in the U.S., and I'm interested in the idea of using essays from previous students as examples in a writing class. At a previous institution we used a permission form that students signed giving the university the right to reproduce or modify written work, in part or whole, and with identifying information removed.
However, as an adjunct who will likely work at multiple schools, I would like to have that permission myself as well.
* What would be the legalities to consider doing such a thing?
* If I have students' written permission, should I still have permission from the institution to do this?
* Will a signed statement (in English), given by someone whose understanding of English is demonstrably weak, function the same as any other?
* Is there a precedent for instructors to gain this permission? As opposed to the institution as a whole.
* Would a blanket statement applying to all assignments work, or should it be for each individual assignment?
**Edited to clarify:** I'm interested in both positive and negative examples. Perhaps more so negative ones since the errors produced by international student populations would be more authentic and difficult for me, a native speaker, to reproduce.
I also have no intention of publishing them outside of classroom materials. Anonymous Mathematician made an excellent point that withdrawal of permission would be impossible if I did this. The only foreseeable publishing I can imagine would be as a course pack or teacher's guide given to the institution or other teachers, but I would still want to ask for additional permissions to do this.
# Answer
Good question!
I ask students individually by e-mail if I can use their essays as examples for future classes. Almost always they are thrilled and happy. Then again, I only ask people who serve as positive examples. But I think if you explained to an ESL student that they have the bones of a good essay and that you would like to use it as a sample essay for future students to work on to help improve, I think they would be similarly pleased.
This would be more problematic if I wanted to use the examples in a textbook, used negative examples, or if I posted essays publicly on the internet. Then I might want a stronger version of a copyright waiver, such as what your previous school uses.
> 5 votes
# Answer
I'm not a lawyer and can't address the legalities, especially for students with a weak grasp of English. I'd imagine it would be best to write a clear, straightforward permission form that gives some explicit examples of what you have in mind in addition to an overall statement. I'd recommend the following principles as well:
1. Students should be assured that they don't need to agree to this and can withdraw their consent at any time in the future by getting in touch with you. (The main drawback I see to this is that you wouldn't be able to use their work in published teaching materials, since that wouldn't be compatible with withdrawing consent in the future. However, if you have in mind large-scale public distribution or anything that hints of profit, you should really make this explicit anyway.)
2. To avoid the appearance of coercion, it's best not to ask the students until after the course is over. That way, they won't worry that their decision could affect their grade.
3. I'd mention this in advance to your department chair in e-mail, not necessarily to ask permission but just to make sure he/she is aware of it. That way you'll find out quickly if the chair considers it a problem, and you'll have the e-mail as documentation if you run into any difficulties later. (Adjunct positions can be precarious enough that it's not worth taking unnecessary risks.)
4. If you request permission for a small number of carefully chosen essays, you can explain to the authors why each one would be a useful teaching tool. That would likely get a better response than just asking for blanket permission, although it would be more work and cut down on your flexibility.
> 4 votes
# Answer
A technical but not legal suggestion (as I'm not a lawyer). You can choose a license from Creative Commons and ask your students to release their work in such a license.
Given your needs, you could have something like a **CC-BY-SA** or **CC-BY-NC-SA**.
Pros:
* these licenses are internationally recognized
* there are many translations (so you can actually let the student understand the terms of the license)
* you would be given the right to modify the text, print it, share it.
You would have though to release *your* material with the same license (and I see as a feature, not a bug, but that is a personal opinion): often this is seen as a limitation if you want to *publish* something, but as long as you don't want to incorporate these excerpts outside classroom materials it's not your problem.
> 2 votes
---
Tags: writing, intellectual-property, international-students, legal-issues
---
|
thread-35095
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35095
|
Which address to state as my own at top of publication?
|
2015-01-02T08:05:18.460
|
# Question
Title: Which address to state as my own at top of publication?
i am a MSc Computer Science student writing on a Work-in-Progress publication for ACM SIGCHI.
This format including PDF drafts is defined here: (http://chi2015.acm.org/authors/works-in-progress/)!
At the beginning of the paper the address for each author is defined separately. Both my mentor (PhD student) and his Professor have their institute address standing under their names, both the same address (institute at our Uni for electrical engineering). Me and my fellow student are studying at the institute for computer science, i.e. another faculty with significant another address and we are not working nor having an office/address there.
What address should be stated under our names?
I think we need an address, under which letters arrive us, which I think is not the case for the electrical engineering faculty nor the computer science faculty of our Uni. Do you think so, too?
Consequently, I think our personal home addresses have to be stated. But then it appears strange or unprofessional, because it looks like we are not affiliated with anyone.
What would you think?
Thanks in advance!
# Answer
Many templates include a place for authors to put street addresses, but they aren't necessarily strictly required.
In your case, if you look at last year's CHI proceedings you can see that plenty of papers omit it.
For your submission, communication related to your submission will be via email, not snail mail. You can either omit the address entirely, or put the address of your computer science department, it doesn't really matter much. (In the general case, I think it's likely that if a publisher *does* want to communicate by snail mail, they will ask for the preferred mailing address in the paper submission process, not read it off the submission.)
> 6 votes
# Answer
Having a publication is, I think, a good enough reason for requesting a mail box from your institution, so you have a possible solution there. If that was not possible, you can always put the professors' addres as a c/o, so the letters are sent to him, and he will forward them to you.
Note that nowadays, the main use of physical addresses in papers are to send you snail mail spam, like professional societies affiliation offers and such. Almost all communications related to the paper would be via email.
> 4 votes
# Answer
Just give your department as your address. In the twelve years since my first publication appeared, I have never received a single piece of snail-mail related to a publication so, to be honest, the address is largely a vestige of the days before emails. It's much more important to make sure that your email address can easily be found: *that* is how anyone who wants to contact you will try to do so.
> 3 votes
# Answer
In most departments mail for an undergrad/masters student will go to an appropriate admin office, and they'll send you an email - unless you're well known to the front desk staff who would keep it for you - so you can put your own department's address and not worry about it. It would seem like a good idea to do so as your publication history will match your CV better.
*Some* journals will require this field - or if you don't give it, assume the lead author's address is applicable - again it woul dmake sense ot give the right address.
> 1 votes
# Answer
The authors' addresses on a publication serve not only (nor even primarily) to help people to contact the authors. They indicate where the work was done, so that the universities or companies involved get appropriate credit. Some journals (most of the journals that I'm familiar with) allow an additional field called "current address", where an author who has moved since the work was done can indicate where (s)he can be reached.
> 1 votes
---
Tags: publications
---
|
thread-35112
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35112
|
Does mathematical sophistication play a role during paper review?
|
2015-01-02T15:03:07.110
|
# Question
Title: Does mathematical sophistication play a role during paper review?
I am currently in the process of writing a paper for an international conference in image-processing area. One thing that bothers me somewhat is that the mathematical formulation I use is simple(specifically, I quantify a measure as a simple ratio). I happen to have just 2 equations in my paper. The formulation is sound,though, and is a natural outcome of the framework I have developed.
Ideally, simplicity or sophistication of equations occurring in a paper are not a measure of its worth, but I wonder openly -- what role does "density" and sophistication of mathematics used in the paper play in impressing the reviewers ? Just for clarification, I am not saying it should or should not. I would like to get a candid view of reviewer experiences and inclinations.
# Answer
> 15 votes
Mathematical sophistication and mathematical density are often confused for one another, and this confusion often extends to reviewers and the "customs" of scientific communities. To my mind, the best mathematical presentation is the most lucid and simple, and it is certainly the case that important consequences often come from rather simple equations. The simpler your equations, however, the more that the contribution of the paper will depend on your exploration of those consequences (theoretically or empirically), rather than the mathematics *per se*.
It can be very tempting to "puff up" the perceived complexity of your mathematics by adding notational complexity or other baroquery. It may even work well when dealing with some communities (I know of some rather cynical and unfortunately successful experiments performed by certain colleagues of mine). I would strongly advise, however, against doing so. Write the paper as clearly and simply as possible, given the true nature of the mathematics within. Doing so may incur negative judgement from those who confuse "simple" and "trivial," but to do otherwise is scientifically dishonest. Moreover, if your work has value, it will show in the consequences of the mathematics rather than its nature, and writing it more accessibly is likely, in the long run, to increase its impact.
Finally, note that this dictum goes the other way as well: when you are presenting a complex mathematical result to an audience that does not appreciate mathematical complexity, do not attempt to pretend the mathematics is not complex. In this case, however, appendices and supplementary information is the way to go: keep only as much of key elements in the main text as is appropriate for the audience, and put the rest where those who are interested can readily find it without interrupting the flow of the main text.
---
Tags: conference, peer-review, paper-submission
---
|
thread-34775
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34775
|
Unclear terms: Statement of Purpose, Academic Statement and Personal Statement
|
2014-12-25T13:34:33.790
|
# Question
Title: Unclear terms: Statement of Purpose, Academic Statement and Personal Statement
I'm so confused. I can't distinguish between them. It seems to me that sometimes the statement of purpose (SOP) is the personal statement (PS), sometimes it is not the PS, and by the definition I'll give below, academic statement (AS) is the SOP.
### Is the SOP a PS (or not)?
I think most people will agree that the SOP is another name for the PS, and you only need one statement beside your CV and research proposal (if necessary) to be written. That explains why in Academia.SE, we only have a tag but no PS tag or AS tag. And most of the time I see people ask about a PS question under the SOP tag, and accept the answer only says about the SOP. Except these two questions, where the posters notice that SOP is not the PS (I find them when searching for "personal statement" "statement of purpose"):
To be clear, the first question asks about **academic statement of purpose** and only localize to the NSF Fellowship application. But the (sole) answer only discusses the SOP, so I understand that ASOP is the other name of the SOP (don't know if it also be the AS as well).
### Is the SOP the Academic Statement?
Now, in the announcement for a fellowship I intend to apply for, it requires me to have both an academic statement and a personal statement. It defines them like this:
> ACADEMIC AND PERSONAL STATEMENTS. Each applicant must prepare a one-page Academic Statement and a one-page Personal Statement. **The first essay addresses the applicant’s academic and scientific background and preparation, previous research, and a description of the study and research proposed** at a U.S. graduate school department. The Personal Statement includes information about the applicant’s background, practical experience, special interests, and career goals, with some attention to plans after degree completion. Applicants should also address how they might represent Vietnam as students in the United States and how they might represent the United States and contribute to Vietnam upon return.
More explicit details are provided in the link. Based on the definition of the AS, I think that it is the SOP as we widely know (or at least is this SOP). If then, what is the PS in this case? Is it the place for the "my first trembling steps" stuff?
Or, does the aggregation of AS and PS in this situation equate the SOP as we widely know, and the recruiters just want to make it explicit?
# Answer
At least in the scholarship I'm about to apply, the SOP as we widely know is the academic statement. I still haven't got a satiate answer.
> -1 votes
# Answer
Your application is a chance for you to *sell yourself*, and prove to the admissions committee that they should give you money to do research. Your personal statement should address your "background, practical experience, special interests, and career goals," but only in ways that prove you are a good researcher.
You shouldn't waste space talking about your childhood dreams, because usually those say nothing about your research potential. Instead you should highlight parts of your personal history that would make someone want to hire you for their lab.
> 1 votes
---
Tags: application, statement-of-purpose, terminology
---
|
thread-35109
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35109
|
Appropriate response to misattributed title?
|
2015-01-02T14:02:43.420
|
# Question
Title: Appropriate response to misattributed title?
There are many questions here on how to address someone by their title or current status.
What should one do in the case they are addressed by a title they do not have?
Some example of this:
A student submitting a paper and the editor emailing using the Professor/Dr. title. A PhD in a research lab (not university) being invited for a talk and a letter stating "Dear Professor..." A researcher (non PhD) being referred to as Dr.
If this is too broad, the question can be edited to just one situation.
In this type of case, should one reply and directly address the title?
# Answer
The standard answer to such issues is to **ignore**. By and large, these situations arise because the editor etc. did not care to look up the recipient's real title. There is no malicious intent, actually there is likely no intent at all other than trying to use a catch-all title that the editor assumes will not offend anybody (typically Dr. or Prof.). No harm is done by not rectifying this error, and indeed spending more than a short chuckle on this is too much effort.
(also, being addressed by the wrong title is, at least for me, so common that I mostly stopped noticing it)
> 15 votes
# Answer
When I was a graduate student, I was often called "Doctor", and now as a working research scientist I am often called "Professor." I also frequently have people misattribute my affiliation, e.g., saying that I'm at my alma mater rather than my current affiliation.
How I respond depends on the context. My main categories are:
* *Interactions with an organization that doesn't care about me (e.g., review request from a journal, conference spam):* I don't bother to correct: they aren't making a judgement based on the title, and they may not actually have a reasonable ability to correct it if they do, given that many journal and conference management systems use atrocious software.
* *Interactions with an organization that really does care about credentials (e.g., serving on government review panels):* Here, I note the misattribution and check to make sure that my actual credentials satisfy the requirements of the organization, because otherwise I might be wasting everybody's time and money.
* *Interactions with colleagues and long-term interactions with students (e.g., co-advising):* Gentle correction when I feel the misattribution could be perceived as giving me status that I do not have.
* *Brief, role-based interactions with students (e.g., questions at a guest lecture in somebody's class):* I feel it would be actually rude to correct a student who really doesn't care about the title at all, and just wants some help understanding something.
Mostly, I take the stereotypical American position that we shouldn't care too much about title and affiliation, because we are all ultimately judged by our works, and most of the time nobody involved in the interaction really cares all that much about your title. In those cases where getting it right might actually matter, though, don't be shy about inquiring and correcting as needed.
> 11 votes
# Answer
There is going to be a large cultural bias depending on the country.
I have been addressed "Professor" even though the person speaking to me had "Dr" in front of his eyes, just because this was the tradition there.
In Italy you are a "doctor" when you get a MSc.
In Germany titles are very important, you do not want to make a mistake there.
In many other countries you address someone who graduated from medical studies as "doctor", however in Poland they do use "*lek. med.*" as opposed to "*dr med.*" -- the first one being the generic title for someone who graduated and is licensed, while the second clearly indicates that he or she has a PhD. You would still address that person as "doctor" in a conversation, but would refer to him or her as "*lekarz*" (the official name, where the abbreviation *lek.* comes from) when talking in 3rd person.
So it really depends on the place.
The only case where I would care is if this gets formalized (in a book, in proceedings, ...) or at the beginning of a long-term relationship.
> 3 votes
# Answer
Before I *finally* finished the doctorate, my syllabus said, "Call me Bob or Mr. Brown, whichever is more comfortable for you. but not 'doctor' or 'professor.'" Other than that, I didn't worry about it with students. Faculty all call each other by first names anyway, so it never came up in that context. (Now the syllabus says, "Call me Bob or Dr. Brown, whichever is more comfortable for you.")
My professional correspondence (email and postal mail) includes both my degree and my academic rank, so anyone corresponding with me has the correct information whether they need it nor not.
Outside school, I corrected those with whom I expected a long acquaintance, such as a new dentist, by saying, "Please call me Bob." If that didn't work, I added that I did not hold a doctorate. For everyone else, I ignored it.
In my institution and many like it, "professor" is used as a courtesy title by students for faculty who do not hold the doctorate, and less as a title of academic rank. How one reacts to "professor" will depend on local custom. Whether to correct those who call you professor depends on how it's used where you are. If one is a faculty member and "professor" is used as a courtesy, no correction is necessary.
I am reminded of a novel in which a character addressed as "doctor" says, "Oh, no! Not 'doctor." I'm only a humble F.R.C.S."
> 2 votes
---
Tags: titles
---
|
thread-35106
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35106
|
How to cite page from section-page number style document?
|
2015-01-02T12:39:48.680
|
# Question
Title: How to cite page from section-page number style document?
I've come across a problem during my bachelor thesis.
I'd like to cite a single page in a document, but it uses the "section-page" style of numbering pages of the document. It appear like I'm referencing pages 7 to 23, even it is just a single page. (I am using ISO 690)
What's the proper way to cite such page? Thank you.
# Answer
> 2 votes
You can write "page 7-23", so that the singular word "page" gives the reader a clue. A range of pages would be "pages 7–23".
Alternatively, I would have no objection to "Section 7, page 23", though apparently JeffE wouldn't approve of that.
# Answer
> 0 votes
> It appear like I'm referencing pages 7 to 23
A different symbol should be used in the two cases: when referencing page 7-23, the symbol between the two numbers should be a *hyphen*; when referencing from page 7 to page 23, it should be an *en dash*, which is slightly longer than the hyphen.
So, use the appropriate symbol.
---
Tags: citations, citation-style
---
|
thread-1118
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1118
|
How do I deal with diverse interests when applying for a PhD program?
|
2012-04-14T04:48:49.500
|
# Question
Title: How do I deal with diverse interests when applying for a PhD program?
I have a master's degree in Computer Science. I have applied to PhD programs, and decisions are trickling in. I may soon have to choose between two or more PhD programs. I am outside of the US.
Unfortunately, I have diverse interests. I was advised that a successful PhD application is usually quite specific, so I made each of my applications very specific. I wrote to a professor working in decision making (AI), another working in computational learning theory, another working in computer music, another working in quantum & parallel computing, another working in logical foundations & philosophy of computation. With much enthusiasm, I informed each professor that I was interested in pursuing a PhD in his / her field. This is **true**. I am interested in **each** of these fields, and know something about each of them. When advised to apply, I did.
The problem is - being interested in each of these fields also means that I'm interested in **all** of them. (There are **more** areas of CS I'm interested in. What's worse - my interests are not even restricted to CS. For the purposes of this post, I'm restricting myself to only the mentioned areas.) So when I choose between PhD programs, I'm choosing between completely different areas - and that is surely going to be excruciating.
This is **not** a case of not knowing my 'true interest' now, only to discover it later. I have **no** 'true interest'. I have always pursued numerous unrelated things in parallel. I love all my interests equally. In fact, I love the feeling of 'being interested' more than the interests themselves. Whenever I've tried to restrict myself to **one** topic of study - even for a month - that feeling is lost, and I am quickly bored. As a result, my skill-set is a classic case of a jack of all trades - master of none. The worst part is - everybody knows that a PhD is about getting deep into **one** specific topic. It's not about breadth - it's about depth. Even if I were to choose one of the PhD programs (and I **must** choose one), I have a feeling that I might get bored quickly and be prone to constant topic-changing / transferring. Again, this is not about being fickle - it's about following my heart, and my heart takes me to different things at different times.
Do you think I'm likely to fail / never complete my PhD? What are the best practices for dealing with diverse interests?
**Update (2018)**: The good news is that I received my Ph.D. last year. The bad news is that many of the concerns I described in this question did rear their ugly heads in grad school (for example I became one of those PhD students who reads and reads and reads many things but doesn't get actual research done). Though I managed to graduate, the quality of work leaves much to be desired, and I am currently facing a difficult job search, and beginning to suspect that I have no future in research.
# Answer
(My experience with non-American PhD programs is limited, so some of what I say here may not be relevant or possible.)
First, I think you may have painted yourself into a corner. More important than being specific, PhD applications should be *honest*. Hopefully your applications described the breadth of your interests, perhaps with some extra emphasis and detail in one area, rather than implying falsely that you are only interested in one topic. It's better to be rejected than to be accepted into a PhD program where you won't thrive.
I think you need to look for overlaps and connections between your various fields of interest. Decision theory and machine learning are not that far apart. Quantum computing and philosophy of computing are not that far apart. Parallel computing and logic are not that far apart. Decision theory and logic are not that far apart. Machine learning and computer music are not that far apart. Finding something at the intersection of five or six different areas is almost certainly impossible, but **lots** of interesting stuff happens at the interface between field X and field Y.
On the other hand, all the areas you describe are incredibly diverse within their own boundaries. You may find enough different topics within (say) machine learning to keep your fickle heart satisfied.
One thing you should ask about (quickly!) is the possibility of having multiple (ie, two) advisors in different areas. Some departments encourage inter-disciplinary co-advising; some don't. Some advisors encourage collaboration with other faculty; others flatly forbid it. (In many European PhD programs, students are attached to specific projects of specific faculty from day one, and moving between projects or fields is almost impossible.)
What worries me more than the diversity of your interests is this sentence: *"Whenever I've tried to restrict myself to one topic of study - **even for a month** \- that feeling is lost, and I am quickly bored"*. You have to get over that. Research requires long-term focused attention. Early in your PhD program, you *may* be able to juggle a couple of different research projects at once, but eventually, you have to focus on a coherent thesis topic. It can be an interdisciplinary topic, sure, but it has be coherent. You will have to work on that one topic for *years*. If that sounds awful to you, then maybe you don't want to be a PhD student after all.
My department head has changed fields several times in his career, so I think his advice on this topic is worth repeating. Assuming good health and good luck, you have a 50-year research career ahead of you. So if you're deeply interested in half a dozen different areas, you can afford to spend seven or eight years on each one.
> 36 votes
# Answer
I'd start with a fundamental question: why do you want to get a Ph.D.? It's a major commitment of time and effort, so it's only worthwhile if you need a Ph.D. to accomplish your long-term goals. Getting a Ph.D. really isn't worth doing for its own sake, or out of a feeling that it's something you ought to do (because you like computer science, or enjoy education, or feel you should have the highest degree you can get). Really, it's just preparation for what you'll do after you graduate.
So from this perspective, the question becomes what you hope to be doing in ten or fifteen years. Not specific topics, but rather what sort of career. When you look around at faculty or industrial researchers, do you see people who make you say "Yes, that's exactly the sort of work and the range of topics I'd love"? If you do, then you should look into these cases specifically. You can study websites and CVs, and maybe even e-mail a few questions (although keep in mind that people will be busy, so don't be pushy and don't waste time with questions you can answer in other ways). How did they end up in these positions that appeal to you?
If you can find many people doing what you'd like to do, then that's an excellent sign, and you just have to learn how they did it. If you can find only a few, or even none, then you should worry that maybe a Ph.D. isn't the right path for you. In that case, if you enter a Ph.D. program you've got to hope for one of two things. Either academia will change you, or you will change academia. Either is possible, but neither is likely.
I don't mean for this to be discouraging, but I strongly recommend thinking this through carefully before getting too far into a Ph.D. program (if you haven't already). Once you start, quitting is difficult psychologically even when it's clearly the right decision. It's easy to spend years in denial, knowing things aren't really working out the way you had anticipated but hoping they'll somehow get better. This isn't healthy, so the more thinking you do in advance, the better.
Good luck! I hope you either find role models in this career path or find another that suits you better.
> 10 votes
# Answer
I found your question today. I also have "diverse interests". Worse, my interests are more diverse than yours. I am interested in quantum physics, in biology, in history, in computer, in mathematics, in electronics, in music, etc.
Your problem is just in what JeffE had found: "Whenever I've tried to restrict myself to one topic of study - even for a month - that feeling is lost, and I am quickly bored". I get bored after a month of intense reading, or after half a year of leisure reading. It might be with the "instant gratification" vs "delayed gratification" kind of thing. Picking low hanging fruits in a new field is exciting. Having to do hard work for difficult fruits is boring. You might even have procrastination if my theory is right.
I worry that you might not be able to finish your Ph.D, like me. I chose one of the above as my Ph.D direction and I lost interest in reading boring (difficult?) papers and spent easy time in other fields. My GPA was good, I had no problem to pass exams. I just did not want to read those boring papers (the truth was that they were more "difficult papers" than "boring papers") in the field. I finally dropped out after years of struggling and got a job with my master's degree. Today, a day I find out that I am reading in parallel many materials on diverse topics at the same time, I decided to google and found your question.
If you can't focus, it might be better for you to get a job with your master's degree in CS and live an everyday Joe's life, like what I am doing now. On the other hand, if you can untwist your mind so that you realize that life is difficult, research is difficult, and doing difficult work is unavoidable, you might be able to escape being bored ( Now you know it is not about being bored, it is about being unable to face difficult problems for delayed gratification), you may be able to survive your Ph.D life.
**\[Update after 3 years\]** Today I found this answer made by me three years ago. I can tell you what I have done to overcome the problem. I am proud of myself as an amateur scientist that I have focused on one narrow field unrelated to all my previous interests for three whole years and got deep understanding of it. I almost dropped all my other hobbies and interests. How?
The first reason why I can make this change to my style was three years ago I suddenly realized that the old saying that we used only 5% (or 10%) of our brain capacity thus we had enormous capacity for learning was a lie. This is easily seen if you believe in evolution (why keep an energy hungry giant brain if there is no need). The truth is we have limited memory capacity. Don't jam garbage information in it! The second reason is somehow related ---- Those highly respected big figures in the past had limited brain capacity too! I believe if a person with good IQ and required education spends 10 years (sometimes 3 years) focusing on on topic, he can surpass almost all past and existing experts in the field, except for maybe one or two greatest.
With this second reason in mind (Most great figures are average Joe's themselves) I think I have made a discovery in a field I once was interested in. I have to pick it up and set aside my current main focus for a while (maybe as long as a year). Hope the above two reasons can help some people here.
> 3 votes
# Answer
It is possible that you will have trouble finishing your dissertation and thus obtaining your PhD.
It is easy to do your coursework; each subject takes only one semester. You'll finish your subjects before you get bored. But a dissertation usually takes a year or more to finish.
One possibility is to take your PhD at a university which allows publication of a few papers as equivalent to a dissertation. You can make the papers about different fields and yet related to each other.
> 0 votes
---
Tags: phd, application, interdisciplinary
---
|
thread-35132
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35132
|
Supercomputers and undergraduates?
|
2015-01-03T00:33:43.917
|
# Question
Title: Supercomputers and undergraduates?
Is it common for an undergraduate to run its thesis (evolutionary genomics) in a supercomputer? In my country, few supercomputers exist, but I'm not sure how it is for bachelors in the US or Europe. I am writing my application to graduate school abroad and I want to know if it is a remarkable point I can use as hook to begin my statement.
# Answer
> 2 votes
If by "supercomputer" you mean a "computer cluster," there are lots of people with such experience in the US and Europe, and many universities even have their own. (My university, for instance, operates its own 25,000-core cluster.) If you mean "supercomputer" a machine like one on the Top 500, that may be worth mentioning. However, indicating that you have experience running calculations in high-performance computing environments is certainly worthwhile to mention if it's relevant for your graduate program.
---
Tags: graduate-admissions, graduate-school, computer-science
---
|
thread-30090
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/30090
|
How does the author's native language impact the likelihood of having his publication accepted in an English-speaking venue?
|
2014-10-16T21:00:41.303
|
# Question
Title: How does the author's native language impact the likelihood of having his publication accepted in an English-speaking venue?
I've heard a few authors whose native language wasn't English complain that they are put at a disadvantage with respect to authors who are English native speakers, when it comes to publication acceptance in English-speaking venues.
Is there any research/study/survey that looked at the impact of the author's native language on the likelihood of having his publication accepted in an English-speaking venue?
# Answer
It's probably more a commentary than an answer. I look forward to others' input on this issue as well.
As an ESL myself, I joined the English academic community knowing that language will be an extra barrier. I wrote (or perhaps still write) many awkward sentences that are grammatically sensible but funny to read from the angle of general English usage. To compensate this shortcoming, I read papers and study their styles, I read books on scientific writing, and I coauthor with native speakers. My English has improved somewhat and now I can even throw a couple trivia about academic writing in front of my native speaker colleagues. But deep down, I know it's a never-ending project, and chance is I will not be as fluent as a native speaker, and should perhaps settle for "good enough."
If I were to talk to your author friends, I'd probably ask if those submissions were anonymous. And if they are anonymous, and in multiple occasions comments like "English needs improvement" were given, I would suggest them to spend some time to work on their English rather than complain about unfairness. Non-native speakers having more difficulty to publish in English speaking channels is logical; to expect a fair ground that would totally ignore linguistic difference is unrealistic.
To formally answer the question, I have not come across with any study similar to what you described. And even there is one, I will study the results very cautiously. Native language cannot be randomized, so it's impossible to have a randomized controlled trial. This means what we will likely to see are observational studies, which are prone to missing important confounding variables: Native language intertwines with too many factors (education system, country of origin, culture, socioeconomic status, writing style and syntax construction, quality of English education, existence of equivalent concepts in English, etc.) that probably cannot be fully adjusted for in the analysis. At the end, we will likely see that non-native speakers are at a disadvantage, but the true cause of such disadvantage may be lurking elsewhere, and the true effect contributed by the linguistic difference alone is next to impossible to be parsed out.
Truth be told, I believe discrimination exists. If a reviewer reads that the data were collected in a non-English-speaking country, he/she may pay more attention to the grammar, or be more likely to suggest comments like "Please consult an editor or a native speaker in order to polish the English." I am fortunate enough to be working in the biomedical field in which most writings tend to follow a framework of being succinct, direct, and optimally simple. Most of the time I could easily parse out the ideas from the writing quality and give comments separately to both. Researchers in other fields may feel differently.
> 6 votes
# Answer
Writing a paper is, of course, more difficult for non-native speakers. They have to learn a second language and master it well enough to convey compplex ideas to their audience. And that is no easy task.
That being said, I don't believe there is much of a bias against non-native speakers. I myself have published several papers (authored with other non-native speakers) and never did we encounter any problems with the language. Bear in mind that English is not always the native language of the referees themselves so they usually have some understanding for your struggles (and don't necessarily see all grammar errors you did anyway).
The main catch for non-native speakers lies, in my opinion, more in effectively and clearly explaining their ideas which is, naturally, more difficult if you struggle with the language. This issue can be solved, at least to some extent, by reading other papers and books and studying their style as Penguin\_Knight suggests.
> 3 votes
# Answer
Not being a native speaker of English does of course affect your ability to publish in English speaking journals, but it cuts both ways.
Many journals and conferences these days are dominated by non-English speakers, while the majority have a degree of balance. The transactions style journals in engineering and computing publish shorter papers with a more mathematical flavour and a conventional format, and often have editors and reviewers with an Asian background. In round numbers less than a quarter of the world's population speak/write English with native level efficiency, the major languages/grouping being English, Spanish, Chinese and Indian - and their dialects and relatives.
As a native speaker of English and a linguist, I have sometimes been told by reviewers that I need to improve my English, include more display equations and more references to their journals, and get my paper checked by a native speaker! I can quite easily see their linguistic background from the idiosyncrasies and errors in their review. Although this may sound laughable, there is a message here for both of us, the native speaker and the non-native speaker of English.
As a native speaker and an academic used to using English in a sophisticated interdisciplinary way, I need to learn to write in a simpler way to be comprehensible to readers who do not share this background - whether native English speakers or not. For the non-native speakers, they need to do exactly the same thing. In fact, computers also need simpler language, so for natural language processing, optical character recognition, speech recognition and machine translation systems, the same simplifications will also help.
This simplification includes
* reducing sentence length and complexity
* reducing vocabulary size and complexity
* reducing the use of jargon and idioms
* reducing the use of informal models
Let's explain this a bit more, and I'll draw on some Computational Linguistics background to help here... Parsers can't handle long sentences and shortly before the turn of the century people started to scrap sentences longer than 40 words before publishing statistics about their systems - because they just couldn't handle the complexity and ambiguity. English is very rich, and individual words and phrases can have many meanings and alternative apparent synonyms can have very different nuances. This creates a lattice of possibilities. In English every second word tends to be a simple one, one of the 150 most frequent words, and to have a grammatical function, but often overloaded with different possible meanings (at least two on average). These more grammatical words are called functional closed class words (there is a fixed number), and the others that have more meaning associated with them are called contentive open class words (there are always new words and usages being invented). Many words have a dozen or more meanings (but again assume at least two).
So a 40 word sentence can have a million (2^20) legal grammatical parses and a million (2^20) semantic combinations expressed as a network or lattice of possibilities to choose from. We choose the intended grammar and meaning based on the salience of the concepts in our physical or linguistic context - in the real world, that includes things we know and see and hear in our society/environment, but in a paper it includes the things an expert in the field should know and the ideas expressed in the sentences or paragraphs before. When speaking, we see when someone isn't following, we hear when something is ambiguous, and we adjust accordingly. We might stop a sentence half way through and go back to basics. We might pause and repair with a parenthetic 'that is'. We might simply say 'pun not intended' because we've recognized that there is another meaning that jumps out.
In text we need to anticipate how different readers will understand things, what the ambiguities are, where the complexity lies.
In relation to length, if a sentence is more than 40 words, or 4 lines, chop it up. I tend to make use of participles (-ed and -ing) words and relational connectives (which/that) to join phrases and clauses together. I tend to put in lots of parenthetic comments, often shown with commas rather than parentheses, but these add complexity. So look particularly at the wh-, th-, -ed and -ing words (closed class functional/grammatical words or suffixes that can be used in many different ways). Break these up into separate sentences and that way the non-native reader or writer won't get confused by the subtleties of how they are used. Words like 'to' and 'through' and 'that' can be a problem, and reflect different usages between different brands of English. Sometimes the problem is that a th- word is omitted, particularly 'that' or 'the'. Adding the word in can resolve ungrammatical or ambiguous sentences.
If a paragraph is more than about 10 lines, chop it up. People scan papers quickly with their eyes being drawn to the headings and the first sentence and last few words of each paragraph. Make sure paragraphing is clear and the formatting compact (modern journals don't require double spacing which is designed to slow the proof reader down, and should not be supplied to people are meant to be understanding the content, and inline use of equations or superscripts should not cause line spacing to open and close like an accordion - select fixed mode and make sure everything fits). The first sentence of a paragraph should introduce the idea explained or developed. The last should provide a bridge from that idea to the next. A punchy paragraph may have a single line, particularly the conclusion at the end of a section. A long paragraph may consist of three or four sentences.
Note. Things you have in brackets that make a sentence or paragraph too long can be moved to a note. If you are using (hyperlinked) footnotes or endnotes, yes it can be that sort of a note, but endnotes are archaic and don't really help due to the need to flip back and forth. The comment can simply be moved to a following paragraph.
In relation to content word usage, make sure technical terms and acronyms are defined at first use in the body of the paper, and acronyms are refreshed at the beginning of each section. Definitions of mathematical variables may also need refreshing, particularly around equations or in table or figure captions. That is people forget these things, or skipped over them without taking them on board. They should be able to look at a table or a figure or a section on their own, and make sense of them without (re)reading the preceeding text. Avoid informal speech forms and idioms (phrases that have special meaning to people of particular nationalities rather than following from the standard meanings of the words used). Language teachers like to teach idiomatic phrases to their students to make them think they sound more natural, but it has the opposite effect because they invariably use them inappropriately. Use the appropriate technical terms, but explain them in simple language if your whole audience can't be expected to be familiar with them. Be sure you are using a word of phrase correctly before you use it. Don't just copy things other people have said, particularly authors who are clearly not native English speakers.
In relation to functional word usage, be careful of words like 'this/that', 'the/a'. English normally requires an article or a conjunction or relative pronoun, and while the native speaker knows when to omit them, it is normally grammatical to include one. Also be careful of words with negative connotations, the word 'not' and hedges like 'hardly' or 'quite' - it is easy to miss such a word when scanning quickly, and get the wrong impression, and non-native speakers tend to use the hedges incorrectly. This again is something computers are bad at, and information retrieval, recommender and ranking systems can't currently deal with such words correctly.
It is also important to talk about equations, particular from papers by non-native authors, or in papers sent to non-native editors/reviewers. Don't just copy equations from paper to paper. Always go back to the original source, the originator of the idea, to understand equations, models and assumptions. Always explain the equations and the insights that lie behind them. Many authors/journals use models and equations in a way that obscures their meaning and makes it hard to understand. The non-native speaker is particularly tempted to avoid trying to explain something in English by expressing it in Mathematics. Many students (and all too many academics who should know better) copy equations into their papers that they don't understand (which are thus often wrong, incorrectly applied, or simply inappropriate to the paper). Mathematics should be used to clarify not to obscure. Explanations should always be provided. Don't describe what going on in operation-by-operation words, but explain the insights and the effect of the equations.
> 2 votes
---
Tags: publications, language, reference-request
---
|
thread-34436
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34436
|
What is the strategy to identify natural experiment as a PhD student?
|
2014-12-17T19:10:30.707
|
# Question
Title: What is the strategy to identify natural experiment as a PhD student?
As social scientists become more concerned with causal inference, a good thesis these days needs some sort of quasi-experimental strategy. For example, an economist wants to know the effect of military service on income but faces the problem that people who enlist are different from those who don't. So he uses the random Vietnam War lottery as a quasi-experiment with a valid control (who won the lottery and did not serve) and treatment (who lost and did serve). (More examples of these natural experiments).
As a PhD student sitting in my cubicle, I'm lost on how to identify these opportunities. Reading published work does not really help since these experimental opportunities are quite idiosyncratic. I'm not averse to going out there to find my own opportunity, but unsure about how to do this effectively. Do I read history book? Or talk to policy makers?
Since experimental opportunities are not available to all (or most) topics, I'm already paralyzed at the stage of choosing a topic (and thus can't start reading history book / talking to policy makers).
The standard advice I've got is not to pick question based on method. However, I find this quite a double standard given the concurrent push for quasi-experimental design.
# Answer
> 2 votes
Don't sit in your cubicle!
Go to the library (a physical one assuming you have one still). Read the newspapers (physical ones are easier to browse but you can do this on line). Look at the controversies, the scandals, that are emerging daily on the news: political lies, child abuse, discriminative policies, public funding, privatization, quantitative easing, bank bail outs. Look at states with different parties in control. Get hold of the latest and previous census data. Get hold of the Enron emails. Get access to the data that companies are building up through loyalty cards and credit cards. Talk to you med school or a disability charity about mining their data. Have a look at the data mining literature - talk to the people at your university who do this and what contacts they have...
---
Tags: thesis, research-topic, social-science, experiment-design
---
|
thread-35139
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35139
|
Will reviewers see acknowledgements in double blind peer review?
|
2015-01-03T02:29:07.093
|
# Question
Title: Will reviewers see acknowledgements in double blind peer review?
In the acknowledgements section of a paper, I am thanking some well known people in the field I am working in, for helping me revise the paper.
Just out of curiosity: Do most conferences blank out the acknowledgements section? I feel like these people will add bias to the reviewers decision.
# Answer
There is no reason that you need to put anything into the acknowledgements section until it is accepted and you are preparing the camera-ready version. It is perhaps the only portion of a paper's text that can't really be affected by peer review (unless you do something remarkably unusual). Furthermore, some acknowledgements must always be left our in order to maintain double-blind review: for example, funding should be acknowledged in the final document, but grant information breaks blinding.
Thus, I would recommend that you treat acknowledgements just like you treat author information: blank it for blind review, and add it in for the camera-ready after acceptance.
> 11 votes
---
Tags: publications, acknowledgement
---
|
thread-35122
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35122
|
Is it wise to develop skills that do not immediately benefit short-term research productivity?
|
2015-01-02T18:01:49.407
|
# Question
Title: Is it wise to develop skills that do not immediately benefit short-term research productivity?
I have a master in physics and philosophy and have a keen interest in mathematics. Currently I am doing a PhD in philosophy. On a personal level, however, I cherish the interdisciplinary ideal of combining mathematics, physics and philosophy. I am well aware that realizing this ideal requires an enormous amount of work and talent – and that very likely I cannot 'completely' realize it.
On a structural level, I suppose this is an unfortunate side-effect of the level of specialization in academia today. On a subjective level, however, I feel the need to “revolt” against such over-specialization. It a shame that some "philosophers of science" in my branch haven't solved one differential equation in their life; yet they intend to reflect on what physicists do. I am convinced that combining different disciplines is a worthy thing to do. I suspect many people would agree with me, but the competitive reality of academia makes it very hard to realize.
The time one invests in a secondary area of interest (i.e. mathematics, physics) takes away time to do research in one's main area (i.e. philosophy). The reduced time would (on the short-term) make me less productive and successful. However, in the long-term, it might allow me to produce work of more value and depth.
* (1) Is it wise for a PhD student, somewhere below on the academic ladder, to gamble already on long-term investments, or should one give in to the short-term safety and (over)specialize in one area?
* (2) Is there some middle-way between the two extremes?
* (3) Is it more useful in later stages of one's career to have a broad skill-set or have more publications in one (limited) area?
# Answer
I think this is a good question, but I have only a brief, partial answer: you may have to accept that, in pursuing the interdisciplinary topics that interest you, the time and energy you spend will *not* be repaid with any kind of academic currency, but only in less tangible forms. In other words, you may never get a better job, get an extra paper published, or even get an extra pat on the back from a colleague; but you may nonetheless, in a subtle and unsung way, advance the anti-specialization principles you espouse simply by doggedly producing quality work that embodies them. This may sound cynical, but I mean it seriously. Of course, you need enough tangible reward to keep your career going, but it sounds like you're asking about how or whether to invest the energy to go the extra mile above and beyond that. It's possible to derive internal comfort from believing that you're doing your best to produce the kind of work you think needs to be produced, even if doing so doesn't earn you any praise or advance your career in any concrete way. In the end, whether you continue to do this work will depend on whether you can be happy and sane doing it, and drawing strength from your inner conviction, rather than from external validation, can help with that.
> 22 votes
# Answer
Good question, but likely to be closed as "opinion-based" or "too broad". My (opinion-based) take below.
Career-wise, you can likely luck out or strike out with either approach. You can turn into the world's foremost expert on a *teensy, tiny* special sub-sub-sub-field. If this turns out to be an important field for the next decades and your reviewers like it, then you are in luck. However, every subfield will likely be sucked dry at some point in time, so even the most specialized specialist will need to switch fields, methods or something else at least at some point in their career. Suppose you were the world's top expert on some obscure topic sexy in 1985, as a freshly-minted Ph.D. - I don't think this will still be quite as hot today. So a one-trick pony will need to switch tricks now and then.
Note that you need some consensus in your field that your one trick at the moment is actually hot. It's bad if you write a grant application and your reviewers groan "not again; he's been milking this particular technique for ten years now, when will he finally stop?"
Alternatively, you can do what you seem to prefer: become proficient in multiple connected fields. This will mean that you won't be the mother of all experts in any of them. But you may just become the person who can actually see, explain and analyze the connections between these fields. Given that there is more and more emphasis on interdisciplinary research these days (which I'd say makes a lot of sense and likely is here to stay), you are well placed to become the linchpin getting disparate single-topic experts together to write grants or papers.
Of course, you still need to pick fields that actually have some connection with each other. You may be interested in all of Shakespeare's plays, high-dimensional complex geometry and parallelized software development, but it will be hard to bring these disparate strands together into a coherent whole.
So you will again need to impress reviewers that your combination makes sense. If your interdisciplinary approach is reviewed by focused experts, these may not appreciate what they perceive as "no expertise" in your research.
(Incidentally, by beautiful wife goes the second route. She is likely not the world's greatest geneticist, nor the world's greatest clinical psychologist or therapist, but she does pretty good *interdisciplinary* research on the genetics of certain psychological conditions and their therapy. Among other things. She started this type of jack-of-multiple-trades approach after her Ph.D.)
I have seen the metaphor of "T-shaped people": people who have a limited understanding of a lot of things (the horizontal bar of the T), but are experts in depth in at least some particular topic (the vertical bar). This is the ideal my employer wants us to strive for - we should neither be "I-shaped" (all expertise, no general knowledge) nor "minus sign-shaped" (all general knowledge, no expertise). This makes sense to me.
> 5 votes
# Answer
I have found that a middle-of-the-road approach works best. Scientifically minded individuals tend to be perfectionists. While it is important to pay attention to details, perfection does not exist and life is short. Keep your eye on the prize and make your mark on the world but don't forget to have a life.
Read some of the books about Richard Feynman. By all accounts a genius but by his own admissions said he was mostly like others but had developed a few special "tools" or ways of looking at a problem. So yes, explore avenues that may not have immediate rewards but may have value for the future. Great discoveries are often overlooked by the unprepared mind...
> 0 votes
---
Tags: phd, career-path, interdisciplinary
---
|
thread-32844
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/32844
|
Where can I find templates for a mathematics research paper?
|
2014-12-07T13:28:16.880
|
# Question
Title: Where can I find templates for a mathematics research paper?
I've recently typed up a mathematics research paper, but I would like to make it appear more formal when I submit it to be peer-reviewed.
Also, how would I be able to incorporate LATEX into my paper?
Are there any templates out there that follow formats similar (maybe even exact) to examples such as this and this one.
# Answer
You can download the latex sources of the vast majority of (actually almost all) math preprints posted to arXiv. Just go to the abstract page of your favorite math paper and click on "Other formats" under "Download." There you can find the link to the source file in latex as long as the author(s) uploaded it and complied by arXiv's latex engine (which pretty much everyone does).
I think reading the actual sources of nicely typeset papers you like is a very effective way to learn how to latex.
For example, here's the abstract page of my latest preprint:
http://arxiv.org/abs/1409.2559
and its source is here:
http://arxiv.org/format/1409.2559v4
To get the latex file I submitted, click "Download source" near the bottom right.
The file is in compressed format. But as the arXiv page says, your browser may uncompress the file. My Google Chrome for Mac does this, so what I actually get by clicking the download link is a latex file, which is named "1409.2559v4" with no extension. If your browser behaves the same way, you can simply rename the file to attach ".tex" at the end if the extension is important.
> 12 votes
# Answer
The question is based on something of a misunderstanding. On Stack Exchange, it is possible to incorporate LaTeX into a post by using dollar signs. However, when you're writing a stand-alone document, you don't "incorporate" LaTeX: rather, you write the whole document in LaTeX. (An analogy would be asking "How do I incorporate MS Word into a document?" You dont – you write the whole document that way.)
As such, you'll have to re-typeset the whole document using LaTeX, if that's the route you want to go down. The good news is that a LaTeX document looks a lot like a Stack Exchange post when you're editing it. It's mostly just a text file, with ordinary text as text and mathematics in dollar signs. (Plus a "preamble" of initialization commands at the top, and a few commands within the document, such as to start a new section.) So you can mostly copy-paste from your Word document (or whatever it is you used for the first version), put dollar signs around short pieces of maths that appear in the main text (e.g., `Pythagoras proved that $a^2+b^2=c^2$.`) You will have to re-work the displayed equations and any more complex pieces of inline mathematics.
> 7 votes
# Answer
I would recommend using the amsart LaTeX format: http://www.ctan.org/pkg/amsart
If you would like an intro to LaTeX itself, consider going through the wikibook: http://en.m.wikibooks.org/wiki/LaTeX
> 6 votes
# Answer
Often, the journal you want to submit to will provide a LaTeX template. Look at its "Guide for Authors" section.
> 5 votes
---
Tags: publications, mathematics, paper-submission, formatting, latex
---
|
thread-35001
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35001
|
Do you not belong in a PhD program if you don't live and breathe your field of study?
|
2014-12-31T02:10:39.240
|
# Question
Title: Do you not belong in a PhD program if you don't live and breathe your field of study?
In my PhD program everyone talks about how passionate they are about their field of study, and how they go to seminars because they're fun. Is it expected that PhD students truly love their subject, or is it enough just to do good work and publish papers?
This thread was prompted by discussion here.
# Answer
In my experience, good primary investigators are always rather unbalanced human beings in one way or another. If you aren't intensively passionate about *something* closely connected to the research process, then you can't last, because so much of leading research involves shaping your own agenda. That said, you can still be doing work in research, even at a Ph.D. level or beyond, without having such independence and drive, but instead being a "super-technician" following somebody else's agenda and leadership.
The scientific ideal holds that every scientist should be of the primary investigator type, and Ph.D. programs are typically designed to select for and cultivate this. That said, in practice it depends a lot on the group that you are in. Some professors expect their students to develop their own research agendas very strongly, others are (whether they admit it or even realize it) more looking for good technicians to execute on their grants, and a Ph.D. is more of a byproduct.
We don't really like to admit this as a community, but with the current market structure of academia, we actually need to have the second type of education and people as well. Look at it from the perspective of simple flux balance analysis: the rate of Ph.D. students entering programs is far higher than the rate at which primary investigators retire or die. If every Ph.D. student either ultimately ends up as a primary investigator or a "failure," then it means most Ph.D. students are failures. But I don't think that is actually the case: people who aren't hyper-passionate to the point where it distorts their lives can still succeed just fine in a Ph.D. program and at research, they just are likely to take one of the other tracks besides being a professor or other form of PI.
That said, even if you don't end up going the harrowing road of PI-ship, research work is very hard, and there are a lot of easier and/or more financially rewarding ways to make a living. To get a Ph.D., you need at least enough passion for the subject to find more value in this difficult and low-paid path than in any of your alternatives.
> 65 votes
# Answer
As I see it, there's a big difference between being obsessed with something (to the exclusion of other interests) and loving it. Obsession is neither necessary nor helpful, but love is certainly helpful and perhaps even necessary if you want to achieve your full potential. Love dramatically increases your powers of concentration, beyond what can be achieved through self discipline alone. Love makes all the little details memorable and engaging, while also drawing everything together into a meaningful story that illuminates the big picture. Of course it's still possible to do good work without love, but that just makes everything harder.
It's important to keep in mind that different people express love differently. Some people are dramatic and expressive, while others are quieter and more reserved. You can have a perfectly good love for your subject without feeling the need to tell everyone, and comparing yourself to more vocal classmates may be unhelpful.
If going to seminars isn't fun, then that's a little worrisome. Some people simply don't enjoy attending talks, regardless of the subject, and that's OK. However, if you like talks in general but not so much in your research area, then that could be a sign that you haven't yet found the right area for you. (Or maybe it's just not a very good seminar.)
Love not only makes things easier, but also more rewarding. Having a job you love is a wonderful thing, and if you could better achieve this by following another career path, then that's worth serious consideration. However, you shouldn't feel any external pressure: if you can do good enough work, then nobody else will care what's in your heart. Ultimately, the only person this really concerns is you.
> 38 votes
# Answer
Allow me to offer a dissenting point of view. In the words of 5 Brainy Birds:
> ### If you don’t eat, sleep, and breathe science, get out of the lab! ... is an antiquated view
I know many successful academics (at all stages of the academic lifecycle) who do not "live and breathe" their field of study, and manage to do excellent, creative, interesting work regardless.
Does it help to enjoy your work and feel passionate about it at least some of the time? Yes, sure. But the stereotype of academics as people who are single-mindedly obsessed with their field of study is unrealistic and unnecessarily discouraging to the huge numbers of PhD students who feel otherwise, and who worry about not feeling "passionate enough" (people like this OP). PhD students are a diverse group with a tremendous range of passions, motivations, and ambitions.
Also, all of the PhD students I know personally (including myself) *passionately hate* their field at least some of the time.
How much love for/devotion to your subject do you *really* need? In the words of aeismail:
> It should be interesting enough to you that you're willing to put up with the failure that is a necessary component of successful research. But it's not necessary, or even practical or desirable, to spend every waking hour thinking about or doing research.
> 31 votes
# Answer
The question and its answers have parallels outside academia, and that is something to consider if you perceive one of your options to be "getting out of academia."
I have seen the problem from a few different sides: I was a student. I worked in the private sector from 1985 to 2001, taught university for a couple of years, and I now work in a staff position at another university where I do not teach.
Being in a field that you "live and breathe" benefits *you.* Find it, and get in it, and stay there. In the private sector I always preferentially hired people who demonstrated true interest in their field; it seems to be no different in academia, nor do the reasons seem different.
> 6 votes
# Answer
Doing a Ph.D. and working in academia both involve being self-motivated on projects with a long time horizon. For example, it's important to go to seminars in the long run even though any given one is not likely to pay off in the near future. One common place that motivation comes from is deeply loving your subject in a way that means you don't need as much self-discipline to work when no one is looking. But that's not strictly necessary in order for people to be comfortable working in a self-motivated way on projects with a long time horizon. If you work best to external motivation or with clear deadlines, then a Ph.D. program is probably not the best place for you, but living and breathing the subject as such is not crucial.
> 4 votes
# Answer
> Is it expected that PhD students truly love their subject, or is it enough just to do good work and publish papers?
I think that whatever you decide your job is, you should love it. Consider you are going to spend a large proportion of the rest of your life doing it, so you better look for something that makes you go out of bed five days a week like you are going to a playground.
In a PhD program this is particularly important because research can be very, very frustrating. You can easily find yourself thinking about the same problem (literally) for months, repeating the same experiments, validating data, once and again. Then you write a paper and it's rejected and you must spend some more time on the same problem. If you don't like it, it's the closest thing to work in a factory floor you could find.
In summary. Find what motivates you and pursue it as a career. If it happens to be research, then good luck with your PhD.
> 3 votes
# Answer
In my experience, passion can manifest itself in multiple ways. Some people are passionate about their fields, whereas others are passionate about the methodology. For me, the challenge of understanding and modeling of a complex system is my main motivation. I enjoy the process and the model development. I do enjoy my work a lot, but I could be a happy scientist in a different field.
> 2 votes
# Answer
When I was a child I read a lot of books about scientists and decided to become one. Fast forward a few years, I graduated in Physics and decided to do a PhD. I loved the research part, I loved (and still love) Physics but the exact field I was in was not at the same "love" level. It was nice, challenging but I discovered what I really liked were computers and simulations.
I started to administer my department servers and gradually got involved with business companies. When getting my PhD I was immensely proud of it, happy to have done research but ready to try something else.
I now work in IT, love it, do not use anything from what I studied but, looking back, I would not have chosen another path.
This is just to say that what you actually love may not be the exact subject of your PhD studies (and further research) but the academic environment is such an interesting environment (challenges, teaching, how achievements are measured) that it may be the optimum place to blossom. You may also find after some time that your exact interest is somewhere else but your PhD studies helped to reveal it.
> 1 votes
---
Tags: phd
---
|
thread-35144
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35144
|
How should I go about doing meaningful academic outreach as a graduate student?
|
2015-01-03T03:43:00.993
|
# Question
Title: How should I go about doing meaningful academic outreach as a graduate student?
I am a Hispanic student (senior undergraduate) from a socioeconomically disadvantaged background pursuing a graduate degree in Physics in US (I just finished submitting my applications). I do not know anyone from my neighborhood that attended college, much less pursued an advanced degree, and I find myself abhorred by the educational inequality in the US (and the world) on a daily basis. I've undertaken some personal outreach endeavors thus far, I act as a mentor via email for minority students in K-12 (for example, I send them updates about what projects I'm doing and links that I think are suitable for their age group) and I stay in contact with minority undergraduates in STEM whom find themselves faced with (socioeconomic) obstacles similar to those that I have faced.
My parents were hard workers, but they had little time (or money) to stimulate me intellectually as a child, and they also had no idea what it meant to pursue a PhD in anything besides a *medical* doctor. Thus, I really only became familiar with the notion of pursuing a career in *scientific research* when I arrived at college; prior to arriving at college, *engineering* was my idea of what it meant to be a "scientist", or, to "do science" as a career.
I would say that over the course of the past three years I have become a relatively successful researcher, and in some ways I have made up for lost time, but to this day I can only cringe thinking about where I (or someone in my same shoes) might be today if I had been exposed to science at a younger age.
**Does anyone have advice as to how I can begin making a significant impact in scientific outreach as a graduate student?** I have a knack for programming, and the majority of my research is computational in nature, so I think I might be well suited for helping individuals learn programming remotely, or something of that effect.
# Answer
> 4 votes
Outreach comes in two flavours: creating interest (*wow, this science thing is actually cool!*), and educating (*this is how you program*). I think both are necessary, so take your pick (or both).
~~Also, don't even think of making it a one man effort.~~ I don't advise to do it alone. There will be times where you will be swarmed in work, and then your outreach will just fall out of priority. Instead, team up with undergrads, schools, youth centres... whoever is willing to help you. If your university has something in place, you should probably go for it, as it will probably suit your primary needs the most. If you cannot find anyone, you can always start alone and get people on board along the way, but do make this a priority to ensure continuity.
Story time: when I was an undergrad, I joined the astronomy club at my university and we did a lot of outreach, mostly talks and workshops about different topics. It was a very good starting point, as I met people that have been *in the business* for some time, and could help me avoid some of the beginners mistakes. To give you an idea of our success, in some years, we (a dozen of undergrads), single handedly organised half of the events for the Science Week at the Physics Department, usually getting fully booked in less than a week since opening the registrations.
My experiences showed that:
* Many teachers are overworked, underpaid, and frustrated; and they would take your activities as a way to relax for an hour. A few others are still passionate and will go out of their way to get you in the classroom and make the most of it.
* Teenagers are difficult to begin with, but once you break the toughness layer, they have a bunch of interesting ideas. Also, beyond that point there are not many differences between posh and underprivileged schools.
* Ideally, all fronts should be covered. This includes schools, family activities, talks for adults, elderly centres, giving teachers ideas... But of course, you don't have to do them all.
* Be engaging. Get small groups, if you can. Prefer interaction in person. I wouldn't recommend teaching programming remotely, as it is too easy to ignore it. It would only work with kids that are *really* interested, but then, there are tons of online resources to learn.
* Sometimes, kids behave like mushrooms, and there is nothing you can do about it. Don't let that frustrate you. Don't be impervious to (self) criticism, though.
* Talk to professors active in outreach, even if they are out of your expertise. In my university there were a couple of them from the Optics department, that taught me a few nifty low budget experiments.
# Answer
> 3 votes
Outreach - to start with, once you know something worth sharing (and for sure you do, as you are a PhD student), the biggest thing is your motivation and drive for it.
There are various styles of doing outreach, and for various audiences (of different age, specialization etc).
In some sense its up to your taste to choose topic and the audience. As you are from a disadvantaged group you should know the best what kind of help and stimulation would had benefited you the most.
It's important to look at the "added value" - i.e. how much they benefit from it. (Sometimes a spark of inspiration can be better than concentrating knowledge; but also sometimes a lecture can be cool but provide little long-term value.)
What you can do?
* Giving lectures.
* Doing workshops.
* 1-1 mentoring.
* Running some blog (but this is less sure, as there is less direct feedback).
In any case, it's mostly practice, practice and practice. You will learn which things work the best, and which - do not. Which things are interesting for the audience, which - not as much as for you.
If you are in programming, it is a good way to start, as it gives them tools they can play with by themselves, and it is beneficial in many different job scenarios.
It's of course good to contact people in your department, who are involved in outreach - very likely they can provide some advice and it may be possible that there are organizations or events you can join (whether run by univ. or something external).
Also, some of my experiences are captured here: An independent camp for high school geeks (some lessons can be used in different settings).
# Answer
> 2 votes
I can completely relate to you. There are plenty of programs out there where you can do some outreach. You can check out Code2040 : http://code2040.org/ . Its a program that helps minorities get their foot in the door in the tech world. It might not be exactly what you had in mind but I would try to network with the coordinators maybe they can give you better advice on your journey. You can also try doing outreach through your local library. I know that some libraries offer tech literacy courses so that maybe good place to start. You can also try to create a non-profit organization for your cause as well.
---
Tags: phd, outreach
---
|
thread-35163
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35163
|
How to write the information related to referees in an application form?
|
2015-01-03T15:53:03.610
|
# Question
Title: How to write the information related to referees in an application form?
What's the best way to give information about the person who's going to give recommendation letter, in an application form?
> John Clark, Ph.D. in Physics and Mathematics
>
> Associate Professor
>
> Teacher of 'Web Programming' course during the 6th semester
>
> Email address: email.address@example.com
>
> Telephone Number: +00 1234 5678
Is there any need for the 3rd line, at all? Do I need to add information related to the department the person is working in?
# Answer
> 2 votes
Looks to me like you've left out the "organization" and the mailing address. I'd change line 2 to something like: "Associate Professor, Department of Physics, The University of Exampleville". Then you should add several lines below the telephone number that gives the work mailing address of your recommender. If they can't provide that to you directly, you can almost certainly provide the departmental mailing address which should be on their website.
---
Tags: application, recommendation-letter
---
|
thread-35133
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35133
|
How many words is a typical scientific publication (particularly in biology)?
|
2015-01-03T00:55:32.410
|
# Question
Title: How many words is a typical scientific publication (particularly in biology)?
I've heard anywhere from 2,000 - 10,000 words is typical for a publication in an average journal. What's your experience?
# Answer
> 5 votes
This source mentions that they're "typically 3,000 to 10,000 words in length". This page may give you some tips on the length of specific parts of the paper, as well.
BTW, I think the length of the publication can also be dependent on where you are submitting it. Also, you can check yourself creatively by going to sites like http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/, and copy+paste the text into a word counter. ;-)
# Answer
> 4 votes
My experiences with "average" journals (by which I mean that they aren't extremely high-end like Nature or Science) is that typically a publication is around 4,500-7,500 words.
My old adviser used to say that if his manuscript reached 30-40 pages (typewritten, Times New Roman, size 12, double-spaced), he would split it into two publications instead. I wouldn't suggest this method because it's a lot of work to write one manuscript, and this way you would have to go through many more drafting stages to get two manuscripts that were thorough, told the complete story, and yet did not overlap.
# Answer
> 2 votes
A typical publication in the areas of biology that I work in, is like an iceberg. The "paper" per se is likely to be only a couple thousand words (for example Nature articles are only 3000 words long, and a number of other high profile publications also have tight limits). That small portion sticking above the surface is typically backed by anywhere from 10 to 50 pages of supplementary material, which contains the bulk of the paper.
---
Tags: publications
---
|
thread-35172
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35172
|
Can my recommendation letters be repeated?
|
2015-01-03T19:09:54.923
|
# Question
Title: Can my recommendation letters be repeated?
For example, if I am going to apply to 3 REU programs that ask me for 2 recommendation letters each one.
Can my 2 professors who I asked the recommendation letters send the exact same letters to the 3 REU programs?
# Answer
Yes, they can. Sometimes letter writers make minor changes to the letters, for example to add information specific to a given program, but this sort of fine tuning is optional (and almost nobody makes major changes). The default is to send the same letter.
> 13 votes
# Answer
Yes, they can send the exact same letter. In fact, trying to come up with a new letter for each individual program can be overly burdensome.
I would, however, make sure that your letter writers either make no specific mention to the individual programs or make sure they change them appropriately. If one of your letters to program X says "This student would make a fantastic addition to program Y," then a reviewer at program X might be turned off to your application. I don't think it's as bad as mentioning program Y in your SOP (where you have complete control of what is said) to program X, but it's an error to be avoided if possible.
> 5 votes
---
Tags: graduate-admissions, recommendation-letter, research-undergraduate
---
|
thread-34630
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34630
|
Is it possible to apply for a post doc (and get a post doc) while struggling with the health issues (a life-threatening illness: cancer)
|
2014-12-21T11:01:17.167
|
# Question
Title: Is it possible to apply for a post doc (and get a post doc) while struggling with the health issues (a life-threatening illness: cancer)
I struggle with the exact question (or at least will have to face it near in the future) that was asked here: Do I need to mention having survived a life-threatening illness when applying for a new academic position?
When I was a kid, I had a cancer. Now I work at the university as a research assistant and I'm on my way to a PhD. After finishing my PhD, I would love to apply for a post doc, preferably in Sweden, Iceland or Norway (but my advisor suggests US or Australia, so I'm not sure *where* exactly I'm going to go).
There is a serious possibility that I will have a reoccurrence in few years (talked with my oncologist many many times about it), or will not have, nobody could tell that, but there is a strong possibility.
At my current university (middle Europe) it was not a problem, I wasn't obliged to mention it to anybody, however, I informed my employer about my illness. My previous condition is almost not relevant today, however, I do have days when I do not feel good and just want to rest and sleep (but have to go to the University anyway, and of course, I go).
So, with my condition, is it possible to find a university and apply to post doc or not? And another, not less important: do I need to mention about my health when applying for a post doc position?
# Answer
Serious health problems can strike anybody at any time. You know that you have a much higher than background risk of having your condition return, but you also have a pretty good chance of getting into a serious traffic accident or having a parent come down with a serious illness or getting hit by major depression or any of the myriad other ways that your ability to do your work can become impaired. No sane organization expects its employees to be in a protective bubble where bad things cannot happen to them.
If you can do your work effectively now, and don't have a known crisis expected in the near future, then the only sensible thing to do is to carry on with life. You don't need to inform potential employers, any more than you would need to tell them that you might get into a traffic accident because you commute. As noted in the comments, though, you definitely *do* need to make sure you have good access to health care that will cover your condition if it recurs.
> 9 votes
# Answer
Let me put in a cautionary note about a potential problem that could arise. When I applied for my position in Germany, I was required to submit a *Gesundheitszeugnis* (health certificate) that was signed by an authorized doctor registered with the German embassy. I do not know how a diagnosis of cancer will play out in such circumstances.
However, if you are an EU citizen, this may very well not apply to you, because you will be able to relocate from one EU country to another through "freedom of movement."
> 3 votes
---
Tags: etiquette, application, postdocs, health
---
|
thread-20010
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/20010
|
Do goofs in a recommendation letter hurt a student applying for grad school?
|
2014-04-30T01:46:24.603
|
# Question
Title: Do goofs in a recommendation letter hurt a student applying for grad school?
When rereading my copies of letters of recommendation I wrote when a student of mine applied to multiple graduate schools, I was appalled to see mistakes I made where the wrong graduate program was mentioned in the letter. For example, in a letter to CMU, I recommended the student to Georgia Tech.
Do mistakes like this hurt a grad student applicant, perhaps by showing they are applying to other programs, or do they only reflect poorly on the letter writer? In this case, the schools were all in the same (top) tier.
# Answer
I've occasionally seen letters with incorrect graduate program names, and it's not something I'd worry about. It's never bothered me, and while I've seen other committee members point it out, I've never gotten the impression that they particularly cared. (They've pointed it out in the spirit of "Oops, someone messed up" rather than "Here's a negative factor we should keep in mind.")
There are two cases in which it could be harmful:
1. If you name a substantially lower-ranked program, then the reader might wonder whether this low ranking influenced your recommendation. (Maybe you have several variants of the letter, and send more enthusiastic variants to lower-ranked programs.)
2. If you include any comments about how suitable this specific program is for the applicant, then of course these comments will become worthless if you name the wrong school. However, most letters for applicants to graduate school don't include such comments, and even when they do it's rarely a crucial part of the letter. (It's particularly awkward if you send Harvard a letter talking about what a perfect fit Yale would be and how you have encouraged the applicant to go there if accepted.)
You mention the possibility of hurting the applicant by revealing where else they have applied. Theoretically, this could look weird or problematic if they've made eccentric choices about where to apply. (If a top program knows they're also applying to a much lower-ranked program, then the committee might take it as an admission of weakness or an indication that the applicant has a strong personal reason to go elsewhere.) However, I wouldn't worry about it in practice. It's expected that everyone will apply to a range of schools, and I don't recall ever having seen a case I thought would really worry admissions committees.
> 18 votes
# Answer
I do occasionally see copy-and-paste errors in recommendation letters and I smile for a minute and move on. Living in a glass house as I do, I would not dare to throw stones.
I know this is tangential, but I take the opposite extreme with cover letters. If a candidate is applying for a job at my university and their letter mentions another university, I take it as a big strike against them. It may not single-handedly sink the application, but mistakes like this often correlate with poorly written applications in general.
> 4 votes
# Answer
I cannot estimate how much, but I think this could harm the student's case: such mistakes make one think that the letter writer made them in a hurry, not caring too much. This can in principle mitigate the positive effect of the letter.
> 3 votes
---
Tags: graduate-admissions, recommendation-letter
---
|
thread-35157
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35157
|
Is it appropriate to mention personal lessons learned in the defense presentation?
|
2015-01-03T13:30:31.443
|
# Question
Title: Is it appropriate to mention personal lessons learned in the defense presentation?
I have to defend my master's thesis in the field of computer science in about one week.
Of course I will put the main focus of the presentation on the thesis itself, i.e. the research question, the methodology and the results.
But besides the evident results, I also feel that writing the thesis thought me some really important personal lessons. For the first time in my student career I think I got a feeling about what research really is about to be - Spending long hours in front of a problem, constantly discarding and revising ideas while trying to stay positive when coping with setbacks and self-doubt. That I eventually finished the thesis despite all struggles was a very positive experience for me and somehow I'd like to mention that in the defense.
I know from other answers on this site that such things seem to depend a lot on the faculty. However, the guidelines of my faculty only specify the hard facts of the defense such as number of senate members, the schedule and the like.
So I wondered, if I sum up my personal lessons and experiences in 1 or 2 slides, would you as a senate member feel that this is appropriate or something that totally is out of place within the context of a defense?
# Answer
That you have made these experiences is probably nothing new for most people who have ever worked in science. Esp. in a thesis -- you do learn a lot. So I think that general issues like:
> I got a feeling about what research really is about to be - Spending long hours in front of a problem, constantly discarding and revising ideas while trying to stay positive when coping with setbacks and self-doubt. That I eventually finished the thesis despite all struggles was a very positive experience for me and somehow I'd like to mention that in the defense.
are personally highly relevant, but not really interesting for the members. To be honest, I think they are expected (in a finished thesis).
However, there are a few things you can do, e.g.,
* thank your supervisor in the beginning/end for the support (e.g., during setbacks and self-doubt) **but take care not to damage your credibility or to give the impression that the supervisor did the hard work for you**.
* move from a personal level to a more factual one. For example, what have you tried/discarded and why? But make sure you have a clear structure and focus on the work that you have done,
* you can show your enthusiasm in your presentation, e.g., in your voice when you present the solution that worked,
* mention some personal notes as side-note during the presentation.
* if there's a question period, you'll likely also have the opportunity to provide some context.
* **Perhaps most importantly:** Many disciplines want a **critical look/reflection on one's own work during the discussion** (near the end of your presentation). How do you evaluate your work? Can you take a critical look at it? This does not mean to destroy/sabotage your work bluntly, but to point out that -- while it did the job and was really good, it could have done better **given what you have learned while doing the work**.
Just make sure that the focus is on the thesis (which usually has a clear structure) and if in doubt, show the hard facts and what you have achieved. And if you got the chance, do a test run with people who have experience with a defense presentation in your discipline.
> 1 votes
# Answer
A bachelor's or master's degree is about the knowledge that you have gained. A Ph.D., on the other hand, is about the knowledge that you have *contributed* to humanity. As such, the defense is not really about you: it's about your work, and you need to treat it as such. Think about the other high-level scientific talks that you have seen (or given), and treat your defense in exactly the same way.
That's not to say that you can't weave in personal experiences or anecdotes if they make sense as part of the presentation of the technical content. Some of the best talks that I have ever seen have a component of the personal in them. The important distinction is that any use of the personal should serve to illuminate and illustrate the scientific point, rather than standing apart and distracting from it.
> 3 votes
---
Tags: masters, defense
---
|
thread-35194
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35194
|
How do academics find time to write books?
|
2015-01-03T22:04:37.490
|
# Question
Title: How do academics find time to write books?
Books covering primarily academic topics, from philosophy and neuroscience to physics and geopolitics, are usually written (not surprisingly) by experts in the field, which are normally academics themselves. **I wonder how these academics secure the time and funding to write such books**?
To give a few arbitrary examples, I refer to books like these (note that these are not college textbooks):
Is this something academics normally work on in their spare time, or do they get paid to actually do it? Are there grants or donations involved? Is it a privilege that comes with tenure? I'm mostly familiar with life science research, where people will constantly publish papers in journals and that's it - there seems to be no time nor funding to write anything beyond that, at least not as a part of the job.
Apparently, the amount of books written by academics also varies with discipline - e.g. there are more books by professors of philosophy compared to professors of physics. Is this also due to the differences in funding mechanisms and day-to-day job duties among various disciplines?
What are the main factors that influence this?
# Answer
I'm an associate professor in a humanistic social science (anthropology). Anthropology is different from pure humanities in that monographs are usually based on extended participant-observation fieldwork.
Before getting tenure, I wrote two books (monographs):
* The first book was an extension of my original PhD dissertation. I revised and submitted it to academic presses in the first three years of my first tenure-track job. I used a portion of my third year leave to do the final editing of the ms.
* I used the remaining half of my third-year leave to do some of the research for my second book. I also changed universities and used another year of leave provided by them for additional fieldwork. The second book was then written during summers and other leave periods.
So in the twelve years or so years since my doctorate, I've finished two books. I'm currently working on my third using a portion of my triennial leave to focus on writing it. Each book has taken around 4-6 years to research and write -- which is on the fast side compared to some of my peers. I should note that one of my senior colleagues in history has written a book every two years -- he is considered exceptional by most.
To answer some of your specific questions:
> Is this something academics normally work on in their spare time, or do they get paid to actually do it?
Writing books (for faculty in the humanities / humanistic social sciences) is considered part of our research output -- the same as when natural scientists write journal articles. We try to do secondary research and write during the school year and do our primary field research in the summers and when we can get research leaves (sabbaticals, triennials, etc.).
> Are there grants or donations involved?
I used external grants to conduct the field research for the books. I also used internal grants for book completion (copyright clearances, indexing, production offsets, etc.).
It should be noted that the royalties for most academic books (except popular textbooks) are very modest. At best, you might earn a few thousand (US) dollars on royalties on an academic book. Many don't make any money at all. Advances on books are also very rare.
> Is it a privilege that comes with tenure?
No. If you want tenure, you have to write. At most R1s, you have to have at least one monograph for a strong tenure bid (in humanities/humanistic social sciences).
> I'm mostly familiar with life science research, where people will constantly publish papers in journals and that's it - there seems to be no time nor funding to write anything beyond that, at least not as a part of the job.
In disciplines where monographs are important, journal articles are slightly deprecated in importance.
Note that monographs are also separate from edited volumes. In disciplines where "books" are prioritized, this almost always means a single-authored monograph from an academic press. Edited volumes count much less in value in terms of promotion and merit raises.
> 19 votes
# Answer
You correctly observed that monographs are more common in the humanities than in experimental sciences. Often, researchers in humanities publish their PhD thesis as a book (typically during their early post-doc years), and the output of the tenure-track years is a second one, etc. Articles are also usually expected, but they can have much less weight than monographs.
For experimental sciences, (senior) researchers write *handbooks*, because they enjoy their field, they see it as a way of organizing their thoughts, and it's a great reference material for the classes they teach. The time and funding is related to teaching appointments. Some say, some even made a few bucks out of these, but I have my doubts.
Otherwise, publishers regularly ask prominent researchers to edit books about their field. These persons proceed to ask around to find people to write chapters for the book that are similar to very thorough literature reviews. Here the funding situation is unclear, researchers know that it's good for their CV and network to author a chapter and make time for this, generally to the expense of their free time.
> 13 votes
# Answer
Another route to finding time and funding for creating a book is a sabbatical. While my own position gives me no personal experience with this, I have often heard colleagues talk about using sabbaticals for book-writing. The semester or year of freedom from other work that a sabbatical provides is often an excellent time for faculty to execute larger-scale projects like writing a coherent book.
> 11 votes
# Answer
From those I know who wrote a book in the field of engineering, the writing is frequently done during spare time -- nights and weekends -- and during the periods where academic work is reduced. The time needed to complete the book can be around 2-3 years. No specific funding is provided.
From the prefaces of technical books, you can read writing times which range from a couple of years to 7-8 years (not many authors declare the writing time, but some do). Such long times are probably a sign of part-time writing. Shorter times can be declared by those who took a sabbatical leave.
> 7 votes
# Answer
First, I think a desire to publish a book is required. You could have all the time and funding in the world to publish a book, but if you're not motivated to do it, it won't be done.
In my experience, the summer "break" offers the best chance of completing side projects like book writing. During the academic year, most people are too busy with teaching classes and doing research; however, during the summer, these obligations become much lighter, especially with regards to teaching. My undergraduate advisor (a life scientist) published his book by writing the vast majority of it over the summer when he had no teaching duties.
I would also surmise that funding does play a part. Someone who is funded primarily through teaching might have more time to polish his/her lecture notes, which in turn might make turning them into a book easier. In fact, I've read several books/textbook where the author explicitly mentions that the book was born out of the classroom. Someone who has no teaching responsibilities doesn't have as much inertia to write a book, and it might even be detrimental to try because it takes away from research and/or publishing research papers in journals.
> 6 votes
# Answer
I've also seen quite a number of textbooks which were originally a professor's lecture notes. After teaching the same class for some number of years, refining the lectures and the notes each time, writing down a combined version of the lectures and notes is mostly a matter of investing the time and effort.
Whether the result is a *good* textbook depends on the professor's teaching, writing, and editing skills -- and the skills of anyone they bring in to help with the project as co-authors -- and on the skills of the editors and technical editors the publisher assigns to that book.
> 6 votes
---
Tags: writing, books, academic-life
---
|
thread-35211
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35211
|
Is it OK to have many graphs, tables, and images in a masters thesis?
|
2015-01-04T07:31:55.743
|
# Question
Title: Is it OK to have many graphs, tables, and images in a masters thesis?
I am writing my master thesis. In my document I have lots of tables. images and graph. Is this have a bad effect on any academic person when want to evaluate my thesis.
I ask this question because I am afraid that they see my document say "look at his thesis , he fills all his document just by picture" . But I am really take time and effort to draw them and I absolutely think they are essential. So what is your idea ?
# Answer
In my opinion, it is perfectly fine if you want to put so many original pictures in your thesis and if you are writing a thesis in natural science, you can even put some pictures from other papers/books in your introduction chapter. Just try to imagine you are a thesis reader (a professor) with so many other things to do. They would like to read less text and see more comprehensive figures. Of course, making a figure comprehensive depends on the quality of your graphics as well as your caption text.
So here's what I suggest: anytime you want to put a figure in your text, ask yourself: how this figure is going to help my readers understand the main point? Is it conveying the main message? And how the captions will help to understand this message?
Remember, other people also have limited time and sometimes limited interest in what you did or even the task of evaluating the thesis, so it is up to you to make your material concisely so that they can understand about your intentions easily.
> 4 votes
---
Tags: thesis, masters, graphics, tables
---
|
thread-35061
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35061
|
Should I mention my goal of expanding my family business in my MS statement of purpose?
|
2015-01-01T07:11:00.120
|
# Question
Title: Should I mention my goal of expanding my family business in my MS statement of purpose?
I am applying for MS in Industrial Engineering. Do you think it is safe to mention that I have a family business which I would like to expand with the aid of IE? Or will it be useless for their purposes since they may perceive me as a rich kid with back up who does not genuinely have the want and need to study?
# Answer
In my opinion, having a clear reason for going to graduate school can only help your application. Many people apply to graduate programs simply because it is the next thing after undergraduate. For you, there is a clear motivation and a source of focus.
With regards to this particular reason, it is not clear to me whether it would be good for a Ph.D., because of the research component. A master's degree, however, is designed to give you knowledge and skills that can be applied outside of academia, however, and so your motivation of applying this to a particular business is a good match (the fact that it is a family business I think should not particularly matter).
> 1 votes
---
Tags: graduate-admissions, masters, career-path, statement-of-purpose, engineering
---
|
thread-34310
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/34310
|
Why is the CV needed for graduate application
|
2014-12-15T07:08:06.537
|
# Question
Title: Why is the CV needed for graduate application
Why do graduate schools ask for a CV to be included in the application? Do they look for anything else besides publications and work experience?
# Answer
> 1 votes
A CV is the academic equivalent of a resume, providing all of the relevant details of your (academic) career to date. Graduate schools ask for this information for the same reason that businesses ask for a resume when you apply for a job: it is a terse summary of your qualifications as a candidate.
In addition to publications and (research-related) positions held, a CV also should include your undergraduate and graduate degrees, service, any awards, and any other academic-relevant information about you. A nice summary, with links to additional guide material can be found here.
# Answer
> 0 votes
Think about it like this, CV is an official paper to introduce yourself for others. At least it has the basic information about you and your achievements.
# Answer
> -4 votes
We want to know who you are, who is the best fit as supervisor/advisor, what is the best fit as a topic?
A better question is why we ask for a proposal - you are not generally in a position to write a proper proposal till 6 to 12 months in once you've done a full lit.review.
What else do we look for beyond the formal education/publication part?
Work experience tells us about what you can do, and what discipline you've been experosed to. Also hobbies, languages, clubs, sports and community involvement are important to mention. Were you on the chess team, the debating team, the school paper? These also complete the picture of who you are, what you can do, and what you could do!
These days everything is interconnected - technology has applications, sport and art make use of technology, science studies both the inner world of mind/brain and society (social/life sciences) as well as the external world of physical entities and devices (physical/biological sciences) and the way everything relates to everything else (information/cognitive sciences).
From you community involvement I might get insight into your aims in life, you leadership ability, your willingness to work alongside other people and health.
I'm not interested in a statement of purpose or some other nonsense that sounds more like something out of a fortune cookie than the kind of evidential data that belongs in formal curriculum vitae.
From your interest in languages or writing, your experience in debating or the school paper, I will gain ideas about how you'll go writing a thesis or dissertation, whether you will understand the literature, whether you can work on particular interdisciplinary or application-oriented parts of the research.
From your interest in music or dance, sports or photography, I might find connections that relate to (say) projects in computer science or engineering, in signal processing, image processing, speech processing - or extend them in new directions to song recognition or music transcription.
---
Tags: graduate-admissions, cv
---
|
thread-35221
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35221
|
Resusing my own poster abstract for another conference
|
2015-01-04T14:57:39.700
|
# Question
Title: Resusing my own poster abstract for another conference
I have to write an (poster-) abstract for a conference in April. Back in November I already wrote an abstract for a similar conference. Since I have not gained many new results on the same research topic, I made some minor changes to the 'old' abstract and was thinking about submitting this 'reused' abstract for the conference in April.
Is that professional? Or is this even plagiarism, since I copied work that is already published (I am first-author of the 'old' and 'reused' abstract)?
I am not lazy, but the abstract that I wrote last year seems to be very good and I don't see the point in rephrasing it.
# Answer
Assuming you're talking about a one or two paragraph abstract, the question here is not really about the abstract per se but the contents of the poster. In my opinion, you don't need to worry about self-plagiarism per se from a brief poster abstract because it's not a real publication in the first place (if it were a 1+ page extended abstract, that would be a different matter).
Instead, the important question is whether your research community will find it acceptable to have you presenting essentially the same material in two different conferences. In many communities, this is OK, taking the view that it is essentially raising visibility of a result with different groups of people; in others communities, however, it may not be viewed as acceptable. Consult with your supervisor to see what the standard is for your community.
> 4 votes
# Answer
You might want to check the policies of your conference. Some conferences ask that all submitted abstracts/posters be original or unpublished. Since you have already presented the abstract at a previous conference, this would prevent you from submitting the same abstract again without considerable changes being made (i.e., a new analysis, etc.). Then again, some conferences would be ok with you submitting the same abstract. I think the best course of action is to be honest with the organizers and ask whether such a submission is acceptable.
> 1 votes
---
Tags: conference, abstract
---
|
thread-35227
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35227
|
How does an early career researcher gain a high citation count?
|
2015-01-04T16:38:57.107
|
# Question
Title: How does an early career researcher gain a high citation count?
In my field of research (wireless networks ) I know of one researcher who is just 33 years old and has more than 1300 citations on Google-Scholar. How is this possible when he is so young? **What are the best methods to gain more academic citations and attention from other researchers for one's work?**
I think there are some parameters like this:
1. Contributing to open source project(s)
2. Working with other top researchers
3. Working on new field, like new standard, etc .
4. Warm welcome to another researcher and willingness to help them.
Are these accurate? What other factors influence a high citation count at a relatively young age?
# Answer
While those kind of numbers are in the upper portion of the bell curve, they are not actually all that unusual. Three likely scenarios for somebody to have 1000+ citations early in their career:
* One "super paper" that hit a hot topic with exactly the right idea at exactly the right time and did the scientific equivalent of going viral.
* Doing very good work as part of a highly productive group that a lot of people are paying attention to, and thus ending up with a number of well-cited papers.
* Leading an intellectual break-out into a new area of work, which many others become interested in.
It's great for somebody to have a good start to their career like this, but you shouldn't spend too much time worrying about it or comparing citation numbers: that way lies madness and brain-dead administrative metrics.
> 6 votes
---
Tags: publications
---
|
thread-35225
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35225
|
Why do we not reinvent the journal system?
|
2015-01-04T16:09:39.603
|
# Question
Title: Why do we not reinvent the journal system?
I am very surprised that I could not find any similar question here.
It seems to me that researchers from all universities are willing to write papers about their research for free and hand them into a journal to gain reputation. On the other hand, some other researcher do voluntary check the paper in order to examine if the paper is acceptable for the journal. Therefore, the main work is done by researches.
The remaining work for the journal is to offer a platform where researchers can communicate and making sure that the reviewer is selected anonymous and to bundle many articles to a journal.
Now everyone has to pay a huge amounts for the papers, they are not accessible for free to the general public, even though that most researchers are financed by taxes and only the journal is making profit.
Now I wonder, should it not be possible to create a network page for researchers which contains methods to imitate the review process of a paper? So that all papers can be downloaded at the website for free. I guess most researchers would be very happy if everyone could read their work. Also the money that is spend on journals by universities could be spend to this huge network page instead in order to keep it running.
# Answer
Please meet the Open Access movement. In the last twenty years, many scholars and librarians did try to address the problem you pose. It is, in fact, a huge issue, and things like this don't change overnight.
The OA movement focused on two main strategies:
* **Publishing in peer reviewed open journals** (*gold open access*): the idea is to create a brand new journal (or to change the model of an old one) which will provide articles free for the readers, without the current subscription model in which libraries (meaning, taxpayers) pay. The crucial factor of Gold OA is the presence of *peer review*: organize real journals costs a lot of money, and at the moment the major business model is APG (*author processing charges*), meaning that the author (often, the faculty behind it) pays for being published and cover the journal costs. We're still in transition, and there are a lot of drawbacks: there are predatory publishers who try to scam authors, and big publishers offer the "open access option" charging huge fees (this is also called *double dipping*, because a hybrid (both Open and Closed) journal will receive the money from subscriptions **and** the money from the authors. It is important to remark, also, that big publishers make a lot of money with subscriptions and they are actively challenging the open access model. PLoS, for example, is one of the new Gold OA publishers.
* **Self-archiving in repositories** (*green open access*): it is the model of arXiv, Repec, and thousands of other repositories. They can be "institutional" or "disciplinary", and they accept mostly pre-prints, but also post-print articles.
Of course, there are some experiments in the field:
### References
*Full disclosure*: I've worked as a digital librarian in managing OA journals from University of Bologna. I'm biased towards OA and open knowledge in general. Please keep it mind that my answers reflect these bias.
> 18 votes
# Answer
The traditional publishing model has in fact been heavily debated over the past decade or so, and there have been several reinventions. Among these are Open-Access journals, repositories like arXiv, academic social networks like ResearchGate and publishing the paper and the data through repositories such as GitHub.
Some of these are also attaining a great deal of success. The biggest reason we're "not there yet" is inertia. There are two reasons for this inertia.
* Publishers don't want to lose their revenue stream, and produce propaganda claiming open access or other alternative models don't work, and traditional paywalled journals are the best.
* There is a very strong culture of judging the worth of research by the journal it's published in. So in practice, if you have a very good paper, you make a decision: Do you compromise on your pro-OA sentiment and publish in a prestigious journal, or do you risk undermining your future job applications by publishing in an OA journal?
Ultimately, it appears to be the case that applicants who are seriously considered will be evaluated on the merits of the papers themselves, not where they published. However, when there are hundreds of applicants for a position that need to be quickly screened, will the overworked committee have time to read several papers of every single one, or will they start scanning the CVs for journal names?
OA will surely prevail in the end. Recent past has shown that in practice and in theory, there are no major reasons why it shouldn't. Perhaps after that, other more revolutionary changes will follow. However, OA will not "win" until faculties overcome the bias that OA journals are lesser journals and papers published in OA journals are not good enough for traditional ones. When they do overcome this bias, post-docs and graduate students will happily switch to publishing in OA, now that it's not endangering their career.
> 5 votes
---
Tags: publications, open-access
---
|
thread-35191
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35191
|
Is it possible to do part of my PhD remotely?
|
2015-01-03T21:45:49.680
|
# Question
Title: Is it possible to do part of my PhD remotely?
I have following situation. No good quality phd is available in my country (field: computer Science). On the other hand leaving my country for too long is also a little bit difficult for me mainly for family situation. My question is: is it not possible that I negotiate somehow with possible supervisors etc. that I do some part of my Phd remotely? Or say I visit the University for 6 month, then next 6 month I will spend in my country, etc. Or similar arrangements. I know sometimes they call such programs also Sandwich phd programs. Field is computer science so I don't need to be there in some "lab" all the time. Do you know if this is possible? And where/how can I find such programs? Who do I have to "negotiate" it with and how?
# Answer
Let me give you a different perspective to your question.
> No good quality phd is available in my country
It is good that you aim high. But you must see things through the PHD admissions' perspective. Good universities and good PHD programs have a lot more candidates than PHD positions. Why should they choose you over the other candidates? Is your undergraduate research work that good? Are your grades excellent? Is your university reputable (probably not). If the answer to these questions is no, then the main issue is that you would not get accepted to these programs anyway, regardless of your plan to do it remotely or not.
Also do you have a MSc degree? In many countries in Europe you need a MSc degree before doing a PHD and in USA you need to pass some courses before conducting the actual PHD research. This simply (in either case) cannot be done remotely
Also from your comments I understand that you also want to have funding during your PHD (you would also agree to a reduced funding). In other words, you want someone to hire you (and pay you) to do research, coming from an unknown university, remotely, without actually having a first hand experience of how you can perform at this level, coming directly from an undergraduate university and with no industrial real-world work experience. This is too big a bet for any advisor and university to undertake, unless you have already proven yourself as an extremely talented individual. In that case, exceptions may be possible but still a remotely done PHD is still a major gamble for the advisor and the univesity. Without funding the stakes are smaller but as @xLeitix said remote PHDs do not always work that good. But I think expecting funding for a remote PHD is highly unrealistic.
The only solution I can think of, is for you to work a couple of years on site for a PHD (if you get accepted to a good PHD program) and after proving your worth there (with some good publications) during the second-half / dissertation writing portion of your PHD you can ask / convince your advisor to work part-time / remotely from your home country.
> 7 votes
# Answer
Yes, this can be done, but this has to be discussed with the school and program in advance. At previous work places, I've seen PhD students on site who were working "remotely" essentially full-time. Usually, for this to work, you need to have a "local" supervisor who is known to the PhD advisor who will be able to oversee your work.
One other important note: you will most likely be required to spend at least a certain portion of your time at the degree-granting institution, as most schools have some sort of "residency" requirement.
> 5 votes
---
Tags: phd
---
|
thread-35027
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35027
|
Referring to myself in my thesis
|
2014-12-31T14:59:39.840
|
# Question
Title: Referring to myself in my thesis
I am not an English native speaker and I wrote my thesis in English. If in the title page of my thesis I would like to write
Advisor: "The name of my advisor"
*M*: "My name",
then what should *M* most commonly be?
My choice for *M* is "student" but am not sure of that.
Note: The common culture of my country makes me write the title page as what I show in my question. I may very well be considered "improper" or even "rude" if I do not do that, and consequently would incur unnecessary judgements.
# Answer
> 7 votes
Firstly, let me remark that, as other have suggested, it is better to check the preferred format of your university.
In case you can't find any, a possible alternative to *Author* (or nothing) can be *Candidate*, because, at the moment, you are a candidate to some kind of examination and the thesis is the work you have to present before a board of examiners to pass it.
# Answer
> 8 votes
For any specific thesis, you should check the regulations of the institution the thesis will be submitted to. There are often strict rules about the formatting of the title page.
I've not come across the advisor being listed first. The format I'm most familiar with would be something like the following:
> # Why there are no Frogs on the Moon
>
> ## Neil Armstrong
>
> Advisor: Dr Thomas O. Paine
There's no need to write a word before the author's name. It is understood that any title page will contain the title and the author so any name that is not explained as being something else (e.g., "Advisor:", "Editor:") must be the author. You see the same with academic papers: the authors are usually not explicitly described as authors; it's just implicit that the list of names below the title is the list of authors.
Note also that the name(s) of the author(s) usually come before any other people who have contributed to the document. Authorship is regarded as by far the most important contribution.
# Answer
> 1 votes
Simply write (**By:"Your name"**), that's it.
---
Tags: thesis
---
|
thread-8359
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/8359
|
Archiving papers, simulation and experimental data, etc?
|
2013-03-04T04:51:25.447
|
# Question
Title: Archiving papers, simulation and experimental data, etc?
Archiving of papers and projects is very important for most of the people, and everyone has a method of it.
I, personally, try to have different folders for different papers. In the folder of each paper, in addition to my manuscript, I keep my simulation files, experimental data, program codes, etc, in different subfolders. Also, I try to keep track of my revisions on the paper, reviewer comments, my response to reviewers in different subfolders. My method has the advantage of all the related material for a paper are together, and I can quickly track the whole process from initial submission to the final proofreading. However, this usually leads to duplicated files.
I work with both my office desktop and my personal Laptop. I transfer my files between these systems by a flash memory. I agree maybe cloud technology is a better choice in this age, but I postponed it because of my poor internet connection at home.
I am curious to know how others approach to archive their works. I also hope to find some methods more efficient than mine, or get some tips to improve my method.
*Edit at 2 Apr 13:* Thanks to these great answers, it is almost a month that I use **Git** for my version control. Also, I manage my repositories in the **Bitbucket**, which gives me unlimited storage for unlimited number of projects.
# Answer
> 16 votes
I have a similar approach with folders, with two additions:
1. Everything goes into a revision control system. In my case, I've got some things in Subversion repositories, and others in Mecurial repositories (I've also dabbled with Git, but haven't made the final transition). The benefits of revision control are that you can always go back to a previous version, you won't have old versions littering your folders, and sharing with collaborators is relatively easy. This should take care of your duplicated-file problem.
2. I also use Dropbox extensively, in order to have my files available on any computer at any time. Dropbox provides a modicum of version control (30 days worth), but it should not replace a proper revision control system. It does provide a cloud-based backup of your work.
Finally, regardless of how you're keeping your work arranged, make sure you keep an off-site backup (e.g., via Dropbox or personally-controlled media).
# Answer
> 9 votes
1. I generally write in LaTeX and do statistics in R so those can be easily versioned in a Git repository on BitBucket. On a sidenote, I chose BitBucket over GitHub that because collaborating is easier as it allows you to set up repos that can be forked but you can still prevent the forker from sharing it publicly. GitHub on the other hand (at least when I last looked) required you to tightly integrate into teams. Also, using Git submodules allows me to include common parts (such as my BibTeX files) into multiple projects without duplication of versions (though technically it does reside in multiple places on the drive), however this sometimes causes me some grief because I'm not very skilled with Git.
2. I have tried to acquire additional space in every way I can for Dropbox. It is now large enough that I can generally keep 100% of my active projects (some of them are the Git repos from above) in it. This way everything is always backed up offsite with no intervention. Because I work out of Dropbox as opposed to "My Documents" or the like, I also can seamlessly move from my Windows box at work to my laptop running Ubuntu or OSX. This also means that my stuff is not only backed up in the cloud but also on my other machine's hard drive. One tricky thing for me is the sharing between the two OSes on the laptop. For that I keep the Dropbox in a shared partition, to avoid wasting 2X the disk space.
3. Finally, I do an incremental backup every week or so when I think to plug my external drive in. That external drive is well cared for in a fancy case with fans and it is usually powered off except when I'm backing up. It never leaves my home.
So I have the storage part pretty well worked out. However, I'm constantly trying to tweak the organization part. Right now I keep a projects directory in my Dropbox with multiple subprojects labeled like "2012-XXX\_YYY\_ZZZ" in some attempt to sort them. In these directories are generally subdirectories for study materials (I work with human-subjects), analysis, notes, and any products such as papers that came from the work. In the analysis directory is generally a subdirectory with the actual R code. I try to name that directory something like R\_git, as I generally use the ending to signify that something is backed up elsewhere in another repo. My system gets difficult when I create a product (such as a paper) based on two projects (perhaps two studies). In that case I usually just move the paper subdirectory out to the main projects directory to avoid duplication. I do sometimes find myself searching through directories trying to remember where a given paper was stored, so clearly my system needs more work.
# Answer
> 9 votes
Toward the less-addressed organizational aspect of the question, I find that I need to maintain a fairly structured organization in order to effectively manage my papers, presentation, code, etc. over time. My methods result in a minor amount of duplication, but it is rare and there are never more than 3 copies of a document at the very most. This is, of course, my own idiosyncratic system, but perhaps it will be useful as inspiration or a template for how you think about developing your own.
First, my driving principles of organization:
* Since collaborative projects have to be shared in so many different ways, I do not use any specialty organizational software, but just the hierarchy of the file system.
* My primary sorting heuristic mirrors how I organize my time (and how it is attributed to projects in funding bookkeeping)
* Higher level directory names are shorter, since they are more persistent and more frequently typed; lower level names are as long as they need to be to understand what they are far in the future.
* No directory should have more than a dozen or so subdirectories
Following these principles, my first layer of directories are sorted by the main business functions of academia:
* **pursuit**: all proposals and funding pursuit goes here
* **projects**: this directory contains one subdirectory for each funded project that is currently active (plus one for each major line of preliminary work). Rationale: each grant/contract needs to have its activities tracked individually for reporting to the funder.
* **internal**: administrative dealings with my institution, such as travel receipts, training documents, and internal process documents go here. Travel receipts get their own subdirectory.
* **service**: professional service, including teaching, recommendation letters, conference organization, seminar series, journal editing, and reviewing. One subdirectory for each major topic (e.g., one for each conference, another for all recommendation letters).
* **notes**: all personal notes and reading, with a subdirectory for talk notes, another for manuals, and another for downloaded papers (with further subdirectories for major topics)
* **sites**: contains one directory for each website where I am one of the maintainers.
Every one of these also contains either an archive subdirectory, where I move completed tasks, either by topic (e.g., pursuit, projects) or by year (e.g., internal, service).
In any second-level directory, I maintain a README file that tells me what I will need to know when I re-visit something after forgetting all about it. The directories for funded projects also have a stereotyped structure:
* **contract**: This is where all contract documents go for funded projects.
* **admin**: all reporting, deliverables, etc.
* **publications**: each paper gets its own directory; the conference presentation for a paper and any derivative papers also go here.
* **presentations**: all presentations not directly associated with a paper go here
* Beyond that, there are directories for each major strand of work in the project
* For publications, every published paper (and supplement) also gets a copy, with a long informative name including the year, in the publications directory for my professional website.
* For collaborative projects, there may also be a top-level split between internal and shared, with certain documents having a master version in internal and a second copy in shared.
Finally, everything that I care about must be backed up in two different ways:
1. By the backup system of each machine that I use.
2. By means of some sort of synchronization software (with version control when possible). I am currently using a mixture of SVN, git, Mercurial, Dropbox, and BitTorrent Sync, chosen per-project based on the collaborators.
# Answer
> 5 votes
I do something vaguely similar, however I also use a makefile to integrate the simulations with the LaTeX source code for the paper (generally there are also a set of MATLAB files that generate the contents of tables and the figures). Then if necessary, the experiments can be repeated and the results stitched in to the paper again, just by typing "make". However, more recently I have been having to make a lot of use of my universities High Performance Computing facility, which makes it much more difficult to do this. It works nicely for more simple projects though.
# Answer
> 4 votes
The question of archiving and synchronizing is a good one and for me relates also to backup and storage as key questions, particularly when working on more than one computer. I will describe what I do without implying it is THE solution, it works for me. I have my work computer as well as a desktop at home. I also have several laptops.
1. On the two desktops at home and work, the data resides on the harddisk, organized in a folder system that has developed over time. I have two 600 Gb 2.5" portable harddisks which I carry between work and office and which I use as shuttle/backups by synchronizing with the desktops at home and work. I use a software called Total Commander (shareware), which works fine for me but I am sure others can be used. This way I have three copies, at work, at home and on the portable disk(s), at all times (except in the worst case antyhing produced between syncs).
2. I do not have any data on my laptops but use the 2.5" as an external hard disk when I am away from home and work. I keep a second 2.5" for backup if I am away for longer periods and try to transport the two disks separately, one in carry on and one in checked in luggage. (I have to add I do not have any secret data so I do not worry about disks being stolen apart from my own losses). I could have all data on the laptop as well but have opted for having a faster but smaller SSD disk in the laptop so my data will not fit.
3. I use drpbox to keep a limited number of files that I use frequently and most often need to share with others. I also use Dropbox to deposit files that I think I might need for specific purposes when out of the office as an extra backup and to be able to access quickly. I do not use Dropbox as a backup but rather backup dropbox occassionally, particularly collaborative files.
This works for me and the solution has developed over time and now the synching is a natural begin-end of the work day and I live with three (four when I synch the second, pure backup, hard disk) exact copies. I could go for an automatic backup as well but have not felt this was worth it at this stage. With this system, I always carry with me all files I have ever produced. I clearly see this will be impossible for some activities but will be quite feasible for most.
# Answer
> 3 votes
Several great answers here already, but here's a few more things to consider:
You could take a look at rsync (graphical interfaces are available) and unison for synchronising data/documents between different computers (and/or a USB memory stick). Rsync is simpler but unidirectional, though you can effectively do a full sync by rsyncing in one direction then the other. Unison is much more powerful and results in the two copies ending up identical, letting you specify which files to ignore, how to resolve conflicts, etc. I use unison every day to keep my laptop and desktop in sync.
Also, don't discount your own university's networked storage if available, which will usually take care of backup and give you a level of protection against most problems short of a nuclear bomb. This can be slow when accessed offsite, for example, but for ours I find it doesn't matter too much as long as your files aren't enormous. If nothing else, it can be useful as a "master" copy that you synchronise your other copies against.
Finally, however you choose to organise your files and folders, spend a few minutes writing down *how* you're organising them in a read-me file so that, if the worse should happen, your colleagues can understand how to access your files and your work won't be wasted.
---
Tags: publications, software, data, tools, backup-archiving
---
|
thread-35240
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35240
|
Potential Impact of Pass/Fail vs. Letter Grade in Elective Courses
|
2015-01-04T22:50:17.033
|
# Question
Title: Potential Impact of Pass/Fail vs. Letter Grade in Elective Courses
The current grading system of my university allows graduate students to either receive a letter grade (A through F) or receive a Pass/Fail grade (where A-C is Pass) in any course offered. Each student must indicate his/her grading preference for each course within the first 2 weeks of the term. Most departments have a strict requirement that all "required" courses must be taken for a letter grade; however, elective courses can either be taken for a letter grade or Pass/Fail. Many of these elective courses are advanced versions of "required" courses, or they might be intermediate to advanced courses in other departments that are still related to one's research area.
When it comes time to apply for postdoc or junior faculty positions, could choosing to take elective courses Pass/Fail negatively impact hiring or funding decisions? For example, suppose a postdoc advertisement states that the position requires knowledge of a technique or area covered in an elective course. Would the fact that an applicant received a "Pass" in the course be considered the same as if the grade was instead an A or B? Alternatively, is it better to risk getting a B (or C) in a hard elective course instead of "playing it safe" by electing to Pass/Fail the course (where A, B, and C all get the same grade)? Are there any situations where the choice between letter grade vs. Pass/Fail can impact anything negatively or positively?
I've often heard that grades don't matter as much in graduate school compared to things like research output and networking, which may make this question a bit irrelevant. Still, I would be curious what others think.
# Answer
> 6 votes
Unless you're applying for a post-doctoral position at a corporation or somewhere else where HR personnel will be screening your materials before forwarding them to the person doing the hiring (where GPA might be scrutinized), I don't think it frankly makes much difference. Your work as a researcher matters **much** more than your performance in an elective course taken in graduate school that may have little to do with your proposed research area for the postdoc.
---
Tags: graduate-school, job-search, postdocs, grades
---
|
thread-35226
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35226
|
Consequences of applying for two (or more) programs in one university
|
2015-01-04T16:27:51.933
|
# Question
Title: Consequences of applying for two (or more) programs in one university
Is it alright to apply for two different programs in one university (and in some cases programs within one *department*) at the same time?
I wonder whether that would affect the decision of the admission committee. For instance, will that make them reject both applications due to the differences (different ideas expressed) in each statement of purpose? Will it have any effect in general?
Finally, do you recommend such approach?
**UPDATE:**
I finally applied to two different Master's programmes at one university, and actually got accepted to both of the programmes without any problems. However, the programmes were in different departments! But they were both Computer Science/Technology-related programmes.
# Answer
> 11 votes
When I applied to graduate school, I sometimes sent applications to two departments within the same university because I could see myself being a fit for either department. In fact, at least one school had explicit instructions for applicants to two or more departments, so it is likely not as uncommon as one might think.
My experience was that it didn't really matter that I applied to two different departments within the same school. The biggest issue was making sure that things like my GRE scores and letters were sent to both departments instead of just one, since somehow there were mix ups along the way. In terms of the review of my application, I don't think there were any drawbacks because there was no overlap between the two review committees (i.e., no one who reviewed applications for department #1 also reviewed applications for department #2). As such, expressing different ideas in different SOPs, etc. did not have any impact on my admissions to my knowledge.
I would, however, caution you against applying to two degree programs within the same department (e.g., the Master's degree and the doctoral degree). Since it's within the same department, chances are high that the same people will be reviewing both applications, or at the very least, it is likely that someone will notice that you applied to two different degree programs. This might come across as a sign that you do not fully know what you want to do, which can hurt your application to both programs. Many departments (although certainly not all) have a policy where if you apply to the PhD program and are rejected, you can automatically be considered for the Master's degree program. If you know you ultimately want to apply for a PhD, I would apply for the PhD and see if you can be considered for the Master's program if your application is unsuccessful.
---
Tags: masters, application
---
|
thread-35237
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35237
|
Do graduate schools care about published solutions of contest problems in Mathematical magazines?
|
2015-01-04T20:49:37.693
|
# Question
Title: Do graduate schools care about published solutions of contest problems in Mathematical magazines?
The math club at my university spends its time solving problems from mathematical magazines (e.g. Mathematics Magazine). Let's assume I, as an undergraduate student, submit a solution to a challenge problem from such a magazine, and my solution is published. Is there any advantage to having one or more published solutions like this when applying to graduate school?
For reference, assume this is graduate school in math.
# Answer
> 12 votes
Sure, that would certainly be viewed favorably. How favorably would depend on the rest of the application and the institution (though I can't think of any situation in which it would play a decisive role), but if the question is having done it whether to list it, then the answer is a clear **yes**.
If on the other hand you haven't done the problem-solving yet but are wondering whether you should engage in this activity for the value it has in your future grad school application: I don't recommend that, but I can think of plenty worse ways to spend your time.
---
Tags: publications, graduate-admissions
---
|
thread-35244
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35244
|
Citing "p. x" to mean page ten of a book looks confusing since "x" isn't clearly a Roman Numeral
|
2015-01-05T00:45:56.977
|
# Question
Title: Citing "p. x" to mean page ten of a book looks confusing since "x" isn't clearly a Roman Numeral
By theory, I should cite `page x` (page ten) like `[Krusche1999, p. x]`. If it were on `page iii` or `page xi`, it would look better, such as `[Krusche1999, p. iii]` or `[Krusche1999, p. xi]`. However, it is on `page x`, so we end up with `p. x`. At least to me, I won't understand, what `p. x` means at first sight. What do you think? Any good ideas?
# Answer
> 9 votes
You shouldn't be veering from the style guide (you are of course following a style guide, right?), and style guides cover such meticulous points as this. Even if you feel their advice is a little off and you might have a better solution to a readability problem, you should never contradict it. (Why you should not contradict it is a lengthier topic, and I think this answer stands without going into it.)
So, the right thing to do is consult your respective style guide whether it's AMA or Chicago or anything else, and do what it says.
# Answer
> 3 votes
To expand on AAA's answer, the correct answer to any question about citation style is always "check with the guidelines of the journal in question." To give one example, the Chicago Manual of Style clearly lists how to cite introductory page numbers. Your journal will link to something similar; check their documentation and do whatever they say.
---
Tags: citations, citation-style
---
|
thread-35249
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35249
|
When applying to a PhD program whose strength is not my concentration field, should I adjust my statement of purpose to match their area of strength?
|
2015-01-05T07:33:18.933
|
# Question
Title: When applying to a PhD program whose strength is not my concentration field, should I adjust my statement of purpose to match their area of strength?
I am applying to a PhD in Economics; I am a big in Macro Economics as my background is entirely in macro.
One of the schools I am interested in is more focused in game theory. They have some economists focused in macro & monetary theory but it's just 2-3 members, extremely small compared to the other PhD programs I am applying to.
Should I reword my statement of purpose to areas they have more focus in? I like the school a lot! Do I make myself more or less competitive by being interested in an area a university isn't its best strength?
Two ways of looking at it:
1. If I say I am interested in X and most of the faculty is doing Y and the students and program are more focused in subject Y, less of the faculty vote for my admissions and I am rejected.
Or
2. I am interested in X and most of the faculty is doing Y, subject X is underrepresented, I become a minority and they vote me in.
Which one do you think is the more likely outcome? Should I reword my SOP to the school's strength?
# Answer
It seems you are looking at this from the wrong angle.
You should not (primarily) tune your SOP to whatever increases your chances of acceptance, but to your *interests*. If you are "a big Macro guy", then what good does it do you to pretend like you are really into Game Theory? Do you want to do your PhD in Game Theory, even if you are not passionate about it (hint: you really shouldn't)?
Further, is it possible that you are actually not applying to the right school, if they have close to no faculty in your speciality? Why do you think this school is a good fit? If this question has a good (academic) answer, this is what you write in the SOP. If the answer is non-academic (*"I like their sports team!"*), I suggest you should reconsider applying to this school altogether. As you can see from browsing various questions on this site, being in the "wrong" grad school can be a terrible experience.
> 7 votes
---
Tags: phd, graduate-admissions, statement-of-purpose, economics
---
|
thread-35253
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35253
|
Who issues the transcripts that applicants are asked to upload for a PhD application?
|
2015-01-05T11:28:14.603
|
# Question
Title: Who issues the transcripts that applicants are asked to upload for a PhD application?
For applying on PhD programm I need to upload Bachelor Certificate, Bachelor Grades, Master Certificate and Master Grades? I must upload it in PDF files.
My question is who is the issuer of these transcripts? Universities?
Do I have to translate these documents and the scan to PDF?
Please for a little guidance.
# Answer
The basic problem is that different countries (and potentially different universities within a country) have different standards about what constitutes a program of study and what official documents they provide.
I did my studies in two different Australian universities - both provided a certificate at completion and a transcript. The transcript is essentially a list of all the subjects I studied and the marks. In Australia (at least for the programs I did), there is no overall grade on the certificate. That is, the certificate just says that I completed the course but doesn't say 'cum laude' or 'with distinction' or anything else that US universities might expect. The transcipt is used instead to provide information about the student's skills. One of the universities also supplied a third document, which provides a description of the program of study (eg number of years, what a major is) to help international universities understand what the qualification means.
I don't tend to need these when applying for anything within Australia because the universities have systems in place to communicate with each other. However, they are always required whenever I am applying for anything at any university outside of Australia.
Your university should be able to provide you with something official. The best area to ask is probably whichever administration group is responsible for providing the certificates when you complete. If you don't have anything official, you could provide your results notices and the contact details of whoever at the university is able to confirm they are correct.
> 2 votes
---
Tags: graduate-admissions, transcript-of-records
---
|
thread-32395
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/32395
|
Does a low GPA in an unrelated (second) major affect math PhD admissions?
|
2014-11-28T01:04:59.870
|
# Question
Title: Does a low GPA in an unrelated (second) major affect math PhD admissions?
I'm a second year undergrad in Canada, double majoring in math and philosophy. I take philosophy only because it is a spare time interest in high school, but I'm planning to apply math PhD after my undergrad study.
The problem now is that, my philosophy grade is overall 3.3(77-79, B+), though my math grade is 4.0(85+,A).
I'm wondering whether or not my philosophy grade will affect my math PhD application (targeting a top 20 program in North America)?
# Answer
> 5 votes
For a math PhD program, the GPA in math is by far the most important. Your overall GPA still counts for something, but GPA *in a different major* may not count for anything more: if you applied to my math PhD program (UGA), I don't think your philosophy GPA would specifically be considered by us. If your overall GPA were something like 3.5 and your math GPA is 4.0: well, then you look like an overall good student who is outstanding at math. That's what math PhD programs want!
Having said that: I note that (i) you intend to go to a math PhD program, (ii) you have a perfect(?) math GPA and a (perfectly respectable but) significantly lower GPA in your second major, and (iii) you describe your second major "as a spare time interest in high school". I don't quite get it: you're not in high school anymore, so....tell me again why you're majoring in philosophy?
---
Tags: phd, graduate-admissions, mathematics, gpa
---
|
thread-30573
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/30573
|
How can I replicate a search strategy described in a publication?
|
2014-10-26T01:27:07.470
|
# Question
Title: How can I replicate a search strategy described in a publication?
I found a Cochrane Review from 2012. I would like to perform a new search with the same search strategy to see if there are an updates in this topic. The search strategy is given at the bottom of this post.
Now my questions: Where can I input those keywords? Did they perform every line a whole new search, or are those keywords linked together via one search.
I have access to OVID and read/watched some tutorials but they didn't show me something similar.
---
The search strategy:
> Appendix 1. MEDLINE via OVID search strategy
>
> 1. Molar, Third/
> 2. (“third molar\*” or “wisdom tooth” or “wisdom teeth” or “3rd molar\*” or third-molar).mp.
> 3. T ooth, impacted/
> 4. ((tooth adj5 impact$) or (teeth adj5 impact$)).mp.
> 5. T ooth, unerupted/
> 6. unerupt$.mp.
> 7. 1 or 2
> 8. 3 or 4 or 5 or 6
> 9. 7 and 8
> 10. T ooth extraction/
> 11. (extract$ or remov$).mp.
> 12. asymptom$.mp.
> 13. (symptomless or symptom-free or “symptom free”).mp.
> 14. (trouble-free or “trouble free”).mp.
> 15. or/10-14
> 16. 9 and 15
>
> The above subject search was linked to the Cochrane Highly Sensitive Search Strategy (CHSSS) for identifying randomised trials in MEDLINE: sensitivity maximising version (2008 revision) as referenced in Chapter 6.4.11.1 and detailed in box 6.4.c of the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions version 5.1.0 (updated March 2011).
>
> 1. randomized controlled trial.pt.
> 2. controlled clinical trial.pt.
> 3. randomized.ab.
> 4. placebo.ab.
> 5. drug therapy.fs.
> 6. randomly.ab.
> 7. trial.ab.
> 8. groups.ab.
> 9. or/1-8
> 10. exp animals/ not humans.sh.
> 11. 9 not 10
# Answer
> 1 votes
You should probably take a look at the Cochrane Handbook. What you have are two searches. The first is a search for papers about 3rd molars. The 2nd is the CHSSS and is used to find the RCT studies from the search of the 3rd molars. You need to enter the search items exactly as the history shows since some steps refer to previous steps (e.g., step 9 of the first search refers to steps 7 and 8).
---
Tags: publications, literature-search, review-articles, pubmed
---
|
thread-35255
|
https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/35255
|
How to highlight language abilities in cover letter for a scientific research position?
|
2015-01-05T12:17:24.120
|
# Question
Title: How to highlight language abilities in cover letter for a scientific research position?
I'm applying for a scientific research position at a Welsh university and one of the desirable skills is to demonstrate an understanding of the bilingual nature of the University.
As I am fluent in Welsh, I would like to add a sentence to my cover letter stating that I am a bilingual. I would like to write something that makes them feel that it is important to have someone that can speak Welsh and that this would benefit the university.
Can anyone suggest an appropriate sentence to include?
# Answer
> 4 votes
To address your specific question, I would propose the following sentence for your letter (or something similar to your liking) to highlight your language skills. I would position it toward the bottom, in the concluding paragraph:
> I also believe that my fluency in Welsh will contribute to my ability to effectively support the university's bilingual nature.
(alternative wording):
> ...the university's mission of bilingual service.
I would not worry about providing any additional evidence of Welsh proficiency (as a letter written in the language) as you only want to submit the exact documents required in the application, nothing more. If there will be any need to ascertain your language ability, it can be easily done in a quick chat as part of your interview process or by phone.
Good luck!
# Answer
> 1 votes
I would go beyond what Aymor said and write a paragraph of your cover letter in Welsh where you discuss the importantance of the bilingual philosophy. Stating you are fluent is quite different than demonstrating it.
---
Tags: language, application-cover-letter
---
|
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.