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thread-1437 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1437 | How to accredit my Ph.D. in USA | 2012-05-06T09:12:05.377 | # Question
Title: How to accredit my Ph.D. in USA
I got my Ph.D. from the Faculty of Computers and Information Technology, Cairo University in 2007. I want to know if it is possible to compensate or to accredit my Ph.D. from USA. If it is possible, I want to know the steps for that. Advise and tell me if there is any program in USA for a Ph.D. holder to improve and add on to his career.
# Answer
In the U.S., most academic fields are not like medicine: there is no licensing and for most purposes there are not strict legal requirements for what constitutes a degree. In particular, there is nothing that needs to or can be done to accredit a foreign Ph.D. (Other countries may differ. For example, Germany used to treat non-EU Ph.D.'s differently; see http://www.zeit.de/2008/12/C-Seitenhieb-12.)
Regarding more specific issues:
Employers sometimes verify CVs, but that is not your responsibility. If they need to check that you have a legitimate Ph.D. from Cairo University, then they will get in touch with the university directly to verify this. You do not need to help (and in fact they won't allow you to help, to make sure the verification is unbiased), so all you need to do is to make sure everything on your CV is true.
You may run into people who acknowledge that you have a legitimate Ph.D. but have no idea what the standards of Cairo University are. That will give you a modest disadvantage compared with students from, say, Stanford, but there's nothing you can do about it. Ultimately, if you publish strong papers in prestigious venues, then that will matter much more than where your Ph.D. is from. If you don't, then you will not get a research job anyway, wherever you studied.
If you are talking about upgrading the degree somehow - perhaps getting additional certification or even another degree from a particularly prestigious school - then it basically can't be done. It's not truly impossible, and I know of a couple of cases in which people with Ph.D.s from other countries enrolled as students in the U.S. in order to improve their job chances. However, most U.S. universities strongly discourage this, on the grounds that it's a waste of time and resources to devote a space in a graduate program to someone who already has a Ph.D. in the same field (or a closely related one).
> 14 votes
# Answer
Although it is not possible to "accredit" a foreign degree, there are services out there that will determine if your foreign degree is equivalent to a degree issued by an accredited university in the United States. This type of service might be useful for immigration purposes and it might be necessary to apply for certain jobs in the United States, especially in the public sector. There are lists of foreign degree equivalency service providers available.
If you look at the services offered by Educational Credential Evaluators, the reports that can be purchased vary in detail (and, of course, cost). These reports are not cheap and, in most instances, probably unnecessary, so I would hold off on getting one done until I'm positive I'll need one.
> 8 votes
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Tags: phd, thesis, united-states, accreditation
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thread-1447 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1447 | What are some good practices for applying to the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program? | 2012-05-06T21:13:16.403 | # Question
Title: What are some good practices for applying to the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program?
1. Is it possible if I could get 4 letters of recommendation?
2. How far in advance should I notify those who are writing my letters?
3. Does activity on sites like Quora, Stack Exchange, and Reddit's AskScience (as well as a personal webpage/blog of one's research) count as public outreach?
# Answer
> 28 votes
I think it's helpful to understand how NSF graduate research fellowship applications are reviewed. *\[**Caveat lector:** This answer was written in **2012**; the application requirements and the evaluation procedure have both changed significantly since then. I strongly recommending consulting someone who has been on the review panel more recently.\]*
Each application consists of the following components: a 2-page personal statement; a 2-page description of past research; a 2-page description of proposed future research, transcripts, and ***exactly three*** recommendation letters. If you attempt to send four, NSF simply refuses the fourth letter; on the other hand, if only two letters arrive by the deadline, your application is rejected without review.
All 10000+ applications are reviewed in a single three-day physical meeting. Applications are split into 30+ subject areas, each considered by a separate review panel. Each panel has 20-30 members and reviews 300-400 proposals. (All these figures are ballparky; panels vary in size depending on the number of applications.)
Before review, applications are divided into levels based on the applicants' time in graduate school: None (30%), less than a semester (30%), less than 12 months (30%), and more than 12 months (10%). All level-1 applications are reviewed together, then all level-2 applications, and so on. **Expectations are significantly higher for more experienced applicants.** The precise expectations obviously vary by discipline, but in computer science, pre-students need a credible research plan, early students need publishable results, and older students usually need multiple publications. The "more than 12 months" level is only for people with extenuating circumstances, like a *significant* change of field.
The 12-month limit counts time that applicants have actually been registered, *not* time since entering their first graduate program. So a student who started a PhD program in August 2011 and does not register for classes this summer will still be eligible in September 2012. **If you want to apply in your second year, do not take classes your first summer.**
Each review consists of a "letter grade" (excellent, very good, good, fair, or poor) and a narrative evaluation of "Intellectual Merit"; a letter grade and a narrative evaluation of "Broader Impact"; and an overall numerical score. The panelists use the numerical scores to cluster the applications into four categories: Yes (10%), Maybe (25%), Honorable Mention (5%), and No (60%). NSF uses the narrative evaluations to decide which Maybes get fellowships and which get honorable mentions.
Every proposal is reviewed twice, the proposals in the *No* pile are retired, and each of the remaining proposals is reviewed a third time. Thus, each reviewer reviews roughly 35-40 proposals. **On average, each reviewer spends 20-30 minutes on each proposal.** That's just enough time to read each of the documents once, make a snap judgement, and then assemble a narrative review from a pile of boilerplate sentences. It's brutal, especially because **most applications are strong**.
So anything you can do to make your reviewers' life easier will work to your advantage. *Every* component of your application should *directly* address each of the two main review criteria. In particular, all three statements and all three recommendation letters should include a paragraph describing intellectual merit, starting with the phrase **Intellectual Merit** in boldface type, and another paragraph describing broader impact, starting with the phrase **Broader Impact** in boldface type. Both paragraphs should say something specific, substantial, and credible.
For security/privacy reasons, the review panel does *not* have internet access; reviewers are not even permitted to use their own laptops. So if you use your StackExchange participation as an example of broader impact, be specific about *how* you participate; the panelists can't look up your answers or your reputation.
Another point to keep in mind is that reviewers are probably *not* experts in the applicant's chosen subdiscipline. An application by an aspiring astrophysicist studying planetary climatology (to make up a random example) might be reviewed by a high-energy astrophysicist, an expert in planetary formation, and a string theorist. Yes, your statements must include enough field-specific technical detail in your statements to be credible, but the overall goals and merits of your proposed research should be clear to a broader audience.
For fine details, it's always best to talk with faculty in your field who have experience with NSF fellowship winners, either as an advisor, a reference, or a panelist. (The most useful letters read "I have written reference letters for *x* NSF fellowship applicants, of which *y* were successful; I would rank this student among the top *z* of those fellowship winners.") It's also a good idea to talk with past fellowship winners in your (target) department; ask to read their applications *and their reviews*.
See also NSF's advice.
# Answer
> 11 votes
To riff of off JeffE's comment:
* Although only three letters of recommendation are allowed to be considered, you should always have an "emergency" writer on backup just in case one of the other writers can't submit the letter on time for whatever reason (sudden illness, job change, etc.). You don't want to miss out on the opportunity because somebody *else* dropped the ball.
* You should notify them as far in advance as is logistically possible. You should already know who your letter-writers will be; you should find out how much advance time they need now, so that you can plan accordingly in the fall.
* While most of those sites would count as public reach, I don't think Academia.SE would fall under that rubric. Something discipline-specific, on the other hand, would.
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Tags: graduate-school, funding, application, nsf
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thread-1358 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1358 | Good practices with lab wikis? | 2012-05-02T01:27:09.557 | # Question
Title: Good practices with lab wikis?
OpenWetWare and Google Sites have been effective strategies in curating lab knowledge. I was curious about what are effective ways to create an effective wiki. Factors include:
* Ease of use and low learning curve
* Speed of sharing and diversity of shared files
* Privacy and protection from sabotage
* Organizational flow
* Legally sharing papers/manuscripts
# Answer
> 4 votes
In one of the **labs (about a dozen people)** I work with, we use a MediaWiki install given to use by the university that requires log-in to view everything but the front page or to edit. Although the learning curve is not steep (most people already know how to use Wikipedia) it has been hard to convince the undergraduate lab members to use the wiki. It mostly serves as a place for:
* short project summaries (since the lab has many different projects)
* notes/minutes from lab meetings, a place to store slides and presentations, and
* link repository (for instance I maintain a big collection of links to relevant StackExchange questions).
With a former supervisor, we used to have a private MediaWiki install that was used by a our **small group (3 or 4 people)**. Since we worked on theory/math it contained:
* short tutorials on how to do automated calculations as experiments for testing potential theorems (before trying to prove them), and
* collection of special cases that we had calculated by hand.
It was relatively well maintained by the prof, and a pretty good guide for understanding some of the work behind his earlier papers.
I also keep a **personal** private TiddlyWiki, there I keep:
* notes from papers I've read (although I am slowly moving this over to Mendeley)
* collections of relevant links from the internet
* a more structured index of the folders and files on my harddrive (through local links) that is easier to navigate and search than my file system directly.
* partial documentation of code and notes on partial results of simulations
* administrative stuff like members of mailing lists, and groups I organize.
For me, the most useful was the private Wiki, the second most useful was the small group wiki because of the good maintenance by my prof, and least useful is the large lab wiki.
# Answer
> 6 votes
A wiki is a platform, which you can use in whatever way you see fit. Personally, I've used them academically for the following purposes:
## Lab notebook
I was running cognitive psychology experiments on subjects. I would make a top-level page that contained links to a separate page for all of my research projects. On each research project page, I had links to separate pages for each of the following:
* Study protocols (behavioral testing, brain scanning, data cleaning, data analysis) - separate pages for each
* Change log to the paradigm itself
* Troubleshooting notes... as I encountered problems, write them down here
* Subjects (one page per subject
Each subject page contained notes on each session, results, general info ("subject performed poorly today, possibly due to stress from midterms"), as well as the results of their data analysis.
## Publication repository
This wiki was basically a place for me to store papers. Many wikis allow embedding of pdfs, and I would store pages as follows. The top-level page segmented topics. Each topic page contained links to pages about individual papers, as well as links to ongoing summaries of my reading. This was where I would write down my thoughts and conclusions after reading papers, and made it easier for me to combine my thoughts on multiple papers... after reading a new article, I would review what I had written there and try to somehow incorporate the new article in my ideas (if relevant, more often than not it wasn't).
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These are just two ideas, and they were just used by me, not my whole lab. I'm sure you can think of more (managing lab meetings, managing collaborations, managing lab-wide protocols, etc).
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Tags: online-resource, lab-management
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thread-1473 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1473 | Publishing previous results from a previous lab | 2012-05-08T01:20:47.207 | # Question
Title: Publishing previous results from a previous lab
I just looked over this article from Retraction Watch.
To make a long story short, a student used previous data from their former lab and then published it without the PI's permission or knowledge.
While the above is a rather extreme example of poor ethics, I'm curious where the line gets drawn regarding the ownership of research. I can understand if the data was produced in one environment and then get published in another. What about reagents (clones come to mind) that were produced in a previous lab and then were transported to a new lab? What about ideas that were developed in one lab and then taken to another?
# Answer
> 2 votes
I think that so long as the principal investigator is actively involved in the planning, performance, or analysis of the research being funded, it is the duty of any researcher working in that group to determine the PI's status as a co-author. However, only if there is no active intellectual activity taking place—in other words, it's an entirely self-driven initiative, then it might be possible to say that the PI doesn't merit co-author status. (Even then, though, the provision of financial support should be clearly recognized.)
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Tags: ethics
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thread-1469 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1469 | How intensive is the process of interviewing people for faculty openings? | 2012-05-07T21:35:55.490 | # Question
Title: How intensive is the process of interviewing people for faculty openings?
I'm interested in answers for both the individual faculty member and for the department as a whole.
For the individual prospective faculty member - How long does the prospective faculty member's visit usually take, especially compared with the visit of a prospective PhD student applicant? And does the faculty member go through multiple interviews with individual members of the department? I know that the process varies from department to department, but specific examples would still be helpful.
# Answer
**Edit:** This answer applies only to the US.
For me, the typical case seemed to be:
* Day 1: Fly in mid-afternoon. Meet your faculty host and 3-4 faculty members for dinner where you have informal discussions about research, the university, or anything else.
* Day 2: This is the main day. The day lasts from about 8am until about 6pm. You give your 1 hour talk, interview with about 6 different members of the faculty (sometimes more if the meetings are in groups), have lunch, meet with graduate students, meet with the dean, and meet with the chair. After 6pm, you usually get taken to dinner with 3-4 more members of the faculty.
* Day 3: Sometimes you'll have breakfast with your host, sometimes not. Then you fly out.
It also wasn't so different for research labs. Just replace "faculty member" with "research scientist."
I'd say that these visits aren't any longer than a prospective Ph.D. visit, but much more intensive. Also, Ph.D. students usually visit after being admitted, whereas faculty members visit to interview.
> 17 votes
# Answer
Once again, this depends on where you're applying for jobs. In the US, the typical interview is between one and three days, with public presentation, closed presentation to the faculty (or hiring committee), and one-on-one meetings with faculty and possibly students.
In contrast, in Germany, where I now work, the interview is just a public presentation and an interview with the hiring committee. There are no one-on-one meetings, and the idea that they should be scheduled (when I asked about them) struck the organizer of the interview as an entirely novel idea.
> 8 votes
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Tags: professorship, interview, recruiting
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thread-1471 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1471 | When meeting a professor for the first time, is it always a good idea to ask about their research interests? | 2012-05-08T00:08:14.753 | # Question
Title: When meeting a professor for the first time, is it always a good idea to ask about their research interests?
I'd imagine that a good fraction would actually start to tire (a bit) of the repetitiveness of describing their research hundreds of times over, and would probably want to talk about something else.. After all, does the professor usually benefit when they talk about their research to a random undergrad?
Yet, "ask the professor about his research" is generally considered to be standard social advice in academia... (after all, people love to talk about themselves - http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-people-brain-scans.html ). Is the pleasure of talking about your research similar to the excitement of having the liberty to be self-centered and to talk about yourself?
But maybe professors would prefer to talk about something else - it's just that it's hard to think of a topic that they would prefer talking about, so it's simply a "safe option" to ask them questions about their research?
What I am *really* interested in - is this - would professors usually prefer to talk about something other than their research, if some such common topic could conceivably be found?
# Answer
> 13 votes
Two points from experience (as a student):
* Don't ask/talk about something that can be googled
If you want to talk about the professor's research interest, that's great but the key point is not to talk/ask things that can be answered in a Google search. Asking a professor about his research interest might qualify as one of these cases. Checking his webpage (if updated) might answer the question. "Why did you use X instead of Y in your paper titled Z" might probably be a good question to ask (depending upon the occasion). *Now that I reread my answer, I feel professors are like SE sites. Ask closed non-google-able questions while showing interest and initiative and you will have a good time.*
* Gauge the occasion
Needless to say, meeting a professor for the first time in an orientation party, conference or a course orientation might call for different "first conversations". Don't force what you want to talk about on the professor. (But then, this is true for all people not just professors.)
# Answer
> 8 votes
It depends on the context I guess.
If you are alone at a coffee break, and eager to discuss with someone, you should maybe consider discussing on something else, or on someone else research (talk about the talk just before the break, talk about the nice venue, talk about the quality of the banquet, etc.).
But If you have a purpose wrt talking to a specific person, go straight to the point. You have a technical question about one of my paper, ask it! You are looking for an intership, say it! Don't try to be too smart by starting a broad discussion that you will narrow later. You have only a few minutes to go from the status of "yet another boring chitchat" to "mmm, interesting", don't spoil these minutes.
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Tags: etiquette
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thread-1481 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1481 | Additional data for anonymous submission | 2012-05-08T09:29:35.200 | # Question
Title: Additional data for anonymous submission
I've recently submitted a paper to a conference requiring anonymous submission, meaning that the name of the authors should not be included, and no obvious self-reference should be made. The problem is that I add additional information relevant to the submission, such as some proofs and some code working on an example, calculating some numerical data (that could be found on the paper, but requiring some effort).
For a non anonymous submission, I would have published a technical report with all the proofs, cited the report in the submission, hosted the code on my website, and put a link to it. However, since the technical report would not have been anonymous and since my website is obviously linking to me, it was not possible.
Concerning the proofs, I managed to put them in the appendix, explaining that they were only intended for the reviewing process, but I could not find any solution for the code. The conference submission site (easychair) did not provide any way to input additional data. What's the best way to deal with this kind of situations?
# Answer
> 9 votes
There are three criteria: the solution must obscure your identity, it must not allow you to learn anything about the reviewers, and the second criterion must be common knowledge.
Any attempt to distribute files yourself through the web will fail to satisfy these conditions. For example, if you use a website you own (under a pseudonym, say), then you can inspect the logs. Even if you have arranged to use a service that will not provide any logs or allow you to tag pages or link to outside services, the reviewers may not notice that you have done so, and they may not even be willing to believe that you are not doing something tricky.
So this is a problem you cannot solve yourself. You should get in touch with the program committee chair and ask whether the committee could make this data available to the reviewers. As long as it goes through them, it doesn't matter how they provide it.
# Answer
> 5 votes
If you need to distribute stuff anonymously via the web, as far as code goes, you could create a pseudonymous github or Google account for a "project," and then make it accessible during the review period. Once the review period is finished, you could delete the site, if intellectual property issues are a concern.
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Tags: publications, peer-review, anonymity
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thread-1464 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1464 | Why do some arXiv preprints have increased line spacing? | 2012-05-07T17:33:41.220 | # Question
Title: Why do some arXiv preprints have increased line spacing?
Some preprints on arXiv have 1.5- or double-spaced lines, making it less pleasant to read and more wasteful to print.
Is there a reason for it, except for the laziness/sloppiness? (If drafts were \>1-spaced, one need to change only one option.)
# Answer
I think the real underlying cause is just what Anonymous Mathematician said, that having a double-spaced version of a paper is more convenient for going through and making notes on a printed copy. But it's not just a phenomenon of the dark ages; many people still do this today during the revision process when a paper is being prepared for submission.
In fact, at least in physics (my field), the tradition of double-spacing is perpetuated by the fact that at least one of the major journal publishers' LaTeX class defaults to a `preprint` mode which sets the line spacing to double. It is possible to change this to single line spacing by passing a class option for the appropriate journal (`pra`, `prb`, `prl`, etc.), but many authors forget to do this - and somewhat understandably, I think, because their job is to do research, not to be proficient with LaTeX. I would imagine that a similar situation might arise with LaTeX classes used by other publishers and in other fields.
It's worth noting that arXiv recommends *not* submitting in double-spaced mode. But probably very few submitters have the patience to read through the instructions in their entirety.
> 17 votes
# Answer
I don't like it either. My understanding is that it's for historical reasons: in the dark ages, publishers asked for double-spaced manuscripts (produced on typewriters) because it would leave space for the typesetters to mark up the manuscript. Some authors got used to doing this and have continued the tradition to this day, despite the fact that publishers no longer care, and a few younger authors even imitate it. I think a lot of people find it a little annoying, but they typically don't care enough to complain to the authors, so it will take a while for this practice to die out.
P.S. It's not just the arXiv, but also journal submissions.
> 11 votes
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Tags: publications, preprint, arxiv
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thread-1493 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1493 | Student feedback and jealousy between colleagues | 2012-05-08T16:16:38.590 | # Question
Title: Student feedback and jealousy between colleagues
As a student, I know that some lecturers just do a better job at getting their point across than others, consequently I would give them better feedback than others. I assume that teachers receive their feedback, so they know how popular they are with students. And presumably, they also talk about it with colleagues.
I imagine this to be a considerable source of conflict between academics, so I was wondering: How do those in a teaching role at a university/college/... deal with this problem? Does student feedback create awkwardness between colleagues, or is there some kind of unspoken law not to talk about student feedback?
# Answer
> 8 votes
My feeling is that most colleagues just don't care about the feedback. Long before those feedbacks generalized, we already knew who are the good and bad teachers. However, when I was in charge of one year of our engineering program, I tried to move teachers from the lectures where they were poorly graded. It's not easy, but it's do-able. Luckily, it seems uncommon to be globally bad at teaching, so I was always able to find a place for everyone.
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Tags: teaching, community
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thread-1496 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1496 | How to withdraw your paper from an open access journal where it has been accepted? | 2012-05-08T19:40:20.933 | # Question
Title: How to withdraw your paper from an open access journal where it has been accepted?
My paper got accepted in a mediocre open access journal. However later I found out that its publishing fees was too high.
What would be the correct way of asking a withdrawal of your article from the journal?
# Answer
If it has been accepted but you have not yet signed any sort of agreement, then it's easy in theory: you just tell the editor that you have decided to withdraw the paper. They might be unhappy, but you have a right to do this (both legally and according to academic norms).
If the paper has already been published, then there may not be anything you can do. Retracting a published paper is serious business, done only in cases of serious error or unethical behavior.
If you have already agreed to some sort of license allowing publication and paid (or agreed to pay) but the paper has not yet been published, then you should move fast. Legally the journal can go ahead and publish, and they may decide to do so, but your chances of convincing them before they publish the paper are higher than after they publish it.
There have been stories of unethical journals publishing papers that have been withdrawn and then demanding money. If that happens, then it is serious misbehavior on the part of the journal (and proves you were wise to withdraw the paper).
> 28 votes
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Tags: publications, journals, open-access, withdraw
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thread-1010 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1010 | What preparatory steps should I be taking for admission into med school? | 2012-04-04T23:25:19.533 | # Question
Title: What preparatory steps should I be taking for admission into med school?
I've been maintaining a great GPA in a specialization undergraduate program, am planning on taking the MCAT this summer, and have been looking into some volunteering/internship opportunities. Are there any other special precautions that I should be taking to increase the likelihood of my acceptance into med school? Are med schools looking for anything in particular for admissions? An all-encompassing, comprehensive answer would be appreciated, but any advice or tips are appreciated :).
# Answer
> 5 votes
Speaking from (1) experience applying and talking to applications officers, and (2) knowing doctors who take part in the admissions process, I would suggest that the ideal medical student would appear as follows:
* Any major, but very high grades in all pre-med courses
* Very high MCAT score
* Experience working in a hospital *or* medical research lab, with demonstrated results (good recommendations from doctors and published papers, respectively)
* Very personable during the interview, well-liked by all interviewers
None of these should be a surprise; they just want awesome, academic students.
# Answer
> 1 votes
It would be a good idea to seek info from those that might know, such as:
This site is aimed at questions about Academia, I can see how you might think this would be an appropriate place, but the sites listed above should directly answer your questions.
Have you spent time with some of your local medical professionals, found out about their jobs, their specialties? Good luck!
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Tags: graduate-admissions
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thread-1530 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1530 | Being quoted for an incorrect statement | 2012-05-12T09:05:55.213 | # Question
Title: Being quoted for an incorrect statement
Once I expressed an opinion on a question in a discussion with a person working on the problem. My opinion didn't work in its original form but could be modified a little to make it correct, i.e., although not completely correct it contained useful information.
Recently I found that the person I was having the discussion with has quoted me in a paper in an incorrect form by mentioning that I'd expressed the statement. But he has made no claims about its correctness. The person never asked me later for explanation and didn't even check if the way he is quoting me is correct. The discussion was brief and spoken. And he did not even send me a copy of his paper afterwards.
I feel that he should have asked me for clarification before quoting me in the paper or at least he should have given me notice that he is quoting it. At the time of the discussion he agreed to what I said and told me he would contact me about it and even send me a draft.
I don't like being quoted for a statement I don't know, and moreover I am a little bit pissed off by his action (quoting a brief informal discussion about a possible proof of some result without notifying me or asking me for clarification). What should I do now?
The paper is not published yet, it is on arxiv.org.
# Answer
> 16 votes
Contact the author first. Assume the best, that their memory is faulty, and suggest alternative text in a friendly manner. If you do not get a response, contact the editor of the journal they have submitted to.
Ultimately though a lot of people get misquoted, and a lot of publications get misunderstood & cited inappropriately. If it's really a big deal you might get a publication out of contradicting it, but otherwise just be glad that people think you are important enough to mention. It's better than not being given credit for your own ideas!
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Tags: research-process, ethics, publications
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thread-1032 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1032 | What is the usual role of a faculty senate? Does it typically have any real power, or is it a rubber-stamp for the administrators? | 2012-04-06T00:18:52.943 | # Question
Title: What is the usual role of a faculty senate? Does it typically have any real power, or is it a rubber-stamp for the administrators?
Although the presence of a senate suggests that universities nominally are governed somewhat by their faculty, it is frequently stated that there has been a trend towards greater managerialism, which has perhaps undermined the powers of faculty regarding university governance.
What current powers does a faculty senate typically have, or is it mostly a rubber-stamp for the administrators?
# Answer
This question seems a bit wide to answer. Are you interested in public or private schools? Junior college or peer 1 research level? US or elsewhere? Let me answer from the prospective of a 4-year US state institution. Generally senates seem to be what the faculty make of them, they can choose to become a rubber stamp, or choose to act...
**A. The senate functions as a voice of the faculty**
By filtering and focusing the concerns of the faculty, the senate functions as a key voice of the faculty. A voice selected or elected by departments across the campus. The senate can conduct dialog with the administration, offer press releases, lobby with legislators, join in with other institutions to tackle larger issues... Whether or not they are listened to, faculty member should speak together often about the central issues at the institution.
**B. Determination of General Educational Policy**
Traditionally the senate allows the different disciplines to discuss joint concerns, such as the general education policy, starting new programs, ... They are rarely the final voice (or even the key voice) in these issues, but they are an important one. Anytime an educational goal has been set, it is the faculty who should determine the curriculum, these decisions usually pass through a senate body.
**C. Maintaining the Faculty "handbook"**
This may be given different names at different institutions, but the subset of policies and procedures related to tenure, promotion, post tenure review, usually fall under faculty review. Core parts are usually decided by the institutions board, but many of the details of faculty evaluations, ... are often decided by the faculty. Even when they are not, the Senate provides a united voice to address these issues.
**D. Protect the Faculty's Interests**
For example, the Senate should (to the best of their ability) be involved in suggestion priorities for budgeting (whether listened to or not); in suggesting standards for academic freedom (and explaining to its member what it is, and what it is not); when necessary, the Senate should be ready to stand up for individual faculty when the institutions polices have been incorrectly applied; ...
> 5 votes
# Answer
I've been on the Senate and on the Faculty Board of Studies in my university. Basically, boards like these are about communication, to make sure there is some oversight by academics of administrative decisions. They do have veto rights, and on rare occasion these may be exercised. Individuals on them have an opportunity to bring things to the attention of academic executives. How happy they seem about an idea also gives the executive an idea of how much trouble an idea will be to implement. They also learn things about what is happening in the university or faculty which they can bring back to their department.
How useful a board is and how much communication is really done depends on both established culture and individual initiative. But the mechanisms are usually there in the university's charter for these groups to actually to be quite useful.
> 3 votes
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Tags: professorship
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thread-1478 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1478 | How do universities deal with loss in productivity post tenure? | 2012-05-08T05:47:41.623 | # Question
Title: How do universities deal with loss in productivity post tenure?
A tenure from a good university is generally considered to be the pinnacle of academic achievements. It is packed with so many benefits that it is easy to lose direction in one's research career post tenure.
* In the event that such a thing happens, i.e., if a professor loses interest in research after obtaining a tenure (due to health, family or whatever), what steps do universities take?
* Is there any procedure built into the functioning of universities that helps them minimise productivity loss post tenure?
* Are there incentives which universities (could) offer struggling professors?
# Answer
The cynical answer is "nothing". But in truth there are other ways to monitor progress and dole out rewards/lack of reward.
* If your productivity drops off a cliff after tenure, you're unlikely to get promoted to full professor (US-specific), and get the associated salary increases etc. You may be comfortable with this (less service is a good thing!)
* Some universities do 5-yearly post-tenure review. Doing poorly on such reviews can lead to loss of raises, reduced access to new space and facilities, increased service load (if you're not pulling in funding or teaching well for example), and so on.
but ultimately, the final incentive is your own desire to perform. It's very hard to fire faculty. But administrators can try to kill entire departments.
> 21 votes
# Answer
At good universities it is very difficult to get tenure if you aren't very much driven to be an academic, that is, self motivated. There may thus be a little slackening off, but often not much. I've known of academics who got divorced **after** tenure because their spouses hadn't realised they just really did love working that way and were never going to change. I don't recommend that; it does make sense to balance your life a bit more when your job is safe. Organisations that can't allow their employees to age gracefully and live full lives will lose a lot of valuable talent. But in general, tenured faculty are either still very active or else quite useful for administration.
> 15 votes
# Answer
Universities can and do fire tenured faculty who are egregiously derelict in their duties — doing *no* research, performing *no* service to the university, and doing *no* (or only perfunctory) teaching — or how have committed a truly serious ethical or criminal offense.
But even under these circumstances, firing a tenured faculty member requires extensive documentation (in the case of "just not doing their job", covering a period of several years) and a long legal battle that is expensive for both sides. When faced with the necessary mountain of evidence, I suspect most offending faculty are convinced to resign instead.
> 9 votes
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Tags: professorship, productivity, university, tenure-track
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thread-1528 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1528 | Perils of making a PhD application merely to get funding | 2012-05-12T08:03:20.107 | # Question
Title: Perils of making a PhD application merely to get funding
I know many undergraduate students who are often confused whether to make an MS or PhD application when applying to US universities. They often have the credentials required in a PhD application - good grades, UG-level research, good SOP, etc.
In general, whenever there is a conflict of MS versus PhD, reasonably good students deem it safer to apply for a PhD. While there are lesser positions for PhD, an admit ensures funding and tuition waiver. Later many of those students quit PhD midway and graduate with a master's degree.
What are the risks involved when bachelor's students apply to PhD for purely monetary reasons? Will the tuition waiver cancelled and the students be required to pay the entire fees when they quit? Or do universities bear this loss due to admission decisions that did not work out? Are there any other penalties involved?
# Answer
It can always happen that a PhD student may not complete, and for a wide variety of reasons, so I doubt that you could actually be prosecuted for fraud for a case like this, unless someone could really prove it. But realise that whether or not fraud could be proven, such an action could be highly unethical. Tax payers in your host country would be paying for something they didn't get, and supervisors and administrators would be investing time in someone believing they were likely to become a PhD. It would be taking away funding from someone, possibly multiple people, who really did want a PhD, both because you would have taken money that could have gone to someone else, but also because in the future, an application similar to yours might not be ranked so well if the admissions board was afraid the outcome might be similar.
> 9 votes
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Tags: phd, graduate-admissions
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thread-1529 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1529 | Choosing research ideas to include in a statement of purpose | 2012-05-12T08:35:17.960 | # Question
Title: Choosing research ideas to include in a statement of purpose
The internet is littered with information on what makes a good SOP, but I would like to ask a specific question regarding mentioning one's research interests in SOP.
What points should a student keep in mind while writing her statement of purpose? If there is exactly one specific professor the student is targeting, it makes sense to talk of one of his recent papers and ideas for extending its results in the SOP.
* If 1) there are a couple of preferred professors or more, 2) each of them has multiple research interests and 3) the student is unable to zero in on a field or topic, how should the student tailor her SOP to make it appealing to more than one professor?
* Should the student worry about the feasibility of her ideas in the SOP? Is an extensive literature survey in the relevant field necessary before putting anything in the SOP?
# Answer
Your research statement (not "statement of purpose" as university administrators strangely insist on calling it) should be a description of *your* research experience, interests, and goals, as a supporting case for *your* potential for *independent* research. If you were applying to work in my research area, I would much rather read about *your* research ideas than mine.
Here's what I like to see in research statements:
* **What have you already done?** What problems have you solved, or at least worked on? What independent projects have you been part of? What were your key contributions? What did you learn? What did you teach the world? How do your results compare to what was already known? What original ideas are you most proud of? Be specific, technical, credible, and confident (but not arrogant). Refer the reader to your web page for more details. Have a web page with more details: preprints, project reports, source code, videos, etc.
* **What are you working on now?** What problems are you currently trying to solve? What are you currently trying to build? What are the open research issues? What intellectual tools are you using, or learning to use? What are you reading? What prior results are you building on? How are you building on your own earlier work? What is your current favorite half-baked idea? Be specific, technical, credible, and confident (but not arrogant). If you have partial results, refer the reader to your web page for more details. Have a web page with more details.
You ask whether you should worry about the feasibility of your ideas. No more or less than if you were actually doing research. Ideally, I'd like to see both that you have good ideas and that you're not afraid to have bad ones.
* **What might you want to work on in the future?** What problems you would like to solve? What would you like to build? Do you want to push your existing projects further? If so, how? What new areas are you interested in exploring? What are your long-term career goals? Convince the reader that you are knowledgeable about your target area(s), but be honest about your ignorance. Be specific, credible, and confident (but not arrogant).
No one will hold you to your stated plans. You don't need to do an extensive literature survey (although it certainly can't hurt; put a copy on your web page), but at a minimum you should have had a strong undergraduate course on the topic.
* **How does my department fit your research goals?** (If the rest of your statement is well-written, the reader already knows the answer to this question, but you also need convince the reader that *you* know.)
A few sentences about motivation are worthwhile, but don't talk about how many programming languages you know, or about how you were a child prodigy, or how many contests you've won, or how many A+s you got, or how Alan Turing was your childhood hero, or how your research area will Change The World. Write in simple, direct, flawless English. Like Suresh, I have seen many phrases like "my first trembling steps", but never in successful applications.
The only credible reason to "target a particular professor" is if that professor's research interests *already* mirror your own. If you try to craft the bulk of your statements to different professors in different departments, the result will be much shallower, and therefore much less persuasive, than if you describe your own well-developed research interests.
Yes, that means you have to *have* well-developed research interests. That's the point.
> 93 votes
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Tags: graduate-admissions, application, statement-of-purpose
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thread-1523 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1523 | Applying for PhD after a poor master's | 2012-05-11T23:23:19.237 | # Question
Title: Applying for PhD after a poor master's
I am attempting to apply for a PhD but made rather a mess of my masters. Advice from anyone involved in the process is appreciated.
I am applying in the UK, and have a good bachelor's, which is all that is necesary for funding. I worked for 2 years before doing a master's. My field is computer science or bioinformatics.
The master's went wrong - I failed about half of my modules, although I passed them on retake. I produced a good project, but did not impress my supervisor. He doesn't dislike me, I just just ended up looking flaky. Regarding what went wrong, on the one hand, my cohort had an exceptionally high failure rate, but on the other I didn't work hard enough, and got quite depressed after failing some of the first set of exams.
There is a reasonable question over whether I would be suited for a PhD, but you could say that about anything hard that I try and do next.
I need a **bounce-back plan**. What can I do to mitigate the damage? How bad is the damage? Do you accept candidates with less than ideal transcripts and so-so references, given a good work history and supportive references from earlier supervisors?
# Answer
> 10 votes
Delay applying for a year and work on a new project, where you can perform much better (now that you have more experience). Get a publication out of that and work with someone new, who will write you a good recommendation letter.
I know for a fact that many labs are very interested in getting bioinformaticians, so it shouldn't be hard if you are not looking for a great salary (which you shouldn't be: this is a career investment).
# Answer
> 9 votes
Personally, I have seen some people that were very good in their Masters totally screw up their PhD. And other people are not doing very good in the Masters but doing a great PhD after and get an academic position. A PhD is long time, so be sure that you like the subject, be sure that you can publish within the subject. You have to be comfortable with the people you will working with. If you can work with the people that will offer you a PhD before starting the PhD, that is a very good point. That maybe out of the question but even after 6 months or one year, if you see that not doing it, that better to leave and try to find another PhD. You can do well on your second PhD and get an academic position, I know someone who has done this.
If you don't find a PhD that you feel is good for you it's definitely better to wait. Going back to work or doing an other Master, but in a related field. That gives you more experience and more time to find a good PhD subject.
When you start your PhD it's kind to be like in a tunnel, sometime you never really see the end. I think most of people get discouraged at one time in their PhD, even the better, you really need to believe in yourself.
The main problem by doing a PhD after a not so good Master is that you will have more difficulty to find a good PhD subject. You can definitely find one but you have to find a good one for you. If nobody wants a PhD subject, there is a reason. That's not mean that it's bad subject but you have to figure out why it's less attractive.
Some questions that may help you:
* Did you mentor have previous PhD candidates and how did those PhD candidates end up? Generally when there is not a full transparency from the mentor there is a problem.
* Are you comfortable with your mentor and the team that you will working with (if there is a team)? Can you talk freely? If it's not comfortable when starting I don't think it's will going better with the stress of the PhD.
* Is the plan of action of the PhD well defined?
* When can you expect the first publication? For example if the mentor said you that there is a publication in progress and they can add your name to it that a good point.
* Do you feel comfortable with the subject or does it look too hard? Especially if you have to write a program or build an experiment. You have to estimate the time that it will take you and if you can get publication from this. Some mentors don't hesitate to take a PhD candidate just for coding as cheap workforce.
Hope it helps, good luck!
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Tags: phd, graduate-admissions, career-path
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thread-1566 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1566 | Email etiquette for requesting a meeting with a professor who one won't do research with or take a class from? | 2012-05-14T19:39:39.560 | # Question
Title: Email etiquette for requesting a meeting with a professor who one won't do research with or take a class from?
What is the proper etiquette for requesting a meeting with a professor who you don't do research with or take a course from?
Say, the professor is doing something you're interested in, and you just want to talk to them just to learn more about their research (you might be interested in their research out of pure curiosity, or might be wanting to find a possible connection between their research and your potential research). How should one phrase the email?
In particular, I'm interested in trying to find a way to set a particular time for a meeting. Sometimes I ask "are you available next week?" and they say they are, but it's possible that they could be away for most of the week (for unexpected meetings and the like). Should I request a time of my own in a reply? (especially if they don't give a time).
# Answer
> 16 votes
I'm assuming that you are a graduate student.
Simply send a short, polite email expressing that you are interested in his/her research and that you would like to talk about it. If you share a coffee machine, lounge, canteen, etc, you could suggest to talk over coffee. Certainly, say who you are and what you do in the email, and indicate why you are interested.
Don't ramble on in the email. No one has time to read long emails.
Showing interest in research and showing that you won't be wasting his/her time are main points to observe. Most researchers (unless they are ridiculously famous and super busy) would be happy to explain their work and create new avenues for future exploration.
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thread-1560 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1560 | What does undergraduate tuition fund, and how does this differ between public universities and private universities in the U.S.? | 2012-05-14T17:50:33.907 | # Question
Title: What does undergraduate tuition fund, and how does this differ between public universities and private universities in the U.S.?
Does undergraduate tuition help fund professor salaries? Does it help fund graduate student salaries, especially if the grad students are TAs? What about lab facilities?
# Answer
(This is very much a US centric answer; other countries structure their university systems differently.)
This is a difficult question to answer because money is fungible, so in some sense it doesn't matter what the nominal answer is---if the money isn't going to fund those things, it's filling in other expenses so that other sources of revenue pay for those things. But in practice, most universities put undergraduate tuition directly in their "General Fund"---a big pot of money, which is then divvied up to support the general operation of the university, which includes all the things you mention. (Note that many sources of funding for the university are dedicated for particular things, and don't go into the General Fund, but undergraduate tuition usually isn't one of them.)
The University of Michigan has a nice online presentation about this, and as far as I know, that's typical: undergraduate tuition pays into the general fund, which pays for most of the university's core activities.
> 8 votes
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Tags: university, funding, united-states, tuition
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thread-1561 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1561 | Is it ever advisable for graduate students to go on sabbatical for several months? | 2012-05-14T17:52:30.253 | # Question
Title: Is it ever advisable for graduate students to go on sabbatical for several months?
Undergraduates have several-month long "sabbaticals" every years. While graduate students shouldn't expect to have the same thing, could it maybe be justifiable for them to take a several-month long sabbatical in the middle of graduate school? These things can be really helpful for things like evaluating whether or not you're trying too hard to reach a dead end.
# Answer
We encourage our graduate students to take internships for 3 months during summer (at Microsoft Redmond and MSR Cambridge). This is a bit like a sabbatical. In our experience, these are extremely valuable for the students and for fostering research collaborations. Usually one publication results for the student, but the experience and the contacts they gain cannot be measure in the regular units.
We do not allow our students to go on such 'sabbaticals' if they are not already performing well. The lucky students who do get to go need to act as ambassadors for our university. We do not use internships as a way of kick-stacking the research of a student-gone-astray.
Unless by sabbatical, you mean vacation, in which case, I've answered the wrong question. Students are entitled to 6 weeks vacation per year (not including Christmas). They may take it in one chunk if they wish. Whether we allow it depends on what project deadlines need to be met and so forth. Generally, we encourage them to split up their vacation into smaller chunks (1 week here, 2 weeks there).
> 9 votes
# Answer
From my experience, academic sabbaticals have a direct, stated purpose; for example, performing research (and having some fun) in a different country with a different academic environment, casting your hand at doing some work in a completely different field, taking a break from work to write a few long review papers. To this end, I'm not sure what a student would *do* on a sabbatical; most graduate students have a single project, and they haven't been involved in research to be able to try something else–they're still learning their first field, for goodness sake. I'm not sure how anyone would benefit from a student taking a sabbatical. On the other hand, there are numerous downsides, the main one being that there is a definite chance that the student will not return to their research after doing something else for a few months. I can't think of any reason why this could be a good idea.
> 5 votes
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Tags: graduate-school
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thread-1572 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1572 | Do tenure reviews in U.S. universities usually consider the number of PhD students that a professor successfully graduates? | 2012-05-15T02:19:21.453 | # Question
Title: Do tenure reviews in U.S. universities usually consider the number of PhD students that a professor successfully graduates?
When it comes to the tenure review process, someone puts it like the way it's put below:
> The tenure review process is designed to determine whether someone has "the ability to do their job." The junior faculty member has six years to construct a track record of success. During these six years, the junior faculty member acquires teaching evaluatons from students and colleagues. The junior faculty member acquires grants and sets up a lab with a productive research program. The junior faculty member develops a reputation of collegiality and service within the department and the university.
Though that's how it's done in name. Others, like Sean Carroll, say that research is far more important than teaching (which is probably true in the elite private universities).
What about things like successfully graduating PhD students though? Can a PhD student help an assistant professor gain tenure? I'm particularly curious about whether or not this applies for all universities - both in the elite privates and the public ones.
# Answer
> 14 votes
How many graduate students a professor helps through the program can have a number of impacts on tenure - including some I'll likely miss. Off the top of my head:
* As a former student, I have been asked to write a letter on behalf of a mentor of mine. The more students one helps launch off into bright, shiny, productive careers, the more of these letters should be positive and strong.
* PhD students *are* heavily correlated with research productivity. One person can only be so productive - having a thriving lab with graduate students passing through it can help boost publications, productivity, etc. all of which may very well help one's tenure portfolio.
* To address "like Sean Carroll, say that research is far more important than teaching" - your actual, direct supervised graduate students really don't fall under "teaching" in many cases, and are much closer to either the research or service end of things.
Keep in mind that, with the tenure clock of many universities, a junior professor may very reasonably not have graduated any students from their lab by the time they come up for tenure. But being a good mentor and building a pool of capable graduate students can help one's tenure application in a number of ways even if the committee doesn't look at it as a solitary number.
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Tags: tenure-track, mentoring
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thread-1531 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1531 | Is the middle of May very late for graduate admissions in the same year? | 2012-05-12T10:21:03.220 | # Question
Title: Is the middle of May very late for graduate admissions in the same year?
Let me explain my situation a little bit, then I will try to make it more general for others to benefit.
I am graduating in a month and getting my bachelor degree in computer science. I did apply to graduate programs of US universities, and it did not end up as I expected. Right now, I am still looking for chances, graduate programs, to get in. I guess all the programs in US made their decisions already, and this is true for most of EU universities. But, still I want to check if I am missing anything.
More generally, consider an international student who wants to apply for graduate programs of computer science in EU/US. It is mid of May. Does this student still have chances to get in a graduate program with scholarship?
# Answer
> 4 votes
At my university (Bath), prestigious university scholarships are awarded through a competition that has its first rounds of evaluations in January, so we recommend submitting December of the year before. However, in the UK and Europe generally much research is funded by grants from research councils and industry which may be awarded at any time. These studentships are on particular topics and will be advertised on relevant mailing lists and sites like http://jobs.ac.uk. In addition, often multiple universities offer the same top students studentships, so occasionally funding gets returned and reoffered to a new applicant.
Application times for American academic positions (both faculty and postgraduate) seem to be more structured, at least in my experience. At MIT they said they had at least 120-150 fully-qualified applicants for the 30 slots they had the year I was lucky enough to get in (note: this means getting rejected does NOT necessarily mean you weren't good enough to get in!) So I don't think there is any chance they would look at someone who missed their application deadline if they applied late. But I could be wrong, and certainly it might be different at smaller universities.
In general though I'd recommend spending the time between now & the next deadline making yourself a better candidate, e.g. by publishing, working in a lab, or helping out with a conference or even just getting a job. Even if you put in another application this year, this is still good advice in case you reapply for next year.
# Answer
> 5 votes
**Yes, it's too late**, at least in the US.
All the PhD programs I'm familiar with (mostly in North America, but a few European programs too) require admitted applicants to accept or decline admission offers by April 15. The admission offers themselves are sent out weeks or even months earlier. For example, my department tries to finalize all PhD admission offers by mid-February. We get about 750 PhD applications every year, so to keep ourselves (relatively) sane, we don't even consider applications that arrive after the December deadline.
A few PhD programs do consider applicants for admission in the spring semester. But I wouldn't recommend trying for spring admissions to the same programs that already turned you down. In my experience, spring admission is *more* competitive. Moreover, a few months is unlikely to significantly improve your application, especially since they've already formed an opinion.
I also agree with Joanna's recommendation: **Your best bet is to strengthen your record and apply again next year, for admission in Fall 2013.** If possible, get involved in a research project with the goal of publication. At a minimum, do something independent, creative, and technical to show off your potential for research. Show your complete application to your letter writers (or other faculty mentors), especially your research statement, and ask for their detailed *and brutally honest* feedback. Listen to them. Finally, confirm with your references (by asking them directly) that they are willing to write you strong letters emphasizing your research potential.
# Answer
> 3 votes
At my university (KU Leuven, Belgium), PhD positions are available all year round, as admissions depend very strongly on faculty obtaining grants, and these are available at different times of the year. Faculty select their own PhD students individually, rather than depending on a centralised procedure. Just check the web site of the faculty you are interested in and look for open positions.
The same procedure may be used by other Flemish universities, but I cannot say for sure.
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thread-1128 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1128 | Scientific hackathons or other intense voluntary bottom-up events | 2012-04-15T13:07:02.527 | # Question
Title: Scientific hackathons or other intense voluntary bottom-up events
In programming there are many hackathons \- intense voluntary one day-week events, where participants collaboratively attack problems. They may be proposed by a company, NGO, participants or a group; for qualification/profit, for fun or for a good cause (eg. http://www.rhok.org/).
The question is - are there any similar events in science?
If not, what can be done or why it cannot work?
(As a comment: as I observe, while scientist are open-minded for a discussion, they are conservative, when it comes to action; at least much more than some of the programmers.)
EDIT (much later):
There *are* such events, even if extremely rare, e.g.:
> So how can we continue to make science more disruptively accessible across all science disciplines, geographies, industries and skill-sets?
>
> Enter Science Hack Day, a 48-hour-all-night event that brings together designers, developers, scientists and other enthusiastic geeks in the same physical space for a brief but intense period of collaboration, hacking, and building ‘cool stuff’. A hack is a unique modification, an interesting mashup or a quick solution to a problem – maybe not the most elegant solution, but often the cleverest. By having a fresh set of eyes from those who solve different types of problems across a variety of industries inside and outside of science, new concepts often emerge and can go on to influence science and adults’ relationship to science in unexpected ways.
# Answer
> 6 votes
I have found, having participated in a few fairly intensive workshops that were intended to produce a product after a short amount of time that this tends toward failure for a few reasons:
* Most academics are interested in *problems* as well as the implementation of solutions. Hackatons are *implementation* factories, but its only a small subset of academics who will enjoy and/or be supported just to solve other people's problems.
* Building on that, its hard to formulate a meaningful problem, do the background research, plan the research and perform it in a one or two week period. A hackathon benefits from having all but the last stage done before-hand. Generally I've found with those types of intensive workshops, you can get the concept and maybe the plan down, but there needs to be more work done when everyone goes home. A lot more work. Which leads to the final issue...
* Long distance collaboration, especially with people with whom you have a fairly weak bond, and especially one without strong, lasting grant support, is really, really hard to do.
So they do happen, but the finished-product focused ones tend to have a longer timeframe, and the shorter ones tend to be trying to accomplish very specific things, like putting out a consensus statement or *planning* research to be done later.
# Answer
> 7 votes
In math we have various programs where a group of people get together to do focused work on a problem, usually at one of the mathematical institutes (I know of the SQuaREs program at AIM and the Research in Pairs program at Oberwolfach, and there are probably others). These are usually for 2-6 people, and the time frame is longer.
# Answer
> 2 votes
In industrial math, Oxford has a long tradition of running study groups. This vague-sounding name has a rather specific meaning. From the page just linked:
> **What is a study group?**
>
> Study groups bring together mathematicians from across the globe to work on mathematical problems presented by industry in a week long workshop.
>
> **How does a study group work?**
>
> The academics work in problem solving teams with the presenters to tackle the problems raised, formulating their ideas using modelling, analysis and computation. At the end of the study group the academics present their findings and make suggestions of future work to be carried out. A final report is written after the study group.
I attended this one. They are a lot of fun and have a track record of real impact.
# Answer
> 2 votes
I shall argue that iGEM falls under the category of a Hackathon. Having coached a team, I have grown the impression that the program essentially gathers a bunch of undergrads together, teaches them various problematic things about biology, and then for 10 weeks the students slash together a random assortment of solutions and call it a day.
Like EpiGrad, I have evolved to not favor this type of approach. Many times the students will take on a problem without recognizing that it is actually isn't a real problem. The result is a solution that tends to be very very narrowly constrained. Secondly, unlike a programming Hackathon, these sessions result in tons of hastily performed experiments with very few controls and lots of very difficult to reproduced data. Notably the Registry of Biological Parts is having a serious issue with the quality control of their "parts" since they all come from unsequenced plasmids that were shipped to the Registry to qualify for the deadline.
The positive is that it does get a lot of young students interested in science but it isn't a very productive way of doing science.
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Tags: open-science
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thread-1580 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1580 | Attributing contributions to academic work that occur in Stack Exchange | 2012-05-16T05:41:47.777 | # Question
Title: Attributing contributions to academic work that occur in Stack Exchange
Sometimes we may ask questions on stack exchange or online forums wherein the response is helpful or even essential to a piece of work that gets published in an academic journal. If this occurs, how should credit be given to those involved in the exchange? Should they all be included as authors? Should a link to the forum be included as a reference in the paper?
Once something is in a stack exchange or forum, it's "published". Perhaps in the future, the current peer review model will transform into people writing blogs and posting in forums and databases. But for now, how might this issue be dealt with while forums, blogs, etc coexist with journals?
# Answer
> 22 votes
### Issue of citing authorship
Starting from first principles, I think in most instances on StackExchange it would be **the original poster of the quoted answer** that would be the relevant author. The person asking the question is useful but it is typically the information provided in a particular answer that would be the typical candidate for citation.
That said, I imagine there could be instances where the question itself or an overall exchange represents the unit of citation. In such a case, it would make sense to cite all relevant contributors.
### Does something learnt from StackExchange need to be cited?
A lot of learning goes into a journal article. This learning comes from many sources. That which gets cited is only a small fraction of that. A scientist might (a) read a statistics book; (b) ask a friend; or (c) ask a question on Stats.StackExchange.com to learn more about how to analyse his or her data. In both cases, the person has devised an analysis plan based on having learnt something. However, generally these sources are not cited. In each case the scientist has learnt how to do something, but ultimately the knowledge is already established in the literature.
I also think that the vast majority of posts on StackExchange do not constitute a citable unit of original research. That said, where this does occur and it it influences your work, it makes sense to cite the source.
# Answer
> 11 votes
Citing a forum post is very close to "personal communications".
The benefit of actually citing (instead of thanking the author in the acknowledgements) is that you:
* explicitly say what was **their contribution**,
* give more **details** or provide the context
(sometimes the post is longer, with more threads than those mentioned in the paper),
* implicitly **build visibility** or prestige of the forum/SE site/MO/...
When it comes to the author(s), there is no established approach. Typically (default from `cite` on the MathOverflow and `link -> cite` on the StackExchange) **you cite the exact post** (e.g. the selected answer with its author). However, if you want to point explicitly to more authors (e.g. actually you base on two answers or the question itself is non-trivial), then it may be a good idea to include them as well.
If you consider that their contribution is substantial, then you can decide to have them as **coauthors** (of course assuming they agree). But then the rules are no different from talking in person. (Except for the fact, that on fora some people may be unreachable).
Moreover, if something is simple (but not trivial, i.e. present in standard textbooks), citation is welcome. For that reason people quote tables of integrals and for the same reason I think that simple **findings you base on should be cited** as well.
I think that hiding one's sources is neither productive nor fair.
# Answer
> 9 votes
What merits a citation or coauthorship is a subtle question, but the answer doesn't change when people interact online. The main difference is that the interaction is more visible: authors may feel awkward if they decline to cite a publicly visible (but unimportant) contribution, and the contributor may feel encouraged to complain. This adds to the pressure of the decision, but it shouldn't change the answer, and the other issues and subtleties are the same as in offline interaction.
As for online contributions being "published", I suppose that's true in the technical sense that they have been made available to the public, but that's not what academics mean when they talk about publication. For example, listing a stackexchange answer as a publication on one's CV would be considered at least eccentric, if not deceptive, regardless of how impressive the answer was. (The best one could hope for is to list it somewhere else.)
I'm not sure what the relevance of the second paragraph of the question is, but here's a guess. Suppose Alice is writing a paper and Bob makes an absolutely critical intellectual contribution via a stackexchange answer. Normally such a contribution would merit coauthorship, but Alice might declare that Bob's work is already published via stackexchange and that she will simply cite it rather than making him an author. That would be unreasonable and unfair to Bob, but if Alice was scrupulous in citing Bob's answer and giving him full credit for its contents, then it's not clear that Bob would have any recourse. I'm not convinced this is more than a theoretical problem, since the number of stackexchange answers that could merit coauthorship is tiny (maybe not zero, but that's a good first approximation) and most authors are well behaved anyway. However, I suppose it could happen.
# Answer
> 5 votes
There's a simple test for citing/acknowledging. Did you come up with the contribution yourself ? If not, then you need to cite whoever did.
Whether this amounts to authorship, and how exactly to cite the contribution (as a footnote, acknowledgement, personal contribution or whatever), depends on the conventions of your research area (especially for authorship thresholds). In general, if you're merely deciding between different kinds of citation, more information is usually better.
As for the entire second paragraph about conventions in publishing, I think that's irrelevant.
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Tags: publications, peer-review, citations, reputation
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thread-1588 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1588 | How can I create a sense of community in a research group? | 2012-05-17T00:48:43.777 | # Question
Title: How can I create a sense of community in a research group?
I am beginning to develop research projects that will incorporate undergraduate researchers. I have observed that some faculty manage to create a strong lab culture, where the students that work with them seem to get a sense of achievement from simply being part of the lab and the lab culture. (I work in biology but I have seen this across disciplines)
Similarly, I would like to create an environment where there is a sense of community associated with my lab. What steps should I take to accomplish this?
# Answer
* **Enthusiasm**: Students in a lab should get the feeling that the professor is someone who shows as much interest and puts in as much hard work in the project as themselves. The professor may have a lot of credentials and experience, but his enthusiasm level must be the same as that of his students.
* **Emotional management**: Sometime there could be students who lose their focus on research; at others, there could be slight rifts and differences in opinion between the professor and student because of their approach to the problem. There may also be problems within the students which could be distasteful. The professor must be mindful of these, try his best to ameliorate the situation and not let things go out of hand. Without getting smarmily personal, the professor must manage his lab as though it were his second family.
* **Ensuring good placement**: Placement is not an indicator of research, but in reality, people use this record to gauge a lab's quality. The professor must build contacts and be willing to counsel and recommend their students to good places (each according to his ability, etc).
* **Good Results**: The most important point. If students must feel a "sense of achievement from simply being part of the lab", then the output from the lab should be sensational. This involves a lot of man-management; knowing what each student is good at and how to get the best out of each one of them. Finally, though it may sound cliched, hard work is the key to good results.
> 15 votes
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Tags: research-process, professorship
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thread-1590 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1590 | How does calibrating syllabus based on the requirements of the industry happen? | 2012-05-17T08:00:01.050 | # Question
Title: How does calibrating syllabus based on the requirements of the industry happen?
Often the industry finds that students graduating from a particular department do not possess the skill-set required to perform well in their company. While research can at least afford to be outside of the interests of the industry, academic syllabus taught to students for their bachelor's or master's has to cater to the demands of the industry.
* What steps are taken by a university to ensure that its students are employable and industry-fit?
* Does this recalibration happen at all, and if yes, how often?
* Not every requirement of the industry could be met in an academic syllabus. For example, programming languages cannot be taught in class simply because the industry needs them. What points should academicians keep in mind when addressing industry's expectations from a university?
# Answer
Specifically, for teaching computer science, information systems and software engineering you can refer to model curricula provided, e.g., by the ACM. An advantage of such curricula is that they result from a joint effort of the universities and companies. For instance, the Graduate curriculum for Sofware Engineering lists contributors from General Motors, IBM, Lockheed Martin, Ford, Nokia, Avaya and the Department of Defense: http://www.gswe2009.org/fileadmin/files/GSwE2009\_Curriculum\_Docs/GSwE2009\_version\_1.0.pdf
Of course, the ACM curricula are but a proposal and every univerity has to try and find the right balance between industrial and academic needs. However, comparing your curriculum with the ACM guidelines can reveal interesting patterns.
> 3 votes
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Tags: graduate-school, university, industry, syllabus
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thread-1591 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1591 | Motivating students when teaching a widely disliked course | 2012-05-17T08:16:32.043 | # Question
Title: Motivating students when teaching a widely disliked course
There is a general tendency of students (master's or less) to rate highly those courses that create a value for them at the industry. For example, in CS, networking or OS courses are found to be attractive by many students simply because these are (almost) indispensable for most job interviews. It is difficult to find the same kind of enthusiasm for say, an optimisation course.
Another example from ECE will be courses pertaining to electromagnetism. Students generally love VLSI-based or telecommunication courses and ignore or dislike the ones on EM. Similarly there could be subfields in many areas where research has stagnated and relevant courses do not carry industrial value, but it is impossible to exclude them from the syllabus.
How does a professor teaching such a course sustain the interests of the students? How does he/she make the best out of a bad job?
# Answer
> 18 votes
There are many ways to motivate students, including but not limited to
* showing practical relevance of the course
* explaining what makes *the teacher* passionate about the subject
* linking the course topic to their own experience
* actively engaging the students in discussions
* giving the students adequate tasks and providing them with rapid and positive feedback (adequate = not too difficult and not too easy)
Some tips and tricks can be found on http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/affective/motivation.html
# Answer
> 4 votes
I hate to resort to youtube but:
http://youtu.be/WgWNQVdhE9A
Channing Robertson at Stanford teaches Intro to Chemical Engineering which is essentially a glorified way to say Mass Balance and Stoichiometry. It is literally a course on converting values from Metric units into English units. It is literally a course about realizing that what goes in a box must come out of the box. It is dry and boring material.
As described in Why do so few universities offer OpenCourseWare videos of their lessons?, not every class is worth making an OpenCourseWare video but they did for this one. He kills time with stories and lots of them. He goes into the history of chemical engineering. He teaches use the Socratic method. They do problem sets and then go on field trip to see what their problem set was about. It may be dry stuff but at least it would be entertaining.
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Tags: teaching, coursework, motivation
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thread-1604 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1604 | How to prepare for a (PhD or PostDoc) admission procedure? | 2012-05-18T15:21:19.387 | # Question
Title: How to prepare for a (PhD or PostDoc) admission procedure?
> "Luck favors the prepared mind"
>
> ( Louis Pasteur )
During the MS degree program or PhD program, it's advisable for a good student to get used to take a look on scientific activities of research groups he want to join, after graduation.
So, if the student decides somehow that he wants to try to join X, Y, Z groups, how should he **prepare himself the best** for the admission procedure?
What should he do **before actually applying** for that position in that group?
What should he do **before** the (formal centralized or informal) **admission procedure starts**?
Some of my own answers:
Task #0: he must read all the recent papers of the group he would like to join, and know very well those related to his research field.
Task #1: prepare all the admission material (we've already discussed about this)
Task #2...#N... what else?
What would you suggest to anyone to prepare himself to an admission procedure?
Thanks a lot
# Answer
> 8 votes
I'll start with some steps prior to yours in the interest of making the answer more generalizable:
1. **Determine which universities to apply to.** This will involve weighing factors such as ranking, faculty members, student opinions (from online discussion sources like this one or face-to-face discussions), sub-field specialties, and location, among others. You can prepare for this by looking all this stuff up:
1. US News & World Reports rankings for graduate programs is a good ranking system; there may be better ones I'm not familiar with.
2. Check the department's faculty page (example) for each university to see broadly-defined research interests for faculty members. Some people will explicitly list whether they're taking on new graduate students or not.
3. If you know anyone in the field, talk to them to see which universities/professors/labs would be good to check out.
2. **Determine which lab to apply to.** This will involve a lot of the above, but specifically it will involve talking to graduate students. This question covers that topic in pretty good depth.
3. **Read up on the fundamentals of the topic you're interested in.** I would suggest you be familiar with the field enough to ask a basic question about it. In my field, review papers would be a great resource for this, although I will admit that it may be hard for you to find a good one. Speak with one of the subject matter librarians in your university (i.e., if engineering, talk to the librarians in the engineering library) and ask them to help you find recent review papers on your topic.
I'll concede this is a difficult task, but being able to ask even simple questions about the field shows familiarity, and will make you look better during the interview. I recall some of my graduate school interviews where I just sat there, almost completely unfamiliar with the lab's research topic, and I felt very foolish indeed.
4. **All the stuff in the question you linked to above**.
At this point, most of your work is already set in stone; your undergraduate grades are set, your summer internships are complete, you finished the GRE, and it isn't likely you can do anything for your professors at this point to improve your recommendation letters. Just focus on the labs themselves and learn as much as you can before making decisions.
# Answer
> 6 votes
The answer to your question also depends on whether you want to apply to a specific group (which I think of as the "European model" of admissions) or to an entire department ("US model").
In the US model, test scores, transcripts, and letters of recommendation tend to be the most important factor, with the statement of purpose being a less weighted criterion, as you tend not to be "locked in" to the area you outline in your statement of purpose. In that case, selecting a group follows admission, and then you need to do your homework on the different groups at the institutions you're interested in.
However, in the European model, selecting a group occurs *before* the admissions process begins. In that case, everything eykanal mentions in his answer is important. However, the key thing will be to convince me that you are directly and actively interested in applying to *my group*:
* Indicate how your skills and background are tied in to the projects available in my group.
* Show that you've done some looking into the recent work in my group.
* If you've established previous contact with me, raise a reminder of that.
* Explain why you would make a good fit in my group.
If you start doing those things, you'll make me want to request letters of reference and call you for an interview. If not, it's likely I'll send your application to the "circular file" without further consideration.
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Tags: phd, postdocs, job, career-path, graduate-admissions
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thread-1598 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1598 | What are the factors one needs to take into account in order to choose an appropriate mathematical journal? | 2012-05-18T01:20:39.987 | # Question
Title: What are the factors one needs to take into account in order to choose an appropriate mathematical journal?
Several months ago I submitted a paper to a journal. The area covered by the journal is the same as the one covered in the paper. However, I waited several months and finally the paper was rejected by the journal, and they explained to me that it was not of sufficient interest for them. What can I do to avoid having to go through this again if I submit my paper to another journal?
# Answer
There is no easy solution to this problem.
I recently went through a situation where a paper was rejected from a journal without review; the same paper, with only minor edits to the abstract and the introduction, was accepted "as is" for publication in another journal of similar quality and impact factor.
The main issue for getting your work accepted may not be that it isn't of sufficient interest—it may be that the way *you have presented it* does not convince the editors and referees that the work is suitable. Have you hit on the "hot-button areas" that tend to come up again and again in the journal? Have you made it clear from your abstract and your leadoff paragraphs why this article will be of interest to the target audience of the journal?
Small differences—these changes don't require much work—can make a **huge** difference in the acceptance of a paper.
> 9 votes
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Tags: publications, journals
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thread-1608 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1608 | Etiquette and guidelines for sending pre-published work to other people? | 2012-05-19T00:44:29.683 | # Question
Title: Etiquette and guidelines for sending pre-published work to other people?
So I've just written up a report that could eventually turn into a publishable manuscript, but since I'm new and this would be the first paper that I've ever written, I'm definitely going to need quite a bit of feedback before submitting it (especially since it's important for research to be interesting to multiple individuals if it's ever going to be cited).
So I'm wondering - how should I phrase an email asking someone to look at my work? Which people should I ask to comment on my work? And how would it differ from professor to graduate student? I'm thinking that my research can be interesting and helpful to a few grad students, so they can often provide a lot of help (that, and they have a lot more time than professors).
If one has time, I'm also wondering if it's a good idea to send the manuscript to people sequentially (e.g. send it to a 2nd person only after getting feedback from the first). That way, no effort is lost if two people suggest the same set of changes.
# Answer
> 7 votes
1) Talk to your advisor. She or he should be aware of your intention to send your work to a third party, and can even suggest you the right persons to send your work to.
2) Usually you can ask only people you know personally (or your advisor knows personally).
3) In our university internal review of two colleagues is required if you want to publish a technical report. So, sometimes showing your manuscript to somebody else is required.
4) You might like to stress that the manuscript you are sending is still a preliminary version, and ask the reviewer to keep confidentiality issues in mind.
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Tags: publications, etiquette
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thread-1613 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1613 | What's a good way out when research is stuck? | 2012-05-19T17:22:03.663 | # Question
Title: What's a good way out when research is stuck?
Consider a mid-level PhD student in a STEM field (maybe 2-3 years into the program), he and his advisor are working on something relatively new and interesting but they have reached a point where the research isn't moving ahead. How do you get out of this situation?
All papers have been read, colleagues have been consulted and top-of-the-head alternatives considered but the problem isn't moving ahead. No theory, computation or intuition helps. The only possibility left is to (optimistically) wait for a Hollywood moment when it all comes together.
Where do you go from here assuming that you **cannot** completely abandon that topic? At what point should you "start searching for other problems"? How do you choose what to work on next (should you start anew or pick something allied)?
# Answer
Here are another three suggestions to add to Ran G.'s answer.
* The first approach is to **solve a simpler version** of your problem. If your problem involves some dimension that is infinite, what does the problem look like if that dimension is finite (or ignored all together). This approach worked for my PhD research. The system involving the finite dimension was easier to deal with and the technique developed to get my solution generalised to the infinite case.
* The second approach is to **work through a less general version of the problem**. This could involve solving some examples of the more general problem or make more concrete some of the general dimensions.
* The third approach is to **solve a more general version of the problem**.
These approaches are not guaranteed to work and the results they produce may not be publishable, but they might give you enough insight to move forward.
> 23 votes
# Answer
two possible suggestions:
1. let it go. Take a break, or start a new project. But not for good - come back to it after a month, two months, maybe even half a year. A fresh look on the problem might be useful.
this will (a) give your mind the time needed to consider it with no pressure, and (b) will allow you to have alternatives for the case the project is a dead end.
2. Try to go in the "opposite direction" to what you've done so far. I mean, if you are trying to prove something, and it just doesn't work, assume it is false and now try to prove it wrong. Maybe you'll succeed (which is already a progress), but even if not, this might give another insight to the core of the problem and how to solve it.
Deciding when a project is a "dead end" is a tough decision, and I would say that's the role of your advisor (which depends on your current status: funding, time to graduate, current publications, and of course your advisor's estimation of the probability to solve it eventually).
> 23 votes
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Tags: phd, graduate-school, stem
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thread-1544 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1544 | How should I interpret a journal rejection of "not of sufficient interest" or "does not meet journal standards" without mention of any errors? | 2012-05-12T20:25:26.660 | # Question
Title: How should I interpret a journal rejection of "not of sufficient interest" or "does not meet journal standards" without mention of any errors?
How should I interpret a journal rejection of "not of sufficient interest" or "does not meet journal standards"?
This is what happened to me particularly. Papers were rejected for those reasons and the journal never told me that they had found any error or that anything was wrong or inconclusive.
When a paper is rejected, do reviewers let you know if they found any error or they will never tell you even if they found one?
# Answer
> 24 votes
When a journal rejects a paper because it is not of sufficient interest for them or it does not meet the standards of the journal, it generally means exactly what they said. They thought the paper wasn't interesting or important enough.
Journals vary enormously in how selective or prestigious they are. Some journals will accept any paper that seems to be correct, original, and at least somewhat interesting. If a journal like that rejects a paper for this reason, then either it's not a very good paper, or they are being unfair (perhaps accidentally - peer review isn't perfect, so occasionally you just have to try again), or you submitted it to the wrong sort of journal (the line between different subfields can be blurry, but if you choose the wrong side it decreases your chances of acceptance).
Other journals impose extremely high standards and only want to publish papers on exciting breakthroughs. In that case, there might be nothing wrong with the paper at all, and the only issue is that they have received other submissions they like even better.
And, of course, there's a whole range of journals in between these extremes. Depending on where the journal is in this range, it will shift from a statement about your paper to a statement about the journal's high standards, and there's no way to be more precise without knowing more about the situation.
The best source of advice is a trusted mentor in your field, but I wouldn't get too worried on the basis of one rejection. Look over the paper again with fresh eyes, make sure the introduction and conclusions are compelling, choose another journal, and resubmit. If you run into this problem repeatedly, then something's wrong (either the paper needs work or you need to choose more appropriate journals) and that would be a good time to seek more detailed advice.
# Answer
> 13 votes
The short answer is that if a reviewer found an error, the reviewer will generally tell you. If you get a rejection without any further comments, the likely reason is that the reviewer read the outline and main results, and concluded that it wasn't necessary to go through the paper carefully to decide to reject it, probably because the results weren't significant enough for that journal. (Some journals specifically request that reviewers do a quick read of the article within a couple weeks of receipt, to see if it has any hope of being published; it often takes reviewers months to do a full read through, and if it has no chance, it's kinder to the author to give a quick rejection so the author can promptly resubmit to a journal which might publish it.)
However sometimes the reviewer has carefully read through the paper before recommending rejecting it, and in that case the reviewer usually (at least in my experience) includes a list of suggestions or comments (including pointing out any errors the reviewer found).
# Answer
> 9 votes
Often, when a paper is rejected by the editor (without being sent out for review), the standard response is along the lines of "not of sufficient interest".
How should you interpret this? One interpretation is to be humble and select another journal that will be interest. Another interpretation is that good and interesting science has been poorly presented.
One possibility that has not yet been covered is that the paper did not present interesting science in an interesting way. I had a paper that was rejected from a number of journals although I felt strongly that these judgements were inconsistent with the work that I had done. I also recognized that such quick judgments can be based on the title and abstract, and on re-reading these, I realized that the main, important points of my paper were not given enough emphasis up front. After minor revisions to focus my readers, my next submission was very warmly received.
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Tags: publications, journals, peer-review, rejection
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thread-1610 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1610 | Etiquette and guidelines for asking someone if they might be doing work potentially similar to yours? | 2012-05-19T06:43:18.183 | # Question
Title: Etiquette and guidelines for asking someone if they might be doing work potentially similar to yours?
So, say, if I want to start on a new research project but want to be sure that someone else isn't doing the same thing that I'm doing, how should I phrase an email to them, if at all?
Oftentimes, this could lead to a collaboration between the two. But in a few cases, this could also be a case where someone might be competing with you for the same research finding, and where they might want to "take the glory" so to speak.
# Answer
> 4 votes
I'd recommend against sending such an e-mail to someone you don't know well. If you've got serious reason to fear there may be competition that neither of you wants, then perhaps a mutual friend could help sort it out; if you don't, then I wouldn't worry about it.
One danger is that the e-mail can come across as aggressively staking out territory. Even just asking whether someone is working on this topic can be read as "speak now or forever hold your peace", with the implication that unless they announce it now, you'll be seriously offended if they end up competing with you on this topic. This is not a fair position to put someone in, since research can be unpredictable and their work may end up having consequences for these topics that they do not yet foresee.
Collaboration can also be a touchy issue. It's sometimes a mutually beneficial way to resolve this sort of situation, but not always. It can be awkward when someone you don't know well suggests a collaboration, since no matter what excuses you offer, it's hard to avoid the appearance that declining a collaboration request is a negative judgement on the person making the request.
If you know someone well, you may be able to avoid these difficulties, but I wouldn't try it otherwise.
If you're a graduate student, then your advisor should help with situations like this. For example, they should make sure potential competitors are aware of your thesis project (at least in mathematics, it's considered extremely bad form to compete with a grad student, and part of the advisor's role is to minimize the chances of accidental competition).
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Tags: research-process
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thread-1626 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1626 | How to evaluate an open access journal? | 2012-05-20T19:58:58.293 | # Question
Title: How to evaluate an open access journal?
> **Possible Duplicate:**
> How do you judge the quality of a journal?
How to evaluate the genuineness/authenticity, impact, significance & reputation of an open access journal? The prestigious journals have Impact factor & various indices, What about open access journals?
**EDIT:** Although a previously asked question has garnered many responses, this question is only toward open access publishing.
# Answer
> 3 votes
In the same way you evaluate quality of a non-open access journal: who are the people on the editorial board, what kind of papers do they publish, etc.
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Tags: publications, journals, ethics, open-access
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thread-353 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/353 | What are some good questions to ask current graduate students when visiting schools? | 2012-02-22T13:49:51.453 | # Question
Title: What are some good questions to ask current graduate students when visiting schools?
For the record, I'm visiting the University of Chicago as an accepted PhD student (in the geophysical sciences) next week.
In particular, I'd especially appreciate creative questions that few other visiting students ask.
# Answer
> 24 votes
You'll want to get a sense of their feelings for:
* The graduate program
+ Easy to work with regarding customizing the program to their specific needs (i.e., taking courses outside their specific area if necessary)?
+ How easy/difficult was the process for joining a lab?
+ Have they found the staff easy/hard to work with?
* The advisor
+ Attitude towards students (respectful/distant/slavedriver)
+ Presence in the lab (micromanager/occasional presence/absentee)
+ How organized is the research?
* The university as a research institution
+ Easy collaboration between departments (in their opinion)?
+ Availability of course offerings (from their experience)?
* The city as a place to live
# Answer
> 20 votes
* Talk to current graduate students in your lab (even better, working with your potential adviser!)
+ Ask about their opinion about how the working environment is - what is the working style of your adviser, what is the average time take for a PhD student to graduate from the lab, and where do most of them land up (as eternal postdocs, or tenure-track faculty positions)
* What is the funding scenario - do most people have to be TA's for an extended period/all throughout, or whether RA grants are available? What about conferences - do students get funding for traveling to important venues?
* What kind of a social life exists in and around the campus, and what is the cost of living - a Ph.D is a long commitment, and you should remember these "soft" criteria as well, so that you are at least prepared mentally when you enter grad school
I'll expand on my answer as and when other points come to my mind!
# Answer
> 6 votes
Few of my favorites are 1) Did anything regarding the school surprise them? 2) Things they wish they had been told when they had visited/started grad school at that school. 3) In retrospect, would they still make the decision to come to that particular school.
# Answer
> 2 votes
I want to add three important questions:
* What have you personally done?
* What is that you currently work on?
* How long have you been here?
The best indicator of future performance is past performance. You are likely to be in these graduate students' position in a couple of years' time. How satisfied will you be if you accomplished as much?
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Tags: graduate-school
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thread-1639 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1639 | What are the advantages and disadvantages of having multiple advisers? | 2012-05-22T02:41:32.387 | # Question
Title: What are the advantages and disadvantages of having multiple advisers?
Could multiple advisers mean that it might be easier for you to get funding? (since you're not just limited to one person?) Could it also mean that you get more overall input in your project (the input of 3 different people), and that maybe your project will be geared in a way that it's "interesting" to more people, and consequently might also get more citations that way?
They might pull your project in different directions, but how much is this really a concern?
And what about the special case where they explicitly expressed the desire to interact with each other more through the student? (this was actually the case in my situation).
# Answer
The answer (as in case of most answers in academia.SE) is it depends, often widely from case-to-case. Unless presented with an exceptional example, I would generally view having more than two advisers as a major hindrance - the perceived benefit of having another source of ideas is negated heavily by the communications overhead between them, and the scope for misunderstandings about their role, which might cause the student to be either overloaded in multiple (possibly conflicting) areas, or languishing without any significant guidance. The rest of my answer is based on the assumption that the number of advisers is 2.
1. What is the defined role of the said advisers - are they equally responsible for guiding the student towards completion of their graduate studies (as I've been told is the case in some European schools/research schools), or is one of them the principal guide and the other a co-guide? The amount of time/effort invested by each would depend on their perception of how much they are actually responsible for the student's growth as a researcher.
2. As with most social interactions, it would help greatly if there is a good (or at least professional) working relationship between the 2 guides, as well as a healthy overlap of research areas - a new student might not be able to handle multiple research problems in completely different areas at the same time (without affecting the time to graduate, or the quality of results).
3. Assuming the student publishes with both of them independently, it would look good on her CV that she can produce publishable research with multiple established researchers. This could also have the side-effect of enhancing the student's research network - as a lot of papers (in CS at least) have more than 2 authors, and often collaborating on an paper could lead to more papers/research done with the same set of persons in future.
> 12 votes
# Answer
I think it's detrimental to research progress to have more than two advisors "in practice." (By this, I mean that there should not be more than two people directly involved in day-to-day matters. A "formal advisor" who does not play a substantial role in the thesis would not count.)
There are a number of reasons for this:
* It can be very difficult to get all of the advisors together in the physical sense, and even harder to get them to agree on anything, when they all will want to have their viewpoint considered and accepted.
* A substantial part of your time as a research student may be spent "translating" back and forth between the different advisors. On the other hand, this can also be a potential strength, in that you will have to learn how to make arguments using several different research "languages."
* Funding and bureaucracy will become more complicated the more advisors you have. (This will be true for multiple advisors, even if some of them are "hands off" or formal rather than practicing advisors.)
So, in general, it's best to have one or two advisors.
> 7 votes
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Tags: graduate-school
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thread-1655 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1655 | How to archive an academic blog or website? | 2012-05-23T05:11:25.203 | # Question
Title: How to archive an academic blog or website?
Academic blogs and websites are emerging as an important component of academic discourse.
However, I often lack confidence that the content will remain accessible in the short term (e.g., 5 years) let alone the longer term (10, 20, 50, 100 years).
An important function of journals is to archive the content and provide a stable citation system.
In particular, I'm worried about:
* academics who change employment where the site is hosted by the previous employer
* academics who die or lose interest in their content (e.g., domain names lapsing; site hosting fees ending)
* Internet services that close down
**Question:** What can an academic blogger do to ensure that their blog content remains archived and accessible in the longer term?
# Answer
Digital preservation is an evolving area, and the ability to preserve websites over the long-term is one of the most problematic areas. There are several reasons for this: the dynamic nature of contemporary websites (especially in a format like a blog, where content is update regularly and interactive components such as commenting), hyperlinking (which will eventually lead to broken links and broken images, which, if you point to content external to your site, is out of your control) and the instability of Web formats (websites might look better in one browser than another, much less how websites hold up over time) are just a few of the challenges in preserving websites.
There are, however, several things you can do to help preserve your website:
1. Backup—keep your content stored in more than one location (on your server, on your hard drive, on an external hard drive, in the cloud, etc.) and don't use an external service as your primary storage location, as they can collapse at any time (Geocities was a huge service when it was shuttered);
2. Keep up to date in changes in file formats and browser software—when browsers get updated to view HTML 5, 6, or whatever may replace HTML in the future, will they be backwards compatible to be able to view the blog you're authoring today, or will you need to migrate your website to a contemporary format?;
3. Utilize pockets of expertise on campus—archivists on many campuses have been working towards digital preservation solution and your university's archivist (especially at larger universities) may be able to provide solutions for the long-term preservation of your website; and
4. Consider normalizing your website to a preservation format—although creating a copy of your website as a PDF may mean losses in functionality (in terms of interactivity), it is a way to preserve the content and appearance of the site in a file format that is considered a safer bet for long-term preservation.
The Library of Congress also provides some tips on how to design preservable websites including following available web and accessibility standards, embedding metadata and maintaining stable URLs.
> Taylor, N. (2012, February 6). Designing Preservable Websites, Redux. Retrieved May 23, 2012, from http://blogs.loc.gov/digitalpreservation/2012/02/designing-preservable-websites-redux/
> 9 votes
# Answer
1. **keep up-to-date backups** so that you've got copies in at least two geographical locations (e.g. one at home, one at work) of everything you want to keep.
2. **route everything via your own personal domain**: so that even when things are hosted elsewhere (current university website, pre-print archives, whatever), the URL people see and bookmark is the one on your own personal domain. That way, their bookmarks will still work when you change your affiliation away from your current university.
3. pick good URIs, and then stick to them.
> 4 votes
# Answer
I believe you have a number of options, which I'm stating in no particular oder:
1. You can use the Wayback Machine, which strives to store snapshots of web-pages across time. You can also use the more personalized archive-it service, which lets you manage your *own* collection, at the same time sharing it with the public - this is mostly used by institutions I think.
2. Alternatively, you can host your own blog on a licensed domain name, where you've prepaid the fees for enough years in advance.
Lastly, a very simple suggestion - if the content of the website is tending towards the academic quality/nature of a book, why not publish it as a short collection essays, which you can then disseminate freely over open web libraries etc?
> 2 votes
# Answer
I guess that unfortunately, it's not possible to rely on any private service to ensure a long-term accessibility, since any service can shut down (in a similar way that any book editor can disappear, making impossible to print new editions of old books).
For your own blog, you basically need to have a local copy of it, and either you back-up the public version. For instance, you have a wordpress blog, and you back-up every new article you publish locally. In my case, I have a local version of my own website running on my personal computer (with a webserver and database), and I just sync my local copy with the server it's hosted on, so that there are always two versions of it. The likelihood of losing both at the same time is low enough to make it safe. If you have a decent Internet connection, you can also have your own server at home, and back it up online, so that there are always at least two versions in two different places.
For the other blogs, that's why it's important when you cite one blog not only to put a link, but also to put the text you're quoting, or some text you find interesting. Hence, if the original source disappear, there still exists a copy in many other places. That's the reason why on the SE network, it is asked not to put only links, but also the (description of the) content of the link. In other words, copyright problems aside, it's a good thing to copy!
> 2 votes
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Tags: website
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thread-1660 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1660 | Contribution of gifts and hospital services to university revenue | 2012-05-23T09:18:24.110 | # Question
Title: Contribution of gifts and hospital services to university revenue
This question is based on the pie-charts shown in this link, such as this one for the University of Michigan.
* In most of these charts, around 5% of the revenue comes from gifts. What are these exactly?
* How do hospitals and clinical services play such a critical role for the revenue?
# Answer
Gifts are donations, typically from former students but they could come from anyone. That's just how higher education works in the US, and the tradition of making these donations is a big factor in how some US universities have become very wealthy (some of the donations are spent each year, but many are added to the endowment). The donations qualify for a tax deduction, so there's an element of government subsidy as well.
Hospitals and clinical services can loom large because university teaching hospitals are huge and medical services are very expensive. (You can have thousands of employees, some of them very well paid, and elaborate equipment.) However, this is really not relevant. The medical revenue is typically paying for the hospital activities and medical education, but not used to subsidize the rest of the university. Many universities do not have hospitals or medical schools.
> 7 votes
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Tags: university, funding, health
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thread-1651 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1651 | Percentage of waiting-list students offered a PhD position | 2012-05-22T18:41:15.457 | # Question
Title: Percentage of waiting-list students offered a PhD position
As a result of comments on my earlier question, I am posting another question.
Is there a rule of thumb for what percentage of waiting-list students is eventually placed, or invited, for a PhD position.
# Answer
No, there really isn't a rule of thumb for this.
For graduate departments that admit on a fixed cycle, they generally have a certain number of places open each year. They admit from their applicant pool a number of applicants that, when all decisions are made, are designed to give them their target number of enrollees. If, for some reason, the number of students who accept is significantly smaller than the target, and there were good students who were wait-listed, they *may* be offered admission, although this is by no means guaranteed.
For graduate departments that do rolling admissions this is obviously not an issue, as they don't need a wait list.
> 2 votes
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Tags: application
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thread-1004 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1004 | Can a researcher get his full salary from a European Project? | 2012-04-04T07:39:31.643 | # Question
Title: Can a researcher get his full salary from a European Project?
I would be interested in creating with some colleagues a FET Young Explorers project, in which I would be Work Package leader. I've been involved in several european projects, but always as a postdoc recruited by a PI (or WP leader), and I don't have a permanent position yet. So basically, the idea of applying to this project would be to get my full salary paid by the EU project, but I don't know if it's possible.
Indeed, in the FAQ, they say that the applicants need to have a position somewhere. I don't think getting a position would be a problem, but only if I come with my own salary. The question in this case is whether the hosting institution still needs to pay some part of my salary?
EDIT: A precision on the question. From the Guide for Applicants, Section A3/Budget, p. 47, the part about the requested European Commission contribution:
> The requested EC contribution shall be determined by applying the upper funding limits indicated below, per activity and per participant to the costs accepted by the Commission, or to the flat rates or lump sums. Maximum reimbursement rates of eligible costs
>
> * Research and technological development = 50% or 75%\*
> * Demonstration activities = 50%
> * Other activities (including management) = 100%
>
> (\*) For participants that are non profit public bodies, secondary and higher education establishments, research organisations and SMEs.
So, if the salary of a researcher is included in the Research and Technological development, then does that mean that it's possible to only ask for 75% of it to the EC? (assuming the researcher is employed by a university).
# Answer
So, after quite some time spent on reading the paperwork and talking with helpful staff, I finally understood how this system works. There are different amounts involved:
* **S**: the salary of the researcher, corresponding to the gross amount, i.e. before tax. For instance, 50.000 euros per year.
* **r**: the overhead asked by the host institution, which basically corresponds to the indirect costs of hosting the researcher (renting the office, paying the admin staff, etc). This is an agreement between the host institution and the european commission, usually calculated as a percentage of the salary. For instance, where I'm working now, it's 67%. In some places, it can go up to 100%.
* **T**: the travel and equipments expenses. It basically depends on the expected number of conferences to attend per year, the meetings organised for the project, etc. For instance, based on 4 conferences per year, 2500 euros per conference, that makes 10.000 euros.
* **C = S + rS + T**: the total cost of the researcher per year. For instance, that would be 50000 + 33500 + 10000 = 93500.
* **Req = 0.75 * C**: is the requested amount to the commission (assuming the host institution belongs to: profit public bodies, secondary and higher education establishments, research organisations and SMEs, 0.5 otherwise). So, for the example, we would request 70.125 euros per year.
Note that the request amount is 10.000 euros above the gross salary of the researcher (deducting the travel costs). In other words, one could consider that the 25% the host institution has to pay are indirectly paid by giving an office and proving staff support (who, in general, would be paid anyway, EU project or not), and therefore it does not necessarily mean that the researcher has to find another funding source for the missing 25%.
> 7 votes
# Answer
I think this is a function of the EU country in question, and perhaps even the specific institution that you want to work for.
If you have a particular institution in mind, then you should contact them directly to ask about the specific procedures that apply there. Otherwise, you should take a look at the national-level funding agency or agencies that provide the funding that is comparable to the EU-level program. For instance, in Germany, that would mean looking at what the DFG permits as part of their internal practices. \[In Germany, this usually shouldn't be a problem, but it might in other countries, depending on their appointment procedures.\]
But I think the other thing is that most likely a *temporary worker* can get a full-time salary from an EU-level grant, but a *permanent* employee cannot.
> 3 votes
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Tags: salary
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thread-1696 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1696 | How might changing topic affect a career in academia? | 2012-05-25T10:44:18.863 | # Question
Title: How might changing topic affect a career in academia?
I am curious whether it is common working on different subjects in an area throughout an academic career. I think life is long enough to work on different and interesting subjects, but how common is that?
Particularly, let's consider area as computer science. Topic X and topic Y are not totally unrelated, but it is hard to find people who list X and Y together under his/her interests. For my situation X is software engineering and Y is computer architecture/embedded systems. How might pursuing masters on a topic X and applying to PhD on topic Y look like?
# Answer
If you do a masters thesis on topic X and topic X is not too far from topic Y, for example, if they are both computer science topics, and your academic record is good and your background is sufficient to make the transition, then I don't see any problem making the change at this level. You can catch up on whatever knowledge you need while learning about and researching topic Y. This will not look bad. After you obtain your PhD, people will be less interested in your masters.
Changing later in your career is also possible, though a little more difficult.
One positive point about being able to demonstrate that you can change topic is to show that you are not a *one trick pony*, meaning that you are able to apply yourself at the highest level to different areas.
Indeed, as interests in the field shifts and technology changes and new topics open up, it will often actually be necessary to change topics in order to survive in the field. If people (or just you) lose interest in a topic, then you need to be able to change.
But it is also good to demonstrate that you can commit to one line of research. Apart from the advantages this gives you, such as having a deep knowledge of a specialised topic, it demonstrates your commitment and can be used to show that you have and follow a research strategy.
> 21 votes
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Tags: phd, masters, changing-fields
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thread-1221 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1221 | How formal should figures in a thesis be? | 2012-04-21T13:19:02.823 | # Question
Title: How formal should figures in a thesis be?
I am currently writing my masters thesis. I include in it a screenshot of a webpage, in which I want to point at some components and explain what each of them does. What I did so far is that I draw circles around the components and an arrow from the component to a one word text saying what it is, I intend to go into details under the image.
Is that sort of “labeling” formal enough for a thesis figure? Or is there another presentation that would be more appropriate?
# Answer
Images in a thesis should be of the same quality as images in a peer-reviewed publication. Hand drawn circles and arrows are not formal enough. Circles and arrows drawn with programs like TeX, GIMP, Illustrator, or Powerpoint are formal enough.
> 8 votes
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Tags: writing, thesis, graphics
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thread-1336 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1336 | What items should I ask for in my startup package? | 2012-04-30T23:45:47.053 | # Question
Title: What items should I ask for in my startup package?
I have offers for tenure-track computational biology positions at a couple of U.S. research universities. What sort of things do I need to budget for in my startup package?
# Answer
I'll hopefully be in your position in another year or two, so I'm not speaking from experience. But a few things come to mind:
* Laptop (be specific) and associated technical support
* Any software licenses you need to complete your research and teach
* Office space and furniture
* Lab space
* Lab equipment (be specific)
* Access to shared lab equipment as needed (be specific)
* Access to server(s) where you can test your code/algorithms/etc.
* Access to cluster computing resources (if that fits in with your research)
* Lighter teaching load your first 1-3 years
* Lighter service load your first 1-3 years (not sure if that's something you would explicitly ask for though)
* Salary (and benefits where applicable) for any students, staff, post-docs you will need to be successful in getting papers and grants written
* Money for other miscellaneous expenses that you envision will be necessary
* Money to travel to 1-2 conferences per year
I'm sure others could think of more to add...
> 23 votes
# Answer
In many departments, while it might seem like you're negotiating with the department, you're actually negotiating with the dean and the department is really trying to help you. If there's a way to determine this (talk to recently hired faculty at the department), then it changes your strategy, because now your goal in the negotiation is to provide the department with plausible arguments (not iron-clad) for why you need what you need.
There are probably comp bio specific needs you have for which you should consult colleagues who've recently joined other universities, or even any senior mentors you have who sit on the other side of these negotiations. For generic things, Steve P's list is great. Just remember that each department at each university has their own customs and things they "usually" give out - you don't have to stick to that, but it's good to know what the baseline is.
Also, it always helps to provide justification (for equipment, student support, postdoc money, and so on). It's a lot harder to argue for salary raises unless the school is private (since public schools often have fixed scales).
Bottom line though: there's no harm in asking as long as you can provide a reason. Definitely ask for all that you need, and let them whittle you down.
> 16 votes
# Answer
Congratulations on the offers.
With respect to negotiations, you should privately keep track of what you really need, and then ask for a bit more than that in the negotiations. Since the department (or university) will likely want to negotiate downwards, starting with just what you need might leave you after negotiations with a somewhat undersized package.
To borrow from Steve P's answer, however, perhaps the single most important component that can help you get the group off the ground is to get as much salary support for additional employees as you can. Having that first postdoc and grad student can make a *huge* difference in a new group.
> 11 votes
# Answer
I would add to the list of @Steve
* Summer salary
* Duration for which start up capital is good (if you get a grant, you want to be able to keep your startup)
* Lab renovations
* Moving expenses
* Web page design
* Page charges
You want to provide whoever you are negotiating with justification, and ideally quote(s), for everything. In general, they want to give you as good of a startup package as possible.
> 7 votes
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Tags: job-search
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thread-1694 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1694 | Physics masters and PhD degrees in England/UK | 2012-05-25T09:25:48.507 | # Question
Title: Physics masters and PhD degrees in England/UK
This question is about academia in the UK/England. I understand that in physics, the PhD thesis one produces must be of their own studies, almost like publishing a paper. If you will, a kind of discovery they themselves or along with others have made.
However, I'm not so sure about a physics masters thesis, if there even is one?
I'm assuming here that you do have to produce a masters thesis as I've seen people ask about masters thesis questions for other subjects, please do correct me if I'm wrong.
In a physics masters thesis, is it the same basis and a PhD thesis (something on research you've conducted yourself)? Is it a thesis question on something you find interesting and you're just writing as a good a question as you can about it (so something someone else has discovered)? Or is it something completely different from the two of these?
# Answer
I'm not sure how much this question strongly depends on Physics/UK, so let me detail how it is done for Computer Science in France (as far as I know, the French and British systems are quite close on this, and hard sciences tend to have a common academic process).
The PhD thesis is indeed a novel contribution to the state of the art, and demonstrates the ability of the candidate to be an autonomous full-time researcher. In many fields, it's usually required to have several publications before submitting the PhD thesis.
On the other hand, the Master thesis corresponds to an research internship done in a lab (usually the one in which the candidate will pursue her PhD). The role of the Master thesis is two-fold:
* First, it demonstrates that the candidate has acquired some techniques taught during the Master, and that she was able to use them to solve a particular research problem.
* Second, it's a first step for the candidate into the world of research. Often, the Master thesis constitutes the first chapter of the thesis.
(note that I'm talking here only about research-focused Masters, as there are also industry focused Masters, for which the thesis has a different role).
As such, the topic of the thesis is usually a "simple" research problem, defined by the advisor based on the interests of the student. By simple, I mean that even though the exact solution might not be known, the advisor is usually confident that the solution can be found in a reasonable amount of time.
Note that in France, the time constraint is quite strong, and the thesis must be written in 6 months maximum, otherwise the Master is not validated at all, and therefore the topic of the thesis is usually not an open and complex research problem.
> 4 votes
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Tags: phd, masters, thesis
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thread-1708 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1708 | How to interview undergraduate candidates for research assistants? | 2012-05-25T18:45:53.123 | # Question
Title: How to interview undergraduate candidates for research assistants?
I am at a public high-ranked Canadian university where undergraduates are heavily encouraged to participate in research, and currently recruiting an assistant for myself (and my supervisor). While at this university both as an undergrad, undergraduate researcher, visiting lecturer, and graduate researcher I have seen a very large variance in undergraduate performance:
1. A good number of students have great research potential, motivation, and creativity; these students typically contribute well to undergraduate research and go on to top graduate schools in their specialties.
2. A good number of students are here just to prepare for a professional school (typically Med School, but sometimes Law). Typically these students are very hard working, but don't have a passion for research. They apply for research positions just to flesh out their CVs. They typically don't display great creativity and tend to be overworked and over-committed.
3. The majority of students are hard to motivate, and seldom display great research potential or creativity. It is hard to get results from them on tasks that are not route/mechanical in nature.
Are there any tips and tricks to how to attract students of type 1. More importantly, **how can I structure interviews to better recognize students of type 1**? Is it impossible to attract type 1 students with high probability and I should just hope for the best, but plan for the worst? Is the division I observed artificial and it is my job as the supervisor to turn every student into type 1?
# Answer
My advisor, bless his heart, entrusted in me the responsibility of interviewing and selecting undergraduate students to work in our research lab while still being a graduate student myself. Sometimes it's difficult to determine what a person is really like just from a few minutes speaking with them. I found a few particular questions to be particularly helpful:
1. Ask them what their goals are for the future. Most undergraduates give very general answers because they are not sure what they want. A highly motivated student knows what they want, and are likely to link their goals as part of the reason why they want this particular research job opportunity.
2. Ask them to describe in detail a difficult problem that they had to overcome, and explain how they overcame it. This is a question they typically anticipate, but it's the manner in which they answer that matters... Observe how well they put together their answer, how long it takes them, and how well they articulate it and its relevance to the research job that they're applying for.
3. Ask them about their greatest strengths, and greatest weaknesses. In particular, examine how they explain how their weaknesses may affect their job and how they intend to overcome these weaknesses. A strong candidate will not only be self aware and honest, but will seek ways to overcome these deficiencies.
> 13 votes
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Tags: research-process, interview, research-undergraduate
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thread-1707 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1707 | What are the main goals of administering preliminary / qualifying exams to graduate students? | 2012-05-25T18:44:45.513 | # Question
Title: What are the main goals of administering preliminary / qualifying exams to graduate students?
If I were a Spanish Major as an undergraduate and decide to pursue a PhD in a completely unrelated field (like Theoretical Physics), it makes sense to give a qualifying exam to check that I had the necessary skills to begin the program. But if I'm coming from a B.S in math to a PhD program also in math, it doesn't seem to make sense to give a qualifying exam, as if the knowledge I gained in my undergraduate was insufficient. I presume that one is accepted into a PhD program because he/she has already demonstrated the "qualifying" skills. Thus, I'm baffled by the notion of the qualifying / prelim exam. I'm curious about the ultimate goals of these exams, and how they relate to the professional development of a graduate student.
# Answer
This answer serves mainly to corroborate @Anonymous Mathematician's answer.
As she says, the most important thing to realize is that there are two different kinds of exams that go under the name "prelims / quals". The first of these generally:
(i) tests undergraduate material
(ii) is administered soon after arrival in the graduate program
(iii) used to be used for preliminary weed-out purposes but is now -- at least, in most programs I know about -- used almost entirely for diagnostic purposes.
Probably (iii) is most important: once upon a time, many graduate programs -- even excellent ones, like Berkeley (in fact, especially Berkeley) -- admitted lots of students, as in up to 50% more than were expected to finish. The idea was to give a large group of people, including those with less than sterling (or ivy) pedigrees, a fair shot. Then after a small amount of time in the program -- maybe a year or less -- they would take a "prelim" exam, and a significant portion would fail and leave.
This is no longer the way graduate programs work (at least not in North America, which is what I am primarily familiar with, but to the best of my meager knowledge they don't work that way in other parts of the world either). We pay much closer attention to each student we admit now than in the scenario above, and further our program is judged on retention and completion rates. A graduate program in 2012 who dismissed a third or more of its incoming class every year would look disastrously bad by these sorts of metrics. So this "weedout prelim" is, as far as I know, a thing of the past.
In the graduate program at UGA we still give a "prelim exam" to all entering graduate students, but as I said above we use it almost entirely for diagnostic purposes. In fact we have a certain graduate course designed entirely for students who didn't do well on the prelim, whose purpose is to shore up their undergraduate knowledge ASAP. Other than being encouraged to take this course, there are no direct consequences of failing the prelim (in fact, I'm not sure that one "passes" or "fails" the prelim in any technical sense).
In contrast, most of the "qualifying exams" that you hear graduate students talking about are something entirely different. They:
(i) test graduate level material; in particular, most students do not enter equipped with the knowledge to pass most qualifying exams.
(ii) occupy students' attention for a while: in our program, students have up to three years to pass their qualifying exams.
(iii) really must be passed in order for students to advance in the program, in most cases.
I hope this answers your question. Let me say though that the scores on the "prelim" exam -- i.e., the undergraduate level exam that I mentioned first -- are often all over the place. All of our entering students have at least an undergraduate degree in mathematics. So, unfortunately, no, an undergraduate degree in mathematics is *not* a guarantee of ability to do undergraduate level mathematics...at least not to the satisfaction of a decent mathematics graduate program. (And a student who does poorly on this entering prelim may yet succeed in doing PhD level mathematics a little later on: that is, the fault often seems to lie with the undergraduate program more than the student.)
> 7 votes
# Answer
There are two types of qualifying/preliminary exams, those that cover graduate or undergraduate topics. I assume you are just talking about the latter (while in my experience the former is a little more common).
As I see it, the big reason for preliminary exams on undergraduate material is that many students haven't actually mastered this material to a professional standard. At less prestigious schools, many students won't have received straight A's (or the equivalent in other grading systems), so they had gaps or weaknesses in their understanding, and unless they took more advanced courses in the same area they may never have filled those gaps. Furthermore, it's possible to get excellent grades without true mastery, and students sometimes forget things they knew while taking a course.
The preliminary exam sends a message of "OK, you're in grad school now, and as a professional you're expected to know this material cold. If you have any doubts about your mastery of it, now is the time to study carefully." The few students who don't need to study suffer little harm from the exams, and the students who do need to study benefit from the studying.
> 9 votes
# Answer
There are two main reasons:
* as a "sanity check" to make sure that the student you've admitted is really the student you thought they were; and
* as a weed-out tool, in case you've admitted more students than you have spots for in PhD projects in a given department.
Both purposes are significant. The second is the more unfortunate, and could generally be reduced through better selection processes and through better deployment of teaching and research resources and funding within a department. The former use is equally important, in that it makes sure that students don't try to "coast" their way through what the department believes is its core curriculum that students need to know.
> 4 votes
# Answer
I concur with @Pete L. Clark and @Anonymous Mathematiciar. These exams have names that suggest the darker purposes in their pasts, but they are mainly used as administrative tools by graduate departments.
At the graduate school I attended for chemistry, we took "placement exams". These exams happen for three reasons:
1) to provide the department with a common baseline, as we all did not likely take exactly the same GRE on exactly the same day. Particularly, this provided a means to directly compare the national students with the foreign students.
2) to identify deficiencies, as @Pete L. Clark and @Anonymous Mathematiciar have indicated. In chemistry, the smaller schools occasionally cannot offer courses in all five disciplines: organic, inorganic, analytical, physical, and biochemistry. Rather than punish those students for attending small liberal arts schools, many Ph.D. programs accept them on the premise that they may have to take an undergraduate course to fill in the gaps.
3) to select TAs. All first year graduate students in my chemistry program had to TA undergraduate labs. The placement exams determined which course you got to TA. The highest scorers on the organic chemistry exam were TAs for organic chemistry labs. The highest scorers on the analytic chemistry exam were TAs for analytical chemistry labs, and so on.
> 4 votes
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Tags: phd, qualifying-exam
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thread-1720 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1720 | What kind of questions can I expect to see on a qualifying exam? | 2012-05-26T19:35:14.560 | # Question
Title: What kind of questions can I expect to see on a qualifying exam?
In mathematics, there are certain open questions which are the subject of current research (think of the newest papers in the top journals). I have also heard that some graduate programs ask questions such as these on their qualifying exam. How common is this practice? What kinds of questions can I expect to see on a qualifying exam? I know that a qualifying exam typically tests the knowledge gained in graduate school, but I'm not sure to what extent this knowledge is tested? How "advanced" should I expect these questions to be?
# Answer
I think you shouldn't believe everything you hear. Mathematicians like to tell stories about posing various famous open problems to certain brilliant young students, the idea being that these students don't have the respect and fear for these problems that an adult mathematician would and that maybe, just maybe, they will innocently work on them and even solve them. And it seems to be true that every once in a great while a student solves a serious open problem this way. The vast majority of the time they don't, of course: a problem that the experts in the field want to solve but can't is not going to be accessible to a young student, however brilliant, 99.99% of the time.
So maybe every once in a while a faculty member decides to put a "ringer" problem on an exam. What do you think is going to happen? With probability very close to one, no one will solve the problem, and the writer will have to own up to the fact that the question was not an appropriate one and make sure the students were not in any way penalized by its appearance on the exam. How many times have I seen this happen on exams I have taken, written, or otherwise encountered? Zero.
In fact qualifying exams test a standard syllabus; they certainly do not test research level mathematics. Every department does their exams at least a little differently (a very few departments, like Princeton, don't even have written qualifying exams!) so I don't think there's much point in preparing / worrying about quals until you enroll in a specific graduate program.
Conversely, when you arrive in a graduate program, you should start asking for information about the qualifying exams. And you'll get it: most programs have posted syllabi for quals. Many programs, including those I've personally been involved with, have years and years of old quals for you to page through. Nowadays a lot of these are freely available online: in fact, please see Ohio State's webpage: not only do they do they have posted all of their own qualifying exams going back at least ten years, they helpfully post links to qualifying exams at almost 20 different departments.
Thus the way to study for and pass quals is to go through old quals learning the material and techniques that come up again and again until you can do most of the problems on a given qual in a reasonable amount of time. It's not really any more mysterious or romantic than that...
> 16 votes
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Tags: phd, qualifying-exam
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thread-989 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/989 | How to find a good part-time programs by reputable business schools? | 2012-04-03T03:42:30.473 | # Question
Title: How to find a good part-time programs by reputable business schools?
I have a bachelor degree and work for a marketing research company as a senior research analyst in Morris County in NJ. Having this day-time job, my options for further education remain part-time programs only. However, I do want to get a formal degree from reputable part-time programs, such as part-time MBAs/Master degree. Not just some random courses or certification training offered by community colleges or education institutions.
I work till 5:30 everyday so I am only available after that or on weekends. And the place of lecture has to be close enough to my office/home. Not some place too far away.
I am wondering if there are any programs meeting these criteria. I am not sure where to find, who to ask or which website I should look at to search for these kind of programs. Where should I start? What are the other things I should consider when I plan my further education and choose the programs?
# Answer
Baoye, There are plenty of accredited online MBA programs at accredited institutions. In Maryland, where I am, Frostburg State University offers an AACSB accredited MBA fully online. University of Maryland University College also has a good online program. A little effort on Google should find other programs, perhaps even on New Jersey.
> 1 votes
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Tags: graduate-school
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thread-1722 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1722 | How to salvage a rejected paper when you don't have time to correct it? | 2012-05-27T00:02:40.063 | # Question
Title: How to salvage a rejected paper when you don't have time to correct it?
I just submitted a paper to a conference. The reviewers gave me their responses only two days before the deadline to resubmit the paper. They seemed to indicate that my paper was on topic, and had good preliminary results, but they seemed to indicate that it was lacking more results. I understand it, and I think they're probably right, but I really don't have the time to invest much more time into this particular paper. My advisor thinks that I should invest my time in other research endeavors, but I don't really want to abandon a paper that i've already invested a lot of time in.
**What should you do when you want to salvage a paper but don't have time to correct it?**
# Answer
One piece of **advice-I-would-not-follow** is to submit the paper to a lower quality conference. This could really be a waste of time if the conference is of very low quality, and if you are really proud of the work, do not do this. In the end, this may even look like a black spot on your CV.
What are you doing this weekend? Maybe canceling those plans and using the time to obtain the additional results. Then improve the paper based on the reviewer comments (evenings and other weekends) and resubmit to the next suitable venue.
Another alternative is to get help, either from a colleague or maybe even an undergraduate, if it is easy enough to the him/her how to run your experiments. Reward them with co-authorship, even if they haven't written a word of the paper. (This won't hurt you any.)
Ultimately, you cannot get something for nothing.
> 10 votes
# Answer
I guess we work on fairly different domains, because spending significantly more than *two days* to improve a paper seems negligible to me (writing one good paper a year is already good for me!), even if I agree it would mean submit to another venue in your case. If the referee is right in his or her demands, you should afford to spend a time at least one order below the time already invested in the paper.
> 7 votes
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Tags: publications, time-management
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thread-1623 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1623 | Does one need a specific field in mind to apply to a PhD program in mathematics? | 2012-05-20T18:16:03.287 | # Question
Title: Does one need a specific field in mind to apply to a PhD program in mathematics?
When applying for the PhD program in mathematics, usually, one is not required to specify in what field (e.g., PDE, dynamical system, etc.) he/she intends to do. However, I don't know whether it will be *disadvantage* that one does not have a specific field in mind at all.
I ask this question because some people suggest the students who are applying to the graduate school should talk to or connect with the professor who is in the school he/she intend to apply for. But if one does not even have a specific interest in mind, how can he/she talk to a professor about his/her application? (Even if the student is interested in analysis, say, there are lots of sub-field in analysis.)
So, here is my **question**:
Does one need a very specific field in mind to apply a PhD program in mathematics? Would this be thought as advantage or disadvantage of an application?
# Answer
At least for most graduate programs in pure mathematics in the US, there's no need to have a specialization in mind when applying. \[This may be very different in other countries.\]
It's valuable to demonstrate in your application that you have studied some serious mathematics, by discussing undergraduate research or advanced coursework. However, there's no implication that you intend to focus on the same fields in graduate school.
It's common to indicate an interest in a few possible specialties, usually at a level of detail ranging from "algebra" to "analytic number theory". If you are completely undecided, then that could come across negatively, by suggesting a general lack of enthusiasm. However, being too specific is also problematic. Matching a possible advisor too closely comes across as pandering, while being specific without matching anyone makes it look like you aren't a good fit for this particular department.
Overall, the general feeling is that incoming graduate students don't know enough to make well-informed decisions about specialization, and that anything they say is a little unreliable because their interests may shift as they learn more. From that perspective, it's not worth worrying about this too much.
As for talking with professors, at least at the schools I'm familiar with this will not increase the chances of admission (the decisions are made by a committee). After you've been admitted, it's important to talk with faculty and try to gauge the chances of finding a suitable advisor. However, that can and should wait until February.
> 20 votes
# Answer
To add to what the Anonymous Mathematician said (so again, this has to do with United States)
If you have not already decided on a specialisation, you should *certainly not* try to shoehorn yourself into one just for the sake of applying for graduate school. If you have already decided on a specialisation, however, you should certainly specify it *and* try to talk to faculty members before and/or during the admission process. This is not so much to improve your chances at the school per se; this is mostly to find out whether that school would be a good fit for what *you* want to study.
When I was applying for graduate schools I had just one such experience. I was already quite sure about what I wanted to study, and so contacted some faculty members at places where I applied to who may be good advisors. One of them told me that (a) I have a pretty strong application and they will probably admit me (b) But he is personally busy with his existing students and won't want to take another one (c) There's no one in the same department that he sees as having similar enough interests to be a good advisor for me and (d) The department is running a bit low on money so unless I get a fellowship somehow I will have a hellish teaching load.
In the end I took an offer from another school.
For emphasis, however, what I mean by specialisation is very narrow: "partial differential equations" is still too broad. For my advice above to apply you need to be able to say which type of PDEs you are interested it (elliptic, parabolic, evolutionary, dispersive, transport, kinetic theory, fluids, and/or optimal control to list a few) and to be able to hold an informed (not necessarily expert) discussion on the subject and why you want to study it.
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For other countries the system can vastly differ; this is especially so for degree programs which *require* a Masters or equivalent degree for admission. Many of those programs require submission of a research proposal and admission is contingent on the research being likely to be able to be conducted at said university and that a suitable advisor can be found for your research proposal. But for these kinds of degrees the opposite of the expectation described by Anonymous Mathematician holds: the incoming students are expected to be sufficiently educated (by the Masters degree) to make informed decisions and are also expected to have a good idea what is involved in pursuing PhD research and know what they want to work on. But you can general tell the expectations by reading up on the qualifications for admission and on what the departments/universities expect on the application form.
> 11 votes
# Answer
In France the picture is very different from the US, since you start right away your PhD research (so you must have an adviser from the beginning, and an idea what you will be working on).
If one includes the M2 (second-year master) in graduate studies, then anyway most of them are specialized, so by picking one you do choose a specific field. You can switch for your PhD, but for some fields with many prerequisites it is usually a bad idea.
> 10 votes
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Tags: phd, graduate-admissions, mathematics, application, research-topic
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thread-1616 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1616 | What metrics are used to judge a mathematical journal's quality? | 2012-05-20T02:25:15.007 | # Question
Title: What metrics are used to judge a mathematical journal's quality?
The metric I see most on the internet and on journals' home pages is the 'Impact Factor'. Are there any other metrics that are considered as important as (or more important than) the Impact Factor?
# Answer
> 24 votes
To expand on JeffE's comment, impact factor gets zero respect among mathematicians. It gets very little respect in any field, as far as I know, but it's a particularly bad measure for mathematics journals. For example, it only counts citation received within two years of publication, which is just about the quickest turnaround time you could get in mathematics (given math's publishing practices and timing). So numerically, the impact factor amounts to saying that if your paper doesn't inspire people to drop everything else and rush to get followup work into print quickly enough, then it has had zero impact.
Impact factors are also manipulated by journal editors, often enough to require serious work detecting and punishing this behavior.
The only reason impact factors exist at all is that administrators want simple ways to rate research productivity, especially in dysfunctional settings where there's no infrastructure of trusted experts. Counting citations is easier to defend as "unbiased" than most other approaches.
There are many other numerical measures of journal quality, such as eigenfactors, but they are not popular or widely used.
In 2010, the Australian Research Council rated 20,000 journals by quality based on expert opinion (for example, see here for the math journals). This is still not great, since the ratings miss subtleties (such as journals with greater strength in some subfields than others) and it's not clear how reliable they are for lesser-known journals anyway. However, this is the closest anyone has come to giving a replacement for impact factors based on expert opinion. Unfortunately, it was so much work that they decided not to do it again.
# Answer
> 5 votes
Now the Web of knowledge issues a five-year impact factor that may be considered (slightly) more relevant in some fields, like mathematics. Mathematicians sometimes convince people rating them to use the MathSciNet MCQ instead, which is a five-year impact factor computed with a mostly mathematic database.
The AMS Notices publish yearly a survey of the processing time of many mathematical journals; this is one aspect of the editorial process quality, probably the easiest to measure.
You can find surveys on the prices of journal, which is certainly a good measure of the commercial talent of the publisher.
Overall, quality can mean a lot different things and you should explain for what purpose you intend the measures to be used.
# Answer
> 3 votes
Considered important by whom? Funding agencies will obviously prefer something "objective" like the impact factor, immediacy index or cited half-life. Researchers usually have less quantitative criteria like where do my peers publish or what is the journal's reputation.
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Tags: publications, journals, mathematics, publishers
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thread-1716 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1716 | Is it okay if a student wears a mask to class to conceal scars? | 2012-05-26T18:19:27.123 | # Question
Title: Is it okay if a student wears a mask to class to conceal scars?
Like a halloween mask to conceal injuries of a burn?
# Answer
Of course. If there's a medical reason for it and the student can produce an appropriate doctor's certificate or what not. You would need to check the regulations.
It probably depends on what sort of mask it is. If the mask is distracting for other students or plain silly, then I can imagine that it is reasonable to object to it. So, 'halloween mask' may not be the best description of an appropriate mask.
> 15 votes
# Answer
You will definitely need to check regulations regarding the wearing of costumes that conceal one's appearance. For example, in France it's forbidden by law to conceal one's face in public space, including in universities (and it's made explicit in universities' by-laws). While there's normally allowances made for legitimate medical reasons, there will definitely be limits. "Halloween-style" costumes and masks will probably be disallowed.
One additional comment not mentioned in Dave's answer is that in cases of laboratories and other "practical" exercises, such costumes may be disallowed for legal and protective reasons. You will need to talk with the appropriate staff about any accommodations that can be made.
> 12 votes
# Answer
In general, I second Dave's answer. There is one point, however. During exams students have to identify themselves, and this is commonly done by showing some identification document (e.g., student id) to the person in charge. Wearing a mask would likely be interpreted as a failure to identify yourself, unless identification is possible in some other way. As a rule, failing to identify yourself at our university means that the lecturer is not allowed to grade the exam. However, if wearing a mask is required due to a medical condition, the student can notify the examination board *before the exam* that can decide to deviate from the identification rule and oblige the lecturer to grade the exam.
> 11 votes
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Tags: health, outward-appearance
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thread-1748 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1748 | Professors and Liberal Arts Colleges | 2012-05-27T17:45:26.910 | # Question
Title: Professors and Liberal Arts Colleges
In general, do professors work at liberal arts colleges because they do not want to have to face the pressure of writing a lot of research papers? Instead they want their evaluations to be skewed towards their teaching quality?
# Answer
> 11 votes
You're not expressing the question in the most flattering way, but yes: most academic jobs are a mix of research and teaching (and also service / administration), and there is a lot of variation in the importance placed on each from job to job. Some people are more interested in one than the other, and the faculty at liberal arts colleges have signed up for a job in which more emphasis is placed on teaching and student contact than a, well, a research university.
At a good liberal arts college faculty are still expected to be research active -- it's just that they spend more hours per week on teaching than their colleagues at a more research-oriented institution. Someone who felt like writing research papers was pressure that they didn't want to face would probably be more comfortable at something like a four-year, junior, or community college, in which in most cases the research expectations are really nominal.
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Tags: publications, professorship, teaching
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thread-1753 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1753 | What does it take to get a tenure track position at an Ivy League School? | 2012-05-27T18:25:00.053 | # Question
Title: What does it take to get a tenure track position at an Ivy League School?
I see some professors at Ivy league schools who didn't go to Ivy league schools. I also see professors who went to Ivy League schools that end up working at mediocre universities. So clearly pedigree doesn't play a very significant role by itself. What other factors come into play?
# Answer
> 25 votes
The Ivy League is an athletic league, not a list of the top universities. They are all very good, and some of them are great, but nobody thinks UPenn is more prestigious or a higher-ranked university than Stanford (despite the fact that UPenn is in the Ivy League and Stanford is not).
Furthermore, the strength of individual departments is correlated with the overall prestige of the university, but there's a lot of variation. The prestige of the university plays some role in recruiting faculty, but departmental strength is the primary factor.
Finally, schools really shouldn't (and generally don't) care much about the pedigree of the candidate. They are much more interested in accomplishments than educational background. Of course, there's a strong correlation between accomplishments and pedigree, for at least two reasons. Talented, ambitious students are likely to have the opportunity to attend top schools, and they often take that opportunity. Once they are there, they benefit from an environment full of top faculty and other students like them. So it's no surprise that many professors at top schools studied at such schools themselves, but they didn't all do so.
As for what other factors come into play, that's a very broad question. At top research universities, the big question is how good your research is, primarily judged by external letters of evaluation. There's nothing special about getting a job at a top school, beyond the degree of competition.
Regarding the Ivy League students who end up teaching at lower-ranked universities, that's numerically guaranteed. Every research university graduates more Ph.D. students than it hires, and typically far more, so there's no way they could all get jobs at schools like the ones they attended. (But keep in mind that most colleges are not research universities and do not offer Ph.D. programs.) To a first approximation, most Ph.D. recipients from top universities will get jobs at lower-ranked research universities (or other types of jobs entirely, for example teaching-focused or industrial). Most students from lower-ranked research universities will not get jobs at research universities at all, although of course they may still end up in academia.
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Tags: university, job, tenure-track
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thread-1597 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1597 | Sample Research Grant White Paper | 2012-05-17T17:49:06.507 | # Question
Title: Sample Research Grant White Paper
I am working on a research grant proposal and the funding agency requires us to turn in a white paper before the actual proposal. I have no clue how a research grant white paper should look like. I tried googling and searching in the university library, but could not find anything similar. Will somebody be able to give me a link to a research grant white paper, something which I can look at and learn the format? (my field is computer science)
# Answer
> 7 votes
Based on a little Googling, his white paper sounds like a preproposal. It is likely a short overview over your research project: the problem you are working on, your approach to solving it, how much it will cost, and what you and/or the agency will get out of it. Consider this white paper an outline of your full proposal.
Many agencies will ask for these if they expect a particular program or funding opportunity will have a high response or if the purpose of the program is to provide a single large award to one project. The prepreposals are used to narrow the field before they ask for full proposals from a smaller set of submitters.
I have not been successful at finding examples, since proposals and affiliated documents are almost never released unless they are funded. However, I have found some tips for preparing white papers from Rochester Institute of Technology and Purdue.
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Tags: research-process, funding, publications
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thread-1490 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1490 | Why is the city of publication important in most bibliography format? | 2012-05-08T15:38:06.213 | # Question
Title: Why is the city of publication important in most bibliography format?
Most bibliography formats require the city of publication for books. Why? In this digital era, ISBN would be way more important. But even before the digitalization of everything, why was the city of publication important?
I can imagine some purposes:
1. to distinguish potential same names of different publishers, and
2. to help book-seekers find the publisher and the book by actually visiting the city or contacting libraries in the city.
I want to know better stories about the '*city of publication*'.
# Answer
Mentioning the city in the bibliography is important because sometimes the same edition published in different cities would have **different pagination**, and occasionally even **redacted content**. Therefore when someone wants to look up the original source, they need to have this additional information available to them.
Another important reason to keep the bibliographic information on place of publication is for reasons of style. Many of us might have bibliographies stretching a century or more, and it would look odd to mention place for some and not for others.
But naturally changes in citation styles are continual, and another element of the citation that is of lessening importance is the page number for journal articles. For one of my publications, I was actually required to *remove* the page numbers in the in text citation, because the relevant information is easier to find using a search engine rather than by leafing to the correct page in a printed copy.
> 23 votes
# Answer
In most cases, mentioning the city in the bibliography is not important. It appears to be largely a legacy of older practices. For this reason, I usually don't include the name of the city in my references, unless there is some particular reason to include it.
> 1 votes
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Tags: publications, books, citations
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thread-1746 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1746 | How active should professors be in writing papers with their students? | 2012-05-27T17:38:07.177 | # Question
Title: How active should professors be in writing papers with their students?
In recent months, I have found myself getting involved in varying degrees with the papers being written with members of my group. Some of the papers—by the more senior and experienced members of the group (primarily the postdoc) have needed little real effort on my part, except suggestions for improvements.
On the other hand, some of the more junior members of the group have been struggling significantly in writing papers that I believe can pass muster in getting into good peer-reviewed journals. My question is: *how involved should I be in the writing process*?
While I am ultimately equally responsible for the contents of the paper, it is not clear how strong a role I should play. Is it better for me to keep hounding the student through draft after draft until things are fixed to a satisfactory level, or do I need to step in at some point? Does the decision calculus change when an important deadline is on the horizon?
# Answer
Writing "good" papers is an integral part of being a good academic, and therefore it is, in my opinion, something that supervisors *should* teach their students.
This means you should be **active in teaching them how to write**, and less active in the actual writing itself.
Struggling is part of any learning process, provided they are struggling with writing, and not with your reviews. The best you can do is to provide the student with clear goals of how the paper should look, how it should be structured and what it should contain. Looking back at my own first papers, I usually started writing before knowing exactly what the bottom line, e.g. the take-home message, should be. Discussing a plan of the paper, both with regards to content and the writing process, with the student before letting him/her write it is probably a good idea.
When reviewing the manuscript, I think it's important to provide clear, consistent and constructive criticism. Specifically:
* *Clear*: If you don't like a sentence, paragraph, figure or table (don't forget these latter two!), make sure you tell the student *exactly* what you don't like about it. This may require putting intuition aside and thinking through why you're not happy with it.
* *Consistent*: Avoid editing ping-pong that lead to the same paragraph being re-written 20 times back and forth. It's probably a good idea to keep copies of previous iterations with your own comments. This also helps the students if you can tell them they've done a good job fixing things from the previous iteration.
* *Constructive*: This is kind of obvious, but I can't be reminded of it often enough.
Deadlines are a bummer, but they're as much part of the academic process as the writing itself, so the best you can do is to teach your students to prepare for them adequately, i.e. plan ahead.
**Addendum**
As for authorship, in my opinion, teaching a student to write a paper in no way qualifies as co-authorship. It's part of your job as an academic. Co-authorship is something that arises out of having contributed significantly to the *contents* of the paper.
> 20 votes
# Answer
It seems you already know the answer -- it depends on the paper (your level of interest), the co-authors (their ability to work alone) and your time. There are no rules. I saw both advisors that spend a lot of time in technical discussions and advisors that hardly spend time to read the paper. Both were good advisors INHO.
I would say the role of the advisor is like the role of the head-chef in a fancy restaurant: *Quality Assurance*. If the cooks make great food, all you need to do is to clean the crumbs off the plate before it goes out. If the cooks messed the food up, you need to return the plate back to them and tell them that the fish is still raw; the chicken is blend; and the correct way to do Flambé is by lighting up 95% alcohol rather than 5%-alc beer. Demonstrations are always appreciated.
> 8 votes
# Answer
One strategy for teaching students about the writing process is to get them involved in projects/papers being written by the professor or by more advanced researchers of the professor's group (post docs or 3rd or 4th year students in European system), and over time gradually increase the amount of responsibility that the student has. This works in groups where people are collaborating on the same thing. For a computer science example, you can imagine that people in the lab are developing the same software system.
Start by getting a first year PhD student working with a more advanced researcher. The research is not wholly done by the new student, but the student should be involved in all steps of the process. The new student can learn mostly by observation (watching the paper grow), contributing about 10% of the total effort.
Writing of the next paper could follow more or less the same pattern, except that the new student should take a more active role, say 25%.
For the third paper, give the new student the lead, and keep the more experienced researchers around helping and contributing, but make sure that they do not take over, and let the student work at his/her own pace. Whenever the student gets stuck, the more experience researcher could help move things forwards, to avoid the work stagnating. On this paper the student could do 60-70% of the work, and most of the writing.
Finally, let the student take the main responsibility on a paper and have the more experienced researchers contributing only comments and encouragement.
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Doing things in this way requires a bit of bootstrapping, as you need to have multiple papers on the go, written by multiple people, but all around the same topic, but it could work with a single student-single professor set up.
> 5 votes
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Tags: publications
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thread-1712 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1712 | Suggestions for high school student who is visiting a professor for HS research? | 2012-05-25T22:05:19.423 | # Question
Title: Suggestions for high school student who is visiting a professor for HS research?
So this is what she sent me:
> i emailed a caltech neurobio prof, dr. X, and he emailed me back and wants to meet me, im visiting him on june 16...i went through this sort of thing with ucla and stuff but this time i'm sooo nervous because he's a caltech prof and caltech is caltech...do you have any tips for me?
So my general suggestion to her is this: show that you can do something that can reduce the time load on his research (which is pretty much what all PhD/UG/HS research is about) - you want to do things that the professor wants to do but doesn't want to spend the time on, although some professors might be willing to "waste" a little time mentoring high school students and undergrads.
> he already asked me what lab and general knowledge i know i told him i know gel electrophoresis, pcr, restriction endonuclease digestions, immunohistochemistry, and some basic cell culture techniques and that i learned some basic neuroscience neuroanatomy and neurohistology and how to read fmri images through the us nat'l brain bee competition
I also suggested this: when making a list of your skills, show - don't just tell (although this is really hard for many high school students since they haven't had the chance to show yet). Professors are used to people who claim to know more than they really know.
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What are some other general suggestions that can be helpful to high school students who are trying to do research with specific professors? Generalizable cases are fine - as I do get quite a few emails from high school students who want to seek my advice on how to get research with a professor.
# Answer
As a HS student visiting a lab, a willingness to do some of the "grunt" work in exchange for a chance to do "real" research is helpful. Being able, and willing, to do literature searches on a database (e.g., pubmed), to download easy to get papers, and go to the library to get hard to find papers papers is really useful for a lab. Most researchers would happily trade their time teaching about the methods they use and love, in exchange for not having to make a run to the library. Being able to do data entry and carry out statistical tests, with guidance, in a program like SPSS, is really valuable. Being able to make charts/figures in programs like Excel, Photoshop and Illustrator is a real plus.
> 8 votes
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Tags: professorship
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thread-1752 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1752 | Why don't colleges and departments teach social skills? | 2012-05-27T18:19:28.853 | # Question
Title: Why don't colleges and departments teach social skills?
After all, to do research with a professor, a student has to have good social skills. So why not have classes that teach social etiquette and social skills? It seems that many courses in college are "book courses." Yet, when students graduate, what really matters is how they present themselves and their social skills.
# Answer
During one's university life as an undergraduate, there are many opportunities to improve one's social skills and confidence as an adult. These range from the various sporting and political clubs students can join, through volunteer activities students can participate in, through coaching activities (of more junior students or even high school), all the way to activities like having a few drinks in the uni bar (soda, for US students). During the summer, one can participate in *spring break*-style activities or get an internship at a law firm.
All of these activities, I dare say, help shape a student into a person. There's no assessment, no assignments, no grades, but such is the school of hard knocks.
> 3 votes
# Answer
I heard that there where some (highly wanted) trials in Potsdam (maybe somewhere else):
> Even the most quirky of computer nerds can learn to flirt with finesse thanks to a new "flirting course" being offered to budding IT engineers at Potsdam University south of Berlin.
>
> The 440 students enrolled in the master's degree course will learn how to write flirtatious text messages and emails, impress people at parties and cope with rejection.
To name the (alleged) reasons, why university courses in social skills are so rare:
* many social skills can't be easily fitted into a course scheme,
* there is a common belief (with which I strongly disagree) that there is no such need (as its to late (not necessary) or people will learn it automatically (a wishful thinking)),
* there may be a huge difference in initial social skill levels (from one where no course is needed to one, when a course won't change things),
* teaching social skills may be difficult, as many things are very culturally- and context-dependent.
Personally, I regret that there were no social skills courses at my university (so I had to learn from books, mostly - undergraduate psychology). For me, as for many other STEM students, it was (relatively) easier to learn technical material "in the natural way", than social skills.
However, social skills (as any other skills), are the best to be honed in practice (at least after). There are many opportunities, e.g.:
* teamwork on any project (scientific or "just for fun"),
* running a students' chapter or club,
* organizing trips, excursions, movie nights, parties, ...,
* organizing a students' conference.
> 3 votes
# Answer
At our university (the Netherlands) students are actively involved in group projects and as a part of the preparation to these projects they get some training on how to give talks, how to negotiate, how to organize/chair meetings, etc.
> 1 votes
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Tags: etiquette, coursework, soft-skills, social-skills
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thread-1779 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1779 | What are the elements of an effective elevator pitch? | 2012-05-28T15:09:19.090 | # Question
Title: What are the elements of an effective elevator pitch?
When I go to conferences and try to network, I want to be able to explain my research in a clear and concise manner while still effectively communicating what I do. What are the most effective ways of doing this?
# Answer
An effective elevator pitch is between 30 and 60 seconds in length. Based on how most people speak, that's between 60 and 120 words. That's not a lot of time or verbiage, as this corresponds to about one paragraph in length.
If you look at the challenge as answering the six fundamental questions (Who?, What? Where?, When?, Why?, and How?), several of them have already obvious answers (these would be Who?—You!, When?—Now!, and Where?—My PhD project!). That leaves the three remaining questions: What?, Why?, and How?
Basically, I'd format the pitch as follows:
* What is the basic problem?
* Why is solving this problem important?
* How are you solving this problem in an original way?
The other thing is to rehearse it until you can tell it without thinking about it—either because you have a rehearsed script, or because the key points have become ingrained and recallable without much thought.
======
**POSTSCRIPT**: As Artem mentions in a comment below, you should have different elevator pitches for different audiences. At a minimum, you should have one for experts in your specific field, one for other members of your profession but outside your field, and then a third for "general" audiences. Having one for family and friends who want to know "what exactly is is that you do?" probably isn't a bad idea, either.
> 11 votes
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Tags: networking
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thread-1782 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1782 | Why do Math journals provide you with LaTeX class files and instructions and they also advise you not to spend time typesetting the paper? | 2012-05-28T17:28:23.623 | # Question
Title: Why do Math journals provide you with LaTeX class files and instructions and they also advise you not to spend time typesetting the paper?
This is what I don't understand. Journals provide you with LaTeX class files and instructions and they also advise not to spend time typesetting the paper into the exact format of the journal. What does this mean? I don't know if this applies to all journals or to most of them.
# Answer
> 22 votes
I don't know, but here's a possibly useful tip: when I get sent latex style files and complicated instructions for how to format my (accepted) paper, I usually try right away to get these files to work and to format things in the way asked of me...for up to half an hour. If at the end of half an hour (or slightly less if I am feeling impatient that day) the task is not yet finished, I generally give up and say that I wasn't able to get the style files to work. In almost all cases, the editor in question asked no further questions and gladly did the formatting himself.
The exception was a note I submitted to the American Mathematical Monthly, where they were extremely picky and passive aggressive about the changes they wanted made. After at least six (not an exaggeration!) emails from a secretary of the form "For some reason you still haven't included your references in the proper format..." I lost my cool a little, gave them blanket permission to format the (three page!) paper however they wanted, and requested that they leave me out of it. Which they did, and the note appeared a few months ago.
Moral: this is one of those tasks that will expand to take up as much time as you let it. Given that most journals have professionals who will devote further time to typesetting your paper after you sign off on it anyway, why not sign off on it sooner rather than later?
Let me add as a counterpoint that there are some smaller, internet based journals where most of the nuts and bolts work is done by a single person, who is working hard to put out the product rapidly and well (example: the Journal of Integer Sequences). In fact I seem to recall that Prof. Shallit of JIS spent some time reformatting my accepted JIS manuscript, which then got electronically published within a few days of its final acceptance. He really went above and beyond, and if I have it over again I will do more on my own side.
**Added**: Looking back at your question, I worry that I may have misinterpreted it: are you asking about the initial submission of the paper? Definitely do not mess with any style files or publication instructions before your paper gets accepted. I agree that "instructions for authors" pages seem ambiguous on this point, but in all of my experience authors, editors and referees have a common understanding: **first we decide whether we want to publish the paper, then we worry about its format and type-setting**.
# Answer
> 12 votes
The instruction not to typeset means that you should not worry about the appearance of your manuscript over and above what the style file provides. Don't worry about strange page breaks, overfull hboxes, and floats that end up in the wrong place. Fixing these would be examples of what the publisher means by "typesetting". Any fixes you make will almost certainly be removed by the publisher once the manuscript is final and being prepped for publication, so you will have wasted your time and made extra work for the publisher. You do want your manuscript to be readable using the publisher-provided style file, and you should probably be judicious about adding packages to your document. (Ideally the publisher will give guidance on this.)
I agree with Pete L. Clark that you shouldn't worry about this issue at all until your paper is accepted. Journals should provide clearer instructions about this.
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Tags: publications, journals, publishers
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thread-1762 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1762 | How does a PhD student make meaningful comments or suggestions regarding a professor's work? | 2012-05-28T02:27:41.680 | # Question
Title: How does a PhD student make meaningful comments or suggestions regarding a professor's work?
So bobthejoe said this:
> The PhD students I remember the most are the ones who came up to me and made meaningful comments or suggestions regarding my work. They get extra bonus points if in the middle of the night the next week they offer more meaningful comments or suggestions.
Here's the question though: how many PhD students actually manage to make meaningful comments or suggestions about a professor's work? And how often does the professor follow up and inform the student that those comments are helpful (rather than pretend that the comments are helpful as a matter of politeness)? And if the comments are implemented, does the professor ever notify the student?
I'm saying this as someone who makes *a lot* of suggestions/comments to other people, but who can never be sure whether or not they find them helpful. Most suggestions seem to be discarded simply because it takes too much time/effort to implement them.
# Answer
> 10 votes
The other answers make good suggestions for the asking of questions or posing ideas to professors. Most professors are open to questions and new ideas. I personally love it when my students come to me with something that I hadn't thought of before. As for getting recognition, it depends on the relationship between the Ph.D. student and the professor.
If you, as a grad student, ask a poignant question at a visiting professor's lecture, and then the professor returns and gets his or her group working on the matter, the you will very likely not receive any further communication about the matter. You will, however, be able to determine if your question had an effect when the publication came out. If nothing else, you can have that warm little feeling that something came of your question.
If you, as a senior graduate student, pitch something to your adviser that is relevant to your project, your adviser should listen. At some point you know more about your project than your adviser does. I pitched many things to my adviser over the years. Sometimes I was shot down, and then did them anyway. One of my questions, however, transformed the direction of my thesis work. I started and finished a whole new project in my last year based on an idea I pitched.
Senior graduate students weighing in on other projects going on in their group also tend to get listened to, and occasionally acknowledged in the publication for "helpful discussions." Yes, sometimes those names are graduate students. For one example I know of, see the acknowledgements in this article. "The authors would like to thank... ...Mr. Benjamin N. Norris for helpful discussions."
# Answer
> 9 votes
From my perspective, even a good question at a department colloquium will make a student stand out. Often, a student will ask a question or make a comment that I've thought about but didn't bother to mention. That is also something that catches the eye. Ultimately I think that Bravo's point is a good one: just try to think about the problem and comment if something comes to mind.
# Answer
> 8 votes
**Very very carefully.** One of the important aspects of being a PhD student is learning how to think critically. Turning that critical eye on a colleague, and even worse on an advisor, can be a real disaster. The key is for the student to be able to provide his/her insight into the issues without putting the colleague on guard.
# Answer
> 8 votes
The same way any other researcher would make meaningful comments or suggestions regarding a colleague's work. By having real insight, and presenting it carefully and respectfully.
(And I agree with all the other answers.)
# Answer
> 3 votes
If a professor finds your comments insightful and valuable, he/she would take the initiative to request your opinion or collaborate with you on a project. If not, they won't make an effort and may keep silent about it to be polite or outright request that you not give your opinion. Just keep in mind though... Some professors may regard your comments as being a bit ostentation or arrogant... I know, because I've been there and done that myself :)
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Tags: phd, professorship
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thread-1793 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1793 | How to reference different sources in a list? | 2012-05-29T10:50:47.853 | # Question
Title: How to reference different sources in a list?
I am writing my master thesis and I am not sure how to reference/cite different sources in a list.
I have a small list like:
> The benefits of an "incredibly interesting topic" are:
>
> * benefit 1 (ref 1)
> * benefit 2 (ref 2)
> * benefit 3 (ref 2)
> * benefit 4 (ref 1)
> * benefit 5 (ref 3)
I think that putting the reference after each point is a bit intrusive, but I don't know how else can I do it.
Is there any convention of how to reference in this scenario?
# Answer
> 11 votes
I think the method you've proposed, while cumbersome and intrusive, is also the correct way to do things, as you will be assigning a specific item to a specific source. That is the point of citing original source material in the first place. So while it may be somewhat unsightly (particularly if using a Harvard-like style in which the authors are listed as part of the reference), what you're doing has the advantage of being unambiguous and completely legitimate.
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Tags: citations, writing, thesis
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thread-1802 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1802 | Etiquette for seeking collaboration via E-Mail? | 2012-05-29T19:46:39.923 | # Question
Title: Etiquette for seeking collaboration via E-Mail?
I work on a certain topic on the theoretical side and just came across a publication that I think would be a nice starting point for collaboration with an experimental lab (developmental biology).
I am a second-year student in Europe and my supervisor does not know anyone in the other lab. The question title mentions e-mail specifically as I don't expect to run into these people at conferences or any other occasion.
What are common rules and guidelines you follow when contacting someone for the first time about stuff that they work on and you feel excited about?
How do some of you that are contacted by people like me react to their attempts? And what are aspects to these requests that trigger interest on your part?
# Answer
> 16 votes
A collaboration is comparable to a business relationship; both sides need to put significant, continuous effort into making the relationship work, and the benefits are often only realized after some initial time period has passed. Given that mindset, you'll have to convince the prospective collaborator that:
1. You are a good researcher,
2. Your idea is worth researching, and
3. They will significantly benefit from having your cooperation in implementing this idea.
\<negative nelly\> From my experience, as a graduate student, you will likely find it very difficult to succeed at convincing them of 1 and/or 3 without having the full backing of your advisor. \</negative nelly\>
All that being said, if you plan on initiating contact via email, simply compose it as you would a communique to a business contact; write professionally, describe the idea clearly and briefly, and discuss how they should contact you to follow up. You will want to convince them of all three in the email, which may be a difficult task. I would imagine you should follow up via phone or in-person meeting, as you would a business contact.
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Tags: research-process, etiquette
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thread-1804 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1804 | Who applies academic CS research in the industry and how? | 2012-05-29T20:11:33.013 | # Question
Title: Who applies academic CS research in the industry and how?
After a paper is published, say in CS, who reads the paper? How are the ideas presented there applied to business and industry? How is industry collaboration done?
I'm asking this question per this comment.
# Answer
> 6 votes
I think it depends in large part on what the research is. Some fields lend themselves more readily to real-life application, while others like, say, theoretical physics, are a long way from being used by industry.
It also depends on the researcher. I am a firm believer in the "Last Research Mile" principle (disclosure: the man who wrote that is my advisor). The premise of the Last Research Mile is that a big part of doing research is taking it all the way through to implementation. Doing the early research provides a good start, but lots of important lessons, including research lessons, are learned as the idea is carried through to execution. I'm studying in an Information Systems program, and so my research is in business, computers, and people. While it would be easy to do the basic research and move on to another topic, I think it is important to continue to push and test the idea even in its implementation phases.
As a result of following the Last Research Mile principle, my advisor has created at least one company that sells the product of decades of his research. Many lessons were learned, and many publications resulted because of those lessons throughout the whole process.
# Answer
> 0 votes
We have a lab within our department that "...takes state-of-the-art methods, techniques, and tools on software product quality analysis developed during more fundamental/strategic research... and applies, validates, and deploys these in industry and government."
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Tags: industry
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thread-1157 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1157 | Do presentations given during interviews count as invited talks? | 2012-04-17T14:01:51.580 | # Question
Title: Do presentations given during interviews count as invited talks?
I am in the process of interviewing for faculty positions and trying to keep my CV up to date as I go. Should I include research (or teaching) presentations given during on-campus interviews as invited talks? Or are they considered just a part of the interview process and better left off the CV?
# Answer
> 25 votes
I disagree with Dave. An invited talk is, by definition, a talk that you've been invited to give. Yes, interviews count. (More-or-less inviting yourself is not necessarily different than a non-interview invited talk.)
I agree that you shouldn't reveal *which* of your invited talks are actually interviews, but that's only an issue if all your invited talks happen in the last semester before you submit your thesis. (And maybe you should wait until after interview season is over to add them. The people who are interviewing you are *desperately* curious about where else you're interviewing.)
# Answer
> 19 votes
I would say **no**. Leave them off the CV.
Apart from the fact that you more-or-less invited them to invite you by applying for the position, thus they are not really invited talks, it's probably not a good idea to advertise all of the places you've unsuccessfully applied to or declined.
# Answer
> 13 votes
I wouldn't say it's unethical to list them, since I think they could legitimately be considered invited talks, but I would strongly recommend leaving them out. Partly that's because it's not worth the (probably small) risk of offending someone who really doesn't think they belong there, but mainly it's because in my experience most people don't list interview talks on their CVs, so listing them will look a little unusual. In particular, it may make people wonder whether you felt you didn't have enough other talks, whether you're doing other unconventional things in your CV that they should watch out for, etc. This isn't likely to cost you a job by itself, but it's not what you want readers to be thinking about.
There's a general meta-principle here: you should make your CV look like everyone else's, not because doing it differently would be wrong, but because you don't want readers to focus on the differences.
# Answer
> 6 votes
It depends on which CV you are talking about. Hopefully you have better things to include on a one-page CV. Everything you do belongs on your "full" CV. I put departmental seminars in a different category from conference talks. I divide up my conference talks into invited and not invited (and maybe someday keynote). Interviews talks generally either go in external departmental seminars (as opposed to internal seminars) or guest lecturing depending on if it is a research talk or teaching demo. If the interview talk is only given to the search committee, then it goes under positions interviewed for and does not make the seminar list. My full CV lives on the web, but if I am asked to send a CV I purpose tailor it.
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Tags: cv, interview
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thread-1816 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1816 | Do interviews require taking vacation days? | 2012-05-30T14:36:42.677 | # Question
Title: Do interviews require taking vacation days?
When interviewing for a new position, is it common practice to count the days spent on interviews as vacation days?
It wouldn't seem unreasonable to count these as vacation days, except that I could also see them as being work days. If I were only visiting to give a lecture and speak with faculty in another department, it would seem like work, and presenting at a conference is certainly not vacation.
A few follow up questions - does it matter that I am a post-doc (e.g. would it be different from a faculty, in which case interviewing for another position would not be in the interest of the current employer)? Would it be different if I were interviewing at a company rather than a university? Does it depend on the country? I am in the U.S.
(this is related to the question related to Do presentations given during interviews count as invited talks?)
# Answer
You should ask your advisor, but it is reasonable for an advisor to allow you time (potentially several weeks or months) to essentially be away from the lab and your research in order to interview for jobs. In my opinion, this is a concession that is reasonable to give as a reward for hard work during previous phases of an advisee's research. If not, the advisor likely does not have the advisee's interests in mind. That could come back to bite him/her later when attempting to find new advisees.
On the other hand, if you're spending a lot of extra leisure time on the trips that is not part of the interview, then it should probably be considered vacation time.
> 7 votes
# Answer
In most cases you will not take all of your vacation days and work more than the required number of hours, so it shouldn't really matter. As a post-doc, you should ask your advisor.
> 4 votes
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Tags: postdocs, job, interview
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thread-1820 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1820 | Undergraduate European Computer Science Schools and their application process? | 2012-05-30T17:13:42.637 | # Question
Title: Undergraduate European Computer Science Schools and their application process?
I'm a U.S. sophomore (junior in the fall) studying Computer Science looking to transfer. I have three questions:
1. What schools in Europe should I look into for Computer Science? To clarify what I'm looking for out of this question, I'm not asking for schools tailored to what I'm seeking (ie, will this school be good specifically for me), but rather the shared consensus of which schools are considered respectable for Computer Science. For example, even in the states I think everyone would say Oxford and Cambridge are well respected, but beyond that most (including myself) are not aware of other schools not in the U.S.
2. What is the timeframe for applying to these schools? In the U.S. most schools allow you to transfer into the spring or fall semesters, with the application being due approximately 6 months in advance (for example, due in March for fall semester that starts in September) and the application process starting 9 months in advance.
3. Ballpark, how much does it cost for international students to study at these schools? I've heard that University tuition is much lower in Europe. I have tried transferring to schools in the U.S., but for both schools I got accepted into the financial strain of ~30k in loans per year made it impossible to transfer. I don't want to waste my time applying to schools across seas if the same will happen.
# Answer
As there are many different countries in Europe, each with many different Universities, and each probably has its own application procedures and costs. You will need to consult each candidate university's website to find the appropriate information.
As an example, I googled "International Admission University College London" and clicked around to this page. It estimates **11-14,000 pounds** living costs (food, accommodation etc) per annum and, clicking further, **24,500** pounds of tuition fees (I guess, per annum). London is expensive to live in.
There's plenty of information on the web. Universities are competing for students, and are happy to take your money, so they provide good web sites to make it easy for you.
Regarding timing, I think it's good to start looking into it now. On one website (ETH, I think), they said admissions closed at the end of April, but late admissions will close at the end of July. Time is tight.
You need a strategy to get this done relatively quickly.
* Do a bit of googling about universities and countries.
* Select a few candidate places and find their web pages about international admission procedures and fees. Also check whether they have a program in English.
* Perhaps make a few phone calls, though with the time difference this will be difficult.
* Narrow down the set of candidate universities to relevant ones that fit your budget and are in sufficiently interesting places.
* Apply!
Don't forget that you will need to obtain a visa, and that can take months (especially if you were to come from a dodgy country).
> 3 votes
# Answer
If you believe in university rankings here is the one from QS. According to it, the following nine European universities belong to the world top 50 in Computer Science: Cambridge (UK), Oxford (UK), ETH Zurich (CH), Imperial College London (UK), Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (CH), École Normale Supérieure, Paris (FR), University of Basel (CH), University of Amsterdam (NL), London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) (UK). Basically, I would say that all universities in the world top 200 list are good.
Moreover, depending on what are in Computer Science you prefer, it might be a good decision a university outside of this top 50/200 if they are specialised in the area you like.
> 3 votes
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Tags: university, europe
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thread-1819 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1819 | What to do when visiting a lab or a university for prospective application? | 2012-05-30T16:26:13.553 | # Question
Title: What to do when visiting a lab or a university for prospective application?
In his famous and interesting article "Ten Simple Rules for Selecting a Postdoctoral Position", author Philippe Bourne states, in the 2nd point:
> Rule 2: Select a Laboratory That Suits Your Work and Lifestyle
>
> If at all possible, visit the laboratory before making a decision. \[...\]
I think that is definitively a good advice, not only for Post-Doc applicants, but for all applicants in general. But, **what is the best way to arrange a lab visit?**
What to do when you're there?
Whom to speak to? What to ask? What to do?
# Answer
> 3 votes
Two options I can think of:
1. Simply email the professor and arrange a visit.
2. Some programs will have lab tours during the recruitment/orientation programs, so you can try to arrange to meet the professor on that visit.
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Tags: phd, postdocs, job, career-path
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thread-1826 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1826 | Can I simultaneously pursue separate masters and PhD degrees? | 2012-05-31T12:41:07.577 | # Question
Title: Can I simultaneously pursue separate masters and PhD degrees?
Can I enroll in a masters degree program via correspondence at another university while simultaneously enrolled as PhD as a regular student from University of Delhi?
# Answer
The answer to the question as stated is almost certainly "yes". A correspondence degree can be pursued by anyone, regardless of occupation, and your occupation as a PhD student shouldn't affect that. Note that your department may discourage this practice, as you would effectively be holding two full-time jobs (or one full-time and one part-time, depending on how quickly you pursue the correspondence degree).
> 4 votes
# Answer
I think most departments set the maximum number of hours you can work an outside job. In this case I think pursuing a second degree would count as a job. Funding agencies have even tighter rules. If you are being funded for both degrees, that would also cause major problems. Finally, most advisors would frown upon this.
> 4 votes
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Tags: phd, masters
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thread-1835 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1835 | Could faculty members earn a degree while being employed? | 2012-06-01T08:18:35.053 | # Question
Title: Could faculty members earn a degree while being employed?
Is it possible for faculty members to enrol themselves for a degree while being employed? I have seen professors attending classes occasionally, but how about earning a full degree?
I guess this may not be an issue within a university, but what if the professor wants to earn the degree with another university in the same city, for example?
# Answer
Normally someone who holds the rank of a professor already has an earned doctorate, so there really isn't any need for additional qualifications. It's not really clear to me why a faculty member would then want to go on to pursue an additional degree. To my mind, it would be one of those warning signs that they're not entirely serious about working in their given field, and might choose to move on to "greener pastures" in a few years.
So, in short, I don't think there's any real advantage in a professor obtaining an additional degree.
However, if one is a lecturer or adjunct, then returning for a further degree *in the field in which one is working* makes sense from a career perspective.
> 4 votes
# Answer
In France, it is possible, in particular in order to get the "Habilitation à diriger des recherches (HDR)", which is a degree one can get after a PhD, and that demonstrates the ability to fully supervise a PhD student. It is required in order to apply for a full professorship position.
In order to get the HDR, the lecturer must write a thesis and defend it in front of a committee, and needs to enroll in a university (and therefore is a student), usually the one where she is working (but I don't think it is required). Note that for the HDR, there is no class or lectures to attend, only the thesis to write.
> 6 votes
# Answer
I've seen a few examples of people getting other qualifications in the Australian context:
* Some universities require or encourage lecturers to get a qualification (perhaps a diploma) related to higher education teaching. These courses are often provided by the employing university.
* Some academics want to expand their skill set; doing a formal qualification is one way of doing this. It really depends on circumstances and personal goals. Often an academic has a choice between self-study or doing a formal qualification.
In general life, many people do a degree part-time while they work full-time. If you are still able to perform your duties at your job, then there typically wont be any issue with the study.
Of course, if you need some time off from your job to attend classes, then in most jobs you would typically want the support of your supervisor. In an academic context, if the study is related to your research or teaching, then a supervisor (e.g., a Head of Department) is likely to give such support. Furthermore, most academics have a high degree of autonomy in how they spend their time, such that no one is keeping track of when they go off campus, whether that be to attend a colloquium, collaborate with other researchers, or do a little study somewhere else.
> 2 votes
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Tags: professorship
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thread-1840 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1840 | Do senior PhD students form a part of the admission commitee? | 2012-06-01T10:04:02.820 | # Question
Title: Do senior PhD students form a part of the admission commitee?
Recently, I was having a chat with a few senior PhD students (almost done with their thesis) and they pointed out that the professors would, at times, solicit their opinion regarding the admission of a particular student. This was especially true when the prospective student belongs to the same country as that of the senior PhD student.
Does this happen in all institutes?
If it does happen, is it official or discussed-over-coffee unofficial?
# Answer
> 9 votes
Not a particularity helpful answer, but ...
No, it does not happen at all institutes, but it does happen at many. In some cases it is official and in other cases it is unofficial.
As an applicant you should assume that the entire time you are on campus is part of the interview including any drinks/meals.
# Answer
> 6 votes
My department's graduate admissions committee officially includes senior graduate students. And yes, we specifically ask student committee members for opinions about applicants from their home countries. We sometimes also solicit unofficial "over-coffee" opinions if a student knows an applicant (or letter writer!) personally but isn't on the committee.
# Answer
> 2 votes
In our department, we employ the help of grad students (through the grad student committee) to assist with rating institutions (especially in countries that have seen a proliferation of colleges in recent years). We don't usually let students read things like reference letters, since that gets into confidentiality issues.
If the applicant knows people at the department, then we often get informal feedback.
# Answer
> 0 votes
Graduate students will almost certainly not be part of the official committee. However, as Daniel stated, they will may be asked about their feelings about a given applicant to the graduate program.
When applying to join a lab, it is very common for individual lab professors to consult the postdocs/graduate students in the lab regarding candidates.
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Tags: phd, graduate-admissions
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thread-1853 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1853 | PhD to be advised by Mr. Enfant Terrible? | 2012-06-02T06:38:10.720 | # Question
Title: PhD to be advised by Mr. Enfant Terrible?
I have been admitted to a generally well-regarded Computer Science PhD program.
My potential advisor's research **interests** match very well with mine. However, he appears to be an extremely controversial figure within the community - someone whose research always evokes strong reactions.
Some people consider him to be an innovative out-of-the-box thinker whose research is always fresh and interesting. Others, perhaps the majority, consider much of his work to be ridiculous, outrageous, and gimmicky. In either case (for both the right and wrong reasons), he appears to enjoy plenty of publicity. He is also a full professor and the chair of his department (which is a well-regarded department).
I really want to accept the offer, but these issues are making me uneasy. Should I be worried at all? What do you think? For obvious reasons, I don't want to name my potential advisor here. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
# Answer
> 26 votes
The best single predictor of your future is how your advisor's students have done in the past. Of course, this is not entirely reliable, because you could turn out to be your advisor's most or least successful student, the job market changes over time, etc. However, there's a good chance that you'll fall somewhere in the range of past students.
If the past students have been well accepted by the community and ended up with jobs you would like, then that's a good sign. If not, then you should certainly be worried.
If you do work with this advisor, I'd recommend keeping this issue in mind and trying not to become too narrow. Talk frequently with other faculty, do an internship at an industrial lab, try to collaborate with someone other than your advisor, etc. This is a good approach anyway, even if your advisor isn't controversial, but it's especially important if you are trying to establish greater mainstream credibility than your advisor. (You may have trouble pulling off the "out of the box thinker" approach to getting a job: even if you are as creative as your advisor, being his student can still make your creativity look derivative of his, so it's important to have another angle.)
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Tags: phd, graduate-admissions, advisor
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thread-1855 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1855 | What format should the Methods & Materials section of a thesis be in? | 2012-06-02T13:45:01.307 | # Question
Title: What format should the Methods & Materials section of a thesis be in?
I am writing my thesis in biology, and am not sure how to format the M&M section of my thesis.
One option is like an experiment protocol, with a lot spaces, itemized lists of steps, etc...
Another option is more like an article, which is usually more dense, and harder to comprehend, but takes up less space.
Which format is the norm for a thesis?
# Answer
Thesis writers generally have much more freedom to format them as they please. The only real requirement is that it follows any guidelines of the department and institution to which it is submitted, and receives the approval of the writers' thesis committees.
That said, I believe that these days, space should not really be a limiting consideration for a thesis writer. The methods section should be as long as needed to convey the necessary information. In addition, since this is not normally a journal publication, there is much more room to explain things in detail—which can be very useful for future members of the lab group who might follow up the same project.
> 3 votes
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Tags: thesis
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thread-1848 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1848 | Does university location affect job prospects? | 2012-06-01T22:01:53.267 | # Question
Title: Does university location affect job prospects?
My university is in Oklahoma and most companies are in east coast and west coast in the US. I am a bit worried if a PhD will be worthy from an average university with poor location. Should I apply to a college where there is a bunch of industries around?
# Answer
Far more important than location is the quality of the program. You can get some measure of the program's quality by looking at the job placement of recent graduates. If they are making it out to the companies you are interested in, then you should be fine. If all the graduates are staying in-state, you will probably want to look to a different program.
> 4 votes
# Answer
The location of a school is far less important than its reputation in the field. In particular, a school may have a top-10 department in some fields, but have only an average reputation in general.
A good employer who knows his field will know which schools are good and which are not. Location close to industry will not matter as much, so long as you can get on the radar screen of potential employers. This is where your contact network and mentors will be able to help you negate any potential disadvantage of being far away from the traditional job centers in your field.
> 4 votes
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Tags: phd, job, industry
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thread-1862 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1862 | How does one submit an article "informally"? | 2012-06-03T04:38:07.347 | # Question
Title: How does one submit an article "informally"?
Although I have read a lot in my area of interest (plant taxonomy and botanical nomenclature), in am no academic of it, having only a Bachelor of Translation degree.
It has taken me two years of waffling back and forth before I worked up the courage to write up a quick note (something not entirely dissimilar to this in nature, mostly bibliographical, but necessary nonetheless) which I'd like to submit to *Phytoneuron*. I call it "informal" because it is an independent, one-man journal with a relatively unelaborated review process where one sends the prospective article straight to the editor.
However, I have NO idea what sort of language one in my situation can be expected to address to a journal editor. That I am diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome and have been told before my writing can be overly formal to comical or insulting degrees at times is not helping my crushing nervosity about the whole thing.
# Answer
> 15 votes
You could write something like the following. Short and sweet.
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To the editor,
Please find attached an article for consideration for publication in the journal Phytoneuron. I assert that this is an original contribution and it has not been submitted for consideration elsewhere.
Could you please acknowledge receipt of this submission?
Best regards,
**Your name**
**Your Affiliation**
**Title of Article**
**Authors**
Abstract
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Proin egestas odio non mi mattis rhoncus. Vivamus ultrices urna a ante tristique pellentesque. Nam tincidunt lacus a mi sollicitudin tincidunt. Curabitur malesuada, quam sit amet iaculis lobortis, enim lacus commodo turpis, nec elementum mauris libero ac enim. Quisque justo mauris, eleifend id ornare vel, luctus eget tellus. Etiam auctor ultrices tincidunt. Curabitur diam nulla, aliquam nec gravida a, consequat non nulla. Cras viverra massa id felis blandit gravida. Pellentesque enim mi, convallis vitae ornare quis, ornare sit amet dolor. Pellentesque velit urna, feugiat non tincidunt in, sollicitudin sed purus. Phasellus laoreet ligula nec odio mattis fringilla. Fusce sed arcu mi. Pellentesque dictum erat sit amet sapien pharetra porta.
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Tags: publications, etiquette
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thread-1864 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1864 | arXiv preprint and final paper differing by sections and appendices | 2012-06-03T14:00:59.740 | # Question
Title: arXiv preprint and final paper differing by sections and appendices
Because of the style of a journal, and the space limit, I was asked to remove a section and all appendices.
While I have no problem with that, I want to preserve it in the arXiv preprint.
So:
* Is it OK to have different final papers and its arXiv version?
(perhaps with the comment, e.g. *"Sec 3.4. and Appendices A and B only in the arXiv version"*)
* Is it OK to cite in a paper its own arXiv version?
(e.g. *derivation of (15) is in \[5\]*?)
# Answer
> 12 votes
There doesn't need to be a strict correlation between an arXiv publication and an actual publication. It's actually common to use arXiv to publish extended/longer version of a published version (which seems exactly what you want to do). So
* Yes, it's OK to have a final paper that differs from the arXiv version.
* Yes, it's even encouraged to cite the arXiv version to point to appendices/extra material/proofs/detailed examples, etc.
However, the main rule is still that your journal paper must be self-contained, i.e., must be understandable without having to read the arXiv version. In other words, if removing the section implies to remove a definition (for instance), then you must put this definition somewhere else in the paper.
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Tags: publications, citations, preprint, arxiv
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thread-1799 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1799 | Which soft skills for research career? | 2012-05-29T15:15:11.527 | # Question
Title: Which soft skills for research career?
In a previous question we stated that soft skills are pretty important for admission decisions in universities, so I suppose that you'll agree with me if I said that they are very important not only during the admission phase, but throughout the whole career.
**Which do you think are the most important ones?**
Thanx!
# Answer
I broadly agree with Davide's answer above, but I would move the list around somewhat:
1. Tier 1:
* Self motivating
* Communication, broadly-defined
* Ability to stay focused on a single task for multiple months & years
2. Tier 2:
* Work on a team
* Creative, curious personality
* Strong writing skills
3. Tier 3:
* Learn from criticism
* Personable
**Tier 1** skills are, in my mind, absolutely required to be a researcher. The inability of any of those will preclude you from doing your work (i.e., unable to communicate means unable to publish; unable to stay focused for long periods of time means unable to complete research projects & grants.) **Tier 2** skills will turn a good researcher into a great researcher. Technically speaking, researchers don't need to be good team members, but having that skill will greatly improve your academic worth and potential. **Tier 3** will improve your worth to yourself and others as a researcher. There are probably a bunch here that I missed and should have included.
> 10 votes
# Answer
In my opinion, I'd suggest these (in order of importance):
1. hard-working attitude
2. public speaking
3. ability to manage personal relationships
4. ability to work in independently
5. ability to work in team
6. creative skills and ability to formulate new problems and ideas
7. ability to accept & learn from criticism
Do you agree with this list?
Would you add something?
Would you change the position of something?
> 8 votes
# Answer
I will add some further unmentioned skills I value highly and miss among many students **in the age of internet and information overload**:
Being a scientist means to study further and learn your whole life, more than in any other job, where most of soft skills named in other answers apply too (work hard, in team, motivation ...). Also I think curiosity and creativity are rather personal traits than trainable skills. If you don't have them, consider choosing another job.
> 7 votes
# Answer
You didn't say what kind of graduate program you are talking about. The admissions criteria for a Master's program are very different than for a PhD.
Here's what the top-three admissions criteria look like for admission to a research-oriented PhD program:
1. Evidence of research ability.
2. Evidence of research ability.
3. Evidence of research ability.
So, if evidence of research ability is so important, how is it judged? Well, there are several ways that applicants can demonstrate research ability:
1. Demonstrate prior success at research. For example, participated in one or more prior research projects that led to a publication at a peer-reviewed place. This is usually the strongest evidence.
2. Show prior experience with research, with evidence that it went well or that future research will likely be a success. For example, participated in one or more prior research projects, which did not lead to a publication, but the letters of reference state have positive things to say about the applicant's research ability, and the letter-writers are credible on this. This is next-best.
3. Show great intelligence and technical ability, as well as passion/motivation. Here we are talking about indirect measures of research ability. One of the strongest ways is to excel in technical classes. Admissions committees will also look at the motivation/drive (what does the applicant want to study? why? is the applicant driven to do research? why?), at written and other communication skills, and other factors.
Of the materials in the application packet, I could prioritize which are most important:
1. Publications. If you have publications, include them. Admissions committees will often read the publications, look to see where they are published, etc.
2. Letters of reference. Strong letters of recommendation can be very valuable. They need to come from credible people who are well-calibrated about what it takes to be successful in a Ph.D. program, and they should be as strong as possible about the applicant's research potential and other abilities.
3. Classes. Great grades in relevant courses is helpful. The courses also need to provide adequate preparation for the Ph.D. program.
4. Essays. The personal essays should be thoughtful, well-written, demonstrate the applicant's interest in research and goals for Ph.D. study. Admissions committees will read to see whether the essays seem well-informed about the field the applicant wants to join. They'll also try to figure out the applicant's most likely interests, to see if they are a good match for the faculty in the department who are looking to advise new Ph.D. students.
5. Other materials. The rest of your application packages (e.g., GRE scores) are of lesser importance. They're more likely to get you rejected, or raise a red flag that causes the committee to look more closely at the rest of your application packet, than they are get you accepted. It is semi-important to demonstrate communication skills; if you cannot communicate clearly in the language of instruction at the university, then you may not be able to serve as a teaching assistant, which means the school may not have a way to fund you, which is very bad. Also, advisors are more likely to want to work with someone who has good written English than someone who will need to learn how to write clearly.
> 2 votes
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Tags: job, career-path, soft-skills
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thread-1644 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1644 | What percentage of admitted PhD students comes from waiting lists | 2012-05-22T12:50:25.813 | # Question
Title: What percentage of admitted PhD students comes from waiting lists
I was wondering if there is a rule of thumb for the following.
What percentage of students that are accepted for a PhD position were initially put on a waiting list, and were only admitted after high-scoring applicants did not enroll?
# Answer
> 1 votes
This will depend upon the department, but I would expect that relatively few students would be admitted via a waitlist. Departments usually have a pretty good estimate of how many students who they accept will take their offer and enroll in their program.
# Answer
> 1 votes
We don't have a wait list, and actually make more offers than slots, because of the historical hit rate that we have with admissions. Some years, this comes back to bite us, but it all averages out.
A practical matter with waitlists is that you have to wait till Apr 15 before moving to the wait listed students. But by then, they've often accepted a position elsewhere.
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Tags: phd, application
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thread-1878 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1878 | How do I become a journal reviewer? | 2012-06-04T22:40:22.007 | # Question
Title: How do I become a journal reviewer?
> **Possible Duplicate:**
> How do you earn opportunites to review journals or conference papers?
Assume that I have just finished my postdoc and am now starting a professorship/scientist position (I am not). How do I start joining the ranks of peer reviewers? More importantly, how do I become a peer reviewer of a particularly prestigious journal rather than some junk journal? Does the journal contact me or do I start to publish in those journals, the editors recognize my "expertise" and then they solicit me? Even though everything is "blind" does my reputation of doing quality reviews get shared with other editors?
# Answer
> 7 votes
The best way to do it, in my experience, is to write. Every single journal I've been asked to review things for (with the exception of one done as a favor) was born of a request by an editor to review a paper in an area where I might be considered an "expert" - because I had a publication, and a decently received one, in that topic area.
Once you get an invitation or two, **accept them** and as importantly **make your reviews useful and timely**. Establishing yourself in an editor's mind as someone who gets their reviews back, and gets them back on time (or communicates when they aren't able to do that) can't do anything but help in ensuring that you'll get similar requests in the future.
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Tags: peer-review
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thread-1887 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1887 | Is "working from home" a bad thing in academia? | 2012-06-05T06:21:50.703 | # Question
Title: Is "working from home" a bad thing in academia?
Is it a bad thing in academia if a student works from home? Missing department talks and seminars is obviously bad, but in case a student is pursuing a problem alone and he feels comfortable researching at home, is it viewed negatively? At times the time spent on travel and a crowded lab may disrupt one's flow of thoughts, so in those cases home provides an edge.
Is physical attendance deemed important by the department as long as they are kept in the loop regarding your progress?
# Answer
The answer is it depends - both on the student and the culture of the department.
There are of course some situations where working from home is impossible - graduate programs that are heavily lab based come to mind. Below is a summarization of my thoughts from a more data analysis driven field, having done both.
**Positives**
* Lots of departments these days don't *have* lots of graduate student space. While some labs might have dedicated bench space, and there may be an RA/TA office or two, there's not "a place" where students can work anyway, which makes "is it bad to work from home" something of a moot point.
* Working from home benefits certain work styles. If you're the kind of person who prefers to work in a spread out, sprawling fashion, with multiple monitors, tons of stacks of paper, and a whiteboard or two, that's just not feasible in most grad student offices, even when they do exist. And when the only spaces that exist are transient ones, like shared desks or cubicles, library study areas etc. you also can't customize your work space at all - and expensive textbooks and laptops are theft bait.
* It facilitates more flexible schedules. Universities tend to be closed at 3:00 AM. I tend to do my best work at around that time. This seems to be relatively common in academia, and as academia seems to promote an "always working" lifestyle, having a single centralized space you have access to 24 hours a day is nice.
**Negatives**
* You do lose out on departmental interactions somewhat. The concern about missing seminars is I think a bit of a non-issue. Those are easy to miss when you're working *on site*, and can be attended with just a little bit of diligence on the part of someone working from home. What I've found missing more is the transient, passing in the hallways interactions. I realized, for example, one day that I had gone several weeks without talking to anyone about my field. That's not good. It also does some harm to cross-polination and ideas from unexpected places.
* It can get lonely. Seriously, this seems to be a major challenge. It's possible, and the workload sometimes promotes, just disappearing into a cave.
* It's possible to get distracted, as it always is working from home. "Real life" has infinitely many things to take care of, and its much easier to defend "work time" if you're at an office. But then unless you have an *office* its easy to get distracted in a department where your friends and colleagues are around.
Overall, I wouldn't say its bad. I know successful academics who work almost entirely in their office, and who work almost entirely from home. I'd say the best way to promote on-site work, if a university is trying to accomplish that, is not to focus on the bad parts of working from home, but on addressing what makes it appealing. I finally moved entirely to a working from home setup because I got tired of "work" involving camping out in cramped spaces, without the materials I needed, fighting for power outlets.
As for whether or not your physical presence is *important to the department* \- it depends on the department. I've known some who don't care as long as you show up to what you need to, and others that absolutely want you there, and subtly penalize those who aren't around.
> 20 votes
# Answer
As this relates to students, I feel it is extremely bad to work from home regularly. Being a grad student is not about being efficient, or even learning to be efficient. It is about learning your subject area and making contacts. Working from home means you miss interactions with your colleagues. You will be judged by your senior collegauges both in terms of your productivity and percieved work ethic. No department sets out to hire people who they know will predominately work from home.
> 7 votes
# Answer
Not necessarily. With the way that some departments are rapidly running out of physical real estate, they may even appreciate students who chose to work in their dormitories, homes, or libraries. (Of course, there is a barrier where one's work needs to be able to be performed at those locales, which of course rules out lab-based works in the experimental sciences.)
When I was a graduate student the department actually sent out an e-mail to all students asking students who intend to work mainly from somewhere apart from the department building to *declare their intention* so that they can more efficiently assign (the very limited) office spaces. But this was in a math department and eccentricity seems to be more tolerated there.
> 6 votes
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Tags: phd, university, etiquette, lab-meeting
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thread-1896 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1896 | How to get the most out of an internship (in industry)? | 2012-06-05T12:35:12.163 | # Question
Title: How to get the most out of an internship (in industry)?
As a PhD student pursuing an academic career (but optionally a career in industry), what should I do do to get the most of a 10-week internship at a research lab?
Things I've thought of: talking with people (networking); attending talk/seminar (new ideas); giving a talk (get people to know you).
What other things can/should be done?
# Answer
First of all, good for you in getting the internship. Now that you're there, some suggestions for what to do, broadly and specifically:
* Meet people with similar backgrounds to yourself. Find out what they do, what skills they value, what skills they wish they had.
* If you're in a large company, talk to people in other parts of the business, see what they do. You may find positions in other parts of the company that interest you that you weren't even aware of.
* If you're in a large company, talk to managers, see what they desire in people like you. They'll already be slightly impressed that you thought to talk to them. Learn what they do, what skills they like. It can help you guide your career later on.
* Learn new skills & hone old ones. This is a good time to see which of your skills are marketable and which aren't. Get really good at the marketable ones.
* Use the opportunity to reach out to people in similar positions at different companies and see what they're doing. If you don't know people at other companies, ask around; your new coworkers should have friends they can put you in phone/email contact with, and you can take it from there.
Above all, try to do a really good job. Internships can often lead to full-time employment, so you want to impress.
> 7 votes
# Answer
Let me add two important items to eykanal's great answer:
* **Do awesome research.** If you want an academic career, you can't ever *not* do this. A good internship is not a vacation from research; it's an opportunity to broaden your research portfolio.
* **Cultivate references for your future job search.** Find, work with, and impress people whose interests overlap yours *and* whose opinions are valued in the academic research community. These people may work at the company, or they may be visitors.
When it comes time to look for an academic job, your application will be *significantly* stronger if you have recommendation letters from and publications with people who don't work at your home institution. In fact, if your CV lists an internship, but you don't have a letter from or paper with someone at your hosting company, that gap will raise a (small) red flag with recruiting committees.
> 8 votes
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Tags: phd, industry, internship
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thread-1609 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1609 | Are reviewers allowed to discuss their review with each other? | 2012-05-19T01:47:56.827 | # Question
Title: Are reviewers allowed to discuss their review with each other?
Suppose you find out that someone you know well or work with is reviewing the same journal paper you are reviewing (i.e., finding out this information on your own, and not via the journal or editor, assuming a blind process).
Can you discuss the paper? Can you discuss your reviews?
# Answer
> 23 votes
If it's a blind process, you're not meant to find out. As various people have pointed out in the comments already, discussing your review with them is therefore a big no.
One of the main principles of reviewing by several people is that you get independent opinions, so that if a particular (maybe well-known and well-respected) person doesn't like the research, they can't just make it disappear by convincing everybody else that it's bad.
For some conferences (and maybe journals?), you are able to discuss your review with the other reviewers after the initial submission. But in this case the facilities for doing this are provided by the submission system. There are two important differences to the situtation you've described though. First, your initial review will not be influenced by the discussion and second, there is a record of the conversations and changes made.
# Answer
> 9 votes
I largely agree with @Lars Kotthoff's answer, but I think there's another important aspect to the reviewers not discussing the paper with each other.
It encourages you not to rely on the other reviewers.
If I knew that X, who is really good at the mathematical side of things, was reviewing the paper, and talked it over with them, I might very well be tempted not to go over the math aspects of a paper with a fine-toothed comb, figuring "they've got it". Similarly, they might rely on me to pick over the data analysis or parameter choices, etc.
That's bad. Reviewers should be reviewing *papers*, not chunks of papers. It's one area where division of labor isn't desirable.
# Answer
> 3 votes
I think it depends upon the context and field.
For instance, on program committees in my field, once you've submitted your own review, it is normal to know who the other reviewers are and be able to see their reviews. (As a program committee member, I've always been able to see other reviewers' reviews and see their identity. If I was barred from doing so, I would probably refuse to serve on the program committee.) I always read the other reviewers' reviews, and sometimes discover that I'd missed something important. It is not uncommon for me to adjust my review in light of insightful comments found in other reviews. Therefore, I think it is helpful to be able to read other reviews.
Generally, I think the reviewing process assumes that reviewers will be independent. This is important, to give authors a fair shake and combat groupthink. For instance, in my field, we generally try to ensure that every submitted paper receives at least 2 reviews (usually at least 3 reviews). Why do we do this? Because we know that reviewers are human and can make mistakes, and it is possible for one reviewer to dislike a paper that is nonetheless great and worthy of publication. Therefore, our system relies upon reviewers to independently evaluate the paper in their initial review, without talking to other reviewers. If all reviewers got together and shared notes before forming their own evaluation or submitting their own review, it would create significant dangers of groupthink and undermine the purpose of having multiple reviewers read every paper.
On the other hand, once you and the other reviewer have submitted your initial review, it's probably fair game to exchange notes -- but this may be dependent upon the culture in your field or conference/journal. If you are not familiar with the culture, I recommend that you contact the program committee chair or journal editor to find out what process they want you to follow.
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Tags: peer-review, ethics
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thread-1919 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1919 | Should we reply to the editor after a paper has been rejected and we don't plan to revise/resubmit? | 2012-06-06T23:19:09.060 | # Question
Title: Should we reply to the editor after a paper has been rejected and we don't plan to revise/resubmit?
After receiving a rejection (not revise and resubmit) decision from the editor/associate editor of a journal, should we write an email to thank him/her for the time, or just do nothing? I imagine one might do that out of courtesy, but then I don't really have much to say otherwise.
# Answer
> 19 votes
I don't recall ever having received such an e-mail as an editor, so it's not standard (let alone mandatory), but I wouldn't be unhappy to receive one. I doubt anyone would care enough to make it worth the effort, but it could be a nice gesture if you feel inclined.
# Answer
> 10 votes
I believe that if you feel the rejection was unjustified and you do not plan to submit to that journal again, you do not need to reply.
But if you feel the rejection was justified, you plan to submit to that journal again, or you were helped by the comments and suggestions of the referees, then I would recommend that you write an e-mail thanking the editor and the referees for their time and effort.
# Answer
> 5 votes
I think it is reasonable to thank editors that keep you up to date, solicit reviews in a timely manner, and provide an understandable overview of the reviews. Unfortunately, the number of good editors is small, so I would caution against thanking editors for merely acting as editor. The benefits are small while the potential cost is huge. It is so atypical that you run the risk of the editor thinking you are whining.
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Tags: publications, peer-review
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thread-1931 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1931 | What is the difference between research intensive vs. research extensive universities? | 2012-06-07T14:40:05.310 | # Question
Title: What is the difference between research intensive vs. research extensive universities?
I keep hearing these terms being thrown around at conferences, but I'm not really sure what they really mean, if there is any difference between them.
# Answer
> 26 votes
"Research intensive" and "research extensive" are obsolete terms from the Carnegie classification of research universities. They are terrible, confusing terms that should never have been introduced (see page 5 of Rethinking and reframing the Carnegie classification). The idea was that "research extensive" means there's an extensive research program covering many areas at a high level, which "research intensive" means there's just a narrowly focused, intensive research program in certain areas. Basically, extensive is supposed to be better than intensive. Of course the problem is that this really isn't what they sound like. For example, most people would say Harvard is a research intensive university, but in this classification it's not. Because of massive confusion, the Carnegie classification was updated to use other terms, but the old terms still persist. One reason is that some people just got used to them and found it hard to develop new habits; another is that every time the classification changes, some universities end up moving to a less prestigious category than they used to be in, so they have a strong incentive to describe themselves using the old terms.
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Tags: research-process, university
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thread-1934 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1934 | How long should I register a domain name that will be referenced in scientific publications? | 2012-06-07T16:17:09.887 | # Question
Title: How long should I register a domain name that will be referenced in scientific publications?
I have a website (with data and modeling interface) that will be referenced in a series of scientific publications that are beginning to be published.
Currently the website is along the lines of `myserver.institution.edu/mysite` but I would like to change this to something like `mysite.org`.
Costs for the site range from $37/year for 2 years to $9.99 for 100 years. Even 100 years would be a tiny fraction of the overall research budget, but my first inclination is to go for five years at $33/year. But I don't even know if the web will still be around by then, much less a server hosting this work.
(this is related, but not a duplicate of related, but not a duplicate of How to archive an academic blog or website?)
Is five years long enough? Is 100 years justifiable?
# Answer
If you consider the data of permanent value and essential to your paper, then you should try to preserve it permanently. The question in that case is not how long to register a domain name for, but rather how to find an organization that's willing to archive the data in the long run. If you don't have that, then it's going to disappear eventually anyway. If you do, then you can do whatever you want with the domain name as long as you provide enough information that someone could access the data from the archive even once your domain has expired.
Most scientific publishers solve this problem by archiving supplementary information and data along with the paper. There are also field-specific data banks.
On the other hand, if this isn't an essential part of your paper (but rather just for illustrative purposes), then you can do whatever you want.
> 12 votes
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Tags: publications, research-process, website, reproducible-research
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thread-1897 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1897 | Can I reuse part of a paper for my thesis? | 2012-06-05T13:05:19.623 | # Question
Title: Can I reuse part of a paper for my thesis?
I am finishing writing my master's thesis (~100 pages) and I also just submitted a paper (8 pages) to a conference. Since both are on the same subject and I am an author on both, is it ok if I reuse one page from the paper and put it in my thesis without many changes? The paper will not be published until 2013 (if at all). Is it necessary to cite it in any way?
# Answer
> 33 votes
Yes. It is certainly okay. Indeed, general practice when writing a PhD thesis is to produce a number of publications that add up to the thesis, whether directly (using staples) or by a good deal of massage. Some published material may be omitted and some additional material may be included. There's no reason why this shouldn't apply to a Master's thesis, too.
It is a good idea to cite the paper in the thesis (if the paper has been accepted for publication) and the thesis in the paper, if possible.
# Answer
> 7 votes
Yes, this is very common. Indeed, theses are often verbatim copies of one or more published or submitted papers.
I would say you should cite the conference paper, listing it as "Submitted". You should also check with your university's thesis guidelines. It is very likely they will tell you how to cite work that is/will be published elsewhere.
# Answer
> 3 votes
While reusing material is typically done there are three concerns.
The first is citation. If it is in press or published at the time you submit the thesis, I would cite it. I wouldn't bother citing manuscripts that are in preparation/under review/in revision.
The second issue is copyright. Many journals and some universities require you to give up copyright control. Most make concessions, especially for articles, less so for book projects. You need to check and read the rules.
The third is being scoop. Putting your stuff in the public domain is important, but it also puts you are risk. Someone might independently build on your research publish your second chapter before you or conduct follow up research which reveals a huge hole in your research.
# Answer
> 3 votes
While many universities accept sandwitch theses, the only thing that can give you the right answer are the **examination regulations** you're subject to.
* There are cases when parts of thesis work are not allowed to be published (in an article) though that can also create difficulties with the regulations.
* Usually the university will want to get a paper out of the work in addition to the thesis. So the content being published is usually seen positive.
* However, they may still not accept verbatim copy of large parts of the text but expect you to rewrite it so that your thesis is one "unbroken" piece of text written by you yourself.
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Tags: writing, plagiarism, self-plagiarism
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thread-1933 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1933 | What figure formatting can, should, or will be done by a publisher? | 2012-06-07T15:58:38.403 | # Question
Title: What figure formatting can, should, or will be done by a publisher?
### Background
When preparing a final version of a figure, it appears that some changes could be more easily made in a graphics software (gimp, inkscape, scribus, adobe) as opposed to R. Such changes might be done more efficiently, and more to the publishers standards, by the publisher. Apparently, the publisher uses some such software to makes final changes to the image anyway. Presumably, these changes can do it more efficiently and to their standards. Also, some tasks would be trivial or would be done anyway by the publisher.
Some tasks that I am currently doing to prepare figures for a journal article:
* move / add text
* change font
* change line thickness
* change background color
Something that would be neat to do:
* integrate figures into text, in the style of Tufte:
### Questions:
* What formatting is commonly done by a publisher rather than an author?
* Is it reasonable to make requests?
* If so, what work will a publisher be willing to do?
# Answer
> 11 votes
For many years, the standard on the part of journals is to do *absolutely nothing* with respect to journal articles. Essentially all of the work in terms of preparation falls on the authors. Previously, figures had to be "camera-ready"; now, they "just" have to be publication quality. The journal production staff will not do anything, except potentially change the size of the graphic to better fit the column space.
You should check with the journal about the regulations on acceptable graphics; they should have them available for your review on their website. If there are questions about the use of graphics outside of those guidelines, send an email to the journal office.
# Answer
> 8 votes
In many particle physics journals the answer is they do *nothing*. You deliver a latex source file that uses their class and figures that meet their standards or they send it back.
And in all truth, I *like* it that way.
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Tags: publications, journals, presentation, books, graphics
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thread-1923 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1923 | What sources provide a list of all academic topics? | 2012-06-07T04:09:12.537 | # Question
Title: What sources provide a list of all academic topics?
I'm an STS student, so bear with me; I'm happy to provide clarification but I want to leave the specific application unspecified:
**What sources would you consult if you were trying to generate a huge "list of all academic topics"?**
I'm thinking it would include all the 'ologies', the 'isms', the 'X studies', all the historical "movements", all the 'subjects' of journals and papers, all the 'big questions' of any given "field".
What other sources, whether vague (like above) or specific (like a URL with some good list items), would you suggest in compiling this list?
# Answer
You need to define topic first. At the macro level, all topics fall under "knowledge", or some such nonsense, and at the micro level, every published paper and book is on a different topic.
You could use the different doctoral degrees as pretty broad topics. This would give you a list like philosophy (PhD), medicine (MD), science (ScD), etc. A less coarse division would be "schools/College". This would give you a list like School/College of Arts, School/College of Humanities, School/College of Medicine, School/College of Science, etc. A finer division would be departments and institutes within a School/College. A still finer would be research groups within departments. This of course leads to individuals within groups and finally publications by individuals.
University websites would provide all the information you need, although not in a format that is easy to search and retrieve.
> 6 votes
# Answer
A good starting place may be: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_academic\_disciplines, with the links there, esp. restricting to specific disciplines (e.g. List of biology disciplines); for each field of science, usually there are a few different official classifications of sub-disciplines (e.g. Physics and Astronomy Classification Scheme (PACS)).
However, bear in mind that:
* there is no universal classification,
* some are constructed for different purposes, with differently 'catching' subfields and their intersections,
* there are many synonyms, e.g. 'biological chemistry = biochemistry',
* for may there may be historical bias (i.e. divisions which were useful 10 year ago, but not are out-of-date),
* some classifications use descriptive names (one sentence or more), some - 1-3 word tags,
* many classifications are hierarchical.
> 5 votes
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Tags: bibliometrics
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thread-1412 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1412 | What are the most important points to emphasize while pitching for a dissertation to be published as a book? | 2012-05-04T23:49:45.527 | # Question
Title: What are the most important points to emphasize while pitching for a dissertation to be published as a book?
An editor for a major publishing house is visiting our institute, and some PhD students will get the chance to have a 15 min talk with them and discuss the publication of their dissertation as a book.
I would like to pitch my dissertation (a few months from completion) as a potential book for their publishing house. I am in the social sciences in Europe and there is no tradition of the authors getting any financial benefits out of their books, indeed sometimes we have to pay the publishers. But I would like to convince this one to a) Publish my diss b) do it for free
What is the sort of **information that this editor would be the most interested to have** regarding my dissertation? **What important criteria do such editors consider** in coming to a decision regarding the publishability of Ph.D. dissertations?
Just to clarify, this is not a formal book proposal but only a short informal conversation, but one which I hope can be useful to both the editor and me.
# Answer
Editors need books that will have an audience, a point, impact, and a connection to their "lists".
In a conversation you should be able to briefly summarize your manuscript -- and in this summary make clear its central argument / narrative, scope / evidence base, and its what is novel, important, and exciting about it. You should also summarize the audience for the manuscript, -- how it fits into the market: what other books are competing for this audience, and what distinguishes your manuscript. These summaries should be honest, and direct -- avoid both negativity and overstatement. Choose language to appeal to a smart, and critical, but not specialize reader -- avoid jargon, and if you have to use specialized terms, define them briefly, in common-sense terms.
For a written prospectus, follow the same model, but expand to two pages; and include an outline of the work, list of figures/tables, and note any special features such as data, or an accompanying website.
For more details, see: Germano, *From Dissertation to Book* and Luey, *Handbook for Academic Authors*
> 7 votes
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Tags: phd, thesis, books, publishers
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thread-1512 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1512 | Teaching Loads by Field at Research Universities | 2012-05-10T17:01:42.993 | # Question
Title: Teaching Loads by Field at Research Universities
For computer science tenure-track faculty, the standard teaching load at a major research university in the US is 1-1 (meaning 1 course each of the two semesters). My understanding is that in math the standard teaching load is 2-1 (two courses one semester, one course the other).
What are the standard teaching loads in other fields (e.g. physics, history, etc.) at major research universities in the US?
# Answer
> 8 votes
There is no standard load; it depends widely on the department, the number of students enrolled, the available number of faculty, and so on.
Moreover, in some departments, it is possible to fundraise your way out of commitments. For instance, if you bring in X dollars in overhead, you can "buy" out of teaching a class for a semester.
In addition, stating that a load is "1-and-1" can mean different things. In the department where I did my graduate work, professors now co-teach one class per semester, and sometimes offer an elective course on top of that 1-and-1 load.
# Answer
> 4 votes
In the largest national survey collecting this data is the National Study of Postsecondary Faculty. (http://nces.ed.gov/surveys/nsopf/design.asp) It was last conducted in 2003-4. The average number of classroom hours for full-time faculty ranged from 7.9 in engineering to 11.0 in fine arts (as of 2003). See: http://nces.ed.gov/das/library/tables\_listings/showTable2005.asp?popup=true&tableID=2128&rt=p
# Answer
> 2 votes
It does depend on how popular the field is among undergrad majors, and whether or not their courses are often pre-requisites for courses in other majors.
In the fields I'm in (astronomy, earth/atmospheric science), there are so few undergrad majors, and so few majors that use their courses as requirements, that the professors generally tend to have much lighter teaching loads (often one course per year) than professors in other fields with more undergrad students.
And in some departments where there isn't even an undergraduate major in them, professors often have years without needing to teach at all (e.g. Pathology or Physiology/Biophysics at the University of Washington).
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thread-1943 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1943 | Picking referees for a staff review? | 2012-06-08T10:28:35.123 | # Question
Title: Picking referees for a staff review?
For an interim (or tenure!) review, are their guidelines in place for choosing "neutral" referees, if asked?
Obviously choosing the PhD advisor (and probably postdoc advisor) is a no-no, but are there other things to take into consideration? For instance:
* How important is the standing of the referee?
* How well should the referee know the candidate?
* If someone is working in an inherently multidisciplinary area, how should the referees be selected? According to the "home department" of the candidate, or are other criteria more important?
# Answer
> 6 votes
tl;dr: **You want a letter from God. Until then, do not work with God.**
Reference letters for promotion and tenure cases are supposed to be impartial evaluations of the quality, importance, visibility, and impact of the candidate's research, their standing in the research community, and their promise of future intellectual leadership (or in the case of full professor promotions, their *proven* intellectual leadership.) So the people who write those letters must be credible independent judges of those qualities.
Here are the rough guidelines applied at my university. Specific standards my be different elsewhere, especially outside the US — Ask your senior faculty mentors, department chair, and/or dean! — but I suspect the general principles are common everywhere.
* **Referees must be familiar with the candidate's research.** Promotion letters must discuss the importance and impact of the candidate's research in detail. It is especially helpful if the candidate's work led to a breakthrough in the *referee's* research. (Obviously, you can't dictate the letter; you have to choose a referee that can write such a letter.) It doesn't matter whether the referee knows the candidate personally.
* **Referees must be experts in the candidate's research area.** For successful cases, this criterion should immediately imply the first. However, "research area" must not be defined so narrowly that there are only a dozen experts in the entire world, or the impartiality of the referees is not credible. Editors-in-chief of major journals, committee chairs of important conferences, and officers in relevant professional societies are all good choices, but for the most part, the expertise should be visible from the language of the letter.
* **Referees must be *obvious* experts in the candidate's field.** Here by "field" I roughly mean "department". The letter-writers will be scrutinized by faculty committees at several levels (department, college, and campus), most of whom don't have the expertise to make a direct judgement; they have to rely on the trappings of success instead. At my university, it is a de facto requirement that all promotion references must be full professors (preferably with chaired positions) at top departments, in top colleges, in top universities. Professional society fellows and major award winners are even better.
* **Referees must be *obviously* impartial.** Thesis and postdoc advisors are right out. At my university, *any* faculty member from the candidate's PhD department is barred, but this is not universal. Frequent and/or recent coauthors/coPIs are out. It's okay to have a few letters from former collaborators, as long as the coauthored work is far enough in the past **and** represents a small fraction of *both* the candidate's *and* the referee's research record.
* **Referees must be familiar with the promotion standards of the candidate's institution.** At my university, this means that almost all letters must come from faculty at top *American* universities. I was explicitly warned *not* to ask for letters from European researchers, because they tend to write blunter ("more honest") evaluations than Americans, and in any case, European promotion systems are different. This is another reason for needing letters from top institutions; a supportive letter from a significantly lower-ranked school will likely be viewed with suspicion, because the writer "doesn't understand *our* standards".
Multidisciplinary research makes this much more difficult. The strategy I would recommend (and have applied myself) is to find referees that cover most of the different disciplines of the candidate's research. To pick a random example, a candidate studying molecular simulations might request letters from other molecular simulators, from other computational scientists, and from polymer chemists. This may require a higher than usual number of letters.
An additional complication at most US universities is that a majority of the referees must be chosen by the candidate's department, *without* the candidate's knowledge or direct input.
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Tags: job-search
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thread-1968 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1968 | How to prepare for the French language exam as part of PhD program? | 2012-06-04T13:27:06.023 | # Question
Title: How to prepare for the French language exam as part of PhD program?
I am about to take the French language exam as part of the requirements for the PhD program at my university. The exam will consist of having to translate (with the help of a dictionary) a subset of a mathematics paper written in French. As an Indian international student in the US, I speak a number of languages, but I've grown up knowing them (i.e. never went through the process of having to learn it) and none of them (except perhaps English) give me any insight into the French language, which makes me nervous!
I would appreciate any tips as to how one might prepare for this exam, and materials that might be handy. For example:
> 1. Did you have to take a language exam? How did you prepare for it?
> 2. Has knowing said language helped you out in your mathematical career?
> 3. Do there exist collections of mathematics papers in French that one can practice on?
Thanks you in advance for your answers!
# Answer
1. Yes. I took both German and French. I was already fairly comfortable with French from having studied it in high school and in university, so I'll write about German instead. I prepared for my German language exam by going on to the GDZ server (a program to retroactively digitise documents, including a lot of classical mathematics papers) and downloading some papers in mathematical analysis (my field, sort of) from around the 1950s to 60s (when still a lot of the papers were published in German). I then went to the library and borrowed the copy of Hyman's German-English Mathematics Dictionary (for the nouns) and a copy of a normal German-English dictionary (for the verbs) and sat myself down and started translating word by word. After about a month I translated about 30 pages or so of math papers (and at the same time learned about uniform spaces), and proceeded to take my exam.
2. Not much. I have absolutely no conversational German, and only very rarely do I have to look something up in German that I cannot find a write-up in another language. (So far twice only, one a slightly obscure result in algebraic lattices that the only reference I could find is to a paper in the 30s.) (French on the other hand has been useful; mostly because the abovementioned "write-up in another language" often turned out to be in French.) Given how much I've found French to be useful for me, I'm sure that if I had actually properly learned the language, German would be just about as useful. Conversely, if you don't really learn the foreign language, you will probably be able to get by through other means in this day and age.
3. The canonical place to find French papers to read is NUMDAM. Of course, for practice, you can also check out Bourbaki from the library; it may be slightly less intimidating to start working first on the language by reading something whose mathematics at least you are familiar with.
> 18 votes
# Answer
I think the main purpose of learning another language in the PhD program is to be able to explain your research in that language if necessary. At my former institution, the language exam covered reading and writing about mathematics in french or russian. It would be best to investigate your institution's policy about the exam and their requirements for the PhD degree. That will determine what and how you need to study for that exam.
While I've never had to write a technical paper in another language, knowing these other languages has certainly increased my ability to network with experts from around the world. That's the true value of learning languages: being able to connect with others on another level.
> 1 votes
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Tags: phd, graduate-school, language-exams
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thread-1966 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1966 | How much information should I divulge about on-going unpublished research at a conference? | 2012-06-10T19:22:19.133 | # Question
Title: How much information should I divulge about on-going unpublished research at a conference?
I'm developing a paper right now based upon some of my preliminary results, and I'm attending several conferences to present and get some feedback on my results from other experts in my field. A thought occurred to me that because my work is yet to be published, I there is a potential for others to steal my idea and publish before I get a chance.
I'm probably over-thinking this, and there is little chance of it actually happening. But I'm curious how frequently this happens in scientific domains. Do people go to conferences to steal ideas? If it does happen, how can I best prevent it from happening? Obviously, I want to share my ideas with the world, but I don't want to lose a chance to take an idea into fruition. What should/shouldn't I share about my research before it is published? Should I simply wait until my paper is accepted before I go on the conference circuit?
**Update:**
My field is computational science (not to be confused with computer science).
# Answer
> 8 votes
As some comments note, answers will vary dramatically by field, but it seems better to have a bunch of answers for different fields to one question, instead of having people ask the same question a dozen times for different fields.
For math, if you're talking about a completed, submitted paper that hasn't been published yet (say, because it's still being refereed), you should feel free to talk about it; the submission date proves your claim on the result, so it can't really be stolen at this stage. (Also, you already put it on the arXiv, so it's already public, right?)
Suppose you're still writing the paper, but the results are completely solid. There are good reasons to tell people about the result: you may be want to discuss ideas for how to build on your paper, you may want to give people a head's up that the theorem is coming---say, so they can use it to prove things themselves, and you may want to establish a partial claim on the result in case someone else is doing the same thing. There are also good reasons not to tell people: even though you're really awfully sure the result is solid, there might still be mistakes; routinely announcing results well in advance of the paper can negatively affect your reputation; someone could use your ideas to write their own paper faster. (There's an interesting phenomenon where once people know a theorem is true, it becomes easier to solve; sometimes a problem is open for a long time, and then abruptly solved multiple times in a short period.)
Taking these together, I'd advise not to announce a result until the paper's finished unless there's a strong reason to do so. This is particularly true early in your career, when it's more likely that you'll mistakenly believe a proof was really-definitely-totally finished. (I was given this advice when I was in grad school, and while I haven't followed it 100% of the time, I've never regretted following it.)
# Answer
> 11 votes
This will really, really depend on the field you're coming from - or even the sub-field. Take two examples:
* Mathematical epidemiology: If I present a paper with a nice infectious disease model, with the equations, the parameter values, and some numerical results, but I haven't tackled anything analytical yet, you could very well - if you could get all that down - beat me to publication.
* Observational epidemiology: I could tell you everything about my study but, without access to the raw data, you'd have to go find your own multi-year hospital acquired infection cohort to study. Good luck with that. And if you *still* beat me to the punch? Well, I probably deserve that.
Generally speaking, for in-progress stuff, I present enough for people to know what I'm doing, comment on it, etc., but not enough to fully replicate the experiment without coming to me for more information. For example, some folks I'm working with struggled with whether or not to present a theoretical result without its implementation done yet, because someone *could* scoop us with the implementation. We decided for the audience I was presenting to, that was...unlikely. For another audience? They'd get the theory in broad strokes, but without enough information that the theory alone is enough of a springboard to run with the paper.
# Answer
> 6 votes
I say give all the details and don't hold anything back. Most researchers do not want to enter a first to publish race from that far back. People tend to work on similar topics so getting scooped is bound to happen. This doesn't mean your ideas were "stolen". I think you are less likely to get scooped if you let people know everything you have done and where you are going. This lets people get out of your way or approach you about collaboration.
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Tags: conference, intellectual-property
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thread-1975 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1975 | My adviser threatens to kick me out if I am not to be a full time student | 2012-06-11T04:21:59.420 | # Question
Title: My adviser threatens to kick me out if I am not to be a full time student
Background: I have been in the Phd Program since fall 2010, I have made great academic progress (two papers published in journals). From the 4th semester (spring, 2012), I have started working in a company and still a part time student in school. Till now, I am still keeping doing research and publish another paper and one conference paper. As I have finished all coursework requirement (72 semester hours, I transfer some credits from MS), I plan to work in the company and be a part time student to finish the degree.
From last month, my adviser kept asked what's my plan. I told him I will make my decision in mid-July as I can know my H1b working visa is approved or not. He send me another email ( I post here for information). My impression is he is threatening me...
Any suggestion? Again, it's difficult to look for a job for international students in such economics. I hope I can work and study as a part time student to finish the degree.
# Answer
It is completely inappropriate for an advisor to send an email like that. The email makes it clear that this is an advisor that you should steer clear of. At a minimum a change in advisor is required. I would also approach the department head about the email. Faculty need to know that they need to behave better.
> 15 votes
# Answer
**Don't walk. Run.**
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
> 10 votes
# Answer
First of all, I think OP's situation is not that specific. Many international students in US are facing the same. Just that his is very extreme - his advisor wants to kick him out. In that regard, I agree with JeffE's comment. OP's advisor is not friendly at all, he probably needs to run.
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Now, to answer the question. It all depends on how much you want to be an academic.
To continue what you're doing right now, I think you hurt your current and future academic career. Your industry job is demanding, particularly since you need your employer to sponsor your H1B visa. You have to work very hard. You can't devote yourself to your research unless your job is directly related to your dissertation. You are still publishing papers. I believe you can even publish more and better papers if you do research full time.
If you quit your current job, the H1B will be gone. But, you can concentrate on your research. You might become a great academic.
On the other hand, if you continue your industry job, you will get H1B visa and everything to make your American dream come true. But, how about your dream to be a great academic? Didn't you want to be a scholar when you went to US to study?
It's June now. Too late to change school. I would talk to the advisor if I were you. Explain to him your situation. Maybe it's just misunderstanding between you and him. He may not know what you really want and need. If it doesn't work, change the advisor. If you can't do that either, you'll have to make a tough choice.
> 7 votes
# Answer
This is a fairly common experience at my university given the large volumes of EE and CS PhD students who take a "leave of absence" and slack off on their PhD research to do trivial things like starting Google and Yahoo. Here is what I've learned from their experiences:
* Your University may offer you some protection while your H1B visa gets worked out. Typically, students can take a 1 year deferment, stay on status as a student, work for their company, and wait for their visa status to change.
* Take the leave of absence. The "part-time" status is a lose-lose scenario for you, your advisor, and your company. You're wasting your time by being inefficient, your advisor is probably still paying for all of you despite your "part-time" status, and your company isn't getting your full mental investment.
* For EE and CS PhD students, their goal was to get a US-based job and with it, legal status. For the majority of them, the PhD wouldn't add much since they would essentially be doing the exact same work. However, if you're in an industry where that isn't the case, maybe I would be a bit more concerned about giving up the PhD.
* That being said, you have a job and it sounds like the company wants to keep you if they are talking about the H1B process with you.
* Finally, you're a 2nd year grad student. You have a long long way to go if you want that PhD and it just so happens that you have an advisor in the way.
> 6 votes
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thread-1994 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1994 | Can I apply for a post-doc in global studies in North America? | 2012-06-12T23:45:49.980 | # Question
Title: Can I apply for a post-doc in global studies in North America?
I am doing my doctorate in global studies in Germany, and would like to apply for a post-doc position in North America, especially in Canada. The topic I work on has considerable policy relevance, and I see that some North American professors are working in those areas. I am a non-EU citizen. Is there any chance that I will be accepted?
# Answer
I can only speak for the US.
Yes! US universities routinely hire postdocs from all over the world. A few positions may be reserved for US citizens, due to funding requirements, but those will be indicated in the postings.
As one way to check, go to the web site of a department that interests you, find the web pages of some of the postdocs, and read their CVs.
> 4 votes
# Answer
It's fairly routine to hire foreign postdocs in the US. The main issue to worry about is the work visa - the faculty mentor might not have much of an idea so if you did get an offer you'd have to discuss it with them and probably some admin folks at the university.
> 4 votes
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thread-1998 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1998 | Different CV for university position and research industry position? | 2012-06-13T08:02:08.110 | # Question
Title: Different CV for university position and research industry position?
Up to now, I've only applied to "public" academic positions (universities or public research centers). I have now an academic CV, that is roughly 7 pages long (2 pages of "classic" CV, and 5 pages of research experience + list of publications).
I would be interested in applying for research positions in industry. I know that if I wanted to apply for a regular position (for instance, as a software developer), only my classic CV is enough (and the long one might actually be counter-productive). However, the kind of position I'm interested in is very similar to a public research position, i.e. people there publish, applying for public funding, might even co-supervise PhD students.
So, what kind of CV should I send for such a position? Should I consider the application process as the standard public one, or rather as the standard industry one?
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In case it's relevant, it's in Computer Science, and I'm thinking of positions such as those available at Microsoft Research, IBM Research, etc.
# Answer
> 13 votes
As a general rule of thumb, if the position you are applying for (1) has the term "researcher" or something similar in the position title and (2) requires a PhD (or research masters), definitely send the academic one. The fact they're looking for PhDs means they're interested in research experience, and your academic CV will highlight that much better than your industry one.
That being said, it is an industry position, so I would do my best to keep the resume two pages, and offer to send the full CV on request. Definitely include "Selected Publications" and "Selected Oral Presentations" sections, but keep it short.
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One extra idea for consideration: I sent my (academic) resume to an industry position, and they sent it back asking for a short (one to three) sentence blurb describing each of my projects (at the time, my resume included work as a research assistant, graduate student, and post-doc). I ended up using that format for all the jobs I applied to, since most people have no idea what "Temporal Dynamics of the Cortico-limbic System" actually means. It's a good way to help them actually get a feel for what you accomplished and what your skills are.
# Answer
> 9 votes
I didn't really change my CV for industrial research positions versus academia, but I did tailor my research statement a fair bit. As I recently explained to a student, industrial research labs are often more interested in your skills, and academic positions are more interested in your contributions to an area (*all these statements are "on average"*). That might indicate ways to modify your CV ? maybe have a blurb highlighting your interests/skills up front for the industry position ?
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Tags: application, cv, industry
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thread-2008 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2008 | How does the US National Science Foundation (NSF) research funding system work? | 2012-06-14T08:08:48.230 | # Question
Title: How does the US National Science Foundation (NSF) research funding system work?
Sometimes here on Academia I read messages referring to American National Science Foundation (NSF), "the USA agency that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering" (page on Wikipedia).
In this question and this question we discussed about NSF postdoctoral funding possibilities. Since I am in the European Union, I don't know very much about NSF.
* **How does NSF funding system work?**
* How does NSF postdoctoral funding program work? Does it fund only American citizens or anyone that wants to work as a researcher in the US?
Many thanks!
# Answer
> 19 votes
I'm most familiar with the NSF mathematical sciences research postdoctoral fellowship, which I was lucky enough to get 15 years ago. The application process is described in detail in NSF's formal solicitation, but here's an executive summary:
* Unlike most other NSF funding, this program is **limited to US citizens and permanent residents**. (NSF's regular research grants formally fund the *institution*, not the PI, so non-American PIs can win grants; on the other hand, NSF's graduate research fellowship has a similar citizenship requirement.) There was a parallel program for international postdocs for several years, but it seems to have been retired.
* Applicants must be within two years of their PhD and must have no previous US federal grant funding. In practice, this means each applicant can apply at most three times: once just before graduating and twice after. Applicants do not need an academic affiliation when they apply. (Again, the fellowship funds the applicant, not the institution.)
* The application itself requires a bunch of NSF boilerplate, but the main content is an abbreviated (3-5 page) research proposal, a one-page project summary, and four recommendation letters (submitted separately by their authors). As usual for NSF, the proposal *absolutely must* contain a paragraph explicitly labeled **Intellectual Merit** and another paragraph explicitly labeled **Broader Impact**.
* Applicants also need an agreement from a sponsoring scientist/mentor/advisor. The sponsor separately submits a statement describing their proposed mentorship role, research opportunities available in the hosting department, and promised infrastructure (office, computer support, libraries, specialized equipment, etc.). The sponsor cannot also write a recommendation letter.
* All applications are submitted electronically through NSF's FastLane web site. Considering how much FastLane has to handle (basically everything NSF does), it works *amazingly* well.
* The applications are reviewed by a panel of mathematical scientists (or more likely by multiple panels, given the number of applications). Panelists are invited by the program director, but in my experience, NSF program directors are happy to hear from volunteers!
* Each panel recommends and ranks a subset of the applications they review. Standard NSF practice is to fund all applications *strongly* recommended by the panel, and *some* applications with weaker recommendations, depending on available funds and other criteria. (NSF is deliberately vague about these other criteria, but gender, ethnic, and geographic diversity are likely guesses.)
* Applications for fellowships to begin in Fall 2013 are due **October 19, 2012**. Yes, this is *really* early. Winners are usually notified in February and announced on the NSF web site soon thereafter. All applicants receive a summary of their panel reviews.
* The total award amount is $150,000, distributed over a two-year period. Most of that is salary, but about $30,000 is set aside for stuff like equipment, travel, and benefits from the host institution. Frustratingly, fellows are neither employees of the hosting institution, employees of NSF, nor formally self-employed; the US Treasury Department simply injects $5000 into your bank account every month. So good luck with taxes!
* Fellows need to submit progress reports once per year and a final report when the fellowship ends.
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Tags: phd, job, postdocs, career-path, nsf
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thread-2009 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2009 | Publication sponsorship for research conducted elsewhere | 2012-06-14T10:33:54.220 | # Question
Title: Publication sponsorship for research conducted elsewhere
Do universities sponsor a student's conference travel and publication costs if the research on the paper has been done elsewhere? For example, a student may have published a paper during a master's at university 1 and may currently be pursuing PhD at university 2. Similarly will the second university bear the cost of the journal publication? Are there any caveats involved (eg., indication of university's name in the paper, related department, etc)?
On the other hand, will the first university sponsor one of its alumni for the travel? (This looks unlikely to me.)
# Answer
> 4 votes
In contrast with Anonymous Mathematician, in the cases I'm familiar with (American CS departments), travel funding is provided primarily by *advisors* rather than by departments. And then it's really up to the individual advisor.
But as a rule of thumb (or as evidence of my confirmation bias), I suspect most CS advisors would be happy to pay for at least one conference trip stemming from earlier work, if only to advertise their own insight in recruiting the student!
Journal "publication costs" are almost completely unheard of in computer science, even in open-access journals, so the answer there is trivially yes.
# Answer
> 4 votes
At least in the cases I'm familiar with (math departments at US research universities), funding for travel is more likely to come from an individual department than from a university-wide source, so this would be a matter of department policy. That's a little less true for publication costs, because some universities have started funds to pay for gold open access, but everyone is setting it up a little differently so I don't think one can announce a general rule.
At the department level, this really varies. One department I used to be at provided a certain amount of travel funding to each student, to be used however they wanted (as long as it was for academic purposes, of course). I think that's a little unusual, and many departments don't make a decision until the student applies for funds.
If you are in a field in which these costs are an important part of publication (not pure mathematics, for example), then this is probably the wrong question. In such fields, the funding usually comes from the advisor's grants, rather than the university.
# Answer
> 4 votes
In contrast to *both* Anonymous Mathematician and JeffE, I've had a fair amount of conference funding come from a University-wide funding source, and never had anything come directly from my department.
In that case, there wasn't actually a restriction on whether or not the research was done at the university, merely that I was a student there, and that I was presenting research (rather than merely presenting at the conference). As you have a very limited number of times you can apply for travel funding using that mechanism, and it seems the frequency of conference travel increases as you approach graduation (and understandably have more to present), I suspect they're content if a few "slip through".
In terms of @JeffE's statement that a lot of funding comes from *advisors*, I agree, and then it really is up to the individual advisor. Many I know would be happy to fund a student regardless of where the research originated (especially if the student hasn't had a chance to produce research from their lab yet) for the experience, networking, education, etc.
Publication costs are a somewhat trickier question - honestly, I've never *had* to publish in something with publication costs, so if I were the new supervisor, I'd argue it was an avoidable expense. If its not, then I'd probably say it's the originating university's problem - their faculty are presumably the ones who would be benefitting from the research hitting the press.
Regardless, I'd at least expect your affiliation to be at your new university.
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Tags: university, conference, funding, travel
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thread-2017 | https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2017 | Should writers give credit to reference librarians? | 2012-06-15T01:07:11.297 | # Question
Title: Should writers give credit to reference librarians?
The reference librarians at my school are often very helpful. If I tell them my topic, they will help me find many resources which I might not have otherwise found and generally tend to save me a lot of time. Is it common practice to credit them in someway, especially when publishing a paper? If so, what is the common format?
# Answer
Yes, the acknowledgements section of your paper is an appropriate place to thank anyone who provided valuable assistance. Depending on the circumstances, you could phrase it pretty generally ("I thank the reference librarians at University X for their assistance in conducting a literature search"), you could thank specific people, or you could even identify particular contributions ("I am grateful to Y for bringing the literature on Z to my attention").
> 23 votes
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Tags: publications, etiquette, thesis, acknowledgement
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